hand into a fairly impressive weapon. “Third, don’t fucking walk on that street at night by yourself. Get a fucking ride. Someone where you work has to have a car. Fourth, look where you are going, for Christ’s sake. Get your head up like you know where you are going and what you are doing even if you don’t. Fifth and final—let me know if you need anything. I’m right above you in apartment 242.”
With that, I turned and left her, mouth agape, in front of her door while I headed for the stairs at the back of the hall. I could feel her eyes on me, and found myself compelled to look back one more time and grin at her before I headed up the stairs. She pursed her lips, but they quickly spread into a smile just before she entered her apartment and closed the door.
I was never one to get attached, but I had the feeling I’d be seeing her again.
Chapter 3—Make the Move
My apartment was way too quiet, and I had too much pent-up energy to even consider going to sleep. I took a quick shower and pulled on a pair of sweats, commando style. I was just about out of clean underwear, and I fucking hated doing laundry. The refrigerator called to me, but when I opened it, I was not particularly impressed with the contents. The only thing that interested me mildly was the six-pack of Guinness, but I wasn’t in the mood for beer.
My hands began to shake a little. It was probably the pent-up energy from the brawl. I wished it were easier for me to calm down after such things, but any change in my routine usually ended up being a little dangerous for me. Though it has been years, the desire to slip up never really goes away.
I shut the door to the fridge and looked over the small, four-room apartment. Every room could be seen if you stood between the kitchen and the living room and looked past the small opening to one side that led to the single bedroom and bathroom. It wasn’t pretty, but…
Well, but nothing. It was a dump. The whole building was. It did fit the unique qualifier of being a place I could afford though, which wasn’t much. Most of the apartments in the building were advertised as furnished, which was an overstatement. I had gotten a deal on mine because the previous dude took most of the furniture with him the night he disappeared. I had to supply my own, but the rent was lowered to make up for it.
Most of the living room furniture came from Freecycle.
The mattress had been new when I got it, at least. I’d splurged a bit on it when I moved in, deciding I could make up for its cost by eliminating the box spring and a frame, so it’s not actually a proper bed. It just sat on the floor of my bedroom next to a little nightstand made of cinderblocks and plywood.
Still, it was better than squatting in an abandoned building or living out of car. I tried to remind myself of that on a regular basis.
I walked over to the gym bag I had discarded by the door and pulled out my cigarettes. Clambering over dirty laundry on the bedroom floor, I hauled the window open and threw my leg over the sill. Right outside was a ledge of decent width, so I could make my way over to the fire escape.
On one side of the three-foot by six-foot platform was a miniscule woman of completely indeterminate age. If you just looked at her size, you’d think she was about twelve, but her eyes were a whole different story. They were deep and dark and gave the impression they’d seen a lot of deep and dark shit. If you judged her by her eyes, you’d think she was a hundred. If someone asked me to really guess, I’d probably say she was in her thirties, but that was still a guess. Her hair was a mess of spiky black tangles, and I kind of doubted she owned a hairbrush.
“What’s shaking, Krazy Katie?” I wasn’t expecting a response and didn’t get one as I dropped down on my ass next to her and lit my cigarette.
Krazy Katie lived in the apartment next to mine and had been in the neighborhood longer than the nine years I had been here. She didn’t really say much of anything, let alone talk about herself, so I didn’t really know much about her. The assumption was she was on disability for whatever the hell was wrong with her head, living here in the half of the apartments dedicated to Section 8 housing. She spent almost all her days and nights sitting on the fire escape and chain smoking.
Every once in a while, she’d start yelling predictions about the future at people on the street, and the police would get called. That always stirred shit up and had even been pretty damn entertaining more than once. Most people just ignored her, but I sometimes kind of liked talking to someone who almost never said anything back, and she didn’t seem to mind me sitting out here with her.
I never knew what she would be doing when I crawled out the window. Sometimes she’d make a lot of strange sounds. Sometimes she’d spend the afternoon pushing her finger into each and every hole in the fire escape grate, one-by-one. Sometimes she’d take off her clothes and just lie up there in her underwear until the landlord or police made her put her clothes back on. Sometimes she ditched the underwear, too.
Tonight she was stacking cigarette butts into a little pyramid of sorts. She had done this before, and at least her timing was a little better. When she did it during the day and a door in the building slammed shut, they would all tip over, and she’d go ballistic.
“Pretty,” Krazy Katie said. She took a long draw on her cigarette, which brought it all the way to the filter. I cringed a little at the smell, knowing what that tasted like, and shook my head.
“You saying I’m pretty?” I asked with a quiet chuckle. “I didn’t know you were into guys.”
She didn’t respond, and I didn’t try to get her to do so. I had been around her enough to know that random shit just came out of her mouth for no particular reason. I used to try to figure out what she was talking about, but I never got very far, so I didn’t try any more. She could have been talking about me, the stack of butts, or the crabgrass growing in the gutter, for all I knew.
I leaned back against the brick wall behind me, then hissed and pulled away. It was damn cold. I decided to sit up with my knees against my chest instead. I took a long draw on the smoke and watched the ash fall between the holes in the grate below me. Krazy Katie lit up another cigarette off a little butane lighter she kept shoved in the center of her bra and actually looked at me for a minute. As soon as I looked at her, she looked away. She never looked me in the eye.
I shivered a little, wondering if it would be warmer inside than it was outside. I concluded it was probably about the same. At least inside, there was a blanket on the bed and no wind. I sucked down my cigarette and started to climb back inside.
“Don’t stay out here all night, Krazy Katie,” I said on my way in. “And eat something, for Christ’s sake. I’m afraid you’ll fall right through the grate.”
She didn’t respond or even look at me.
Rubbing at my eyes, I clambered onto the queen-sized mattress and dropped onto my back. I sighed heavily and pulled the sheet and blanket up to my chest before I rolled over to my side. It was too cold to sleep comfortably but too warm to actually crank up the heat. I had already had the electricity turned off once when I couldn’t cover the bill. Now I tried to economize as much as possible on heat and lights.
Physically I was exhausted, but my mind wouldn’t turn off. Images of the girl in the street with her ridiculous purse-slash-Bag of Holding ran through my mind.
Tria.
She just didn’t seem to be the kind of person who would be living in this area, working at that nasty bar and grill, and having a bunch of guys ogle her for tips. And studying economics? Really? Who does that, other than the Northsiders and their high society business and bullshit majors? People didn’t study economics because it sounded interesting—they did that because Daddy told them that’s what they needed in order to take over as CEO.
“Just your yearly reminder that you don't have to live like this.”