by Joey Bush
Mel reached toward me and put her slim hand on my knee. “You know he really cared for you, right?”
I felt a stirring in my stomach, as if this information—spoken directly from my only friend in the city—was ill-formed, false. I wanted to laugh it off, even as I remembered the targeted way his eyes had looked toward mine as we fucked each other, my body moving over his, my breasts bouncing onto his chest. In those moments, we had been one.
I slammed my fist on the table. My eyes burned like wildfire. “Mel. You know. This morning I was so strong. I walked through this city looking for new spaces to rent. There are places open all over Wicker. I just have to be strong, be selective. I have to be more like Drew, in a way. More like a shark. I can get through this fucking—injustice.” I cleared my throat, standing tall next to the table. Mel stood up as well, a bit shaky on her feet. “This is all I’ve worked for; it’s all I have.”
“It’s all I have, as well,” Mel whispered toward me. She cleared her throat. “I’ll help you in any way I can.”
CHAPTER TWO
Mel waited for me to put on my coat and scarf. We skirted out the doorway once more, feeling the cold whip across our faces from the streets below. We grinned at each other, feeling a sense of excitement in this strange new chapter. “Where have you looked already?” Mel asked, turning her head left and right when we reached the main road.
I pointed to the left, noting that many of the business people from the day had scurried into their businesses and offices; they had left these tired streets behind and found solace behind boredom and glass windows. “Let’s try over there,” I murmured.
Mel and I walked quickly down the street, peering into the coffee shops and bustling restaurants. Wicker Park was a continuous flurry of activity, of song. I stopped sharp before a restaurant that was called “The Goat,” peering into the window to see a young woman drinking a pint at the bar, a cell phone in her hand. I looked up at the top of the kitsch-y pub, noting that the building had a FOR RENT sign. I peered toward Mel, scratching at my head for a moment—feeling the strange cleanliness of my hair after so many days of wallowing. Mel shrugged, sensing my interest. “Why not try it?”
I entered the pub door. The smell of greasy food, of musty beer entered my nose, and the comfort made my head spin. Mel and I sat down at the bar, a few seats away from the woman on the telephone. She was speaking with such exactness, with such fortitude, that I understood; she owned this place. I peered around me, feeling the striking masculinity, the power of the cute place. How had she done this on her own? What could I learn from her?
A young man—a bartender about my age—walked toward us languidly, drying a pint glass in his left hand. “Can I get you ladies something to drink?” he asked us. His smile skirted to the left, then to the right. His black curly hair was wrapped in a handkerchief. I thought about him at home, wrapped in the calamity of guitar music and marijuana.
“Two pints. The dark—the porter,” I nodded toward the tap system. He nodded back, swiping two glasses from the top shelf.
Mel shuffled a bit on her seat, looking toward me with a small bit of earnestness. What was my plan? Her eyes wondered.
The woman on the phone finally said her very loud good byes, huffing a bit as she exerted her finger to the OFF button. She sighed, looking up at the bartender. “Those lunatics,” she said, shaking her head. She turned toward us, raising her left eyebrow. “I’m so sorry about that, ladies. Sometimes working out rent issues can be a bit of a bitch. Chicago rents, you know.” She laughed, showing all of her teeth.
Mel elbowed me in the side as the bartender set the drinks before us. I felt my heart beating fast in my chest; I had to act now. I took a slow, steady sip, feeling my eyelids dip languidly over my eyes. I cleared my throat, turning back toward the woman. “You know. I saw you had a place open upstairs.”
The woman laughed for a moment, not taking me seriously. I was, after all, no older than the bartender cleaning her barstools. “Yes. Well, you see. That’s mostly my problem. It’s a wide-open space, one that I can’t seem to do much with. I thought about making it an area for dancing, maybe karaoke on certain nights.” She waved her hand back and forth. “But we’re not really the scene for that, you know. It wouldn’t really work.”
I nodded expressively. “Well, I’m looking for a space right now. For my dance studio. We were bought out by a corporate developer.”
The woman’s dark eyes widened. Her lips slimmed dangerously into a grim smile. “Those bastards,” she murmured. “They got you too? It’s not for that bookstore down the street, is it?”
I nodded, shrugging my shoulders. “It’s fine. I just—obviously—need a new place to be. Maybe even a better place.”
“Well.” The woman turned her eyes to the sky. “This place gets plenty of light. You’d need it—when? During the day?”
“Morning and day time, yeah,” I said. “Sometimes around dinner time, but only about twice or three times a week.” My brain was going over the usual schedule, trying to remember life before the whirlwind of Drew.
The woman nodded. She stood up, revealing that her short frame only brought her five feet into the air. She breathed with an air of determination. “Why don’t we go up and look at it, yeah?” she said. “Bring your beers.”
I grabbed my slippery glass, and Mel did as well. We sauntered up the back steps as they revolved in a tight circle. Finally, my head spinning, we burst into the bright light of the empty room.
I tapped my shoe against the wooden floor, standing up against the wall. “Wow,” I murmured, shaking my head. The room was longer than I had expected when I had been in the pub. The wooden boards swept long and clean across the room, and the windows were strong, zealous. They pointed toward the east, yielding much more sunlight during the morning and the afternoon than in the evening—which was essential, I knew.
“What do you think? Pretty grand, right?” the woman asked.
I nodded, peering around the corner. “And there’s something—“
“An office, over there. And a bathroom. What is it you do?”
“Dance instructor,” I answered, nodding my head. Of course; we had hardly been introduced. I had simply followed her on a mad dash to this beautiful place. I didn’t know anything; I didn’t even know the rent. “My name is Molly, by the way.”
“Oh,” the woman murmured, her mouth forming into a tight OH. “You’re Molly Says Dance, yes?” She grinned. “I’m Carol, by the way.”
I nodded. “Pleased to meet you. How did you know about my dance studio?”
“I make it a point to know what’s going on in this neighborhood. You weren’t competition, no. But a few of my regulars have daughters who attend your studio. They speak rather highly of you. And your prices.” She peered around the empty room, her eyes tracing each nook and cranny of the old place. “You’ll probably have to raise your prices a bit to have a studio here. I don’t know what they charged you at the old place, and I don’t know how you got away with it for so long. Here—because so many of your customers are my regulars, and this will cause them to drink more, eat more, everything more—I’ll give you a good deal.”
I tapped my foot, tipping my head to the right. “What kind of deal?”
Carol stated the number plainly, with a sense of near-sass. She wasn’t doing this on purpose, no. Rather, she was exerting her power. She owned the business below; she owned the property. She couldn’t afford to simply give the place away.
But even so, I felt my heart dip into my stomach once more. Granted, this had been the best deal I’d heard since I’d begun canvasing. And I needed to start somewhere. My head started spinning as I thought of the intricacies of a loan. Was a loan something people did? Was it something I could do?
“I’ll have to take a look at my finances,” I replied, looking at her brightly, confidently. I could make this work, if I wanted to. I could. “I’ll let you know very shortly.”
Carol brought her hand f
orward to shake mine. Her grip was so strong, so forceful. “Please let me know as soon as you can. We both have businesses to run, after all.” Just then her phone began to vibrate, leaving her to turn away from us and push her hand into her pocket. “Yes. Yes. Go,” she announced into the phone, telling the other person to begin the spiel, in this limited timeframe of go-go-go.
I felt rushed. I turned toward Mel, my beer half-empty in my hand. I grinned at her, shrugging my shoulders half-heartedly. I mouthed the words to her as we walked back toward the winding staircase. “We have a dance studio. We have a dance studio.” I allowed the energy to build in my stomach; I allowed myself to fuel up with this sense of earnest excitement. I inhaled, exhaled brightly and then burst into the stunning October world outside the door, a smell of beer on my breath and a feeling of hope in my heart.
CHAPTER THREE
After we left The Goat, Mel told me she had to leave to get her baby from the babysitter. I nodded, understanding. “Baby Jack takes precedence,” I teased her, bringing her close in a hug. I wanted to tell her I was so sorry for blaming her—if only in my head—for the whole debacle with Drew and the studio. But I knew it didn’t matter.
She clapped her hands lightly onto my face, grinning ear-to-ear. “It’s beautiful, Molly,” she murmured. “You’ll find a way to make it yours.”
“Ours,” I corrected her. But she merely shrugged and turned her body toward the subway. She scurried forward, arching her back like a gazelle—like the dancer she truly was. I watched as she disappeared onto the train; I listened to the tracks as it took her far across the city, back to her beautiful baby.
I turned to march back to my apartment, to make spreadsheet after spreadsheet that would iterate what I would need to do to get this beautiful new studio above the bar. I imagined us dancing throughout the day before Mel and I turned our attention to the beers and good conversation. I imagined myself learning all of the regulars’ names, speaking to them daily, developing a community—one I had been searching for throughout Chicago since my arrival!
Something tugged in the pit of my stomach, as I thought about this new future. My old landlord—the one I hadn’t paid back for all those months. If I could get a loan for the new studio—if I could make everything work—then perhaps I could pay him back. I needed to pay him back. I turned my head to the right as I walked, noting that I was only a few blocks away from his new offices. Inhaling slightly, I turned toward the office to face my demons.
A light bell jangled on the door as I opened it, peering into the small leasing office. His secretary stood up as I approached, eyeing me with a bit of distrust. I supposed that was warranted; after all, I hadn’t paid for rent since April. “Hi, Marcia,” I murmured. “Is he here?”
“He’s in back,” she nodded. “Go on. He won’t mind.”
I pushed to the back toward his desk. I found him sitting there, looking up at me expectantly. His eyes were filled with guilt. “Hi, Molly. Please. Sit down.”
I took the seat across from him at the desk. I crossed my legs once before uncrossing them, shuddering in the sheer awkwardness of my body. “Hi. I wanted to talk to you—“
“It’s done, Molly. I already sold him the place. I’m so very sorry.”
But I waved my hand in the air. I knew everything was done, that I couldn’t change the past. But I could make amends. “No. I wanted to talk to you about all the payments I owe you. I know I owe you thousands of dollars. I want you to know—that I’m going to pay you back.”
The landlord’s eyebrow twitched as he peered at me. His black eyes were like daggers. “You want to pay me back?” he asked, as if he were shocked into disbelief.
I nodded. I swallowed slowly, my mind racing. I was sure that I could find the money. If not now, I could orchestrate a series of payments. A hundred dollars here, a hundred dollars there. Perhaps it would take one hundred years, but I would pay him back. “I need to pay you back. I always meant to. I wanted to let you know that our working relationship can’t be over until I’ve paid my debt to you.” I felt the strength of my words; I felt a sense of adulthood come over me like a wave. Perhaps this was all adulthood would really be; standing up to your fears, to your mess-ups. Standing, unflinching, and accepting them whole-heartedly as your own.
But the landlord put his long fingers into the air and arched his left eyebrow. “I’m so sorry, Molly. I simply can’t allow you to pay me back.” His voice was direct, if a little soft. He was talking down to me, I knew, even as I tried to rise to his level.
“You don’t understand, I don’t think,” I said hesitantly. I wanted to make things right! I wanted to make things even.
“I do, Molly. And I appreciate it, truly. You’ve been a marvelous tenant.” He said it so succinctly, like there was no dispute.
I shook my head. “I don’t think you understand. I—I didn’t pay you. I haven’t been marvelous, even for a moment.”
But he shook his head, allowing his long, white fingers to elongate once more. In my head, they looked like spiders—or long snakes. “No, Molly. I don’t want to deal with payments until the final days of your life. I’m cutting you off. You’re free. Everything that’s happened between us will not follow you, will not haunt you. Go off, and start a new life somewhere else. If that means you start a dance studio or a nudist colony, I don’t care. Just go. Be. Live. Do well. I believe in you. I always have.” He smiled at me and winked at me for a moment, his face happy—content.
My arms went limp on either side of my body. I shook my head in disbelief at such kindness. “How can I—how can I thank you?” I sputtered.
He stood up and reached across the desk. I stood up to greet his hand, to shake it like a true adult. “Just by living the best you can,” he murmured. He tapped at his desk a bit loudly, and his secretary opened the door on the other side, allowing me an easy exit. “Be well.”
I stepped from the leasing office, feeling the fire once more in my belly. Anything was possible, even in the wake of all that had come before. I could continue down this path of wellness, of beauty. I could create the world I wanted to live in. I leaped in the air, high like a ballerina in front of the leasing office, feeling the October wind whip around my long arms, my pretty legs. I giggled with glee. Everything was going to be okay.
CHAPTER FOUR
I was floating on air when I finally arrived back to my apartment. I walked to my mailbox and opened it to find a bill. Just one bill. I flapped it against my thigh, still thinking about the previous day’s efforts. My keys jangled in my hand as I neared my door. I was thinking about all I would have to do that evening, all I would have to calculate. How much could I make if I charged this much and had this many students? How much could I make if I paid this much for rent—and perhaps got a different apartment, one that was even cheaper, even shittier? The numbers revolved fast in my brain.
Suddenly, to my left, I heard a jangling down the hall. Someone else messing with his keys. Unconsciously, I peered down the hall.
But I immediately brought my face away. Unfortunately, Drew and I were coming home at the same time. I remembered that morning, when he had yelled at me for my unresponsiveness as he apologized, over and over. I couldn’t care about it; not now. But my heart started yammering in my chest, and I wasn’t able to fit my key in the lock.
“Have a good day?” Drew called from down the hallway. He was watching my struggle.
I wanted to turn toward him and yell at him. I was burning with a sense of confidence unforeseen in my past years. I leaned against my door as he began walking toward me, taking lazy footfalls and gazing at me with his big, wolf-like eyes. “Listen. I thought about this morning—a lot. And I’m so sorry for being aggressive.” He looked down at his keys, at his hands. He seemed mortified. I took pleasure in it, if only for a moment. “And I’m sorry about buying your dance studio. I didn’t even know you were a dance teacher. You told me you were in PR.”
I tapped my foot on the ground, unintereste
d in what I had said, what I had done. “It doesn’t matter—” I began. I wanted him to leave; I wanted his shadow to pass back down the hallway. I didn’t want to remember what passion, what fire had existed between us. It could never last, anyway; he was far too rich, far too important. And I was just a lowly dance teacher who could hardly pay rent. I shrugged. “Good night.” I turned and placed my key in the lock and started to turn it.
But he placed his hand on the door, stopping me. “Wait,” he murmured. I could feel his breath so close to mine. It took all my strength not to reach up and kiss him. I bit my lip.
“What is it?” I stared at the scratched wood on the door.
“I wanted to ask you something. I have to go to this benefit thing. Friends of my father’s, you know. I want to be a pillar of this community—” Noticing that he was losing my attention, my care, he switched topics. “Anyway. I need a date to the benefit.” His eyes looked at me, searching.
I raised my eyebrow. “And you want me to be your date?”
He nodded. His eyebrows were dark above his eyes, and he looked so incredibly handsome in the light emanating from the moon in the early October night.
I shook my head, showing him a well-mannered smile. “You know. I really think I have something going that night.”
I turned back toward my door and started to open it once more. But he paused me again, placing his hand against the wood. “I haven’t told you which day it is.”
I raised my eyebrow to him once more. Why was he being so confident, so cheeky? “What’s your point? You think if it is the right day, I’ll come with you? That’s where you’re wrong.”
He cleared his throat. He murmured the following words, “There will be dancing.”
Suddenly, I was unable to fit the key in the lock once more. I sighed languidly, feeling the excitement building in my blood. Dancing. Public dancing. With a man. I hadn’t done that in years. I turned back toward him. “And what makes you think I’d be interested in that?”
