Page 26 of Alonzo

There’s a big difference.

When I landed here in town the FBI relocation program gave me two thousand dollars in cash, paid my rent up for two months, told me to show up at the library for my new job the next day, handed me a bus pass, and said, “Good luck, Miss Tanner.”

And then they left.

The apartment wasn’t furnished. But I had two grand to get started and two months’ rent paid up front. So I shopped for furniture. Not at the fancy place in downtown where everything is overpriced. I shopped in the newspaper. Estate sales. Garage sales. The end tables actually came from a local carpenter who makes replicas.

I bought my first pencil skirt while walking through downtown. It was on a blank-faced white mannequin in a window. The fake model looked so fabulous I went inside, pointed to the window, and took all the pieces into the dressing room.

And when I got all those clothing components—the skirt, the boots, the blouse, the scarf, the bag—when I got them all on I looked into the mirror and didn’t recognize myself. I didn’t have a wig on, I hadn’t dyed my hair, even though the FBI told me I should. But these clothes changed me.

I bought it all. It set me back almost four hundred dollars. I felt sick handing that money over. But when I stepped into the library the next day wearing my ensemble it was worth it.

I was someone else. Someone new. And even though I never wanted to be anyone else but me—I’m not the type of girl who longs for things she isn’t, or can’t have, or will never get—I felt this sudden rush of hope.

Hope was a luxury I couldn’t afford before this moment. Just like the clothes I was wearing. It was like a diamond ring. They’re pretty. Also useless. Unless you’re selling them. That’s how I felt about hope.

My point is this—I love the pencil skirts. I like the way they make me feel and I like the way people look at me when I’m wearing them.

But that girl wearing the pencil skirts isn’t me. She’s her.

I glance back at my closet. It’s a small closet. Two-sided slider, but the left-hand door is always off the track, so in order to get to the clothes hanging in the deepest depths of the shadows I have to squeeze myself in, push the hangers on the rod to make room, and then identify things by touch.

It’s pretty easy to find a leather jacket by touch. So I grab it, slide back out, and hold it up in front of me.

This is all I have left of Phoebe Covington, orphaned at the age of six, rest of her childhood in foster care, private detective from Los Angeles. This amazing, vintage, black, leather motorcycle jacket with studs on the cuffs and more zippers than could ever possibly be necessary is the only reminder of Phoebe I have.

Last night with Lonnie triggered something inside me. I’m not sure if it was the sex, or the words, or his missing hat and glasses. It could just be that we’re there. That point in a relationship where you realize it’s either got to end or move forward. Or it could just be that I’m tired of living this lie. I’m tired of pretending to be bookish, and stylish, and reserved.

I just want to be me.

So I do not wear my classy shawl-collared wrap coat with a belt to work today.

I put on my badass, stud-cuffed, black leather jacket.

No one notices.

Not a single person realizes I’m old me when I walk into work because once I take off the jacket, I’m just same old Tara in her severe bun, and crisp white button-down blouse, and beige, hip-hugging pencil skirt.

I ponder that as I push the cart up and down aisles re-shelving books. And when lunchtime rolls around I decide that if I want to reclaim my old self, I have to go all in. Ditch the skirts, and the blouses, and the bun.

So I text Belinda, tell her I’m skipping out of our usual lunch date to run errands, and hit up the thrift store down the street from Sick Boyz instead.

The minute I walk in—when that scent of old used-up crap hits me—I’m home.

I almost came here to shop for furniture that first day in town. Old me would buy thrift-store furniture. Old me would enjoy buying thrift-store furniture. Maybe not a couch. I mean, I have bought thrift-store couches but that was out of necessity back when I was eighteen.

But when I got to the front of the thrift store that first day in Fort Collins and wrapped my fingers around the handle on the door, ready to pull it open—I hesitated.

That hesitation was actually more of a decision. Because I turned around, walked back into the trendy part of downtown where I bought my new outfit, and headed right into that over-priced furniture shop.

Well, I was not paying two thousand dollars for a chesterfield couch. That was for certain. But it gave me ideas. Just like the mannequin gave me the idea for the skirts. I bought that one outfit in the trendy store, but all my other stuff came from the On-Trend Exchange—a little gently-worn, second-hand boutique near the university.

Shopping for furniture and clothes in the thrift store felt like going backwards. I was a gently-worn boutique girl now. An estate-sale girl now. The kind of girl who has a theme to her look, and her apartment, and a plan for her life.

I wanted to be a forward thinker. Even if I couldn’t afford a brand-new couch, I could at least find a second-hand one that came with a better story. And no, I could not fill my closet with brand-new four-hundred-dollar outfits, but the thrift store was my new last resort.

I was making some good money back in Long Beach before everything went to shit three years ago. Of course, turns out that money was pretty dirty since all my clients were dodgy criminal types. But it was never quite enough to graduate into gently-used boutique girl. There was always someone from my past showing up asking for the money I owed them. Or I’d have some new fee to pay. Or some car emergency to take care of. And living in Long Beach is so expensive.