15. MAX
MAX
Lucas left for work the next morning with hardly a word to me. We’d eaten breakfast in silence, smiling awkwardly at each other. I’d made things weird. I knew I had. Money always made things weird.
Lucas had definitely reacted weirdly to my asking him for the loan. At first, I’d thought he was going to say no; he’d hesitated like he was trying to find the best way to let me down. But then he’d said yes, and he’d even offered to help me find an apartment.
Clearly, he wasn’t interested in me staying with him any longer than I had to, and I could hardly blame him.
I’d been dragging him down and keeping him busy for close to two months at this point; the guy hardly even got to go out anymore unless it was for work because he was so busy caring for me.
I didn’t blame him in the slightest for wanting his freedom, but it still stung.
I’d half been hoping that when I asked for the loan, he’d immediately tell me that it wasn’t necessary because he wanted me to stay with him.
Reality’s a bitch, Max, said a nasty little voice in my head.
Face it, why would he want you? The voice was right.
I was a homeless, barely employed former stripper who couldn’t even walk unassisted.
I had nothing to offer someone like Lucas, who had a life that was happy and under control.
The best thing I could do for him would be to get out quickly.
Maybe when he didn’t have to devote so much of his life to caring for me, he’d even be able to find a boyfriend, someone who could support him instead of mooch off him.
A pain flashed across my chest at the thought of Lucas with some nameless, faceless boyfriend.
The man would be perfect, of course. He’d have a good job, lots of money, he’d be strong and able-bodied, and he’d be even-tempered and always treat Lucas like the precious thing he was.
All things I couldn’t give him. I should want that for him, I told myself.
If I really cared about Lucas, I should want the absolute best for him, and that was someone other than me.
So why did I still want him so badly? Groaning, I thumped my fist against the coffee table I was sitting in front of.
I needed to get out of here. I needed to get out of here and focus on something else fast, before I called Lucas and said something I couldn’t take back.
I felt like the walls were closing in on me, and I didn’t want to look completely insane when Lucas got home tonight.
I’d go out, I decided. I could live with the stares and the questions; the members of the limb loss group had assured me that I would—had to—get used to it, and if I was going to move out of the safe bubble of Lucas’s apartment, I would have to accept the fact that my new roommates were almost certainly going to have questions about what happened to me and what my limitations were.
So I’d do it. I’d take a stroll down the block to the coffee shop on the corner.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I pocketed my phone, transferred from the couch to my chair, and went out the front door, locking the apartment behind me with the key I’d hardly ever used since I could count on one hand the number of times I’d left the place without Lucas accompanying me.
The first person I encountered on the street was walking two little dogs; they sniffed curiously at my wheels while their owner tried not to look at me, managing mostly to look at me even more conspicuously than if she hadn’t made the effort at all.
I gritted my teeth and gave her a polite nod as I rolled past her.
By the time I made it to the coffee shop, my jaw was aching from the tension I was holding after passing rubbernecker after rubbernecker.
I pulled the door open, realized I wasn’t sure how to hold it for myself and go through at the same time, and cursed inwardly.
Finally, I pulled the door hard, flinging it back as far as it would go, and quickly seized my wheels to push myself in before it could close on me.
Mission accomplished, except now everyone in the coffee shop was staring at the man who’d just entered like he was in a rage.
I bit my lip and looked down at my lap, trying to find the courage to face the room.
After a few seconds, I gathered my tattered dignity and approached the counter.
“I’ll have a large mocha latte, please,” I told the barista.
“You got it,” he said brightly, and then looked me up and down. “You a vet?”
Fuck, I hated being asked that question. No one ever knew what to say when I told them I wasn’t. “Nope,” I managed to tell him neutrally. “Just had a car accident.”
“Bummer.” He gave me a nod and turned to the espresso machine to start making my drink. There, that hadn’t been so bad, had it? I asked myself. He’d asked a good faith question, I’d answered it calmly, and we’d both moved on. I could handle that.
I felt good about myself until I spun my chair to head over to the waiting area for my drink and found three women on a couch staring openly at me.
One offered me a weak smile when she noticed I’d caught them, but the other two just continued gawking.
Had they seriously never seen anyone in a wheelchair before?
For fuck’s sake! I directed a glare in their direction and then proceeded to ignore them.
Yes. I could handle this even when it was unpleasant.
I retrieved my drink from the curious barista, who thankfully asked no more questions, and made my way to the seating area.
The tables, armchairs, and couches were close together, and I wasn’t sure where to sit or how to negotiate my way to wherever I ended up.
I sat there clutching my coffee for a few seconds, and then a young guy stood and quietly moved a chair, clearing a path for me to reach that table and sit at it.
He didn’t say anything. Didn’t stare. Just moved the chair, gave me a nod, and sat back down at his own table and went back to his laptop.
I wanted to hug the guy, but I managed to resist the urge.
I tucked my drink between my legs and pushed myself over to the space he’d cleared a few tables from where he sat.
“Um, thanks,” I told the young guy, my voice coming out hoarse.
He looked up and smiled at me. “No problem.”
I waited for him to ask why I was in the chair, or if I had feeling in my legs, or whether I was a vet, but he did none of that, just returned to whatever he was working on.
Yeah, I definitely wanted to hug this guy.
Instead, I took a large sip of my coffee and pulled out my phone to do some apartment searching.
The faster I got out of Lucas’s place, the easier this would all be.
CraigsList didn’t have a search option for “accessible”, so I had to read each listing to see if it was mentioned and scan the pictures to see if I could make out any features that meant it definitely wasn’t accessible.
The fourth ad I looked at seemed like it could work, and before I could overthink it, I dialed the number it gave and put the phone to my ear.
“‘Lo?” said a male voice on the other end.
“Hi,” I said awkwardly, “I saw your ad for a roommate on CraigsList? Are you still looking?”
“Yep. You wanna come see the place? I’m home this afternoon.”
There was no way I could go over there this afternoon; Lucas was at work. “I just wanted to ask a few questions, actually,” I replied.
The guy snorted. “Suit yourself, but I’ve already had five people look at it today, so if you’re not serious…”
“I’m serious,” I said quickly. “But I have some...limitations...and I need to find out whether your apartment would work for me before I decide whether to come see it.”
“Um, sure?” He somehow managed to sound completely disinterested and salaciously curious at the same time. Kind of impressive, frankly.
“I’m currently in a wheelchair,” I began, “though soon I’ll be on crutches and then mostly a cane. But anyway, the wheelchair means that I need an accessible building—so it would need to be a first-floor apartment or else be in an elevator building, have enough room to maneuver my chair, and—”
“I’m gonna stop you right there,” the guy interrupted. “We’re on the third floor and there’s no elevator. Sorry.”
“Oh. Right. Ok. Thanks anyway.” Before I could say anything else, the guy had hung up on me. “Fucker,” I muttered darkly. He didn’t have to be rude about it!
Back to the drawing board. I pulled up CraigsList again and scrolled down in the search results.
That one wouldn’t work, it had a sunken living room; not this one, either—it said it was a walk-up; that one was a room barely big enough to fit a twin bed, so it definitely wasn’t going to give me room to move my chair.
The converted Victorian was definitely out; it had stairs leading up to the front door.
It made me miss the ease with which I’d once navigated the same sort of house when I lived in New Hampshire.
I found another prospect on page 3 of the search results and placed the call, only to find that the room had already been rented. Page 4 gave me another option. “Hello?” answered an elderly-sounding woman. “Meyers residence.”
I launched into my spiel about why I was calling and what I was looking for, ending with, “So I was wondering if you could tell me whether the room you’re renting meets those criteria?”
“Oh my, yes,” the woman said without even hesitating. “I broke my hip a few years ago and had to have the whole house made wheelchair-accessible so I could stay in it instead of moving in with my daughter. There’s a stair lift and everything—your room would be on the second floor.”
A shot of adrenaline went through me. This could work! “And the room is still available?”
“Absolutely,” she assured me. “It’s available immediately. Would you like to come visit and see it this afternoon?”
As quickly as the good feelings had hit me, they disappeared again.
It was available immediately. If this apartment worked, I could be moving in there within days and leaving Lucas behind.
What if he didn’t want to see me again once I was no longer dependent on him?
He had to be sick of me, after all. “Uh, that’d be great,” I told the woman, trying to muster up some enthusiasm.
“Except I can’t come today or tomorrow, but maybe Wednesday?
Though I’d understand if you rented it before then.
I know the market is competitive for renters.
” And my willingness to understand had nothing to do with wanting to stay with Lucas just a little longer. No, sir.
The woman seemed to consider that for a second. “What’s your name, sweetheart?”
What did that matter? It would be rude to refuse to say, though, especially if I was going to be living with this lady. “Max,” I offered.
“Nice to meet you, Max. I’m Evelyn. Frankly, I’d rather rent the room to someone who can make use of the handicap features; I might as well get some use out of them, for what I paid for the upgrades!
” She laughed. “I can hold on to the room until Wednesday if you’d like to see it then, but probably not much longer than that. ”
“That would be fantastic, Evelyn,” I told her. “What time would be good for my friend and me to come by?”
We agreed on a noon visit and exchanged pleasantries before hanging up. I immediately flipped to my text thread with Lucas. Hopefully, he wasn’t out on a call right now.
Me: Found an apartment prospect! It’s in Haight-Ashbury and it’s owned by a little old lady who did a handicap conversion a few years ago. Can we go by at noon on Wednesday?
Lucas: Wow, that fast? Didn’t expect that. Sure, noon on Wednesday is fine. Is that the only prospect you’ve got so far?
Me: So far.
Lucas: Well, just remember that I’m not in a rush to get rid of you. Don’t stress yourself silly over finding something ASAP.
Me: Ten-four, good buddy!
Ten-four? What the fuck even was I talking about? He probably thought I was an idiot, and I wasn’t sure I’d disagree with him.
I returned to my CraigsList searching and ended up finding another apartment that could work a few listings later, though no more after that.
I made an appointment with one of the prospective roommates to see the place at ten on Wednesday and texted Lucas to tell him.
He didn’t answer immediately, and I figured he’d been called out.
Finally, an hour later, when I was on my third coffee and starting to feel pretty jittery, I got a text alert.
Lucas: Wow, two in one day! I’ll keep my fingers crossed.
So much for him not wanting me to rush out of his apartment. I knew he’d just been being nice. I grimaced as I took another sip of coffee and replied to his text.
Me: Toes crossed too!
Yep, I was an idiot.