Page 27 of Sublimate
“I’ll get stopped at the door,” I answered apologetically. “You think that I look old, but bouncers never do and I don’t have an ID, remember?” I’d had fake ones before, some really good ones, but I had lost them. I wondered, now, what had happened to those and to the rest of my stuff—obviously, I’d had to leave a lot of it behind when I’d taken off from Nevada after the death threat, but what about the other things? I remembered bringing home pictures I’d made in school, when I was little and we’d drawn in class. At one point in my teens, I’d had boots that I’d loved, black ones that looked a lot like leather. Who had those now?
Cadence and I made a plan to meet the next day for coffee instead of going to a bar, because restaurants couldn’t keep you out if you didn’t have a valid license. Also, it was much less likely that Kolter would be at one of those—but maybe I was being too cautious. As far as I knew, he also wanted to stay away from me and there was nothing binding us anymore, nothing at all. He had no reason to want to be in touch and no reason to be angry. The lack of a good reason never stopped someone’s feelings, though, particularly feelings of hate.
There was nothing really binding me to anything and that was very freeing, I decided. Although, the ties of having some official paperwork that recognized me as a valid driver would have been good. I wouldn’t have gotten that burst of fear when I saw a police officer who might have noticed that my license plateswere from another vehicle that had been totaled back in Nevada. Then they might have checked further and caught that my car was probably still titled to my mom’s former boyfriend, and I hadn’t seen him in years.
Not having normal stuff that most people did, lacking the things they took for granted like a license and other paperwork, made you feel anxious a lot of the time. It made you act sneaky and sly. But maybe with Cadence’s help, I could fix that (somehow). I could also get a bank account and at one point, I would earn enough to keep my backup money in there. It would have been better than hiding it in an oven door, which I couldn’t even do anymore because Nolan’s ovens worked.
In fact, all his appliances functioned perfectly, and I had been making use of the stove to cook a lot of soft noodles that didn’t require much chewing and oatmeal that also went down easily. I was careful because the stovetop looked mostly untouched, and no matter how good his cleaning crew was, it was nearly impossible to get things back to their delivery-day appearance (although the women who did his house were very good and nice, too, because I’d met them. I couldn’t help myself from cleaning before they came).
I had looked inside the ovens and they were spotless, as if they hadn’t ever been turned on. The refrigerator and freezer had been nearly empty until a large load of groceries had been delivered the day after my arrival, lots of bags that Nolan had carried in because I wasn’t supposed to lift too much due to my ribs. Then we’d filled the fridge and the shelves in his pantry, acute little room that had previously held only a very old phone book left by the house’s prior owner.
It was like living in a grocery store and it was exactly how most of my former clients lived, too. They bought whatever they wanted to eat, probably not worrying about sales or coupons, and then filled their kitchens. They could go in there and think, “Hm, I’m hungry. What do I want to have?” The choices were basically boundless.
There was that word again. They could eat whatever they wanted, and it was the same thing as being free. They were free in general and they didn’t have to be afraid of people or constrained by a lack of paperwork and money. Now I had some of that freedom for myself and I wanted more.
When I got back to Nolan’s house, I made another helping of the soft food that I’d been eating during the weeks since the accident. Then I sat down at the kitchen table across from the chair I’d seen him use a few times. But not too many times, because he wasn’t often here. He had been correct about how little we’d run into each other when he was, too. His bedroom was on the second floor and he went up and down the other set of stairs, so we—
I heard a noise and immediately thought of taking out the garbage, like I’d done at some of the houses I had cleaned. This was the sound of the garage door opening, which meant that someone was home. I suddenly felt the same rush of fear I’d had when I knew that Kolter was going to walk in.
But I didn’t need to be anxious because this was Nolan, the person who had only been nice and had helped me. I relaxed.
“Vivi,” he said as he entered the kitchen. “Hello.”
“Hi,” I answered. I looked him over for a clue about where he’d gone and then remembered again that this was Nolan. I could just ask. “Where have you been?”
“I went to Montana to fish.” He put down his bag and then took his usual seat. “I discovered that I don’t like fishing very much.”
“That was a long way to go to figure that out,” I said and he smiled.
“You just stand there,” he told me. “People find it relaxing but you have so much time to think.”
I offered him some of the plain pasta I was having, but he declined. He asked me how I’d been feeling and I said great, I was doing so well.
“Cadence is going to help me get my paperwork, I’m getting my clients back, and I should be out of here before you know it,” I assured him.
“I really don’t care.”
That was what he always said but I couldn’t imagine walking into my beautiful home and seeing a stranger there, eating my food…maybe that was the solution. We shouldn’t have been strangers.
“Do you want to go for a walk?” I suggested. “Just around the neighborhood?”
“Are you feeling up to that?”
“If I feel up to cleaning a bathroom, then I can take a walk,” I said. I hadn’t ventured out on foot, not because of any danger here but because I wasn’t sure of how far I could actually go. But now, I could handle it. And this little town was so cute, just one street that crossed another, with a few restaurants and shops, and then a very small docking place for boats. A marina? I hadn’t been a water person before, but maybe that was what you’d have called it.
“A walk,” he repeated. “Ok. Let me put this in my room.” He went out with his bag and quickly returned in a new outfit, nice shorts like the pairs I washed for clients that sometimes had pegs for golf balls in the pockets. I wore jean shorts that I’d cut off a few years before and a T-shirt that must have gotten mixed in with my stuff at some point, because I hadn’t bought it. I didn’t know the band Cum and Go.
“I’ll change, too,” I suggested. I went to look at what I had and there was nothing as fancy as his clothes. There was nothing much in general, since a lot of what I’d owned had gone into the burn barrel at Kolter’s house or had previously disappeared somehow. I could at least pick a different shirt that didn’t mention personal liquids and I also braided my hair, so I felt like I matched the vibe a little better.
Nolan looked at me when I returned but he wasn’t approving my clothes. “The bruises are much better,” he commented. “They’re almost gone.”
“I told you,” I said. “I’m much, much better. Almost totally back to normal.” I didn’t repeat that he’d have his house back soon, mostly because I didn’t want to hear him say “I don’t care” again.
It was late in the day but it wouldn’t get dark for another few hours, which was the trade-off of having five minutes of sunlight in December—no, it wasn’t that bad, but I did appreciate the sun now. I appreciated being in this pretty town and in his beautiful, clean house, too.
“Thank you, Nolan.”
He had been holding the door for me and shut it behind us. “You’re welcome.”
