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Three hourslater Nina let herself into the lobby of her building. She walked to the bank of mailboxes and checked hers, flipped through the mail, and started for thestairs.
“Fontaine!” The voice of her superintendent, Sal, caught her on the firsttread.
“Hey, Sal.” She stepped back down into the lobby. Sal approached wearing his uniform — a wifebeater and chinos tightened well below his significant belly — and trailing his terrier, MisterTwinkle.
Nina approached the dog with her handout.
“Hi, Mister Twinkle.” The dog barked and backed up, growling, behind Sal. “Still a no-go, huh?” She’d been trying to win over Mr. Twinkle since she’d moved into the building two yearsearlier.
Sal surveyed her with narrowed eyes. “You know what your problem is,Fontaine?”
“I have so many,” she saiddrily.
“You don’t know yourself,” hesaid.
“Two years ago, I might have agreed,” Ninasaid.
Sal shook his head. “Nope. That’s it. Mister Twinkle likes confidence in a person, and real confidence comes from knowingyourself.”
Maybe Mister Twinkle knows I think he’s a spoiled asshole,shethought.
“Good to know,” Nina said. “Was there something else you needed to tell me? Or did you just have the sudden urge to pass along some feel-good lifeadvice?”
“Just making sure it was you,” he said gruffly. “It’slate.”
She suppressed a smile. “It’s not that late,Sal.”
He scowled. “This fucking city? It’s no place for a womanalone.”
He hurried back to the open door of his apartment, and Nina started up the stairs again. She had a theory that Sal didn’t go to sleep at night until all the single women in the building had made it home. This despite the fact that contrary to Sal’s assertions, the city had never beensafer.
He would hate it if she made a big deal out of it though, so she usually just played along. The feminist in her probably should have taken exception to the violation of her privacy, the insinuation that she wasn’t capable of taking care of herself, but she couldn’t find it in herself to feel anything but grateful to count Sal as another person in the city who cared abouther.
She reached the second floor and let herself into her apartment. Virginia, her rescue cat, was circling the area, waiting for her to get home. She rubbed up against Nina’s leg as Nina hung up her coat and bag, and Nina bent to pet the cat behind theears.
“You’re about as subtle as Sal, you knowthat?”
Virginiameowed.
Nina laughed and looked around the apartment with a sigh. She tried to see it as she had two years earlier, when she’d first gone apartment hunting. The place had seemed small and dingy after her expansive house in Larchmont, the apartment’s tiny kitchen and worn bathroom cabinets paling in contrast to the house’s open layout and customfinishings.
When had she started to love it? Had it been after the first hideous breakup with Liam and Jack, when she’d cried buckets of tears on the sofa? Or had it been in the months in between when she’d brought Virginia home and spent her free time scouring the city’s curbs and flea markets for things she could use to furnish the place? Maybe it had been after her final breakup with Jack, when she’d stayed in alone with Virginia, refusing to rely on Karen to put her back together yet again, or maybe it had been all the unremarkable times in between, the get-togethers with Karen and the rest of the group, the Friday nights on the sofa with takeout and a movie, the Saturday afternoons listening to music and singing at the top of her lungs while shecleaned.
She didn’t know, but as she slipped between her sheets, turned off the light, and felt Virginia settle in next to her legs, she realized she was finallyhome.
