There’s nobody sitting outside Chell’s apartment this time. Just a quiet Brooklyn street. The only sound is the wind rustling leaves on the trees lining the block.

The key is still there, dug into the soil of the basil plant. The plant is wilted and browned despite the rain. I hold onto one of the leaves and it crumbles in my hand.

Something goes my way: The key works. My leg is blazing now, the full brunt of the pain having made itself at home. I push into the apartment and shut the door, quick but without a sound, then lean on the door and listen. Still quiet.

The curtains aren’t all the way drawn. The apartment is empty, save some cardboard boxes stacked in the corner. Chell’s stuff ready to be sent out? Who knows where. Probably to the trash. I doubt her family would care enough to come and get any of it.

In the kitchen I spread out the results of my stop at the bodega and the liquor store.

Antiseptic. Bandages and surgical tape. Bleach. A sewing kit, just in case.

And a bottle of Jay.

The water in the shower turns hot right away. I strip off my clothes and climb underneath and watch as the water runs down my body, coming off pink at my feet, circling the drain.

The gash is on the outside of my thigh, halfway between the knee and my hip bone. I’ve lost a chunk of skin, but it’s not a huge chunk. I don’t even know that it’s worth sewing. It’s more like a deep scratch. Lucky. I pour on antiseptic and the burn snaps every muscle in my body to attention.

Something I didn’t anticipate: The apartment has been cleared out, and I don’t have a towel. There’s a roll of paper towels under the sink so I use it to dry off, then work on bandaging my leg. I twist the gauze loose around my leg until I get to the end, and fashion a knot. I hold my breath, pull it tight. It feels like getting body-checked by a truck. I scream loud enough I actively hope no one calls the police.

After that I redo the bandage on my arm, unscrew the Jay and smell it, feel the woody sting in my sinuses. I stare at the bottle for a long time without any real internal conflict because I’m resigned to this, and take a very long chug.

The booze kicks a path straight to my brain and it is so, so good.

I take another for good measure, because my first time being shot deserves some sort of commemoration. Shot for a shot.

After getting dressed, I retreat to the corner and crumple into a ball on the floor, my hands on my knees, the bottle cradled between my feet. I switch between the bottle and a cigarette. The alchemy of whiskey and tobacco tastes like the best parts of the last four years of my life. I hold onto that feeling until I’m afraid it’s going to snap.

The apartment is empty. I try to remember where everything was. The carpet at the center of the living room. It was a rectangle, light beige bordered by dark brown. Heavy. It didn’t move when you walked on it.

The floor was always covered with throw pillows. Chell liked sitting on the floor but I never did, even though I tried to like the things she liked.

None of the pillows matched. One was polka dot and one was plaid. Another was a paisley print and one was just a regular pillow, like the kind you’d sleep on. All on that beige carpet. I’m a guy and even I knew Chell’s color coordination was shoddy.

This was where she lived. This apartment was her. Hidden away like it was a secret. Small and sort of perfect.

And now she’s gone. The city took her away. This goddamn city. It does not discriminate. It takes and gives nothing back.

Before I realize I’m drunk, the bottle is half-gone. The booze is hitting me fast but that’s my own fault for being out of practice. For pretending I was something I’m not.

There’s a scraping sound at the front of the apartment. A key in the lock. I watch the knob as it jiggles back and forth. I know it can’t be true, but the dazed and drunk part of my brain expects Chell to come through the door. For her to stand in front of me and shake her head, but then kneel down next to me and cradle me in her arms and tell me that I am not my mistakes.

The door opens and a young couple enters. The guy is wearing a plaid lumberjack shirt and has a thick, elaborate beard. The girl is wearing a skirt over her jeans and a purple leather jacket. They’re happy and laughing and they see me in the corner and stop. We stare at each other.

The guy asks, “Why are you in our apartment?”

“Your apartment,” I tell them, climbing to my feet. “Your apartment. Chell’s body is still fucking warm.”

The guy reaches out and grabs my arm, says, “Hey man, did you take anything?”

I put my hand on his forehead and shove him to the floor. The girl backs up against the wall and pulls out her cell phone. I make myself scarce before the cops show up.

 

You never really judged me, Chell, but you never really approved of the way I am, either.

One night Apocalypse was hosting a dramatic reenactment of that episode from Saved by the Bell where Jessie Spano takes too many caffeine pills. It was a bunch of kids dressed like characters from the show, acting it out like it was Shakespeare.

The show had ended and we were sitting around drinking with the cast. This was during one of our cold periods. I had been sort of seeing this girl, and you were sort of seeing this guy, and who knows where Quinn was, and we were sort of avoiding each other. But it was difficult to not cross paths.

I didn’t like the guy you were seeing. He would talk forever about how he really understood filmmaking and books, and if anyone would dare to disagree, they would disappear from his field of vision, as though having a differing opinion rendered them inert. He was just some guy from someplace else who was so full of himself he oozed onto the floor. You didn’t even bother to introduce him to me.

So this night, you were wearing a black dress and yellow heels, your hair pushed back on your head, like you had just come from someplace fancy. I was doing my best to ignore you but failing miserably, and just when I had settled into a nice drunken groove I saw a flash in the corner of my eye.

He had slapped you across the face.

You took it like a pro, didn’t budge, didn’t say anything, just stared daggers at him so hard he actually took a step back.

He stepped right into me. I grabbed him by his hair and dragged him outside the bar and threw him to the ground and told him to get up. That if he wanted to fight someone he should fight someone his own size. His eyes were so wide with fear they nearly fell out of his face.

I was going to let him take the first shot, knowing I’d put him in the hospital no matter what, but he lingered too long, so I lunged. You got in between us. You didn’t say anything, just stared at me almost as hard as you did him. I tried to get around you and you wrapped your arms around me and I melted because I didn’t want to risk hurting you. The guy got up and ran away.

You asked, What the hell was that about?

He hit you.

Yes. Me. I’m a big girl, Ashley. I don’t need you fighting my battles.

Doesn’t matter. Guys don’t hit girls. It’s a rule.

Whose rule?

Doesn’t matter. It’s a rule, and I’m not going to watch some guy take a swing at you and walk away like nothing happened.

So you’re judge and jury now?

That’s not the point, Chell.

Is this a morality play? Or are you just looking for someone to beat up?

You want to date guys who slap you around, that’s your prerogative.

Sometimes I think you’d like that, because all you ever do it act like I’m some soft little thing that can’t survive without your protection. It’s how you treat everyone.

I want to say something back but you didn’t give me the chance. You spun on your heels and stalked off down the street. I watched you turn the corner and then I felt the eyes of the crowd on me. I left, like I was following you, but instead of walking west, which is where you were going, I went north, toward home.

We didn’t talk for a little while after that.

 

It’s not until I’m on the subway, fighting to stay awake so I don’t miss my stop and end up in some far away land, that I really have to ask: Is Ginny deliberately trying to kill me?

She knew there’d be trouble, which is why she told me to bring the umbrella, happy coincidence aside with the rain. Ginny knows me. She knows under duress, I’ll punch my way out. And maybe that’s why she sent me, because it was her way of sending a message to T-Rex, whose name I can’t even think about with shuddering. Where do these people get their names?

She clearly wanted to make him think The Hipster King pulled the trigger on that, but why not loop me in?

Unless she actually was sending me there as a sacrifice. Knowing I’d get killed, but take a chunk out of them along the way, so she could protect her more valuable players. If she lost Samson, she would lose a one-man army. I’m just occasionally useful. The cost-benefit analysis is pretty clear.

I can’t think about this anymore. My head hurts. I lean forward and rest my head against my palm, eyes closed. Then I look up at my hand. The words are washed away but I can still read them.

You promised.

Who promised?

Chell’s face twists in pain.

A voice across from me says, “Hey.”

I look up at a homeless man with hair that was once white, is now some shade between gray and brown. His skin is wrinkled and dirty like he’s rubbed mud into it. It’s only now that I’m looking at him that I realize what that smell was, the smell of hot garbage that’s sent everyone to sit on the other side of the subway car.

“Hey,” the guy says. “Can I get a sip of that?” He’s pointing at the bottle of Jay still in my hand.

I probably shouldn’t have the bottle out in the open like this, and I’m lucky a transit cop hasn’t bagged me for it. There’s only a sip left, so I down it and toss the empty bottle toward the end of the car, where it shatters. The people on the other side of the car jump.

“No,” I tell him.

He mutters under his breath. “Motherfucker.”

“I’m sorry. Want to repeat that?”

An octave louder, he says, “Motherfucker.”

“Say that one more time, I’m going to come over there and break your fucking jaw.”

On the other side of the car there’s a stage whisper. “Should we pull the emergency brake?”

I close my eyes. “Don’t pull the fucking emergency brake, because then the car will be stalled between stations and you’ll be trapped with us. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with everyone in this fucking city?”

The people on the train look away from me and lucky for them, or maybe just lucky for me, the next stop is mine.

 

So I’m drinking again. Time to celebrate. I hope that, as a bonus, I’ll run into one of the several people trying to kill me, and we can see how things shake out.

I stop into Apocalypse and it’s jammed. More than for Chell’s memorial service, more than I’ve ever seen. I fight through waves of college kids just to make it the bar. First Dymphna’s and now this.

Dave looks up with a lost expression on his face. He shrugs and gestures toward the crowd. “Dude, I have no fucking idea.”

“Whatever. I don’t give a shit. I need a whiskey.”

“Glad to see you back among the sensible.” He pours me a stiff glass then gets a good look at my face. “Ash, what the fuck?”

There was a mirror in Chell’s bathroom. I purposely didn’t look at it. “You should see the other four guys. They’ll be waking up in ICU any time now.”

Dave shakes his head. “Your cousin is here. People are hanging out downstairs.”

“Thanks.” I take a pile of bills out my pocket. Drinks courtesy of T-Rex. “Keep me in Jay until this is gone.”

Dave hands me the bottle.

“Slainte, then,” I tell him. I take a swig and head downstairs, where I find Margo standing in a corner with a bunch of kids I don’t know. Everyone is drinking PBR. When she sees me through the crowd, she waves me over. She grabs my hands and yells, “Guys, this is my cousin Ash.” With a healthy dose of pride she adds: “He lives around the corner.” It’s nice of her to tell that lie.

She points to each person in turn and says their name. I don’t bother to remember them. They regard me like cats looking at a wall.

Margo turns away from the group. “Are you okay? You look a little rough.”

“Long story. Who are all these people?”

“They’re in the program I want to be in at NYU. They were looking for a new place to hang out so I suggested this place. I guess word is getting around.”

“You’re lucky you’re blood.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

People are crowded from wall to wall. I don’t like it. I take a pull from my bottle and listen to her friends. One guy, wearing skinny jeans and a black button-down shirt and an actual real-life mullet, is holding court. I don’t know where the conversation started, but I don’t like where it’s headed.

The guy says, “You know, a lot of people thought 9/11 would have been a transformative moment for this city, but instead it acted as a catalyst for an economic earthquake that’s really wreaked havoc on the poverty line. It’s been moved so many times, we don’t even know what class we are anymore. I mean, do any of you even know?”

At that everyone turns, rapt. Like he’s dispensing some kind of wisdom, like that’s even possible in a fucking bar.

First sign someone isn’t really from New York: Their excitement at discussing 9/11.

I move forward a little into the circle and ask, “What’s your name?”

“It’s spelled like Ian, but it’s pronounced Eye-Anne.”

“Where are you from?”

“Michigan.”

“And when did you move here?”

“About a year ago.”

“Maybe it’s best if you didn’t pretend like you knew what you were talking about.”

“What’s your problem?”

“You.”

I take another sip from the bottle without taking my eyes off him, Margo puts her hand on my shoulder. I yank it away from her. The asshole asks, “And where are you from?”

“Here.”

“So you were born in Manhattan?”

“Staten Island.”

“Well, that doesn’t count.”

I stand closer to him. He recoils.

“At least my birth certificate says New York City on it. Assholes like you, they should stop at the fucking door and turn back. Fucking children, ruining everything for the rest of us.” I look at Margo. “I’m leaving. Your new friends are fuckheads.”

Margo chases after me and stops me as I reach the stairs. “What was that?”

“Nothing.”

“Ash. Look, whatever. I was going to ask, can I stay with you and Bombay tonight? I just got a text from Lunette. She said she has a friend in town and she’s going to be busy.”

“Who’s the friend?”

“Jacqui. Which, whatever.” She waves her hand and looks away. “I can take the floor at Bombay’s if you want.”

“I’m staying with someone else tonight. You take Bombay’s couch. It’s fine.”

She nods, looks at me worried. “I want to ask you if you’re okay but you’re going to lie to me. You don’t look okay. You don’t sound okay. What the fuck is going on?”

“I’ll be fine.” I take out some of the money I lifted off T-Rex and hand it to her. “If it’s late, take a cab to Bombay’s. The door to the building doesn’t lock. And pay attention when you’re going in, to make sure no one’s coming in after you.”

She pushes my hand away. “I don’t need the money. And I’ll be fine Ash, really. This place you’re going right now, will it involve sleeping?”

“Hopefully.”

“Then please go do it. You look like you need it.”

I kiss Margo on the forehead and head back inside to drop off the half-empty bottle. When I place it on the bar Dave waves me over. I lean close so I can hear him.

“Listen,” he says. “I’ve told a couple of people but I want you to hear it from me. We’re closing in a week.”

I smash my fist against the bar and the Plexiglas surface cracks. Dave jumps back. I ask, “Why the fuck would you do that?”

He puts his hands up, like he’s worried I’ll take a dive at him. “Not my call. The people who live upstairs, they complain they can’t open their windows because of the smoke and the noise. They filed complaints, it turned into a thing.”

“They live above a fucking bar. Why are they complaining? They can go live somewhere else.”

“Look, is what it is. The owner of this place has been considering an offer. It’s a lot of money. And he wants to be done with this bullshit.”

“Who made the offer?”

“Starbucks.”

“Fuck!” I take the bottle of Jay and wing it against the wall. It shatters, and so does a mirror behind the bar. Dave ducks away from the flying glass, his hands over his eyes. Everyone in the bar stops and looks in our direction. The place falls silent, so we can only hear a mellow song from The Notwist pumping over the speakers.

Dave looks up at me, his eyes wide. “Dude…”

I take a couple of big bills out of T-Rex’s stash, throw them on the bar, say, “There. Fix it.”

Outside I light a smoke. Watch the kids going in and out like it’s a fucking playground, and not the only place left in this city that I feel like I can call home. Something else that’s being taken away. The thought of it not being here opens a jagged hole inside me.

My head fills with fantasies of benefit concerts and fundraising drives, to get the money to buy the place. Then we’ll tell the people who live upstairs to fuck off and they should move to Nebraska if they want it to be quiet, and we’ll keep running the place, keep things the way they are, won’t change a damn thing. And we won’t let people in unless they can prove they’re native-born.

I put it out of my head. Right now I should go see Lunette, because what Margo doesn’t know is that Jacqui isn’t a person.

 

After ringing Lunette’s buzzer three times I assume she’s passed out. I’m not looking forward to climbing up the fire escape. My leg feels like someone is hitting it with a hammer. Then the intercom crackles and Lunette says, “Yeah.” Her voice sounds further away than three floors up.

“It’s Ash.”

The door buzzes. I climb up to her floor, leaning heavy on the railing, and the door to the apartment is ajar.

The air is stale, like she hasn’t left in days. It’s been less than twenty-four hours since I saw her, but Lunette is good at letting her life crumble at lightning speed.

I find her on the couch, wrapped in a blanket despite the fact that it’s already pretty warm in here. The coffee table in front of her is a mess of discarded bottles of orange juice and empty bowls crusted over with the remnants of things I hope were food.

There’s a dead needle, a spoon, and a pile of cotton swabs lying on the table, next to an empty balloon that previously held heroin. Code name: Jacqui.

I pick up the works, put them in a plastic shopping bag, and leave it in the kitchen. She doesn’t try to stop me. I don’t even know how she got up off the couch to buzz me in.

I drag a chair next to the couch and sit by her side. I figure she’s asleep but then she says, “I’m sick.” She talks in a sing-song voice, drifting between this world and another. She stares at the ceiling, her eyes opening and closing.

“You’re not sick.” I go back to the kitchen and get two glasses of water, place them on the coffee table between us. I down half mine, she doesn’t touch hers. “So, what happened?”

“Me and Margo. I don’t know. We got in an argument about something.”

“And this was how you handle it?”

Her face turns down and tears form at the corner of her eyes.

I ask, “Do you remember what it was about?”

“No.”

“Then why are you so upset?”

“I can’t control myself.”

There are a lot of things I could say at this moment, about self-control, or about how when something bad happens your first response shouldn’t lean toward self-destruction. I can’t say that with a straight face. So I slide my hand under the blanket, find hers, and hold it tight.

“You know I love you,” I say.

“I know. I love you, too.”

“You know it hurts all of us to see you like this?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me. I don’t deserve it.”

I take out a cigarette and get it lit, take a deep drag, and hold it up to Lunette’s lips. She takes a half-hearted pull, then chokes when it gets caught in her throat. She says, “Thank you.”

Lunette drifts off and I think she’s fallen asleep, so I go to the closet and find some blankets and pillows and pile them up on the floor next to the couch. I strip off my shirt, my shoes and socks, and click off the lamp. The apartment plunges into darkness, save the narrow beams of light slowly tracking across the ceiling from the headlights of cars passing down the street.

As I’m getting comfortable Lunette says, “I lied to you, Ash.”

“What did you lie to me about?”

“I saw Chell the night she died. And I saw you.”

I prop myself up, lean a little too hard on my leg, and bite my lip to keep from yelping. Deep breath. “What did you see?”

“Chell was walking out of the subway. She looked upset about something. And I saw you stumbling down the street. You were so drunk you could barely stand up. You bumped into someone and then started screaming at them.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because you didn’t kill Chell. I know you didn’t. But I was afraid.”

“Afraid of what?”

She doesn’t say anything, and I think she’s fallen asleep again. I think about it for a little while, consider quizzing her on exactly where I was, and exactly where Chell was, but she’s so far gone, I doubt I’d get a straight answer.

Think back to that night, try to shake my memories loose. But the only thing I can see is Chell’s face twisted in pain.

No. It’s the heroin talking. That’s all. She didn’t see me.

Just as I’m drifting off Lunette says, “Can we go to a museum?”

“Why?”

“Because all we ever do is sit in bars. There’s so much more we could be doing. There’s so much culture. I want to do things that are different. Different things.”

“We’ll do that.”

“Ash?”

“Yes?”

“I miss Chell. I don’t want to miss you, too.”

Then she’s snoring and I can go to sleep. And as I’m drifting, the same thought plays in my head on repeat: What if I just left?

I could get up and leave and be done with all of this. Margo and Bombay and Lunette don’t need me. My mom doesn’t need me. No one needs me but me. I could go live in a cabin in the woods. Chop down trees and look at the stars and sleep in the quiet. No one would try to kill me in the woods. I’d only have to worry about bears. I can handle bears.

The problem is this place is all I’ve ever known. I haven’t traveled. I haven’t wanted to. I’ve always loved New York for the diversity, because the entire world crosses right at this intersection. Anything you could ever need is right here, always available.

But at what point is that not enough for a person?

Because otherwise, seriously, fuck this place.

Does that make me selfish?

My phone buzzes. Bombay.

Envelope under the door. Says meet at Blue Moon Diner. 9 a.m.