Page 6 of Liquids

They’re all overdue notices, and the urge to hide them underneath a large cushion makes my fingers shake, but I spread them all over the table. The picture of an exploding life. My artist’s brain stirs and, on impulse, I snap a picture. Then I sit down with my phone and pull up my checking account. I have two hundred dollars in there that was supposed to cover me to the end of the month, ten days away now, but if I pay ten dollars on each of the main bills, I’d have a hundred left, and I can survive on the remaining ten dollars a day until the next overdue bill comes in. I can live on pasta and beans. The debt’s been accumulating for years. There’s always some crisis I don’t have the money to cover. My car, getting fired …

The last time I got fired it was because that jerk put a hand on my ass and I karate-chopped him. When he went down like a sack of potatoes, I was so surprised I laughed. I mean, I’m a girl and not a very strong one. I don’t lift weights. Although in a happier time I ran races with my brother, Dan. I think the laughter was what got me fired.

On impulse, I add it all up. The energy company, the credit cards, insurance, drug costs. Over $10,000, and I live hand to mouth in the smallest cheapest place I can imagine.

The therapist’s voice is like a worm in my ear. “And when did the drinking start, Carly?” When he died. When he fucking died. I never told her that, of course … Who wants that kind of analysis? It’s obvious, isn’t it? You fuck something up, you don’t recover. How does therapy fix that? They don’t come back. He is never coming back.

The sky is darkening outside the window: 3 p.m. Must be an incoming storm. My hand shakes, and my muscles ache as my eyes drift over to the pick-me-up cabinet. Normally, I’d have had a drink ages ago. But I’m fucking trying, okay?

My phone vibrates with a text. Marni.

Well?

A smile curves over my lips. I type out:

Kitchen counter sex.

and press send.

And?

Pretty good.

See you at Callahan’s later. I want a full rundown on the liquids thing.

Yeah, you’re going to be disappointed.

The rumors that he uses liquids during sex must be bullshit; there was just the beer on my hand. And if he’s coming back, do I want to go out to Callahan’s? It’s going to cost you a lot more than ten dollars to drink in a bar, Carly. I walk to the fridge and open the door. The stuff Rig bought when he went to the store is sitting on the shelves: cheese, ham, bread. I’ve got food for the day, anyway.

I head through to my bedroom and study the stripped bed, then collapse onto it face down and fall fast asleep.

When I wake, the sky is dark outside and I drag my wrist toward my face: 7 p.m. Shuffling through to the kitchen, I make myself a cup of coffee and a sandwich. Remember to eat, Carly. I text Marni and say I’m too wiped to make it, and then an hour ticks by, two, as I watch pictures flicker over the TV screen.

By 10 p.m. I’m pacing across the floor. He said he’d be back, goddammit. But I have no way of finding out if he is or isn’t coming. Can I remember that road to his trailer? Where we went? Fuck it, I’ll find a way. And I’m out in my rust bucket of a car and on the road out of town before I can second-guess myself. My hands are still shaking, I haven’t had a drink all day, and fuck, fuck this shaking.

The track he turned down is easy to spot. The gate on the field and the daub of yellow paint on a post as we flashed past last night.

When I arrive at the trailer, the lights are blazing and he’s in there, a shadow moving behind the windows. As I pull up, he peers out then shifts away, and I walk up to the door just as he opens it.

“What’re you doing here?” he growls.

My stomach sinks. That wasn’t a friendly “Hello, babe,” was it? I can tell from his expression that this was meant to be one fuck and we’re done, and somehow I didn’t get the memo. But fuck him, he gave me a different memo entirely.

“You got your trailer door fixed.”

He sighs and folds his arms on his mile-wide chest. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for you. You said you were coming back.” And he did say that, but maybe I should have kept my dignity intact by not turning up here.

“Yeah, I did, didn’t I?” He runs his hand around the back of his neck. “I got some shit to do now. Something came up.”

And fuck, it was good, and I’m obviously not getting the memo at all because I ask, “Can I come in?”

“No, babe. Go home.”

I stare down at my feet, and he sighs as he drags a hand through his hair. “Look,” he says, but I’ve heard the conversation that starts with the word “look” from men for most of my life, so I turn blindly. I can’t meet his eyes anymore because I’ll start crying. Don’t hope. Goddammit, I should have grasped that by now. Why the fuck did I come out here?

“It was good, babe,” he shouts after me when I’m close to the car.