Free The Rest of Us: A Novel by Jessica Lott Page A

Saturday afternoon walking in the West 30s, trying to locate a handwritten rent sign I’d seen a few days before. The sun glittered off the distant Hudson. I stepped around iridescent puddles from leaking cars. All my free hours were bound up in the fruitless search. I didn’t have the energy or desire to take pictures, and I constantly worried that although it seemed temporary, I’d stopped for good.
    I gave up, the only thing on this desolate stretch between the ferry and Penn Station were city auto body shops and the Central Park carriages. Horses stood out in the street in their blinders, waiting to be taken in. I thought of what Rhinehart used to say, Illegitimos non carborumdem. “Don’t let the bastards get you down.”
    It had been more than a month since his note. A week ago, around the time I’d internally decided he was back in New York, a familiar feeling had begun to creep up on me. Impatience. At first an exhilarated impatience, like anticipation, and then, the more I obsessively checked my silent phone—irritation, depression. This was ridiculous, I thought. I wasn’t in my twenties anymore. If I wanted to speak to him, I should just call his cell. So I did. Listening to his recorded message, I began to get nervous—it didn’t say he was outof the country. I attempted to sound cheery, casual and upbeat. I waited a day, two days, before it became clear that he wasn’t going to return my call. Maybe he’d reunited with Laura. Maybe he’d just had second thoughts about me. That refracted image of myself that I’d been holding on to—that confident, creative, sweet young woman—evaporated. Why the hell had he come back into my life? Just to reject me again? Make it clear that I would always feel more for him than he would for me? I had an inextinguishable loyalty, like a dog had.
    •  •  •
    Harlem was above my price range, and I began searching even farther up, in Washington Heights. In desperation, I agreed to a one-bedroom on 181st even though the hallway was strewn with trash, and I heard a cooing that I thought came from pigeons outside and turned out to be doves the woman next door kept. But it was large and bright and the building manager said there wasn’t anything that size for the price, and it would go fast. I was an easy target, as desperate and unaccustomed to apartment shopping as a greenhorn.
    I went back uptown the following night to hand in my security deposit and first month’s rent in bank checks. Half a block short of my new building, I passed an empty storefront with the lights on inside. Even with the door closed, I could hear the music blasting. A group of men were standing in a circle around a blanket—a woman was on it, reaching under her dress, doing something. Feeling sick, I turned around and walked back to the subway.
    •  •  •
    In tears, I phoned Hallie, who said, “Call the landlord! Tell him you want to stay.”
    “I did already. He’s rented the place for more than I was paying.”
    “Did you sign anything? A termination notice?”
    “No, but I didn’t renew in time. And he has it on email.”
    “Let me talk to Adán. He knows lots of lawyers. You can fight this.”
    “And how much is that going to cost? All that money just to stay in an apartment I want to leave. I really thought this was going to work out. I thought I was doing the right thing.”
    •  •  •
    Lying in bed that night, it occurred to me that if I wasn’t able to find something within the next week, I would have to start looking at shares. I felt my face flush with anxiety and shame. I was thirty-five years old, and I knew most of the people who shared apartments were younger than me, and they would think it was pathetic once they saw me show up for the interview. Women my age weren’t supposed to sit on old couches that no one could remember who bought, and use a bathroom in the hall, and check off on a chart whether they’d cleaned the kitchen. I would have no