The Missing Hours

by Julia Dahl

  “I can’t really walk in these shoes,” said Claudia.

  Ah.

  Trevor had to crane his neck to see to the top of Ben’s brownstone: He counted one, two, three, four, five levels of windows, all dark, shades drawn. There was an unlit gas lantern in the little square front patio. Ivy crawled up the exterior.

  “Ben’s mom is kind of a hermit,” said Claudia. She opened a waist-high iron gate to a just-below-street-level door and knocked. “She’s always around, but she stays away.”

  “What about his dad?”

  “He died when Ben was nine. Motorcycle accident.”

  Trevor’s uncle had died that way when Trevor was thirteen. Uncle AJ and Trevor’s dad had been riding together since they were young; dirt bikes first, then they both got Hondas in their twenties, when they could afford the insurance. Before either had wives or kids or problems. Would Claudia be interested in the story of how Trevor was pulled out of biology class to learn the news? Or that he’d spoken at the funeral? He didn’t have time to find out.

  “She’s here!” squealed a blonde. “Where the fuck have you been? For real? I think I texted you twenty times!”

  “Adrienne,” said Claudia, “this is my friend Trevor.”

  Adrienne, her hair pulled back in ponytail so tight it took the corners of her eyes with it, looked him up and down. What did she see?

  “Well, come on in, you two,” she said, stepping back, sweeping an arm for them to enter. “Ben said he wasn’t sure you were coming.”

  “I wasn’t sure, either,” said Claudia. “I’ve been sick all week.”

  Adrienne stepped back. “Are you contagious? You better not be contagious. You know we’re going to Mauritius next week.”

  Claudia stiffened. “I’m fine now.”

  Would they believe her? It was clear to him that she was hurting, that every word she spoke took effort, but maybe the dress and make-up was enough for these people.

  The room they walked into was unlike anything Trevor had ever seen in real life. He estimated you could park half a dozen cars inside. At the far end, near some sort of atrium, Trevor saw full-sized trees. He counted six sofas and three chandeliers; the walls were covered in floor-to-ceiling tapestries that looked like they belonged in a medieval castle. The whole place had a citadel vibe: a suit of armor in one corner faced a life-sized horse constructed of what he guessed was driftwood in another. And above him, a second blonde, this one with her long hair hanging loose past her shoulders, stood on an interior stone balcony. A Juliet balcony, Trevor knew from years building sets for the community theater where his mom worked. He’d planned to hook up with the theater world at NYU, but the first show he volunteered for required a twenty-hour weekly commitment, and he had to bail at the end of September because he was so behind in classwork. The amount of reading alone was easily five times what he’d ever been given in high school. Even his roommate Boyd agreed that it was literally impossible to read everything the professors assigned. The difference was that Boyd, who had attended a private boarding school in Connecticut, seemed used to it, while Trevor was struggling. So no more extracurriculars except church. And no spring break. Unless you counted Claudia.

  The girl on the balcony appeared to be taking a selfie. She shook out her hair, then leaned over the railing.

  “Has anybody ever spit on you, Ben?” she shouted.

  The ex, Ben, was rolling a joint on a leather sofa worn light and soft with age, but probably still worth more than any car Trevor’s family had ever owned.

  “No, Lolly,” said Ben, not lifting his head. “No one has ever spit on me in my own house.”

  Lolly laughed and cleared her throat like she was about to hock a loogie from the balcony.

  “You’re disgusting, Lolly,” shouted a lanky redhead standing behind the bar, which appeared to be fashioned from a single slice of some massive tree. The redhead was dressed in a paisley shirt, open to reveal chest hair, and plunking oversized ice cubes into crystal glasses with a pair of tongs.

  “You’re a loser, Harris,” shouted Lolly. Then: “Claudia!”

  Trevor watched Ben see Claudia. Watched his face brighten into a smile. Fuck, he thought. I’m going back to the dorm alone.

  “Come on, pretty lady,” said Ben. “First puff is yours.”

  Claudia went to him. She sat down and inhaled and let him stroke her hair.

  “You all good?” he asked.

  She looked at Ben and for a moment Trevor thought she was going to kiss him. He felt his heart shudder. But then her face reset. Claudia nodded, sucked on the joint a second time, and looked up at Trevor. “You want?”

  “I’m good,” he said. He hadn’t smoked since getting arrested and tonight didn’t seem like the night to restart.

  “Who’s your friend, Claudia?” asked Lolly, descending the winding stone staircase from the balcony. Her dress looked like it was made from Kleenex and her feet were bare. Lolly put her hand on Trevor’s shoulder, let her fingers slide down to his elbow. He looked at Claudia and stiffened, but she didn’t seem to care.

  “This is Trevor,” Claudia said.

  “You go to NYU?” asked Lolly. “What are you studying?” Before he could answer, Lolly continued. “I really hope you don’t say business. Every fucking guy I meet says he’s studying business. Come on! Doesn’t anybody study art anymore? Or history? Or fucking literature?” She punctuated each syllable of the final word with a faux British flourish.

  Ben chuckled.

  “Because,” said Adrienne, “you can’t make money in art or history or fucking literature. We’ve been arguing about this. My sister has decided she wants to marry an artist.”

  “Not marry. And not just an artist. Somebody who can, like, build stuff. Like, an installation artist. You know that guy I was dating, the one from Geneva? He literally couldn’t rehang a picture that fell off the wall at his apartment. He called the super.”

  “You broke up with him over that?” said Ben. “You ladies are cold.”

  “He broke up with her,” said Adrienne.

  “It was mutual,” said Lolly. “Anyway, back to the point. Which is that a man should have practical skills. He should be able to build things.”

  “What do you need built, Lolly?” asked Harris.

  “Nothing!”

  “We get it, love,” said Ben. “You want a real man.”

  “Exactly. A real man.”

  “Trevor, do you want a beer?” asked Harris

  “Sure,” said Trevor.

  “At your service!” Harris saluted, pulled a tall glass from the wall of stemware behind him, then bent down and brought up a bottle of beer and poured slowly. “I’m working on the foam issue.”

  “Harris likes playing bartender,” said Lolly. She turned to Trevor. “So where are you from, Trevor?”

  “Ohio.”

  “Shut up,” said Adrienne, pulling out her phone. “What’s your Insta?”

  He told her and she searched him. He’d only posted three times since leaving home: an NYU banner; a selfie with his three suitemates; hippie musicians playing beneath the arch in Washington Square Park. The rest of his feed was high school. Church and dances and track meets and cast parties and camping. After a few seconds of scrolling, Adrienne turned her phone around and shoved it toward her sister’s face.

  “Oh my God, he was Homecoming King?!”

  Lolly plopped down on the sofa and patted the seat next to her. “Come sit, King Trevor. Tell me more about yourself.”

  “I’m studying business.”

  “No!” Lolly squealed, simultaneously feigning disappointment and delight. Ben nodded his head, amused. Even Claudia smiled.

  “Is that true?” Claudia asked.

  “No,” he said.

  “OMG, you’re awesome. This guy is hilarious, Claudia.”

  There was a knock at the door and Adrienne flitted away to answer.

  “Who else is coming?” asked Harris as he handed Trevor the beer.
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br />   “I told everybody they could come by or meet us at the club,” said Ben. “The set starts at eleven and I’ve got Ubers coming at ten thirty.”

  Adrienne squealed at the door and Lolly went to see who it was. Trevor drank his beer and asked Harris for another. Over the next hour, half a dozen more people entered the house. Everyone was up and hugging, dropping purses, finding drinks, taking selfies, sending messages. Ben opened a box that looked like a chess set but inside were weed vapes: “Party favors,” he announced, and passed them around. Harris shattered a wine glass, prompting applause. Finally Ben whistled—an impressive, practiced call—and it was time to get into the Ubers.

  On the sidewalk, just as they were about to climb into the SUV, Claudia grabbed Trevor’s hand and said, “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  She looked him right in the eye. He thought: She needs me. And though he knew it was not the same thing, he allowed his mind to think—to hope: She wants me. Lolly and Adrienne got in the far back seat with another girl whose name Trevor didn’t catch, and Claudia and Trevor sat next to each other in the middle row. The nameless girl pulled out a Juul and started to puff. In the rearview mirror, Trevor could see the driver watching her. But he didn’t say anything.

  “Did you tell Claudia you invited Chad?” Adrienne asked Lolly.

  “I invited Chad,” said Lolly. “I saw him yesterday at the gym. I figured you guys were cool again after Friday.”

  “Friday?” asked Claudia.

  “When we left Down Under you two were hanging out.”

  “Oh, right. Yeah, cool.”

  Trevor looked at Claudia. She seemed to be concentrating really hard. Down Under was a foul-smelling bar near campus that was known for a loose ID policy. Trevor had been there once with Boyd, but they’d left after a drunk guy called Boyd a faggot.

  “Who’s Chad?” asked the nameless girl.

  “We went to school with him for a while,” said Adrienne. “Then he moved to L.A.”

  “Why would Claudia care if he’s coming?”

  “I don’t care,” said Claudia.

  “They had a little thing in high school and she dumped him for Ben and he got all upset.”

  “Is that what happened?” asked Lolly.

  “It doesn’t matter,” said Claudia. “It was a long time ago.”

  “Right,” said Adrienne. “And you’re cool now. Like I said. He goes to NYU, too, right?”

  “Right,” said Claudia. “He’s in my dorm.”

  They pulled up to the club and Trevor let the girls get out first. It was the kind of place he’d seen on TV: a long velvet rope with people lined up waiting to get in; big men with walkie-talkies and clipboards standing guard; red light bleeding from inside each time the heavy entrance doors opened. Lolly and Adrienne walked to the front and the rope parted for them all. A tall woman in a sparkly black dress and sandals that buckled up her calves showed them to an elevated corner-booth area. The table at their ankles was crowded with half a dozen bottles of liquor and glass carafes of what he assumed were cranberry juice and orange juice. Perrier. Ice in a silver bucket. Harris went to work, kneeling down, pouring, passing. The music was too loud and the lights were too low. Everybody seemed to move back and forth between behaving as if they were on display and entirely alone. Adrienne stood at the railing separating their sofas from the main dance floor, posing with her lips around her cocktail straw as she surveyed the room, assessing. Trevor watched as she stirred her drink, then stuck her thumb in her nose, pinched something out, and let it fall from her fingers to the floor.

  Claudia was at the railing, too, facing the crowd but not examining with Adrienne’s purpose. It was as if she were looking at the ocean.

  “You okay?” he asked her.

  She nodded. “Are you having fun?”

  “Yeah,” he said.

  “Good. Thanks for coming.”

  “Thanks for inviting me.”

  “Lolly wants to hook up with you,” Claudia said. “You should if you want. Not that you need my permission. She’s cool. She does the whole Earth Mother thing. She loves nice guys.”

  What could he say? “Well, that’s me.”

  At least that made her smile.

  “Drink?” shouted Ben, holding a glass, motioning to Trevor.

  “I’m going to the bathroom,” said Claudia.

  Trevor took the glass from Ben and sat down.

  “Happy birthday,” Trevor said. “It’s a big one.”

  “I kind of can’t believe I’m spending my twenty-first doing the same shit we’ve been doing for years. This fucking club. Yawn. Don’t tell these guys I said that.”

  “I won’t.”

  “I should be jumping out of an airplane or something.”

  “I did that once.”

  “You did? What was it like?”

  “It was amazing,” said Trevor. He’d gone with his youth group for graduation. “Like flying.”

  “See? Exactly.” He leaned back and shook his head. “I guess I gotta start taking shit in hand.”

  Trevor and Ben watched the crowd from the booth. More people joined them, but no one else introduced themselves to Trevor. Claudia came back from the bathroom and poured herself a drink, drank it quickly, poured another, and then stood up abruptly, knocking into a newcomer. She fell forward, hitting the table with her hip, toppling what was left of the cranberry juice into the ice bucket, and the ice bucket onto the floor.

  “Castro’s drunk already,” said the guy she’d bumped into, laughing.

  Claudia sat for a moment on the floor, her feet angled awkwardly beside her. Ben remained on the sofa. Trevor reached forward. “You okay?”

  She took his hand and stood up, grabbed the railing, then let go and disappeared down into the dance floor.

  Adrienne and the nameless girl from the car laughed and rolled their eyes.

  “Nice going, Chad,” said Ben.

  Chad sat down beside Trevor, leaning in toward what was left of the liquor tray.

  “That girl needs to slow down,” he said, pouring a drink. “For real. Is there anybody at this party who hasn’t fucked her?”

  “Whoa,” said Trevor.

  “Who are you?” asked Chad.

  “This is Trevor,” said Ben. “He’s with Claudia.”

  Chad stopped pouring and looked at Trevor. “You better use protection, dude. For real.”

  Nameless giggled.

  “I thought you guys were her friends,” said Trevor, and maybe his tone was a little accusatory. But come on. Her ex was just going to let this guy talk like that?

  “That’s the problem,” muttered Ben, motioning to the waitress to take care of Claudia’s spill.

  “What’s the problem, Ben?” asked Chad, his voice rising.

  “That you guys are friends. Just friends.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Fuck you,” said Ben. “Seriously, why are you here? It’s not his fault you can’t close a deal you’ve been working on for five years. Did you think it was gonna happen tonight?”

  “I wouldn’t touch that shit with a pole, man. She fucked a guy in our dorm the first week at school. Did her whole, I’m-so-into-you-thing, then dropped him cold. Gave him crabs. I’m serious. He was pissed.”

  Trevor stood up, maybe a little too close to Chad.

  “Whoa,” said Chad, looking up. “I’m just trying to give you the heads-up, buddy.”

  “I’m not your buddy,” said Trevor.

  TREVOR

  They shared a cab back to the dorm in silence. Claudia held Trevor’s elbow getting in, then she shut her eyes and leaned her forehead on the window. How drunk was she? How drunk was he? The club’s music buzzed in his ears, a pressing, insistent residue of the night. His body was awash in intoxicants; alcohol, sugar, nicotine, envy, anger, arousal.

  Claudia let herself into her room and before she closed the door she whispered, “Thank you.” And then: “I’m sorry.” And then, again: “Thank you.”


  The video popped up on Trevor’s phone the next evening. He was getting his backpack ready for Bible study when it came in as a text from a blocked number, sent at 5:37 p.m.

  Claudia Castro is a whore

  He pressed play, not really even thinking. The image was a close-up so extreme it took a moment for him to recognize what he was looking at. A woman’s mouth. Pubic hair. An erect penis. The camera pulled back and he saw that the woman was Claudia. Her eyes were closed, her hair obscuring much of her face. She was on her hands and knees and there was a guy in a gray T-shirt behind her. It was the kid he’d seen outside her door. The one with the guitar. Trevor heard the muted, rough sounds of bodies moving against each other. Then a voice: “Dude, she peed!” The camera swung around and there was Chad, the asshole from Ben’s party. He was bare chested, his face red and sweaty and smiling.

  The first thing Trevor thought was, I have to show her this. And then, I can’t show her this. And then, I have to show this to somebody. And then, I can’t show this to anybody.

  Five minutes later, Claudia knocked at his door. He saw in her face that whoever had sent it to him had sent it to her, too. And something about the way he looked must have told her the same. She walked in, sat on his sofa, and put her head in her hands. The sun was setting between two of the NYU housing towers outside his window, casting the cluttered room with a dramatic glow.

  “I wonder if he sent it to anyone else,” Claudia whispered. “I wonder if it’s online.”

  “Do you want me to check?”

  She didn’t respond.

  “Was that last Friday night?” he asked.

  “I was really drunk.”

  He wanted to say, I love you. He wanted to say, They will pay for this.

  She noticed his backpack by the door. “Where are you going?”

  “Church,” he said. A pause. “Wanna come?”

  * * *

  The door to Pastor Evan’s apartment was propped open with a woman’s shoe. A dainty sneaker, bleached white. Inside there was laughing. Whitney’s laugh was most prominent, as usual. Whitney laughed a lot, and until that moment standing at the door with Claudia, Trevor had thought her boisterousness attractive. Not anymore. Her laugh was an affront now. Like a waving flag of ignorance. This was going to end badly. Trevor grabbed Claudia’s hand and turned to leave, but Whitney was too quick, bounding from inside the apartment to wrap her arms around his neck.