The Room She Was Asked to Leave

Damian held the book for another moment after Clara finished speaking.

He had built walls, poured concrete, hauled steel until his shoulders burned. He knew the weight of things. He knew when somebody had cut corners.

He had never heard anyone talk about an old roof as though it were a person worth saving.

"We should find you something better," he said.

Clara's expression closed a little.

There it was again. An offer she didn't trust.

"We should go to dinner," she said.

He gave her back the book.

***

They ate by the river at a place with plastic wind screens around the terrace and heaters that worked only when the wind allowed.

Vince knew the owner. The owner knew Damian. By the time the first plates arrived, two tables had become four.

Shelby's friends appeared, then men from the club, then a mechanic who had brought his wife.

Clara watched the introductions become impossible and gave up remembering names.

Somebody put a beer in front of her.

"I don't drink."

"One won't hurt."

Vince lifted the bottle away.

"She said no."

He replaced it with a mug of warm milk from the kitchen and looked faintly embarrassed by his own thoughtfulness.

"Best they could do."

"It's perfect. Thank you."

Clara lifted the mug toward him.

Across the table, Damian put down his fork.

"Don't you have work tomorrow?"

She looked at him.

"Yes."

"Finished eating?"

"Nearly."

"Finish. We're going."

He stood and walked to the car.

Everybody went quiet for a second, then resumed talking too loudly.

Clara looked at Vince.

"Is he always like that?"

Vince considered the safest answer.

"I'll get the check."

Shelby didn't speak to Clara on the way back.

Later, when the lights were out and Clara had almost fallen asleep, her cousin said, "You need to find somewhere else."

Clara opened her eyes.

"What?"

"You can't keep staying here."

"Has somebody complained?"

"It's staff accommodation. You're not staff."

"Damian said—"

"I know what he said. I'm the one who has to listen to people afterward."

Clara sat up.

The heating clicked inside the wall. Somewhere downstairs, a door slammed.

"I can pay toward the room. The utilities. Whatever they need."

"It isn't just money."

"Then tell me what it is."

Shelby pulled the blanket higher.

"You don't understand what it's like here. People talk."

Clara looked at the outline of her cousin's face.

"Can I stay until after New Year's? It'll be easier to find something."

Shelby began to cry.

"Please don't make this difficult. I only have this job."

Clara said nothing for a while.

Then she lay down again, looking at the wall.

"I'll start looking tomorrow."

"I'm sorry."

"It's all right."

She had no idea why she said that.

***

The man from the rental listing wanted forty dollars before showing her anything.

"Standard fee. Everybody pays."

Clara looked at the photo on his phone: a small room, a sink beneath a window, a bed with a blue cover.

"Is that the actual room?"

"Obviously."

"And the bathroom?"

"Shared with one other tenant."

"A woman?"

"Sure."

She should have left then.

Later she would understand that certainty. In the moment, all she knew was that the bank balance on her phone was shrinking, the university still wanted its money, and she had nowhere to sleep after tonight.

She gave him the forty dollars.

He folded the notes into the pocket of a red leather jacket and led her away from the main street.

The first block was fine. A bakery. A hardware shop. Christmas lights around a shuttered window.

The second had warehouses.

By the third, she could no longer hear traffic.

"How much farther?"

"Just through here."

The alley narrowed between two brick walls. A dog barked behind a fence.

Clara stopped.

"I'll come back in daylight."

He turned.

"You wanted a cheap room."

"I know. I'll look tomorrow."

"Tomorrow's another forty."

"Fine."

She turned toward the street.

He caught her arm.

"Pay it now."

Clara pulled back.

His fingers tightened through her coat.

"I said—"

A hand struck his wrist away.

Clara stumbled forward and hit the wall with her palm. Behind her came a thud, a curse, and the sound of somebody being pushed into a puddle.

She looked over her shoulder.

Two young men stood over the agent. One had bleached hair showing beneath his cap. The other wore trainers so white they seemed impossible in that alley.

"You like taking money from women?" the taller one asked.

Clara ran.

"Wait!" one shouted. "We're with—"

She ran faster.

At the end of the alley, a black Mercedes stood beneath a streetlamp with its rear door open.

Damian sat inside, one long leg out, a cigarette between his fingers.

She had never been so relieved to see somebody she didn't entirely trust.

He looked at her face.

"Who's chasing you?"

She got into the car hard enough to knock her shoulder against his chest.

"Shut the door. Please."

He did.

His arm stayed around her for one breath, two, until she noticed and moved away.

He let her.

Vince appeared from the alley a minute later and tapped on the window.

In his hand were two folded twenty-dollar notes.

Clara recognized the bent corner.

Damian looked from the money to her.

"Tell me."

She took the notes.

"I was looking at a room."

"With that idiot?"

"I didn't know he was an idiot until we were some distance into the process."

Vince looked toward the street to hide his smile.

Damian did not smile.

"Why are you looking at rooms?"

Clara smoothed the money against her knee.

"I need somewhere to live."

He stared at her.

"What exactly do you think I've been doing?"

***

At the Nightingale, Damian left Clara in the car with Vince and went inside to speak to Shelby.

When he returned, he was quieter.

He said nothing about what her cousin had told him.

Instead, they drove across the river to the Grand Briar.

A receptionist handed him a key without being asked.

Upstairs, the guest room had cream walls, heavy curtains, and a bed made so perfectly Clara was afraid to sit on it.

"Stay here," he said.

She looked at the bathroom, then at the thick carpet.

"I can't."

His jaw tightened.

"What now?"

"People from my office stay here when we have visitors. We have an account. Everybody knows what it costs."

"I'm not charging you."

"They don't know that. Or if they do, they'll make up a reason."

He looked at the ceiling.

"Let them."

"You can afford to say that."

Something in her voice made him look at her again.

She was still wearing the coat he had given her. The hem had mud on it. A strand of hair clung to her cheek.

"I'm trying to build a life," she said. "A small one. I'd like the people at work to think I earned it."

He went quiet.

Vince stood near the door, hands behind his back.

Clara took a breath.

"And I can't keep owing you more. It's already too much."

Damian pulled out a chair and sat.

"You keep accounts like a bank."

"Somebody should."

"You picked me up off a road. What interest rate are we putting on that?"

She looked away.

"Don't."

He watched her rubbing at the dried mud on her cuff.

"Did you eat before you went looking?"

"I was going to eat afterward."

He picked up the room-service menu and put it beside her.

"Choose something. You can argue with me while they cook it."

She almost smiled. He saw, but wisely said nothing.

"Then tell me what you want. Plainly. I don't have the patience to guess every time."

Clara rubbed her thumb against the folded notes in her pocket.

"A room nobody will ask me to leave," she said.