by Claire Adams
“Actually, most places don’t do that anymore,” I tell her.
It’s a mistake.
“How would you know that?” she asks as she opens a new bag and gives it a deep inhale. “Ooh, this one’s nice.”
She hands it over to me, and before I even think about what I’m doing, I give it a sniff.
It’s heavy on the Drakkar Noir, but it’s mellowing out the lingering taste of the tequila, so I keep it there for a couple extra seconds.
“Not bad, right?” she asks.
“Meh.”
“What does yours smell like?” she asks.
I hand her back the one dripping with cologne and open the bag I’ve been holding. Yeah, this is still pretty weird, but it’s not nearly as creepy as I thought it would—“Okay,” I tell her. “This is one of the bad ones.”
I hand it to her, thinking she’s going to just put it back on the table, but even with my warning, she opens the bag back up.
“Shit, you weren’t joking.”
“I have no idea why you would think I was,” I tell her. “All right, this isn’t as bad as I thought it would be, but the novelty’s starting to wear off. How much longer are we going to stay here and smell people’s clothes?”
“As long as it takes,” she says. “We are not going home alone tonight.”
“Is that what this is about?” I ask.
“What?” she asks, looking for another blue-tagged shirt to smell. She grabs one and hands it to me.
“Dane,” I say.
“Of course it’s about Dane,” she says. “You haven’t talked about anything else since you left.”
“I’m fine,” I tell her.
“That’s good then,” she says. “So you should be open to meeting someone tonight.”
“Yeah,” I snicker. “Kids, did I ever tell you the story about how I met your dad? Well, I was at this shirt-smelling party and your dad’s sweat just got me right between the legs. It was love at first scent.”
“Hey, you never know,” she says. “People meet in some pretty strange ways sometimes.”
“You’re actually serious about getting me to hook up with someone here, aren’t you?”
She opens a bag.
“This one smells like beer and corn chips,” she says, putting it back on the table.
“You’re not answering my question.”
“Yeah,” she says. “I’m not saying you’re going to meet Mr. Right by smelling his sweaty shirt, but you might just find someone who can take you for a nice tumble and remind you that there are other fish to fuck.”
“That’s easily the worst thing you’ve ever said to me,” I tell her.
“Just lighten up, will you? We’re here to have fun. Let it be fun.”
I open up a new bag, but it’s only a formality. After being smacked in the face by the garment whose owner never showered, I’m done putting my olfactory nerves in the line of fire.
Only, the smell wafting from the bag is a familiar one, even holding the bag open and nowhere near my face.
I close it up and walk to the picture line.
Annabeth’s behind me a second later.
“You changed your mind in a hurry,” she says. “What convinced you?”
“A long shot,” I tell her.
Of course the shirt smells like Dane.
The line moves fast, and before I know it, I’m trying to figure out what kind of expression says, “It’s not weird that I’m holding your dirty shirt because the smell gets me hot and bothered,” but it’s not that easy an expression to divine.
I don’t know what the picture looks like because I don’t look at the wall. The odds of Dane actually being here are so remote that I don’t even want to know whose shirt I’m holding.
Annabeth walks with me back to the table, and I set the bag down. Annabeth, though, just picks it right back up, opens it and puts her whole face in the bag.
“That’s not bad,” she says. “A little conventional for my taste, but it’s all right.”
“Excuse me,” a man’s voice comes from behind me.
I turn around.
It’s not Dane.
“I saw your picture up there, holding my shirt,” he says. “My name’s Will.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” I tell him. “I’m kind of new at this, so I don’t really know—”
“Her name’s Leila,” Annabeth interrupts. “She’s single.”
I flash a glare, but quickly turn back to the man.
“I’m Leila,” I tell him. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Would you like to get a drink?” he asks.
“Only if you’re buying,” Annabeth answers for me.
I scowl at her again, but walk with the man to the bar.
“It’s all right,” he says. “It’s my first time at one of these, too. What would you like to drink?”
“Tequila,” I tell him. “Actually, make that a double with a beer back.”
“Hitting it hard,” he says, smiling. “I like that.”
He’s got a cute smile, but he’s not Dane.
I really thought I was doing the best thing for both of us by not dragging things out. Long-distance relationships never work, and neither of us were ready to give up enough to stay together, so I shouldn’t feel this conflicted.
He orders my drinks and something for himself and we find a place to sit and talk. I could kill Annabeth for just leaving me with a stranger like this.
“So, what do you do?” he asks.
“I’m a stockbroker,” I tell him.
“Sounds exciting,” he says. “Are you one of those people on the floor of the exchange?”
“No,” I tell him. “I handle the portfolios of different clients, give them suggestions as to what stocks within their realm of interest and desired risk level might be good choices. I basically try to make people money.”
“That’s not a bad gig,” he says.
I hope he doesn’t think it’s rude that I take both shots and drink half my beer before responding.
“It’s what I do,” I tell him boringly. “What do you do?”
“I’m a fireman,” he says.
Oh shit.
“Really.” No, it’s not a question.
“Yeah,” he says. “It really takes it out of ya, but it’s pretty rewarding stuff.”
“I bet. How long have you been doing it?”
“About five years,” he says.
“That is fascinating.”
Firemen do something funny to me, and I know I’m not alone here.
“Yeah, so what got you into stocks?” he asks.
“Oh, you know,” I tell him. “Being a part of the financial system that runs everything has its perks—so what made you want to be a fireman?”
He smiles, and I’m starting to find that smile more than just cute.
“I always wanted to be a fireman,” he says. “When I was a kid, most of my friends would talk about being rock stars or movie stars or astronauts or whatever, but ever since I can remember, I just wanted to be a fireman. I wanted to be one of those guys that people look to at their most vulnerable times.”
And I think he’s just explained my infatuation with firemen.
“It’s not all heroics and daring rescues, though,” he says. “On the one hand, you spend a lot of time waiting, and when you do get a call, you just hope you get there before anyone’s hurt. I’ve run across some pretty terrible things. But we don’t have to talk about that. Where are you from?”
“Canada,” I answer, batting my eyes. It’s not a conscious act. “So, are you on call?”
“Am I on call?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say. “Like, what are the chances of you having to rush out of here to go save an orphanage?”
He laughs, perhaps a bit uncomfortably.
“Probably not too high,” he says. “I don’t think there are any orphanages around here. I think the only way I’d get a call is if we had something catastrophic.”
“Wow.”
Who am I right now?
Of course, that thought leads me back to standing in Dane’s doorway, and for a moment, I completely forget about the sexy fireman sitting across the table from me, trying to decide whether I’m attractive enough to forgive a little bit of crazy.
“So, what brings you here?” he asks.
“Oh,” I say, straightening up and trying to at least pretend that I’m not a complete flake. “My friend Annabeth,” I tell him. “She dragged me out of the house, put me in a car and told me we were coming here. She’s the one standing in line to have her picture taken with four bags right now.”
He looks over my shoulder, and the way he’s closing his eyes while his upper body shakes tells me that he’s spotted her.
“She looks…determined,” he says.
“Yeah, she’s a bit of a freak,” I tell him. “So, what brings you here?”
If I can’t think of anything intelligent to say, I can at least bat back the same questions he’s asking me, right?
“My brother-in-law,” he says. “He and my sister come to these things all the time and try to ‘meet’ each other by smell.”
And that’s fantasy number two. Okay, so it’s not why he’s here, but at least he’s familiar enough with the concept of the open-eyed-blind-date that it shouldn’t be too weird if I suggest it sometime in the future.
And now I’m thinking about Dane again.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him.
“What’s wrong?” he asks. “They’re really not weird people, I actually think it’s kind of romantic.”
“It is romantic,” I tell him. “It’s just—I’m still in the process of getting over someone right now, and everything is making me think of him.”
“I’m sorry,” he says. “If it helps at all, I know what that’s like. I got divorced a few months back. This is actually the first time I’ve really gone out since it happened.”
“It sucks, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he says. “It does.”
We sit through an uncomfortable silence for a little while.
“Would you like another drink?” he asks. “It looks like you’ve got quite the tolerance.”
“Not so much,” I tell him, “but I would love another drink.”
If I’m going to get Dane off of my mind for good, this is probably how I’m going to have to do it: one good-looking fireman at a time.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Tracers
Dane
I don’t know how long we’ve been swimming, but I’m pretty sure I’m starting to play chicken with the “don’t get too drunk” rule. I’m not getting mean or even slurring my words that much, but I have to admit, I’m pretty sloshed.
Wrigley’s off at the other end of the swimming pool, cackling with one of her old friends.
Me, on the other hand? I’m making another trip to the drink table and trying to figure out what I can have that’s going to keep the buzz going, but not put me over the edge.
Before I can decide, though, Wrigley’s hand is on my shoulder and she’s telling me that we’ve got to get out of here right now.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“Someone’s coming,” she says. “Someone our guys in the hall can’t detain or turn around. Grab your shit and come with me.”
I should have known tonight was going to end this way.
I grab my clothes and Wrigley grabs my hand. She leads me to the women’s showers and whispers for me to get dressed.
It’s completely dark in here right now, I can only assume to throw whoever might go to the pool that there aren’t a bunch of recently-naked drunk people hiding in the women’s locker room.
“Did someone grab all the liquor?” I ask in a whisper.
“It’s taken care of,” a man’s voice answers from my left.
I guess we’re all in here.
If it’s a woman coming for a swim, it does occur to me that we’re probably going to give the poor lady a heart attack, all of us crammed in here. I can’t vouch for whether everyone’s clothed or not, the way Wrigley basically threw me into the room.
“If the guards think everyone works here, I don’t know why we’re worried about someone finding us. Everyone’s dressed, right?”
Wrigley answers, “The guards think we work here, but that’s not going to hold up for very long when someone who actually belongs here blows the whistle.”
“Is there a back way out of here?” I ask as quietly as possible.
“Yeah,” someone says, “but it’s in view of the door. If they’re coming down this hallway or they get in the pool—”
The sound of a nearby door opening silences the room. I lean toward the only minor source of light—the crack beneath the door—and listen for high heels.
There are footsteps and they’re coming closer. I have no idea if it’s a woman or a man and even if I did, it’s so dark in here that I couldn’t mount any kind of escape anyway.
What’s worse? I really have to piss right now.
Wrigley’s still holding my hand, so I use that, coupled with the memory of her height relative to mine to lean down and whisper right in her ear. “I’ve got to get out of here.”
There’s no response other than a squeeze of the hand.
The footsteps have ceased, but that doesn’t mean the coast is clear. No doors have opened since the sound of the footprints, so whoever’s out there is still out there.
I’m crossing my legs as best I can and trying to think of anything but water, streams, rivers, lakes, reservoirs, waterfalls, rivers, sprinklers, hoses, bathtubs, sinks, rain, the Pacific Northwest, oceans, swimming pools, showers, warmth, green tea, or the movie Labyrinth, but I wouldn’t have that list if those weren’t the first things that cross my mind.
Wrigley notices my squirming and squeezes my hand again.
In return, I squeeze her hand nine times: three short squeezes, three long squeezes and three more short squeezes. All I can do is hope she’s got at least some familiarity with Morse code.
I feel her other hand on my shoulder, pushing down. I bend my knees, and a moment later, feel her breath against my skin.
“You’re just going to have to hang in there,” she says. “We can’t risk someone hearing you.”
Well, she knows what my ordeal is. That’s got to be in my favor somehow.
But, as I start thinking about tributaries and rivulets, sandboxes and childhood embarrassment, I’m about to my breaking point.
I squeeze Wrigley’s hand again, more frantically this time, and she’s immediately pulling me. There is no way for me to know if I’m going to run into something, so all I can do is trust Wrigley to know where she’s going and know how to lead me there without having me end up stubbing my toe on something, and with the resulting profane yell, betraying our presence.
After a few dizzying turns, Wrigley stops and puts her hand on my shoulder again, bidding me bend down a bit.
“Aim for the side of the bowl,” she says. “Sound really carries in here.”
“Thank you,” I tell her. “How am I supposed to—”
She puts something cold and flat in my hand. Before she lets it go, I feel her move it and the screen of her cell phone nearly blinds me.
“Make it fast,” she says, “and don’t use the cell phone to find your way back. Whoever’s out there might be able to see the glow under the door.”
With that, she points at a stall, and as quickly as I can, as quietly as I can, I make it inside.
My zipper’s down and ah, sweet relief.
I’m careful to keep a good hold on the cell phone and everything’s going great. That is, right up to the moment when, out of pure habit, I lift one foot and flush the toilet.
Fuck.
Twenty-some-odd people shift nervously in the adjoining room, and I’m just hoping whoever was in the pool room has already left. That pipe dream is shot to shit when I turn around to find Wrigley pushing her way into the stall, telling me
to get on the seat and keep my head down.
“She heard you,” Wrigley whispers as she somehow manages to work her way onto the seat with me.
“How does she know the toilet was flushed by someone who isn’t supposed to be here?” I ask.
“Nobody’s supposed to be here,” she answers. “Nobody comes in this late, not to the pool, anyway. Why do you think we wait until after midnight to go swimming?”
She has a point.
“How do you know she heard me?”
“She asked ‘who’s there’ right after you flushed,” Wrigley answers. “How else did you think I knew it’s a woman?”
“Maybe she won’t come in here, though,” I say.
I should really learn how not to jinx things.
There’s a rush of bare feet over the hard floor, everyone’s rushing for the entrance to the hall.
“Be quiet,” Wrigley says, and then the door to the showers opens.
Just a fraction of a second later, another door opens from the other side, and I’m wondering how inconspicuous a locked stall door is really going to be if someone walks through here looking for trespassers.
“Who’s there?” the woman’s voice comes, her voice reverberating against the tiled walls.
Wrigley and I hold our breath. The light turns on just as the door to the hallway closes. It sounds like everyone else got out, but Wrigley and I are stuck in here.
Right now, I’m not so worried about anyone else getting caught; I just want to get the hell out of here with Wrigley and not in handcuffs.
“Hello?” the woman calls.
I was really hoping she’d hear the other door close and figure whoever was in here had left, but she’s not giving up so easily. Her shadow is just on the other side of the stall door.
“Thank God,” Wrigley says.
“Who’s in there?”
“I had to use the bathroom and then the lights went off. I couldn’t see anything.”
“Who do you work for? Why are you in here so late?”
“I could ask you the same question,” Wrigley says.
“I’m Paula Owen, I run the company that owns this floor,” the woman answers. “Who are you and why are you in this bathroom so late?”
Wrigley turns and puts her feet on the floor. “I’m sorry, Miss Owen,” she says. “I didn’t know that was you. I’m Janet, one of the new assistants. This is kind of embarrassing, but I kind of have a thing about using public restrooms. It’s a privacy thing. I don’t like going where I think other people are going to, you know, hear anything.”
