Page 111 of Forgotten Pieces

I continue to walk down Decatur until I hit Frenchman. I pull up the map on my phone that Laney made and make my way to the first apartment on the list. From the outside, the building looks a bit rundown but I take my chances. I call the manager of the property and he says he will be here in ten minutes.

I decide to walk around the block and check out the neighborhood to see how safe it is when I run into a girl with teal hair as I round the corner.

“Oh my goodness, I am so sorry,” I say as I see spilled coffee all down the front of her shirt.

She swipes the coffee off her chest, holding a mug away from her that saysI’m a goddamned delight. “It’s fine. This is what I get for carrying a damn coffee mug around instead of a travel cup, but I was in a rush and just grabbed this.”

“I’ve been known to do that a time or two,” I answer. My phone beeps with a text and I see the property manager says he arrived. “I need to go. I am so sorry about your shirt. Can I give you some cash so you can pay for a new one?”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll just change into a new one at work. See ya around.”

She waves and walks off while I turn around and do the same.

I meet the property manager and am pleasantly surprised when I see the interior of the shotgun house. The outside needs a new coat of yellow paint and the front porch could be sanded and finished but the inside is completely remodeled.

The narrow living room keeps itself looking big with white walls and bright pops of furniture. A dining table separates the living area from the decent eat-in kitchen. They managed to build in enough cabinet and counter space with a peninsula popping out to give me a breakfast bar. Off the kitchen is a spacious bedroom. There is enough room for a king-sized bed and sliding doors lead out to a small backyard. There is a fence separating the shared backyard from the neighbors and I can already picture setting up a small table and chairs, a sun lounger, and stringing Edison lights back and forth to give myself a small private oasis.

“I’ll take it,” I tell Harrison, the property manager.

“Great. I was going to tell you if you like it you should put in an application ASAP. This house just went up for rent. It’s going to go fast. Let me grab the application out of my car and you can fill it out and we can move along quickly.”

I nod and he walks out. This place feels like my home in New York, except bigger. The brightness of the white walls brings a smile to my face. I am lucky it comes furnished too and it is everything I would have wanted to purchase myself. The price is a little more than I want to pay but as Cam said I could make a killing in tips.

Harrison comes back inside and walks me through the application. He lets me know he should have an answer within forty-eight hours. I thank him and head around the corner back to Frenchman Street to celebrate. I text the girls and tell them to meet me at Talisman, the bar I walk into.

I sit down and order a martini as I wait for Laney and Cam to show up. This bar is not like the swanky bars I worked at in New York nor like the comfortable hominess of Sawyer’s. This bar is red and black leather booths, chandeliers with purple lights hang from the ceiling, the back of the bar is ornate wood with an aged mirror behind it. Skulls and voodoo dolls sit in all the hidden pockets around the bar. It’s creepy but tasteful in its décor. It looks like there is a back room with a stage but the door is closed so it’s hard to tell.

“Girl, you found a place without me?” Cam screeches in my ear as she takes a seat at the bar next to me. The smell of booze wafting off her.

“Sure did. I thought you two were looking at places?”

Laney giggles. “Well we were but then we got distracted.”

I roll my eyes. “By booze?”

Cam slaps me on the arm. “Of course not. That was just a bonus. We met these two hot guys, so we decided to have a little fun with them.”

I raise a brow at her. “Fun? As in the Cam way of having fun?”

Laney giggles again. “Not in the Cam way. Well at least not for me. I just made out with the guy I was talking to in a dark corner of a bar.”

“I may or may not have done a Cam,” Cam tries to whisper, but it comes out more of a shout.

“I am glad you two had fun,” I say as I shoot a glare at Cam. “Now we celebrate me because I hopefully just got an apartment.”

I tell them all about it as we wait for drinks to be served to us.

“This is so exciting, T. I knew the search wasn’t hopeless,” Laney says.

“Now we just need to find you a job,” Cam adds as the bartender comes up to drop off our drinks. “Maybe this place is hiring.”

“Probably not hiring.”

I look up to see a different bartender than I had before and realize it’s the girl from earlier I ran into on the street. She sets our drinks down in front of us and places her hands on the bar. “Actually, I am. My stupid lead bartender decided to run off into the sunset with some girl he met a month ago and left me stranded. I’m not even supposed to be here today. It’s why I was in a hurry earlier when we ran into each other.”

I guess she remembers me. “I see you got a new shirt,” I say as I nod at her shirt with the name of the bar on it.

She nods her head. “Told you not to worry about it. You have any bartending experience?” I go to respond but someone down the bar waves her down. “Hold that thought.”

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