Chapter 22
TWENTY-TWO
AMELIA
“Let’s get started,” Rory says, stepping around her desk in the New Heights office to take a seat across from me.
I sit in front of her, the optimist in me trying to convince me this is a good talk. That her text didn’t mean something bad. We’re just going over the terms of the grant and what it means.
But if that’s the case, why is my stomach sinking further and further down the longer I sit here, her professional facade impenetrable, not the familiar casual elegance I’m used to from her.
“Let’s.” I try to force my voice to sound chipper, and I hope she doesn’t notice the strain in it.
Three family dinners and two girls’ nights out might not be enough for her to pick up on things like that from me just yet.
It took Weston less than an hour to learn my tells, but he’s clearly one of a kind.
“Your grant paperwork came back with some questions,” she says, tone diplomatic and neutral, without a hint of the inviting warmth I’ve gotten so used to, as she pulls a printout out from somewhere beneath her desk.
My stomach, already hovering somewhere around my asshole, hollows. I don’t think I ever grasped how scary this woman can be. Maybe I still don’t.
“What kind of questions?” I ask, my voice even higher pitched than normal.
“Well, one point that needed clarification was your income.”
Rory uses a glittering pen to tap at the section I recognize from when she helped me fill out the paperwork. Employer name and wages, and then I had to submit proof of those. That was all factual.
“Mmm?” Words don’t seem to be coming to me right now.
“There was concern that your income hasn’t been very stable in recent months, that you aren’t meeting the minimum threshold to qualify for the grant geared toward remote workers.”
“Oh.” My voice falls flat.
My work lately has been less than great. That’s why Weston let me help him with painting, so he could split his earnings with me and free up his time to work on my engine. But even working with him, it’s not like that was exactly a formal job that I can put on the paperwork, and it wouldn’t qualify as a remote position, either, so that’s no help to me with this.
Unless I want to get a job here more permanently and swap the grant I’m applying for… I guess that was a fun pipe dream while it lasted.
Nope, today’s a day the pessimist in me is going to win. The optimist got too long of a run anyway. I should buckle up now before this ride dips any lower because, knowing my luck, it can go a lot lower. Like six feet under.
Rory continues, still brusque with me in a way that confirms half of me was right. The shitstorm is just beginning. “That doesn’t mean we can’t still get you approved for that one. And there are other options. If you decide to take a job locally, or open your own business here, we do have other grants you may qualify for.”
Why does she sound so detached? Is this how she always sounds and I’ve never noticed?
Or are the alarm bells ringing in my head indicative of real danger here? The kind I haven’t had to run from in so long I almost let myself get comfortable for a minute.
“Now, I know when you filed this I said you didn’t have to make up your mind until the approval was back,” she continues, “but I would strongly suggest you not resubmit your application, nor swap to another grant type, without the intention of residing here permanently.”
Her brows rise ever so slightly, in challenge.
Does she know?
She knows something or she wouldn’t be acting so distant from me.
My question now is what does she know?
She can’t know everything, she hasn’t told me to get out of the Heights and never come back.
“These grants are limited in number and intended for those who are serious about contributing to the local community, the society, and economy that exists within Smoky Heights.”
“Sure,” I tell her, extremities going numb. I think my vision might be blurring, too, if I were to look too closely at it.
“I have to ask you if that’s your intention, Avery Flint.”
My eyes slam shut, and I rock back in my seat.
“Or is it Amelia Marsh?”
Rory continues down the list of names that I’ve used over the past nine years, her finger trailing the sheet in front of her, up and down as she reads them off. More than a half dozen in all.
I stop her before she can get to my birth name.
“Please,” I say, a shaky whisper.
My nerves should be fraying at the edges, but I think this is where I enter the numb stage.
She peers up from the document in her hand, eyeing me over it.
“Clearly you’re hiding some things,” she says. “And what they are is none of my business. Your background checks came back clean, so I don’t suspect you of some sort of crime ring or anything. The only thing that held up your application all this time was the confusion on the multiple names, because the agency had to continue running those back one by one, and doing a check on each one. And, of course, the question on your income. The fact that you changed your name five times in three years isn’t going to lead to a negative outcome on this grant, but it does make me question your intentions here.”
My breaths don’t come, it’s like the air can’t reach my lungs, the only thing I’m getting is a sporadic intake of jagged wheezes and gasps.
It must go on for a while because when my vision comes back Rory is in front of me, kneeling with her hands on my cheeks.
“Hey,” she says. “You’re okay.”
She’s so strong, so confident, I believe her.
The glass of water she hands me helps, as does taking in my surroundings. The blown up black and white shot of the older woman on the wall. The miniature diorama of the town in the window. Realizing I’m not in that college dorm where my new life fell apart. These people aren’t those people.
Did I really think I could hide out in this town for long and it wouldn’t bite me in the vag? If I were in a horror movie, I’d be the dumb-as-fuck girl who stopped to ask, “Who’s there?” rather than running for the hills when the killer got in the house. I would be screaming at me in a theater. It’s embarrassing, really. I should’ve known better.
When my chin stops wobbling, my lungs cooperating once more, I try using my vocal cords. “I’m not lying to you about wanting to be here,” I tell her.
One thick, smooth brow of hers ticks up. “Do I want to know what you are lying about?”
“I don’t want anyone to know,” I admit in a small voice. “But it’s probably time I told Weston.”
“I think so too,” she agrees, folding her arms over her chest, leaning back on her desk in front of me.
“And if he wants me to leave, I won’t come back,” I promise her.
As much as I might want to.