Chapter 7: Lie

...Roger pays a visit...

When she heard the voice through the intercom, Sherry thought someone had rung the wrong apartment. But when he said “Roger” she knew he had it right and instantly felt like someone found out at last. Alarmed, Riley asked if he should go to his room.

“No. I’ll bring him up.”

Riley and Lola waited as she went downstairs to admit him. When she saw him through the beveled glass in the lobby door, she thought how strange he looked, like a puzzle piece from the wrong box.

She didn’t have to ask. Her parents were curious, too, and kept informed through the family friend who got her the job. They knew she went to work and lived nearby. But it irked her that he didn’t tell her he was coming. Not that it was a big deal. Not anymore.

She pulled open the accordion gate to the elevator and, as they stood cramped in the small space, scrutinized her boyfriend. He had a crew cut and sunburned face and wore jeans and a long sleeved shirt buttoned to the neck. He looked tired. She was glad she’d changed after work into jeans and a gray sweatshirt. She pulled her blonde hair into a ponytail.

She led through the apartment door and into the front room. Riley and Lola turned toward them and she made the introductions. Riley stood, extending his hand.

“Riley?”

“Mara is my other housemate.”

Roger crossed his arms and Riley took back his hand.

He growled, “Is Mara a man, too?”

Lola laughed and covered it in a fit of coughs.

“She’ll be home soon.”

“Do your parents know?”

Sherry shook her head.

He didn’t think so. Ever since Sherry announced she was going away, a shadow stalked him. The whole thing struck him as odd. People went away all the time: to college, new jobs, the military, and on yearlong missions from church. But her trip wasn’t any of those. He believed when something doesn’t fit, you pound on it till it does. But no matter how he shaped it, it didn’t make sense.

He couldn’t persuade her from going, and her parents were all right with it. Though she called and e-mailed, he didn’t feel he was getting the full picture. And when she came back for her birthday, the changes surprised him and raised more questions. He wanted to see for himself, so he took a few days off work and drove to San Francisco.

He looked at Sherry, dropped his gaze into his hands and then scanned the ceiling. He looked at her again.

“You lied. It’s not like you.”

“I wasn’t completely honest.”

Riley flushed red, feeling like the punch line to a bad joke.

“Riley, I’m sorry.”

He stood and pointed at Roger. “You didn’t do anything. No matter what he thinks.”

Roger stood and thrust out his chest, hands at his hips. Sherry rose, too, and embraced the glowering man.

Lola, who’d been sitting on the edge of her seat, leaped up, grabbed Riley’s arm and followed him into the kitchen.

“They together?”

Sherry shook her head.

Just then Mara came into the apartment. Seeing Sherry embracing a man she didn’t know and Riley and Lola huddled together, she quickly assessed the situation. When Sherry introduced them, Mara brought her hand to his stone face and gave his cheek a playful slap.

“Lighten up.”

The apartment seemed all of a sudden like a very small space. Wanting to be alone with Roger, she took his hand and led him to her room.

It looked much like it did after she first moved in: single bed, dresser, chair and nightstand. She avoided collecting things, aware the year would pass quickly. One addition, though, was a picture of the silver moon shining through the gray towers of the Bay Bridge. She’d clipped it from the newspaper and taped it to the mirror on her dresser above the framed pictures of her parents and Roger.

She guided him to her bed and overcame the resistance of his arm pulling away. She sat him down, undid the laces on his running shoes and took them off. Then, she pushed him back so he lay on top of the covers, face toward the ceiling, and took her place beside him.

In the soft glow of lamplight, their breathing leveled off and wordless thoughts of past, present and future filled the room. He brought his arm across her shoulder and she nestled her head on his chest and, sharing a mutual heat, they fell asleep.

She woke in the middle of the night and observed the sleeping figure beside her. She wondered what he was dreaming and was glad she knew his name. When he stirred and opened his eyes, he saw her smiling.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

*

Roger wanted to get an early start because he had to get back to work, so Sherry was making him breakfast in the early morning privacy she’d come to expect. She imagined it as a gift she could share and was happy. But it also recalled her mother making meals for the family, and she was sad. She was hundreds of miles away, and Roger would drive away and be far, too. She teetered between the two emotions as she scrambled eggs and Roger looked outside the window.

Having private space was important, but being able to share it, she realized, was important, too. She had her privacy, in a modest way, in her room. But until Roger’s visit, she’d never shared it. The thought made her feel empty.

At home the lines of what was hers were never as distinct as in the apartment. Her parents restrained themselves from entering without her permission, but they still had the right. Maybe that chaffed unconsciously and compelled her on her journey. But now she saw it differently.

She served the meal and Roger took his place at the table, his hair lopsided from the pillow and his eyes still sleepy.

“Do you want to shower?”

“I’ll wash my face.”

He didn’t want to get too comfortable. Though encouraged by Sherry’s reception, he considered himself in foreign territory and didn’t like the idea she liked it there.

He could never get used to living in a box with cars racing on the street below. It was like living on a freeway. He wanted a green lawn and trees outside, not another building.

Things were like she said, except Riley being a man. Mara was bold. When she patted his face like she did, it fit her. She never did talk much about Riley; now he knew why. It bothered him and should bother him still, he told himself. But he could tell there was nothing between them and he wouldn’t make a big deal about it, unless he had to.

Everything he saw --- including her soft brown eyes across the table --- her behavior, her words and the time they spent together the night before, suggested she was true about coming home. He wanted her to say it, but didn’t want to plead.

After they ate and he washed his face, she walked him to his car that was parked a few blocks away on a steep hill. When they arrived, they faced each other.

“You like living in an apartment?”

“Not like in a house.”

She invited him to visit again and then they kissed, each attaching a greater significance to it than might occur to any passerby.



The persons and events in this story are fictitious and do not represent any living person or real event.

The next chapter will be posted October 3.

Chapter 6: Asylum

...Mara crosses a line...

When she woke in the middle of the night, she thought she’d been dreaming. When she realized what it was, she became annoyed. When it persisted, she got mad.

She wasn’t some newcomer frightened by frisky goings-on. No, not Mara Ware. She knew what had to be done. Still, she didn’t feel like getting out of bed. She lay listening, hoping it would stop; not for lack of conviction but because she was so goddamn tired. When it continued, she cursed under her breath, pushed off the covers and hit the floor running.

Clad in t-shirt and panties and with eyes half closed, she passed through the hallway into the kitchen in search of the broom. It lay against the wall in the corner where her subconscious mind led. She wrapped fingers around the tool nearly as tall as she and escorted it back to her room

Leaping onto the bed and timing her jabs with the upward spring of the mattress, she thrust the fully extended handle three times against the ceiling, like a Jason attacking the underbelly of a dragon. She was putting arms to rest when thwack-thwack-thwack sounded in reply. She thrust the handle angrily but, the mattress having settled, managed only a feeble scratch.

Just then, Riley popped his head inside the door. “What’s wrong?”
Letting go the broom, it clattered against the closing door. “Get the hell out of here!”

She overslept that morning and would have missed class if Riley hadn’t woken her. As she drove them across town, she explained.

They knew Sherry hadn’t complained lately, looked rested and hadn’t been, from what they could tell, sleeping in the front room. The apartment above had the same floor plan, but they didn’t know who lived there. Did they change rooms, passing the problem to Mara, or did new tenants move in? The only sure thing was, despite being in the building for more than a year, they didn’t know much about their neighbors.

They had brief encounters at the mailbox: older men asking friendly but personal questions; young men, zoned out on music or drugs, eyes open but emotions closed to the world; and women, mostly older, who worked in offices downtown. They hadn’t met any students like themselves and were content to maintain their privacy and not get involved, except to stare at anybody scooting in behind them through the secure lobby door.

But Old Joe, the on-site manager, knew everyone. He lived on the ground floor, did routine maintenance and showed apartments. They could ask him.

Weeks went by without any disturbance and Mara didn’t think more of it. But early one morning, it happened again and she went through the cycle of awareness, annoyance and getting mad and she realized she was, as if watching herself in a mirror. Again, she knew what had to be done, again got the broom and again delivered three resounding thuds to the ceiling. This time there was no reply.

Later that day, she wrote a note: “Be considerate of your neighbors. Keep the noise down in the early morning hours!” She didn’t sign it. They disturbed everyone, she reasoned, and should consider the note from everybody they bothered. But, more, she worried about someone crazy coming to the door. She put the note in an envelope and wedged it in the crack between door and frame upstairs.

She saw Old Joe outside a few days later, pushing a heavy bristled broom across the pavement: Shhh, shhh, shhh. Trim, with gray hair and thick glasses, he stopped to listen, his foot propped on the broom, hands atop the handle, looking like a farmer talking crops.

He responded, “walls are thin… people complain… no, not about her… that’s how it is…” He said to let him know if she’s still having problems but he couldn’t do much unless she were totally out of line. Her name was Trish; worked a day job in an office, a night one as a waitress and was half way through a one-year lease.

Confrontation was an option, but it didn’t make sense to go up on any random day to complain. She could pretend ignorance. It’d been a few days so maybe, just maybe, the note did the job.

When it happened again, her anger, pursuing a well-worn path, exploded into action. She leaped out of bed, wrapped a light coat around her and stormed upstairs. There she pounded the door, shouting, “Quit making noise!”

She bruised the wood door and the white haze stillness under soft lights in early morning hours. When her ears began to ring, she knew she crossed a line to become someone with something to work out, someone people hoped would move along, like a muttering bag lady burdened with loads that only grew.

Looking down the hallway, she thought it her private asylum, sterile, empty, her voice the only sound. Somewhere behind peepholes people watched --- unless they didn’t. Wanting a response but unhappy at what it’d be, she slunk away.

She returned to a dark room and fell asleep. When she woke later that morning, she wasn’t sure; it might have been a dream.



The persons and events in this story are fictitious and do not represent any living person or real event.

The next chapter will be posted September 19.