Loose Screws (12 page)

Okay, so maybe he's a tad more intuitive than I'd given him credit for.

“I…don't know. Maybe because most men aren't really interested in listening to a woman's opinion?”

One brow lifts, but he doesn't comment. Although I get the feeling it's because he decides not to, rather than because he's got nothing to say.

“'Night,” he says instead, then turns, his steps sure but
tired as he walks slowly down the hall. I watch until he's on the elevator, then turn to the dog, who's standing—if you can call what a corgi does
standing
—in the doorway.

“Did you notice he didn't even suggest we get together again?”

Geoff yawns, completely disinterested.

Which is what I should be, if I was smart.

 

It's now been a week since I lost both my job and my apartment. My eyesight has gone down the tubes from reading so many classified ads and my cell phone has become permanently attached to my ear. I swear I hear the damn thing ringing in my sleep.

What little sleep I get.

I officially reached panic level two days ago, which is when Max, Brice's accountant, e-mailed me with the joyful news that, despite his having gone over Fanning's books several times, it seems Brice had dipped into a couple of accounts he shouldn't have—probably fully intending to redeposit the money before payroll was due—but the upshot was, he got bumped off before he could do that and basically, there's no money. Not at the moment. Max assured me—as did Brice's lawyer when he called yesterday—that as soon as the assets were liquidated and the creditors paid, the staff would get what was coming to them, but there wasn't anything anyone could do right now. Especially as the police hadn't yet released the property.

This news, on top of everything else, has made me just a hair on the testy side, which is why the creep currently sidling up to me on the midtown subway platform should really think twice before doing whatever it is he thinks he's going to do. I mean, come
on,
do I look like a tourist, what?

My feet are killing me from running twenty blocks in heels in the sweltering heat between job interviews with two different design firms, both of which were impressed with my portfolio but not hiring (which led me to wonder
why the hell they made the appointments to begin with), and now I'm on my way to see yet another apartment that, if it's anything like the last six I've seen, will undoubtedly make me puke. And I've missed lunch.

I can sense, more than actually see, that the guy is taller than I am, slender. The platform isn't crowded at this time of day, but it isn't empty, either. And I'm standing within sight of the ticket booth, too far from the edge for some loony to push me onto the tracks. So if this creep is out to mug me, he's got
cojones
the size of basketballs.

I glance over, notice the size Huge skateboard shoes, black and red, new, closer than they were ten seconds ago. My heart rate kicks up just enough to keep me alert as my right hand fists around my purse strap, straddling my torso as usual. But I'm also carrying my portfolio case today, which dangles from my left hand. My grip tightens around that, too.

The guy closes the gap between us; I decide I do not want to play this game. So I turn, startling the kid, for that's all he is, by looking him dead in the eye, then head back for the turnstile.

A second later, I feel a hand land on my butt.

A second after that the kid is sprawled on his back on the platform, grabbing his arm where my portfolio made unerring contact.

“Bitch!” the kid bellows, too late realizing the attendant in the booth is watching with great interest.

I smile at the applause that follows me back through the turnstile and up the stairs. No matter how bad things get, it's moments like this that make me realize why I love this city.

Unfortunately, my euphoria doesn't last. The apartment was, as Terrie would have so succinctly put it, a shithole. And Annie's going to be back in less than a week now. Six days, actually.

I plop me and my accoutrements on a park bench somewhere in Washington Heights, too tired and dejected to move. I check my watch: six-thirty. There's actually some
thing resembling a breeze stirring, although it's still hot enough to roast a hot dog. Gee. My wedding would have been—I frown, counting—sixteen days ago. Greg and I would have been back from our honeymoon and ensconced in our little—okay, so not so little—Scarsdale love nest for more than a week already. I try not to dwell on the fact that I could have been serving a lovely dinner al fresco right about now. Or getting boffed in an air-conditioned bedroom—

A droopy-drawered teenager ambles by, rap music pulsing from a boom box.

—to Mozart.

I sigh.

To add to my good humor, a funeral cortege crawls by. My first thought is to wonder if the apartment's available.

Well, this will never do. I haul myself off the bench, trying to remember where the subway stop is. Like a dog, I lift my face, decide it's that way (at this point, I don't know from east, west, or whatever). So off I hobble, feeling much like whatever that was that Geoff barfed all over my rug this morning.

After limping along aimlessly for several minutes, I finally run across an old, peanut-size Jewish man out walking his even older cocker spaniel. His yarmulke bobby-pinned to his three remaining strands of white hair, the old man is kind enough to tell me, in heavily Yiddishized English, where the subway stop is. I catch him sneaking a longing look at my legs as I walk away.

I turn the corner at the appointed intersection. The street stretching before me is almost unbearably clean, as if a batallion of elves pour out of the light-bricked, Art deco-era buildings every morning to sweep. And it's incredibly quiet.

Windowsills bloom with bright flowers in planters. Somebody's had a baby: a bright banner yells It's A Girl! from a first-floor window. On the corner, a pair of middle-aged women, their heads wrapped in scarves, exchange gossip. I hear an excited
“Mazeltov!”
as I pass. One of
them gives me a tentative smile. An Asian couple, the woman protectively cradling a tiny baby with a shock of black hair against her chest, laughingly argues on how to set up a recalcitrant collapsible stroller.

I'm charmed.

So when a fifty-ish Hispanic man pops out of one of the buildings, I hear myself asking if he knows, by any chance, whether there are any apartments available.

He studies me, caution simmering his dark eyes—hey, I'd be cautious of me too, the way I look—then nods.

“A one-bedroom on the fourth floor. I'm the super, I can show it to you if you want.”

My heart leaps.

“What's the rent, do you know?”

He shrugs. “Twelve, maybe fifteen hundred a month, I'm not sure. Plus utilities. It's a nice apartment. Lots of light. Good closets.”

I swear I hear a choir of angels burst into song. I grin.

“Can I see it right now?”

He shrugs again. “Sure, why not?”

 

“You sure there's nothing wrong with the place?”

Two days later, Randall is sitting on my sofa, sorting through a pile of CDs I decided this morning I no longer want, while, a few feet away, I am piling endless books into one of a dozen cartons I begged off the Kinko's around the corner. A chore that is a true delight, even in the sweltering apartment. Yeah, I thought I'd loved this place—and I did, I really did—but my new apartment…

A rush of pure joy zips through me.

“Rand, it's incredible. The living room is huge, and it faces south so it's light all day long, and there's a whole bedroom with a huge walk-in closet, and a separate kitchen…and all for twelve hundred bucks a month!”

“I don't get it.” He holds up a stack of CDs. “I'll take these, if that's okay.”

“Sure, whatever.”

“There's gotta be something wrong with it. For that price?”

“Well, there sure wasn't anything that I could see. It was just painted, and the refrigerator is relatively new. The stove's on the elderly side and the wood floors are a bit scratched up, but I can deal with that. I can even see the river if I lean out of the living room window far enough.”

Randall rolls his eyes. “And it just happened to be available why?”

“That's the remarkable thing. The previous tenant had just moved out a couple days before, broke his lease or something, I didn't get the whole story. Anyway, they'd just gotten it fixed up but hadn't listed it with a broker yet. And that's not all my good news. I got a job, too.”

“No shit? Where?”

I name one of the city's largest department stores.

“They had an opening?”

“They did. I start on Monday. Of course, it will take a while to get my commissions perking again, but I'm going to call some of my clients as soon as I get this move done, tell them I'm back in business.”

Of course, to tell you the truth, I'm not as thrilled with this turn of events as I sound. For one thing, I vowed never to work in a department store, catering to little old ladies who just want new miniblinds for their kitchen. But the store's furniture buyer seems on the ball, and one can always special order.
And
if I can get back my clients, it'll be okay. Besides, a job is a job.

Or so I tell myself.

I get up to yank another box out of the pile teetering by the front door, nearly tripping over the dog. I frown. Despite the resolution of the food issue, Geoff is still not a happy camper. I don't think he's sick or anything, but he's not exactly brimming over with joie de vivre, either.

“I think he misses Brice,” I say. “Hard to believe, considering the way the jerk treated the humans in his life, but I guess he was nice enough to his dog.”

“Some people are like that.” Randall gets up, looms
over the dog, who rolls his eyes up at him. “You ask me, I think he's just pissed. You know, because his life has been turned upside down.”

“Just what I need. A dog with issues. Hey,” I say to the dog, gently nudging his rump with my bare toes. He grudgingly lifts his head, blinks at me. “If I can cope with all the upheaval in my life, you can too. You never heard of adaptability, survival of the fittest and all that crap?”

With a soulful sigh, Geoff lets his head fall back to the floor.

“This could spell the extinction of your breed, you know.”

Randall tilts his head to one side, surveying Geoff's posterior. “Honey, I hate to tell you this, but this mutt's propagation days are history.”

“I know that. It's the principle of the thing. Besides, I hate to see him so unhappy. I can't help but think it's my fault, somehow.”

Randall looks at me. “You know, I'm not sure which one of you needs therapy more. Him or you.”

“Well, since I can't afford it for either one of us, looks like we're both just gonna have to tough it out.” I bend down, scratching Geoff's chest. He seems to struggle with his conscience for a moment or two, then laconically lifts one paw to afford me better access. “I just can't help thinking, though, he's not going to be a whole lot happier with whatshisname.”

Turns out the only thing Brice left to anybody was the dog, to some young honey I remembered seeing flitting around the place a few years ago. I mean, after living across from Randall and Ted, who have women making futile plays for them all the time, this guy was a shock. Nice enough guy, I suppose, if a bit rough on the nervous system. I have no idea why he and Brice broke up, let alone why Brice left him the dog. Which is all in theory, at the moment, since the lawyer hasn't been able to get in touch with this Curtiss person, anyway.

I can't quite tell whether I'm going to be happy or not
about giving Geoff up. On the one hand, this animal is as demanding as a whiny three-year-old. On the other, he is a good listener. There's something to be said for having someone who doesn't care if you bitch to them first thing when you walk in the door. And he doesn't torment me with well-meaning advice.

Of course, I don't think Geoff really cares. Yes, he listens, but his heart's not really in it, I can tell.

So why the hell am I becoming so attached to him?

“So,” Randall says. “You tell your mother yet you're moving?”

I get up, move back to my box, surveying the piles of my life teetering all over the apartment. I had virtually nothing when I moved in. Now look at all this crap. Ted's right. I am a packrat. “Are you nuts?”

“She's gonna figure out something's up when she comes over and you're not here.”

“I didn't say I wasn't ever going to tell my mother I'm moving. Although the idea is tempting. Once I'm in,
then
I'll tell her. No way am I going to give her a chance to try to convince me to move back in with her.”

“You know, that might not have been such a bad idea. Until you get back on your feet financially, I mean.”

I look up, shoving a hunk of hair out of my face. “Would you move back in with yours?”

He actually pales. “Not in this lifetime.”

“Then I'll consider moving back in with my mother just as soon as you tell yours you're gay.”

Randall glowers, giving me a glimpse of the little boy he used to be.

“Speaking of which,” I say because I'm sick to death of talking about me, “when's your brother coming to stay with you?”

“Friday night.”

“And just how have we decided to handle…things?”

“The old-fashioned way. By lying through our teeth.”

I straighten up, my hands on my hips. “And if that's not the stupidest idea I've ever heard, I don't know what is.”

“Well, nobody asked you, did they, missy?” he says. I snort. “Look, Ginge, it's just for a week. Al's going to go stay with her mom. Ted's going to sleep in her room, I'll stay in ours, Davis will sleep on the sofa bed in the living room. He'll think we're roommates.”