Free Inside by Alix Ohlin Page B

annoyance.
    Johnny made a flapping gesture with his left hand. “Talk, talk, talk. Give me the drugs, is what I say. In fact, if you want to see my behavior change, shoot me straight in the vein.”
    Mitch stood up. “I guess I’ll hit the sack.”
    Instantly Johnny sprang up and clapped his hand on Mitch’s bicep, the long ash of his cigarette falling on the table between them. “Christ on a stick,” he said, “I didn’t mean to insult your line of work or nothing like that. I just hoped to score a little extra in the way of supplies, eh? Had my hopes up for the medicine cabinet here.” He smiled at Mitch ingratiatingly, as if this were a natural explanation between friends. When Mitch didn’t say anything, he flushed, looking suddenly youthful again. “Forgive me,” he said. “I been up here too long.”
    “Forget it,” Mitch said.
    “Anyway, I’ve got other sources,” Johnny said philosophically, “so no harm done.”
    Mitch left him lighting another cigarette, went to his room, and lay down on the single bed, the flimsy pink curtain doing nothing to block the sunlight. The smoky smell on his clothes reminded him of Martine, and he thought he should call to say he’d arrived safely; but as he was thinking it, his head swimming with whiskey, he closed his eyes and fell asleep.
    After his first date with Martine, he should have let it go. Clearly this was what she expected; he was a prospect too lame to be considered for the long term, redeemed only by being just smart enough to recognize it. But he didn’t want to. For years he had occasionally gone out with some divorced woman, usually sticking with her long enough to have sex a couple of times, to be reminded of the existence and practice of sex, after which he would let things drop. He became the guy who didn’t call. The guy who met your kid and played catch with him one weekend, then never came around again. It wasn’t heartlessness so much as apathy, and if Grace, at one time,would have reminded him that one could easily arise from the other, well, she wasn’t around to do so now.
    But with Martine he felt like he’d met a movie star. He didn’t have her phone number, and he’d forgotten, after their cursory introductions at the bar, her last name. But he remembered her small charming apartment building off a little allée in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve and took a chance, showing up there on a Friday night at six thirty with a bottle of wine and a cooler filled with food. One thing Mitch had going for him: he could cook. He figured he might as well play to his strengths.
    The child who answered the door was lithe, blond, storybook cute, maybe seven years old. In French, Mitch asked him if his mother was home. The kid just stared at him, rhythmically biting his lower lip and then releasing it. Mitch asked what his name was and still got no response. Finally he crouched down and introduced himself, which accomplished nothing. The boy was rubbing his right toe against the hallway carpet in exactly the same rhythm as the lip biting. In his right hand, for some reason, was a twenty-dollar bill. He dropped it on the floor and ran away.
    Mitch stood up, not sure what to do now. From the back of the apartment, Martine was yelling about cold air coming in and she came down the hall to investigate, smelling of perfume and cigarettes, her hair in a bun at the base of her neck. When she saw Mitch, she stopped short.
    “I’m sorry,” she said. “I thought you were the pizza man. That was probably confusing for Mathieu.” It was impossible to miss the tone of reproach.
    “I apologize,” Mitch said. “I didn’t know you had a son.” He wondered where the child had been the other night.
    She looked at him blankly, her hands twisting in whatever task she’d just been performing—folding clothes, maybe, or washing dishes. Her glasses were slipping down her nose.
    “I brought you some dinner,” he said.
    “Excuse me?”
    “I guess you have pizza