I sit up, struggling against a wave of nausea. It's very dark, and it takes me a moment before I realize that I'm in the share-house. This is the girl's room, I think, Pandora's, and the rest of it comes back in a rush: the strip club, the goggled-men and the flight to the taxi, but whatever happened after that is gone.
A door opens and I shield my eyes at the inrush of light; the girl is standing in the doorframe, her body an indistinct smudge of black.
"Mind closing the door?" I ask. She does, and enters the room, setting a glass down on the night stand.
"Water," she informs me.
"Thank you."
"How are you feeling?"
"I'm alright."
It's a lie: the inside of my skull feels like someone went at it with a dull razor, and my ears are ringing so badly that the girl might as well be talking at me from behind a glass wall.
"Taylor won't tell me what happened," she's saying. "But you don't smell drunk."
"Long story."
I reach for the water. It's luke-warm and I can barely feel it going down. Suddenly it's all I can do to keep my eyes open. The girl gets off the bed and I can hear her moving about the room. I lie down and when my I open my eyes again it's morning. The girl is sitting at the desk in front of a computer.
"What time is it?" I ask. She turns to me.
"Almost 10."
"Where are my clothes?"
"On the chair," she says, pointing. I grab my pants and boxers and throw them on beneath the sheets. Standing up sends a jolt of pain through my head, but I feel better than I did last night, and the ringing has subsided in my ears.
"You're leaving?"
"I need to talk to Taylor."
"What happened last night?"
"When I find out you'll be the first to know."
"It's about where you come from isn't it?"
She is gazing at me impassively, her legs drawn up before her on the chair.
"Where I come from?"
"You know," she says, hesitating. "The other side."
I stare at her.
"You're serious?"
Her head tilts slightly, frowning.
"Serious?"
"You actually think I'm an outsider?"
"Well," she says, and then stops herself. "Wait, what do you mean?"
"Why would you think that?"
"The line on your face. I just thought..."
"You can see it?"
"Of course I can see it. I've always been able to see you. I mean, I've been using the powder for a while now."
"Shit," I mutter, pulling my t-shirt over my head. "I was born here. You want to check my driver's license?"
I toss her my wallet, the tension of the past few days boiling over; I'm sick of all of it, never having a clue about what's going on, and the bizarre freak show my life's been reduced to. Without moving from the chair, the girl picks up my wallet and examines my license.
"I wouldn't have guessed you were 29," she says, throwing it back to me. I catch it out of the air and stuff it in the back pocket of my jeans.
"Is that why you were sleeping with me? Because you thought I was an outsider?"
"No," she says, defensively. "I mean, that's not the only reason."
"Wonderful."
I leave her and walk the length of the hall to Taylor's room. I bang heavily on his door without getting a response. Richard calls to me from the other end of the hall.
"Where the fuck have you been?" he asks, waving me inside his room.
"Have you seen Taylor?"
"Not since yesterday."
He sits down at the desk and lights a cigarette.
"Can I have a drag of that?" I ask him
He holds out the smoke and I take it from him, glancing out the window at the snow-covered street.
"You missed the opening last night," he says. I hand him back the smoke.
"There was an opening?"
"I told you about it."
"I can't remember."
"It went good though, thanks for asking."
"You're welcome."
"You look like shit."
"Thanks."
"What did you do last night?"
"Went to a strip club with Taylor."
"With him?"
"It's a long story," I say.
"I've got time."
"I wouldn't even know where to start."
"Is this still about that girl who looks like Kelly?"
"Not exactly."
"You've got to get over that. Isn't sleeping with Emily helping?"
"Who's Emily?"
He regards me with a look usually reserved for the mentally ill.
"The girl down the hall?"
"She wouldn't tell me her name."
He snorts.
"Figures. What'd she give you, a long dissertation on myths?"
"Something like that."
"She thinks she's an artist."
"Yeah well, who doesn't."
He shrugs, and hands me what's left of the smoke. I kill it and I stab the end out in the ashtray on the table.
"This artist made close to a grand last night," he announces.
"You're a credit to the profession."
"You joke, but things are finally starting to come together."
"Are they?"
"Yes," he says, and then: "You know what your problem is?"
"What's that?"
"You get so caught up in these muses of yours you don't have time for anything else. Are you even writing anymore?"
"I'm writing," I mutter.
"Yeah? Some bullshit about this Kelly clone?"
"Something like that."
"No one wants to hear about your ex-girlfriend man, that's lesson one."
"I'll keep that in mind."
He turns from me to his computer.
"What do you know about powder?" I ask him.
"It comes from the mines," he says, without looking away from the screen. "You know that. That's all anyone knows."
"And what do you think of this line on my face?"
He swivels in his chair.
"What are you talking about?"
"This line." I point vaguely to a space on the right side of my forehead.
"What line?"
"You can't see it?"
"How high are you right now?"
"You take the powder don't you?"
"No," he says. "Got off that shit a while ago."
"Why'd you stop?"
"I don't know. Talking to that outsider was getting to me I guess, all that stuff about the end of the world."
"You took that seriously?"
"No. Or anyway I didn't at the time. I don't know."
"Well, if you believe it, you've only got a few days left. Better take up heroin or something."
"If he was right."
"He was probably right."
I start toward the door.
"Hey," he says, stopping me. "Is there really a line on your face?"
"A lot of people seem to think so."
"So... Then what is that about?"
"I have no idea. I'm trying to find out."
"And Taylor's helping you with that?"
"Maybe."
"How do you even get into a situation like this?"
"Just lucky I guess."
"Yeah," he says, and then he glances away, at his feet or the carpet, or maybe both together.
"Just be careful," he says at last.
"I'll see what I can do."
I let myself out and try Taylor's room again, but there's still no answer. As I take the stairs to the first floor, a voice calls out from the living room; I can see her from where I'm standing, Emily or Pandora or whatever it is she's calling herself today, but I have nothing to say to her, and less interest in anything she's likely to say to me. I'm about to leave when she points at something beyond the doorframe. Entering the room, I find Taylor seated on a chair opposite her.
; "Sorry about the misunderstanding," she says.
"No problem."
"Taylor explained about your line."
"That was nice of him."
"And you just kind of... forgot about it?"
"I'm forgetful."
She reaches out, possibly to touch my hand, but the gesture dies before it's halfway finished; I look at her, not sure if I'm angry, or merely deflated. Maybe she did sleep with me because she thought I was an alien, but so what? That's better than if she'd done it for money, especially since I don't have any. She stares at me, her face all but unreadable. The face of a stranger, or an ex.
"You two want to be alone or something?" asks Taylor. The girl laughs shortly.
"Not especially," she says.
"That's good. Because I know where Nathaniel is."
"Where?" I ask him.
"Holed up in a house past 5th Bridge. Jared called me this morning."
"You have the address?"
"I'll take you there," he says.
"It's not necessary."
"I think I should go with you."
"Why?"
A low crackle of static escapes his modulator; a burst of laughter, I think.
"You remember last night? You know where you'd be now if I hadn't been there?"
"I have no idea where I'd be."
"What happened last night?" the girl asks.
"Things could have gotten ugly," insists Taylor.
"They could have, yes."
"I don't know what they wanted but they had no problem pulling out tasers to get it."
"You got tasered?" The girl looks from me to Taylor, her eyes wide, and her pupils large as pits. It occurs to me that she might be high. When all of this is sorted out, I need to remind myself not to come around here anymore.
"You need my help," says Taylor, flatly.
"This isn't your problem."
He shrugs and moves past me to the hall.
"Are you coming?" he calls. The girl gives me a sympathetic look, and I start after him. We put our boots on in silence.