Leah diverts her attention to the layout of the room: new pine cabinetry, stainless steel counters and exam table, the requisite hand soap, and a computer in the corner. The place looks brand new. Then her eyes fall on one of those inspirational posters on the wall. It’s a photo of a fluffy kitten. She leans in to read the saying. The smallest feline is a masterpiece, Van Gogh.
So sappy. Where in the world did her navigational software lead her?
She fingers her butterfly pin, which makes her think of Grandma Gina and the safety of her Illinois home. Tears prickle her eyes, but she sucks them away.
You’ll be back.
As much as she loves her grandmother and as much as she misses the safety net of home, she won’t return. She can’t.
Chapter Four
The cat meows as it lies prone on the examination table. Leah checks her watch. Five-thirty. She only has a half hour to get to her new apartment and pick up her keys. Though Leah feels sorry for the cat, she pats it like it has an infectious disease. More than anything, she feels most sorry for herself.
The guy from behind the front desk enters the room. This time he’s wearing a lab coat. Obviously he’s not the receptionist after all, but a medical tech. Nonetheless, he’s so not the person she was hoping to see.
Leah straightens up and crosses her arms, ready for confrontation.
The male tech snags latex gloves from a box and slaps them on.
Leah studies the guy’s movements as he examines the feline.
“How did this happen?” he asks. His eyes skate over Leah’s. “Driving too fast? Texting?” His tone and words are accusatory.
“No.” Leah grows defensive. “He just…darted out.”
The veterinary tech locks eyes with her, but doesn’t say a word. Leah knows he doesn’t believe her; that this is all her fault.
“Lacerations. Some neurological impairment, hopefully temporary.” He seems to talk to himself. “Possible fracture on the tarsis.” He lifts up a tuft of fur. “Geez,” he says, his voice a study in admonition. “I’ll have to keep her for at least 24 hours. X-rays, blood work, observation. You can pick your cat up in a couple days.”
“It’s not my cat.”
The tech quirks a disbelieving eyebrow. “It is now.”
“Can’t you find a nice home for it?”
He stops what he’s doing and simply stares.
“I can’t take her,” Leah says.
“Well, this isn’t the Humane Society. We can’t take her either.”
Leah does not want to be sidled with this animal. Not when she’s embarking on a new chapter in her life.
Her hand goes to the butterfly pin, and she withers with guilt.
Her eyes move to her watch again. She’s down to twenty minutes.
“Don’t let me keep you,” he says, noticing her gesture.
“Listen, this isn’t personal—” Leah bites her thumb nail and then steps toward the door.
“You can pay on the way out,” the guy says.
“I don’t have cash.”
The tech doesn’t look up from the cat. “We accept credit cards.”
Leah thinks of her dad, the stock quotes on the financial channel, his lectures about money.
The tech lifts the tag on the bloodied scarf and reads.
“This isn’t about the fees. I’ll pay for what I’ve done to…” Leah’s eyes flit to the animal, and she can’t finish her first thought. “It’s just, I need to be on my own. Not responsible for someone else, no attachments.”
“Yeah, I get it.”
Leah places a hand on her hip. “I don’t think you do.”
“You’re going to abandon the cat—the animal you plowed down with your car.”
“I didn’t plow it down.”
He pretends not to hear.
Leah massages her temples and steals a glimpse of the cat again. If it weren’t so mangled and on the verge of death, it would be kind of cute, too.
“Maybe the vet knows of a good home.”
The guy pushes the flap of his jacket aside to reveal his nametag. Leah wonders how she didn’t see it before. Dr. Everitt Grady, Veterinarian.
“I am the vet.”
Everitt stands up and scoots past Leah to the door. “Mary,” he calls out into the hallway. “I need x-rays and a blood work-up for room 3, please.”
“Right away, Dr. Grady,” the nurse says.
Everitt leads Leah back to the front office. He glances at the books.
Everitt sits at the reception desk. “It’s…” He looks around for something, maybe a price sheet. He taps the keys on the computer and scans the screen. “Let’s just says it’s $100 for an emergency visit.”
“One hundred,” she says to herself while fishing out her credit card.
Everitt begins to take it, but then stops. “On second thought…” He looks at the credit card machine as though it’s a high-tech device, “you can pay when you pick her up.”
Leah pulls the card back. “No, I’m not picking her up.”
“In the meantime, you’ll need to fill this out.” He passes paperwork across the counter to Leah.
Everitt looks beyond Leah to the waiting room where the terrier and its owner still wait.
Leah doesn’t want to make a scene, not after she cut in front of scheduled appointments.
As Leah opens her mouth to speak, he stops her. “And…I need your phone number.”
Leah furrows her brow.
“To update you about the cat.”
“I told you, it’s not my cat.” Yet she jots down her cell.
“I should know more tomorrow.”
Leah collects her things and heads for the door.
“Hey!” Everitt calls to her.
Leah turns.
“You forgot to write down your name.” He holds up the sticky note.
“Leah.”
“Thanks for doing the right thing, Leah.”
Leah says nothing in return, knowing the right thing may have cost her the apartment, her freedom, and so much more.
“By the way,” she says, appraising the décor and the meaningless posters on the wall, “your marketing plan sucks.”
Everitt’s mouth opens, but he catches it before it drops. He recovers and turns his attention to his clients.
“Hey buddy. How’re you doing? Thanks for waiting.”
As Leah pushes the chiming door outward, she looks back and sees Everitt stoop down, open the kennel door, and scratch the terrier’s ears.
Chapter Five
Rain patters on the Honda’s windshield. Emergency lights flash. Squad cars and fire engines navigate the vehicular maze. Leah is part of the traffic jam, and she white-knuckles the steering wheel. She’s definitely not going anywhere. The clock on her dash ticks away the minutes, and once six o’clock hits, she lets her head fall forward into the steering column. The horn lets out a long blare, which startles her upright.
Leah glances at her handbag, considering the possibility of a headache pill, which she’s not due to take for another—she calculates the time in her head—four and a half hours. Yikes.
Traffic inches along. It’s down to one lane because the left is blocked by a splash of emergency lights across the wet pavement. As she creeps forward, Leah spies crunched cars and their occupants milling around. Two EMTs load a stretcher into the back of an ambulance.
By the time Leah parks curbside, it’s late. She kills the ignition, and the digital dash lights die on 6:33 PM. Distracted by both her tardiness and the epically-falling rain, she fails to see the No Parking sign looming a few feet ahead. She exits, only to be immediately doused with water from a passing car. The air is filled with petrichor.
Leah has no time to worry about her dry-clean only blouse or the fact that her dripping hair makes her look like she’s strung out on drugs. She has to get her keys.
Leah approaches the apartment building and hits the call button, ringing wat
er from her clothes as she waits.
A man’s voice comes over the intercom. “Yeah?”
Leah leans in toward the receiver, practically yelling into it. “I need to contact…” She digs in her pocket and unfolds a wet piece of paper. The ink has run, and the words are illegible. She clears her throat. “The landlord.”
“You that girl from Iowa?” the man asks, his words crackling through the dated system.
“Illinois.”
“Same thing. She said come back at 9 AM.”
“Is there a number—?”
Her words are cut off by a click.
Leah stands on the steps, saturated by the rain. She takes a moment, and then buzzes again.
“Yeah?”
“Is there any way to get the keys tonight?”
“Wait,” the voice says. “Is this the same girl from Idaho?”
“Illinois, but whatever.” Leah will be just about anyone right now as she blinks against the spill of rain.
There’s a huge sigh. “Unless you’re carrying a mushroom pizza, there’s no way you’re getting in tonight.”
Silence.
“That’s what I thought,” the guy’s voice says. Then he clicks off again.
Leah returns to the car. She locks the doors and chokes back tears. Her hand wanders over to her cell phone seated on the passenger’s seat. She should call her parents. They would know what to do in this situation. But then she thinks of her dad who would lecture her about responsibility. Leah considers her mom, who would tell her to come home. Never mind the chortles of laughter from Glen. This would be reality-show entertainment for him. She moves her fingers away. She can’t call.
Leah’s breathing grows shallow, and she definitely feels a panic attack coming on. She removes the bottle of Xanax, for those critical moments, and takes one. If she weren’t already drenched, Leah would be able to feel the sweat pooling at her armpits. She tries her breathing exercises: deep breath in, count to three; deep breath out, count to three. She remembers to visualize, so she closes her eyes and leans back against the headrest, working hard to block out the sound of the raindrops. She pictures her house, walking down the hallway to her bedroom. She steps inside and spies her childhood bed, the curtains, her stuffed animals. She feels safe because she’s back in Illinois where there aren’t any cats darting out into road, where mean veterinarians don’t exist, and where she sleeps in the comfort of her own bed, safe from anything strange or foreign.
She falls asleep.
Chapter Six
The sun beats brightly on Leah reclined in the driver’s seat. A thumping on the window awakens her. She opens her eyes and moves a hand to her stiff neck, slowly turning her attention to where a police officer looms alongside the window.
He speaks, but his voice is muffled.
Leah shakes herself from sleep.
Anger registers on the policeman’s face.
Leah turns the ignition key and rolls down the window.
“I said move this car!”
“Sure, officer,” Leah says, trying to tamp down her frazzled demeanor by fumbling for her keys—which are already in the ignition—and fastening her seatbelt. “I couldn’t hear—”
But he cuts her off, handing her a ticket through the window and stalking back to his vehicle. She pulls away and searches for a legal place to park.
Leah turns off the ignition and pulls down the visor mirror. Her hair lays limp, she has dark circles under her eyes either from lack of sleep or smeared mascara—maybe both. She puts on a dab of lip-gloss, rakes her fingers through her hair, and puts the visor back in place. Leah glances over and spots the music box on the passenger’s seat. She opens it to the tinkling sound of Chicago. Leah bites her lip and leans her head on the steering wheel. She will not cry. She can’t. Because if she does it’s the same as admitting she’s a failure. Things will get better. They have to.
Leah straightens up with one final, deep breath. When she steps from the car, she triple checks the parking signs on the road before leaving her vehicle at a new curbside location. Ticket in hand, she meanders along the street and eventually stumbles up the apartment steps. Before buzzing, she digs for another headache pill and forces it down her throat.
A bus stop bench catches her attention. It reads, Can You Make It in San Francisco? An ad for insurance.
She approaches the same intercom from last night. This time when she buzzes, someone lets her in.
***
The building interior is carpeted in 1970s camel. A lone, tilted mirror hangs on the wall. Apartments hug the sides of the snaking staircase.
Clara Puccini, a short fireplug of a grandmother draped in a muumuu, guides a disheveled Leah through the first-floor corridor. She speaks in a heavy Italian accent.
“I almost give apartment away.”
Clara points nonchalantly to apartment 1A as Leah trails behind her. “He never pay rent on time.” They reach the second floor.
“This nice apartment—2C.”
Leah heads for the door.
“Not yours.”
Mrs. Puccini gestures toward another door. “She ... eehhh ... weird boyfriend.”
Clara waddles up the stairs. “Yours on third floor next to single man.”
They labor to the third floor where Clara approaches 3A and unlocks the door. “This yours.”
Once inside, the two move along the narrow hallway. The bathroom is a cavern on the right with cracked porcelain. The toilet runs. Clara steps in and jiggles the handle to make it stop. She shakes her stubby finger at Leah. “Do after flushing.”
Inside, a small kitchen adjoins the living room. The bedroom, with a view to the busy city street, sits alone at the back corner of the apartment. The place is bare.
“This it. Here key. Rent due first of month.”
“But…” Leah works to form her words. “Where's the furniture?”
“No furniture. Unfurnished.”
“No. This can’t be,” she says. “I requested a furnished apartment.”
Clara clicks her tongue in a disapproving way. “This not luxury hotel. This apartment, furnish self.”
Clara makes her way to the door.
“But I have nowhere to sleep, nowhere...” She stops, realizing she’s really only talking to herself.
“Important rule,” Clara says, jabbing a finger in Leah’s face. “No pet. Get pet, both out on street.”
Clara leaves.
Leah looks out the window.
On the street below, a man unloads items from her car.
Leah pounds fruitlessly on the glass. “Hey! That's my stuff!”
Chapter Seven
Cars honk incessantly on the street below the apartment window where the day gives way to night. Leah sits with an opened day planner in the middle of her empty bedroom. She’s grateful for her emergency sleeping bag—one of the few items not stolen from her car. It’s only her first day in San Francisco, and she feels exhausted. Leah crosses through today’s date. The following day reads Granberry Apparel—8:00 AM. She pushes the calendar aside and turns off the flashlight on her phone, dousing the room in darkness.
Despite her chaotic arrival in the city, Leah manages to float into sleep. But it doesn’t take long for her to be awakened by the zoom of traffic and the muffled voices from outside. Leah lies on the floor, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling. She springs up, slams the window shut, and lies back down. She tosses and turns, finally closing her eyes. They immediately reopen with the sound of muted traffic and muffled voices. She stares at the ceiling again for what feels like an eternity. But some time in the night, she winds up spiraling into sleep until yet another reprehensible noise awakens her.
Leah rises and thinks to rush to the window for the bazillionth time until she notices the morning light sifting in through the blinds and realizes the sound is coming from her phone.
The screen shows unidentified caller, so she lets it go to voicemail, but she plays it back t
he instant she hears the message alert.
“Hi Leah, this is Everitt Grady from the veterinary clinic. I was calling to give you an update about your cat. Please give me a call back. Thanks.”
Leah waits for more details—in the very least, a callback number—but they don’t come.
“Call back? How can I call you back?” she says to the phone. “You didn’t even give me your number.”
She goes through the ritual of showering and getting ready, all the while fuming about Everitt’s message.
“What kind of business are you running anyway?” she says to the phantom veterinarian while lathering her hair. “Don’t leave a call back. Hmph!”
“I’m not even going to look up your phone number,” she says while pushing a toothbrush into her mouth.
“My cat?” Leah says as she snatches her car keys from their designated spot near the door. “In case you don’t remember, I don’t have a cat.”
She exits the building and traverses the street toward her car. But Leah stops at the sight of a homeless man curled up on a cardboard box alongside one of the neighboring buildings. Her eyes flit back and forth; she’s rendered motionless. Then she reaches inside her purse. Maybe there are crackers, some mints. But she comes up empty-handed, with only her prescription bottle and a tube of lip-gloss. And while the anxiety meds may prove beneficial, the lip-gloss probably won’t go over too well.
Leah opens up her wallet. No bills, just some loose change. She puts it inside the man’s empty cup. Then she inches along.
Before Leah knows it, she stands outside the door to the veterinary clinic. She takes a cleansing breath and pushes her way inside. The lobby and reception area are empty and darkish. Is the place even open yet?
“Hello?” Leah takes a couple of hesitant steps inside. “Anyone here?”
“Sorry, I was just in the back…” Everitt enters the front office. He is five-o-clock shadowy, and his hair is a bit mussed. He halts in the midst of drying his hands. “Oh hi.”
“The door was unlocked, so I assumed you were open.”
Everitt balls the paper towel and tosses it in the trash. “Soon,” he says, glimpsing the clock. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
He flicks through items at reception, and then picks up a patient file and tucks it randomly into the library behind the desk.
Leah winces.
“You called, but didn’t leave a number.” She looks around. “Plus you didn’t show up on caller ID. I assumed your receptionist would be here to take my payment.”