The Bomb Shelter (chapter two, p 2)

 

“I just feel like you have something on your mind and you need to just, like, tell me.” Helga reaches out to grab me by the hand, but instead accidentally grabs me by the wrist, like a handcuff. “You do this, Aimee. You stew. You avoid.”

“I’m fine. I don’t even know what to tell you.” I remove the straw from of my drink and throw the drink back, emptying the glass. I’ve drank enough now that it tastes potable.

“Right,” she says.

“Just because you haven’t spoken to me for ages doesn’t mean I’m mad at you.”

She narrows her eyes. “I spoke to you a week ago, for like an hour. And you were acting like this then, too.”

I reach into my purse and produce my phone. I turn the screen towards her and scroll down my call-log to a call from a week ago. “Twenty-five minutes, not an hour.”

“What the fuck ever, Aimee!”

“They’re firing people at my work left and right for dumb shit, Lowell is being extra weird.” For emphasis, I let my voice quiver. “I need you.”

“Well, I’m here.” She grabs my hand again, successfully this time. “They’re firing people?”

“They fired Toros just for, like, liking a Twitter post. And they made me fire him.”

“They forced you to fire him? That’s not even your job.”

“Mhm.”

“Did you say ‘Toros’? Don’t you hate him?”

“No! He was like my best work friend and he’s gone now, Helga.” I shake my head. 

“Okay, right, I’m sorry. And Lowell?”

“Well, he was being weird and he wants me to quit my job, and –”

“Uh huh.”

“--and he says he’ll, like, pay me not to work, and whatever.”

Helga is silent for a moment. Click-click-click. Ding. The bartender smiles at her phone. “He’ll pay you not to work at the job…that you’re worried about being fired from?”

I shake my hand free of her’s. “Why are you being like this?”

“I’m just asking you things?”

I stand up. “Whatever. You have bigger shit to deal with. Enjoy your night. Enjoy your baby.”

“Aimee, are you serious?”

I put five dollars cash on the bar counter, which won’t even cover the tip. “Yes.”

“Aimee.” But she doesn’t follow me. 

I swing open the door and I’m momentarily blinded by the bright summer evening, sun still high on the horizon. It’s not even six yet. Chet, on his phone by the door, sees me and smiles. He mouths you’re leaving? at me and I nod, walking towards the intersection. 

“Just a moment, I’ll put you on hold,” Chet says into his phone, which he pockets. He catches me at the crosswalk and reaches out for a hug. “It really was nice to meet you.”

I slip from his grasp. “Don’t you touch me,” I spit, too loud. I cross the road before the light turns green without looking back at him.

#

The security guard at the Kestrel Ridge building is more inquisitive than I expected. He runs a meaty finger down a clipboard, squinting through a pair of cheaters. I want to grab him and shake him, scream It’s Saturday, or remind him that all the corporate protest bombers (so far) have been weird, intense Portland guys. I’m about to turn around and leave when he finally looks up at me.

“For that, uh, working bee event, yeah?”

I nod. He hovers near the desk phone like he’s thinking about calling up, then shrugs.

“Alright. Go up.”

I thank him and slip past to the elevator bank. I press the button for the fourteenth floor, aware of his gaze still burning into the back of my head.

I’d genuinely planned to go straight home after leaving Helga and Chet. I got as far as the subway and I was tipsy enough to misread the commuter rail timetable. Halfway to the platform, I realized I’d be stuck at Grand Central for hours. I went back up to street level, all turned around, like a tourist. For a minute, I nearly called Helga to see if she’d kill time with me, before the afternoon’s events reasserted themselves.

Phone in hand, sitting on the downtown curb, I started typing random searches: best downtown food trucks open weekends during day, things to do at Grand Central. At one point I ate a sagging hot dog beside the locked gates of an alleyway. Eventually, I typed Kestrel Ridge’s address and clicked into Maps: Walk four blocks east. Walk one block north.

Each action I took had less irony than the last. Crossed the street once. Then again. At first I dawdled, pretending I didn’t have a destination. Then I walked with purpose. The building came into view,  a steel tower from the eighties, just as I acknowledged to myself I had a plan.

The elevator opens on fourteen. A mostly empty office lies beyond the unmanned reception desk, visible through frosted glass. A sliver of movement in one corner. Top Forty music thuds faintly from inside. Behind the desk, the wall reads: Kestrel Ridge, c. 1995.

I decide to wait here. Worst case, I ride back down at nine and catch my train. I find an outlet behind the waiting room sofa, plug in my phone, and scroll the way I would at home.

At six-thirty pm, a Polish-sounding Uber Eats guy steps out of the elevator, insulated backpack slung over one shoulder. He looks at me.

“Delivery for Rodger?”

“Not me.”

He sighs and calls the customer. “Security let me up. I have your food. Yes.” He hangs up just as the internal office door opens. Before it’s even shut, he’s opening the bag.

“You Roger?”

“It’s Reggie.” Reggie props the door open with one foot and takes the tied plastic bag, eyeing me with open suspicion.

He’s better looking in real life, more vivid than Instagram. Boyish in slacks and a suit jacket, no tie, hair uncombed. College-kid drunk, in a finance guy’s costume. 

“I’m waiting for my friend Joe,” I say, unplugging my phone. “We’re walking to the ferry after he finishes work.”

Reggie glances back toward the office. “There’s no Joe here today. I don’t even know a Joe, actually.”

“Oh.”

“A few of us are doing this end-of-summer reporting thing…” he trails off. “It turned into drinks.”

“Right.”

“But yeah. No Joe.”

I stand, feigning confusion. “Is this eleven?”

“Fourteen.”

“Oh god. I’m so dumb. Sorry. You’d think I’d ask him the name of the company.”

“It’s okay.” He turns to go, then pauses. “I’m surprised they let you up. Anyway, see-ya.”

But I can’t leave it there. “Do I know you?”

He turns back, studies me. A slow sweep up and down. I tingle at the idea of being seen, being actually looked at, my corporeal being filtered through his gaze.

“Maybe. What’s your name?”

“Aimee. Oh! I know where from.” I open Instagram and hold out the screen. “Two mutual follows. You came up on my suggestions the other day.”

“Wow. Your memory is…” He squints like he’s reading through water. “Oh, my brother. You must know his fiancée.”

“Chet! Yes. Helga’s, like, my oldest friend.” I press the elevator button, aware I’ve got maybe a minute left. “Plus… you’ve got a memorable face.”

His suspicion evaporates. What’s left is wide-eyed, unfiltered recognition. That pure, unguarded delight of you know me; a child’s.

“Small world,” he says.

He opens the door fully. Music spills out, along with the sounds of drunk men laughing and roughhousing.

“You can follow me, if you want,” Reggie says. “Aimee.”

The elevator opens.

“I will,” I say. “Reggie.”

He grins — a full, wide smile. I picture him as a child, losing a baby tooth, leaving it under his pillow for the tooth fairy. His and Chet’s mother, slipping a dollar into the dark. It’s erotic in a way that leaves me feeling queen-like.

He disappears inside. I descend to the subway and wait for my train at Grand Central, vibrating with glee.

By nine-thirty, I disembark at Woodwark. The park-and-ride lot is empty. I unlock my car and toss my purse onto the passenger seat.

I sit in the driver’s seat and masturbate to climax. I wipe my hand on the car seat cover and drive home, calm and satisfied.