Page 2 of Wrong Number, Right Grumpy Bouncer

I don't stop to wonder about it. I'm too busy finishing.

"So you can tell whoever handles these notices," I say, voice cracking on the last word in a way I’ll be furious about later, "that I have thirty days, and I’m going to use every single one of them, and I’d like the exact figure of what's owed by tomorrow morning or I swear to God I’ll find a lawyer who works for free out of spite."

I hang up before he can respond. I don't even know if there was a response coming. I just know I'm done, standing in my half-empty living room with my chest heaving like I ran a marathon instead of yelling at a stranger, and it isn't until the silence settles back in that I notice my hands won't stop shaking.

I call Sunny, my best friend, instead of sitting with it.

She picks up on the second ring, her voice warm and a little breathless, with background noise that sounds like a kitchen. "Hey, birthday girl's countdown, three days and count—"

"Vicky's gone." My voice comes out thinner than I want it to. "She moved out. She's been not paying rent, apparently, and now I have an eviction notice and thirty days and I just screamed at my landlord, I lost my job, I don't even know what to do, and I don't have anywhere to—"

"Whoa. Whoa, hey. Breathe." Sunny's voice shifts into the register she uses for actual emergencies, the one under the sunshine. "Okay. First, are you safe right now? Is the apartment safe?"

"It's fine. It's just empty." I sink onto the couch, the only piece of furniture in the room that still belongs to me. "I don't know what I'm doing, Sunny."

"You're doing what you always do, which is panicking efficiently." A pause, warm and certain. "Come stay with us. Beck won't care; there's room. We've got the whole guest situation figured out since the wedding. You don't have to decide anything tonight."

The offer lands somewhere under my ribs and loosens something I didn't know was locked tight. "I could crash with you," I say, testing the shape of it, "just until I figure out the next move."

"Obviously," Sunny says, like it was never a question. "Pack a bag. Bring wine. We'll strategize. It’ll be a slumber party like the good ol’ days. I’ll cook all your favorite foods, and we’ll curse the world."

I look down the hallway at Vicky's empty room, at the sticky note still curling slightly on the bare mattress, and start making a mental list of what belongs to me in this apartment.

It's a short list. But at least it's mine.

Chapter Two

Archer

Night off, which means it's just me, a bathroom faucet that's been dripping since sometime last month, and enough quiet to hear myself think for once. I've got the wrench out, the shutoff valve closed, the old washer sitting in my palm looking about as tired as it feels when the phone buzzes on the counter behind me.

Unknown number. Nine forty on a Tuesday, which around here means either Simon, my boss, calling to not really check in, or somebody who dialed a digit wrong.

"State your business."

"Oh, I'll state my business."

That's the whole warning I get. No hello, no wrong number, no is this even the right person, just straight into it, a full sprint out of the gate, something about a thirty-day notice and zero warning and a word I haven't heard outside a courtroom, unconscionable. I open my mouth to tell her she's got the wrong guy, wrong everything, and she plows straight through the sound of me breathing in to speak.

I close my mouth again. Fine. Let her run herself out.

Wrench still in one hand, I lean against the sink and let it happen. "I have autopay," she informs me, as if I've personally accused her of something. "I have a spreadsheet. Color-coded. Rent is blue, I never miss blue, I have never once in my life missed blue."

I grunt, mostly to slow her down, and it backfires because she takes it as agreement and keeps going. Something about a roommate named Vicky, and a Danny, and a forwarding address pending, and by the time she gets to leaving reviews on multiple platforms written by a woman with a marketing degree and nothing left to lose, I've set the wrench down on the counter, quiet, like it might interrupt her if I move too fast.

"I got laid off today," she says, dropping it into the middle of her own tirade like she expects me to do something with it. "From a very good job. With a title."

I don't grunt this time. I've learned that lesson already.

She keeps going, something about the timing being insulting, something about wanting it noted in a file about her, the file where she is correct. Her voice cracks on the last part of a sentence, and something in my chest does an unwelcome thing in response, a hitch I didn't ask for and don't have room for tonight, standing in my bathroom with a dead faucet and a stranger's whole week landing on me sideways.

Then she gives me a deadline. Tomorrow morning, exact figure, or a lawyer who works for spite.

And she hangs up.

I stand there holding a dead phone to my ear for a solid three seconds, waiting for irritation to finish arriving. It doesn't finish. That's the part that bothers me.

The faucet's still dripping. I look at it like it's responsible for some of this, then set the phone down on the edge of the sink and go back to work, because that's the sane thing to do, the closed-question thing to do. Wrong number. Not my problem. Somewhere out there, a landlord's about to have a very bad morning, and it won’t be me.