Chapter Twenty-Four
Sometimes, when bad things happen, it’s tempting to look for signs and patterns to try to make sense of what happened, to assign some deeper meaning to what normally amounts to people just being shitty.
But in my case, there weren’t just signs, there were giant red flags, flashing lights, and alarm bells, all of which I willfully ignored, because I made the catastrophic mistake of falling in love.
But I had questions! Did he want beer or bubbly to celebrate our last night in the apartment? Did he get the damage deposit back from the landlord? And what should I get for car snacks?
In hindsight, maybe not the most pressing questions, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is that he didn’t answer my multiple calls or texts, and even as my annoyance turned to worry, I didn’t once think he could have possibly done what he did.
I opened the door a crack. “Dyl?” I called into the space between the door and its frame. “You there?”
I waited. Nothing.
I reached my hand in and flicked the light switch. I squinted against the cold glare of the overhead light, which illuminated the living/ dining/kitchen area, a 150-square-foot space which was advertised as open concept, but really just meant that we could watch TV while we made dinner.
It was empty. Completely empty. No couch, no coffee table, no piles of boxes. Red flag #4.
I could have sworn the plan was to pack the U-Haul in the morning, but maybe Dylan had got a head start on it. I called him again, but that time it didn’t even ring before it went straight to voicemail.
I heard yelling coming from the apartment next door, so I slipped inside, locking the door behind me.
“Dylan?” I called again, holding my breath as I waited for a response.
But the silence was absolute. The most obvious scenario is usually the right scenario, and the most obvious scenario here was that I had an amazing boyfriend who had saved me the trouble of schlepping dozens of boxes down two flights of stairs.
That’s one hundred percent what has happened, I told myself.
But something felt off.
I tiptoed to the bedroom door and stood outside for a moment, listening, before bursting in like I’d seen cops do on TV. But unlike those cops, I wasn’t armed and had no idea what I’d actually do if there were someone in the room.
Lucky for me, though, there wasn’t. It was also empty (red flag #5).
No too-small bed, no dented IKEA dresser, no full-length mirror propped against the wall.
There was, however, a framed photo of us on the floor.
I crossed the room to pick it up, swiping a film of dust off the glass.
We were cheek to cheek, faces flushed from red wine and happiness after signing the lease on that place, our first apartment together.
“This is just the beginning,” Dylan had said to me that day.
I went back into the main living area. The apartment felt strangely small without our cheap furniture and thrift store decor, like the space had expanded to make room for our lives.
I looked at my phone, willing it to ring.
At loose ends, I checked the fridge. It, too, had been cleaned out, except for one dried out end of cheddar cheese. I peeled back the wrapping to see if any of it was salvageable, but it was all hard and shiny. I went to toss it in the trash under the sink, but even the trash can was gone.
And that’s when I saw it.
Red flag #6.
An envelope, on the counter.
I opened it and pulled out several pages of dense legalese, but my eyes only registered on the all-caps heading: EVICTION NOTICE.
Which made no sense. We gave notice that we were leaving, we couldn’t be evicted.
And we’d never missed a rent payment, that I knew for sure, because I paid it.
It was easier to use my account to pay, given that Dylan used his primarily for business, and his accountant—a total idiot, according to Dylan—got confused when there were personal expenses withdrawn, too.
Wait, maybe that should’ve been red flag #1…
Or maybe it should’ve been that every month on the first, I withdrew cash and Dylan brought it to our landlord.
Dylan didn’t trust Venmo, said it’s too vulnerable to hackers, and he was the tech guy, so who was I to argue?
He also didn’t trust our landlord, said he didn’t like the way he looked at me, even though he was about eighty-five years old and wore glasses so thick he was probably considered legally blind. Red flag #463.
If the most obvious thing is usually the right thing, then the most obvious thing was that there’d been a mistake. The eviction notice couldn’t be for us. I flipped the envelope to see whose name was on it, and that’s when I saw the Post-it note, stuck to the front.
I opened and closed my eyes several times to make sure I was reading it right, hoping that, in the long seconds that I spent squeezing my eyelids together, the letters on the note might have rearranged themselves to say something—anything—different from what they said. Which was this:
C —
Sorry.
D.
The framed photo fell from my hand. The glass shattered, scattering across the floor. I read the note again.
Sorry.
A small part of my brain cried out For what? Sorry for what?!? But the truth was, I already knew.