Page 25 of The Vacancy In Room 10

“I know you will. What’s your favorite at Micky Dee’s?” I ask him.

“Whatever you like...whatever you think,” he says eagerly, and my heart swells a little. I resist the urge to hug him. Resist the draw to try to erase whatever it is he went through that made scraping tuna casserole out of a microwave the highlight of his week. Instead, I say...

“See, you gotta watch out there, Sinatra. What if I got the Filet-O-Fish? Let me tell ya...they put cheese on it. Fish and cheese don’t go together. It’s sick and wrong.”

“That’s okay,” he says. “If you like it.”

“How about a Happy Meal and one of those lava hot apple pies that destroy the roof of your mouth?” I ask, and he nods vigorously.

“Cool. I gotta go do some stuff, so just come by the office around dinnertime?” I say, and he’s already starting to sweep the patch of linoleum in the depressingly tiny scrap of galley kitchen in the apartment.

“Grandma Mary says dinnertime is when Murder She Wrote comes on and she can start to defrost her Lean Cuisine, but I don’t know what time that is?”

“Anytime you want, how about that?” I say, hoisting my tool bag over my shoulder and walking out into the rain.

“I have to help Grandma Mary with her pills at dinnertime,” he says.

“Oh, well then, lunch. Late lunch. Just stop in in a couple hours.”

“Okay!” Frank beams and waves as I leave and then gets to work sweeping, and I feel my chest tighten upon leaving him, and I don’t know why. But I keep my eyes on Eddie Bacco leaning on his truck, and I try to think of how to lure him into the front office without anyone really noticing.

By noon, the rain has dissipated, and the humidity is suffocating, and I spin back and forth in the office chair, keeping an eye on Eddie outside but not knowing exactly what to do—what I’ll say. I figure if it’s technically afternoon, maybe offering him a beer will seem...normal. It’s Friday, after all. The residents always get together and grill by the pool on Friday evenings. I can tell him I bought a bunch of beer for the Friday potluck and does he want one ’cause he looks hot? That’s not creepy. I think he’d bite.

But just then, one of his weird friends shows up and they talk in whispers, and I can’t hear what they’re saying, so I decide to walk outside the front door to the mailbox block and act like I’m inserting notices into a couple mailboxes, but they stop talking when they see me. I notice a few packages for a couple residents that are too big to fit in the mailbox, so I walk one package over to 207 and drop it off. The other is Callum’s, and since I know he’s teaching summer school today, I pull it into the office and text him to pick it up.

The friend is finally gone, and it’s now or never. I think I’m doing the right thing. Vigilante justice. Guys like him can’t get away with this shit, so he needs to know someone is watching. At least this is what I tell myself, but my hands tremble violently. I take in a deep breath and try to steady them as I pick up two Bud Lights and walk outside.

“Oh, hey, Eddie,” I say, and I can hear my voice shake, so I clear my throat. “It’s hot as hell out here, eh?”

He nods and wipes the sweat from his forehead with a cloth that he shoves back into his jeans pocket.

“Ya want a beer? I bought a bunch for later, but it’s that time of day.” I look at my wrist, at a watch that’s not there, and say, “Beer o’clock.” God, I sound like a moron. “If you wanna cool off a minute.”

He looks around like someone might be pulling a prank on him, and then shrugs and walks toward me. “Yeah, okay,” he says, and I nod back and slip in the office door.

I made sure all the blinds were closed, so nobody would see me threaten him. I mean, I have done this many times before with more dangerous people than him, and it always worked out. I’m not even exploiting him for money this time. Of course, doing this in the middle of the night would be ideal, just like I did with the others, but I don’t have access to him then. I just need to do it. I remind myself that I have the upper hand and I’m doing the right thing and to stay calm.

The office is dim with the blinds closed, and it feels icy cold after stepping in from the sweltering heat. It’s awkwardly quiet—just the hum of the air conditioner and a low rumble of thunder in the distance. He looks uncomfortable and like he’s regretting his decision as he takes the beer from my outstretched hand. He drops his bag on the dusty coffee table covered in People magazines from God knows how many years ago. It’s just about then that he registers how awkward this is.

“Well, thanks. But I better go, I got a trip,” he says, moving toward his bag.

“Oh, you’re a truck driver, right? Big rig?” I ask, but he doesn’t answer. “That must be hard. How long ya gone?”

He gives me the oddest look and then says, “Couple of weeks. I better get going.”

“I thought your car was broken down,” I say, nodding in the general direction of his perpetually broken pickup in the parking lot. “How do you get to the lot? Is that where you pick it up? There’s probably a warehouse or a truck lot, right?” God, I can’t stop rambling.

He picks up his bag and moves to the door. “I have a ride.”

Most days, the door to the office is propped open, and Barry is sitting on the worn leather sofa chatting away about swords or some mundane thing or another, or Crystal, who refuses to pay for internet, is at my desk checking her social media and smoking, or Babs is shaking up martinis for everyone. It really does feel like I live in a college dormitory half the time and I’m the RA with a revolving door, but today it’s quiet and empty and not what he was expecting when he walked in here. I can tell that he feels the energy shift and again thanks me for the drink and he hoists his bag onto his shoulder.

“Wait,” I say quickly. He stops and turns to me. “I have something to show you,” I say, and I guess he thinks it’s sexual maybe, because the look on his face is one of surprise mixed with intrigue. He drops his bag again and walks over to me.

“Oh, yeah, what’s that?” he asks with a smirk on his face.

I turn my phone to him and play the video of him and Rosa in the laundry room—the yelling, his raised voice. I watch him look at the phone, his head cocked, shock spreading across his face. The phone is facing away from me as I show him, so I don’t see him strike her, but I hear it and study his reaction as she falls to the ground. Fury. I think that’s what I see. Red blotches dot his chest and face, and his eyes narrow, but he’s silent.

The video stops. He just stares at me with a look that frightens the shit out of me—like he could attack at any second.

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