Chapter 1 #2
“I’ve never heard of that but it sounds like magic. Wouldn’t it be great if things could just change that way?”
“Water does, according to my middle school science class,” he said. He sighed again.
“I don’t remember it,” I told him, but the truth was that I had probably never learned it in the first place.
“The problem with sublimation is that the clothes turn very stiff, which people don’t like, but the place where I live is too small to hang lines or put up racks inside.
So, that’s why I’m taking a break from my side business. ”
I was talking too much again, but he wasn’t objecting.
Maybe he was afraid I would put him out on the side of the road if he did, or maybe my warning about the knife had scared him.
Anyway, I managed to keep my mouth closed for several miles, up until we approached a small building set close to the road.
“That’s my house,” I announced, although it wasn’t really mine.
There was a light up on a pole in the yard and that was still turned on, but I couldn’t see any other illumination in the actual building.
Good, because it meant that Kolter was asleep, and maybe he was enjoying pleasant dreams that would soothe him out of his bad mood.
“There?” Suddenly, Nolan seemed fully awake. “You live there?”
“I know it looks run-down,” I said. I had been trying to make improvements, like removing some of the trash and cutting back the overgrown plants.
“When I first saw it, I thought that it could have been a hiding place for shadow people but actually, my boyfriend has been in that house since he graduated from high school. It belongs to his mom.”
“It looked like—”
But Nnnn-ooo-lll-aaa-nnn didn’t finish saying what he thought, which was polite.
“It’s not so bad,” I assured him. Kolter and his mother weren’t interested in doing anything themselves but they also hadn’t objected (too much) when I’d tried to clean it up.
They hadn’t cared when I’d taken a can of paint that one of my clients was tossing and had used it on the bathroom walls.
His mom had said that I shouldn’t think she’d reduce the rent I owed her, but she wasn’t charging me for making changes, either.
“It has a tight roof, a furnace, hot water, and everything you’d need,” I said.
“Except a clothes dryer.”
So, he had been listening to me! That was a problem with being a blabbermouth, which my boyfriend also called me: people would tune out and then when you told them something important, they would miss it, just like they were missing everything else you said.
“There’s nothing much around here,” I noted. “Why were you? Why were you walking on that road?”
“I was in a car, but he made me get out.”
I understood that part of the story, which he’d already told me before. I decided that the rest of it wasn’t my business. I would get him to the bar where he could either call a friend or not, and he would be on his own.
It still worried me. “Have you taken something?” I asked. “Are you on something? Because I could drive you to a hospital instead, if you need that. Or a motel, and you could pay them with an app. If you’re already high and then you start drinking…”
Now I was butting in and also offering advice, two more things that infuriated my boyfriend. But Nolan didn’t tell me to shut up or do anything else to express his anger. He also didn’t answer my questions or suggest a different destination, so I shut myself up without having to be told.
It took a while longer, but I didn’t talk again and neither did my passenger. As we approached the bar with the neon sign announcing “Roys,” I saw him patting his breast pocket. Then he patted his front pockets and tilted his hips to feel the back, too.
“You lost your wallet,” I reminded him.
“Oh. Yes, I must have,” he said.
“This is where you wanted to go,” I reminded him further. “We’re here.”
“Oh. Yes.”
We had stopped but he didn’t get out of my car, and I began to wonder whether that might turn into a problem.
I could hold my own against someone close to my own size but like most other people in the world, I didn’t do well against an opponent who was larger and stronger.
And he was definitely larger and stronger, because he was tall and I was on the short side…
Of course, I had the knife. I tried to do more convincing first.
“It’s time for you to go,” I stated. “I gave you a free ride here and it’s not nice to sit in my car.”
“You’re right. I’m no longer wanted. Thank you.” He opened the door.
Good, this was going to…crapola. He still wasn’t getting out!
“Nolan, I don’t want to be mean, but you have to go. Go.” These were the types of words that could have produced a very angry reaction, so I carefully unclicked my seat belt and put my hand on the door handle. It would have been better to jump out and run rather than to stab him.
“I was going to ask if you were interested in getting a drink at Roy’s with me,” he said.
That was kind of exciting! I hadn’t had someone want to spend time with me for a while, not since I’d first met Kolter. But my boyfriend was also the reason that I had to say no to this offer. I opened my mouth to refuse, but also to thank him.
Before I could do that, he spoke again. “You mentioned that you had a boyfriend, but this would only be for companionship.” I could see his face in the dome light, and he twisted his features in a funny way as he said the last word.
It was an expression like a smile but he didn’t actually look happy.
“For companionship,” I repeated. “You would just want to hang out? And talk?”
He nodded and I spent a second reviewing whether that was a good idea.
Then I decided: screw it! I still had rights guaranteed to me under our Constitution, didn’t I?
I hadn’t ever read that document and I was fairly sure that it made no official mention of getting drinks, but still.
It guaranteed that I could do what I wanted, within reason.
“Ok,” I agreed. “I’ll have a round.”
As soon as I spoke, he got out of the car and then I remembered his problem of not having a wallet.
Was he expecting me to pay for our drinks, and that was why he’d requested my companionship?
But I went ahead and parked, and as I pulled into a spot, I also watched him moving toward the bar.
He had a much smoother gait than before, a lot less of a lurch and more of a normal walk.
It made me wonder how long he’d been out there in the cold, to make him so awkward before.
He was waiting in the cold right now, standing in front of the door to the bar. I hurried because people often got mad when you weren’t fast enough, but I didn’t really understand why he hadn’t gone inside. “How are we going to pay for these drinks?” I asked him as I approached.
“I know the owner. She lets me run a tab,” he said.
I didn’t know that bars did that anymore. It must have meant he was a regular here and I thought that was a lucky thing. He probably knew other customers inside who could help him find his wallet.
Roy’s looked a little dingy on the exterior but I was happy to note that it was clean within.
I noticed right away that my shoes didn’t stick to the floor and I tested the tabletop when we sat down, but it had also been recently wiped.
He had held the door for me—he had opened it and then had expected me to go in first, which I had.
Then he had let me choose a booth that was on the other side of the room, where the cold wind wouldn’t blow on us when people came and went.
I noticed that especially because Kolter liked to sit right next to the exit.
He was always worried about getting away from the fights he started.
Nolan hadn’t said hello or greeted anyone by name, as I would have expected if he frequented this place.
And now that I looked at him, I thought that he didn’t look too good.
He was still very pale, which was obvious even though this bar wasn’t glowing with light.
He had put his hands on the table and I could see them trembling, and his blue-grey eyes were ringed with dark circles of exhaustion.
On the positive side, now that his hair was dry, I noted that it was light blonde and that really would hide the grey as he aged. If he was worried about that.
But I was more worried about the sickly aspects of his appearance right now. “Are you all right?” I asked, and then repeated my earlier question. “Are you on something?”
“I’ve had a lot of alcohol. No drugs.”
“Well, it’s good that you’re sober enough to tell me that,” I said encouragingly. “And I’m glad you’re not high.”
He held up his hand and a waitress came over. “What can I get you?” she asked, and he did order another drink. I got a Coke.
“I’ll be driving and my boyfriend would be able to smell liquor on me,” I explained. I checked my phone, but there was nothing from Kolter. He could see my location if he happened to wake up and check…
“Why does he care if you drink?” Nolan asked.
I thought for a moment. “If I knew that he was out at a bar with another woman, I would be upset,” I said. “Of course I would think the worst, that he was cheating.”
“Is that the worst?” He shook his head.
He was right. There were things that were a lot more terrible. “No, it isn’t, but cheating is pretty bad. It either means that he cares about sex more than he cares about you, or that he never cared about you at all. Of course, there are exceptions.”
“Like what?”
“Like, if he was on a spaceship and they had lost control of it and were heading into the sun where they would burn up. Then I would understand having sex with someone else. Or, if a snake had bitten him and the venom was creeping up his body and he just wanted one last time, I would say, ‘Go for it.’ I wouldn’t want to be the woman sleeping with a guy dying from a snake bite, though. ”
“Those are very specific scenarios.”