Page 5 of Levee

“What girl?” I asked, going through the fridge and tossing the food from last week that hadn’t gotten eaten.

“The one across the hall. Stupid name,” he said.

“Yeah? What was it?” I asked, figuring this was as pleasant a conversation as we’d had in a while, and I wasn’t going to ruin it by asking him shit that pissed him off. Like if he took his meds. If he needed me to grocery shop for him.

“Jade,” he scoffed.

“I dunno. Kind of unique,” I said.

“Unique,” he snorted. “Just another word for stupid, if you ask me.”

I ignored that as I got to work on the dishes in the sink. “So she’s been checking in on you?” I asked.

“Gave me a push. Didn’t need it,” he said, lying through his teeth. Because the man could barely roll himself down the hall without his back screaming. And that wasn’t to mention the fact that his upper body strength had been deteriorating for over a year now. The skin that used to stretch tight around corded arms thanks to a lifetime of manual labor now hung loosely off of his meat like a man closer to one hundred instead of seventy.

“That was nice of her.”

“Yeah, whatever,” he said, then cursed at the rerun of last night’s football game for a minute.

“How long has she been living here?” I asked, not remembering the mat or whiteboard the last time I visited.

“Week, two, something like that. She’s quiet. That’s all I care about.”

William was the kind of man who used to hit the ceiling with a broomstick or the walls with his fists, screaming about the racket. Even if it was something as simple as a baby waking up at night for some milk.

“Glad to hear you have someone new around if you ever need anything,” I said, thinking about the last neighbor. A man who my uncle had pissed off so badly that I wasn’t sure he would so much as call the cops if he heard a scream. At least not until the smell of decomposition got too strong to ignore.

“Don’t need help,” he griped, flicking ash toward the ashtray instead of actually making it in. Not that he could have anyway with how full it was.

I rinsed the last coffee cup, then made my way over to grab the ashtray, dumping it in the trash before returning it.

It was killing me not to be able to run a vacuum, no idea how many skin cells, ashes, or dirt was crushed into the discolored carpet.

I’d actually been kind of a slob myself when I lived at home and a few of the years living at the clubhouse. Enough that the guys used to rib me about it. But when I started to care for my uncle who lived in his own filth—unlike my grandfather who tried to keep things at least somewhat tidy—you could say Isaw the lightand the error of my ways.

Now, I was a lot more conscious about shit like that. Not a neat freak by any stretch of the imagination. But bothered enough by mold and dust that I wanted to clean it when I saw it.

Each time I was in this apartment, though, I became aware of a new kind of filth to clean.

Suddenly, the dirt on the windows was driving me a bit nuts. Enough that I made my way back to the cleaning supplies, grabbing the glass cleaner and some paper towels, and getting to work on them.

My stomach felt a little sick at seeing the nearly black grime that coated several changes of paper towels before, suddenly, the sun was streaming in again.

“The fuck you do that for?” my uncle grumbled. “Now there’s a glare on the TV.”

Of course there was.

I drew down the grimy blinds to satisfy him before making my usual trip into the bathroom to clean up, then collect some clothes to wash.

When I made my way toward the laundry room, I glanced over at the whiteboard.

Under my riddle was the answer in a swirly, feminine script.

He’s already stuffed.

I didn’t know who this Jade woman was. But I prayed to hell that she didn’t get too close to my uncle. Because it would be a real shame for all her smart and kind to get ruined by all his cranky ingratitude.

CHAPTER THREE

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