Memoirs Aren't Fairytales (25 page)

After two weeks of not leaving the hotel, I went for a walk. The hotel was sucking all the air out of me. I headed down Massachusetts Avenue, to where Sunshine and I had tricked and the place where I'd been shot.

I owed Richard four hundred dollars and didn't know how I was going to get the cash. Dustin gave me money for food, but if I didn't eat, I'd end up in the hospital again. I couldn't trick with Sunshine because I'd promised Dustin I'd never do it again. Boosting was my only option. So while I walked, I searched through every trash bin on the next four blocks and returned the items on the receipts.

I boosted for a couple hours each night and hid the money in the back of our toilet. If Dustin ever found the cash, I'd tell him I was saving for an apartment, a place of our own we could fill with furniture and framed pictures of the two of us. But an apartment that wasn't too far away. I still needed to be close to Claire even if she wouldn't let me in her room or talk to me through her door. And once I paid off Richard, that's what I'd save for. Dustin couldn't be angry with me for that. He'd never told me not to leave the hotel, he just didn't want me at Richard's.

But he did get angry—not because he'd found the cash—because he didn't think I should be sleeping outside Claire's door. He'd been finding me there asleep for weeks, and he snapped one night after carrying me home.

He set me on the bed and stood in front of me with his hands on his hips. “How can she be so important when she won't even let you in her room?”

I wrapped my arms around my knees and rocked.

He kicked the trash bucket and punched a hole in the wall by the fridge.

Had something gone wrong during his run? He couldn't be this mad because I was sleeping outside Claire's door.

“She's my best friend,” I said.

“What if Frankie found you there passed out?” he asked. “I'm sure that scumbag would love to put his hands all over you.”

Frankie had keys to every room in the hotel. He could stop by anytime when Dustin wasn't home and put his hands on me. But if I said that to Dustin, we'd be moving out tonight.

“Is Claire more important than me?” he asked.

He didn't need to keep bringing Claire into this. I knew what would happen if another guy touched me.

“I won't fall asleep there anymore,” I said.

He stopped kicking. There wasn't much left of the trashcan anyway, the plastic bucket was in pieces. He didn't believe me. Dope made me tired, so it was hard not to fall asleep when I was up there talking to her.

“I promise,” I said. “When I get tired I'll come back to our room.”

He sat on the edge of the bed by my feet. “I wish you'd just leave her alone.”

“I'll never leave her and don't ask me to. Claire's old and she needs me—”

“She won't even let you in.”

“I'm going to keep going to her room until she does,” I said.

I crawled under the covers, burying everything but my eyes. He got under too and our backs faced.

Just as I was about to fall asleep, he cuddled behind me. “I'm sorry,” he said.

I wasn't going to apologize. He could set any other rule he wanted, but not one that had to do with Claire.

“I just want you to be careful. There's a lot of shady people in this hotel, and if something ever happened to you…”

I'd won. But he'd made his point very clear. If I ever fell asleep there again, we'd be moving out of the hotel, and Claire would be added to the list along with no tricking and no going to Richard's house.

“You know, someday we're going to get out of here and you're going to have to leave Claire,” he said.

I rolled over to look at him. “What do you mean?”

“Don't you want to quit all this shit and start a family?”

The only way we could stop using was if we left Boston. Dustin knew that too, that's why he said we had to get out of here. And that was exactly what I wanted—moving far away from our dope connections, living in a little house on the beach with kids running around. But what about Claire? Maybe Dustin would let me bring her too.

“Of course I do, I want that more than anything,” I said.

“I just need some time,” he said. “We need a car and a place to live, and we won't be able to work while we detox, so I need to save for all that.”

I wasn't going to put all this on him. By tomorrow night, I'd have enough to pay off Richard, and then I'd boost to save money for our move.

I took my clothes off and kissed his soft lips, and he pulled me on top of him.

When we'd had sex in the past, I'd always been so high I couldn't come. And before I'd met Dustin, Casey was the only other person who had gotten me off. None of the guys had known how to make me come, or didn't care enough to, or the heroin wouldn't let me. But tonight I'd slept off my high outside Claire's door.

As I rode him, he rubbed my clit, and I felt a surge of tingles inside my crotch. The build-up was much more intense than when I fingered myself, and I shuddered and collapsed on top of him.

He told me how wet I was and how much that turned him on, and he flipped me onto my back and got on top of me. He bit my lower lip while he moved in and out, and then shuddered like I had. After he came, he held me in his arms and said he'd never felt like this with any of the other girl he'd been with. I felt the same, and it wasn't because Dustin was the first guy to make me come. It was because he was perfect for me.

The next night, I left the hotel earlier than usual to boost so I could spend a few hours at Claire's door before I got sleepy. But boosting took longer than normal. Most of the receipts I found were drenched with slop. And when I finally had one I could use, the cashier wanted to give me a store credit instead of cash. I had to speak to a manager.

I knew I was cutting it close. Dustin said he'd be home by ten, and the clock behind the register said seven minutes before ten. Dustin would check Claire's door, and if I wasn't there, he'd come looking for me. But I needed this money. With the seven dollars I'd get from the return, I'd have the four hundred to pay Richard back.

I left the store and I ran as fast as I could to the hotel. A block away from home, I saw smoke and specks of ash, and smelled fire. People on the street were shouting. Red and blue lights from the ambulances and police cars flickered across the buildings across the street.

I didn't know what building was on fire, but whichever one it was, it was on the same block as the hotel.

I pushed my way through swarms of people, and on the corner, I saw the smoke, and flames shooting through the windows of the third and fourth floors of the hotel.

Claire.

Dustin grabbed me before I got to the front door. “Where have you been?” he shouted. “I almost died looking for you.” I could barely hear him over all the screaming.

“Is Claire out here,” I said, searching the crowd, scanning each head for her gray hair. “Where's Claire?”

“They're getting everyone out,” Dustin said. “They'll get her out too.”

Frankie joined us on the sidewalk. His face and hands were covered in soot. “Got the first two floors evacuated,” he said.

“What about the fourth floor?” I asked.

“The fire's bad up there,” Frankie said.

“Are they looking for Claire?”

Frankie shrugged his shoulders. “I think so,” he said.

The firefighters pushed us off the sidewalk to spray with their long hoses. Three firefighters came out the front door with four of the residents. Two I recognized from the third floor.

“Get all the men out,” someone yelled.

“Chief, the men are out,” a firefighter shouted back.

And not ten seconds later, the top two floors caved inward and crashed onto the second floor. Burning wood flew through the air. People began to scream and run across the street. The firemen hosed off the burning ambers that sparked on the sidewalk.

I stood still, staring at what used to be the fourth floor, Claire's home. And now she was part of the burning rubble.

The last thing Claire had said to me was I had broken her heart.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Once the fire was out, the crowd cleared. The other residents had mumbled about finding hotels nearby to rent or going to the shelter. Dustin, Sunshine, and I were the only stragglers left. Frankie was around too, talking to the cops and filling out paperwork.

We sat on the sidewalk across the street, looking at what was left of the hotel: the frame, charcoaled pieces of furniture, planks of wood from the first floor.

My elbows rested on my bent knees, my butt ground into the hard pavement. But I couldn't feel my body or the cold air that whipped past me.

Sunshine cried over losing all her clothes. Frankie yelled about the fine the city was going to slap him with because the sprinklers weren't up to code. Dustin wanted to know where I'd been when the fire started.

Did the clothes and the fine, and three hundred and ninety-three dollars I'd stashed behind the toilet really matter?

My best friend was dead.

Claire was a kind high I couldn't get from shooting. She came into my life to show me love and tried to teach me there was more to live for besides a needle and a bag of dope. Even though I was an addict, losing her only made me want to use more. Maybe I should have listened to her.

Sunshine, Dustin, and I checked into a new hotel, a few blocks down from Frankie's. Dustin let Sunshine live with us. She came home every afternoon with clothes she bought at Goodwill and rebuilt her wardrobe. At night, she worked the streets and saved enough for her own room. After a week, she moved down the hall. She probably made a deal with Lucchi, the hotel owner. I didn't know.

Ten days after the fire, I still hadn't left our room. I hadn't showered either. Dustin complained I was like a dead fish in bed and he had to do all the work. But he never said anything about how bad I smelled.

The fire hadn't slowed Dustin down, he took off every afternoon and came back late at night. Sunshine broke up with her man and started dating a new one, and worked the same schedule as she always had. And then there was me, replaying that whole night in my head, cursing the seven bucks that cost me Claire's life. If I hadn't gone boosting, I would have been home when the fire started. I would have gotten Claire out of the hotel, and she'd still be alive.

Since I couldn't go to Claire's room and rest against her door, I talked out loud like she was sitting next to me. I had full conversations, and in my mind, I heard her answer and saw her face. So when she asked me to visit Henry for her, I did.

Like Claire and I had done two and a half years ago, I sat in the visiting room and watched all the prisoners come in through the double-locked doors. When I saw Henry, I waved. His hair was a little grayer and he walked with care, nursing his limp. His amber eyes were just like Claire's.

He sat down across from me and asked how I'd been doing since the fire. I told him I'd moved into a new hotel. The mattress was just as lumpy as our bed at Frankie's, and the TV had to be kicked because some of the stations had bad reception.

“How are you really doing?” he asked.

“I'm sad.”

But he already knew that. He probably also knew about my fight with Claire over leaving rehab.

“She was sad too,” Henry said.

“That's my fault,” I said. “I let her down.”

“That's addiction for you, constant let-downs and never-ending promises. Don't you think I let her down too?”

He had years to apologize for his mistakes. Claire died with a broken heart I'd caused.

There was a woman at the next table placing her newborn baby in the arms of a prisoner. The baby was tiny against his broad chest, and the pink blanket clashed with his orange jumpsuit.

“That's the first time he's held his daughter,” Henry said.

Henry was looking at the couple too.

“How do you know?” I asked.

“That's Vic, my celly, doing two years on a drug charge,” he said. “He came to prison a few weeks ago, and his girlfriend was nine months pregnant.”

I thought of my baby and the pink blood that had swirled around the drain while I showered off my miscarriage. And then the last time Claire had held me in her arms.

“She listened to you, you know, on the other side of her door,” he said. “She listened to everything you said.”

The buzzer went off, and the other inmates stood, saying goodbye to their visitors.

Henry and I stood too. There was a gold band on his ring finger and he took it off. “I want you to have this,” he said and placed it in my hand.

The band looked old and was scratched. I held it up in the air to read the engraving on the inside: a date and the word “love.”

“It was my dad's wedding band,” he said. “Mom gave it to me when I got sober in prison. I want you to get sober and wear it for Claire.”

I put the ring in my pocket and gave Henry a hug.

“Make her proud,” he said in my ear and then pulled away. “Before it's too late.”

I didn't say anything. I didn't even nod my head. He turned around and walked through the double doors.

On my way home, I stopped by Sunshine's room. The only time I saw her was when she dropped off her money or picked up her dope, and she never stayed long enough to talk.

I knocked on her door and waited a few seconds, but she didn't answer.

Halfway to my room, someone shouted, “Hey you.”

I turned around, and a girl was poking her head out from Sunshine's room. The overhead light was flickering so I couldn't see her face.

“Did you knock?” she asked.

The girl's voice was strangely familiar.

“I was looking for Sunshine,” I said.

“Come back, I'll wake her.”

The girl was standing at the foot of the bed yelling Sunshine's name, and I leaned against the door, staring at her back, and trying to place her voice. New York-ish accent, raspy tone. Her black hair was dreaded.

No, it couldn't be.

She turned and faced me. “Sorry, Sunshine's knocked out—”

Renee looked exactly the same, but her baby bump was gone. It had been years, of course the bump was gone.

“Holy shit, Nicole is that you?”