Page 13 of The Seven Year Slip

He threw it open.

What came next was something out of Alfred Hitchcock’sThe Birds. Because my aunt took care in naming everything that she adopted. The rat that lived in her walls for a few years?Wallbanger. The cat she adopted that pissed on her curtains?Free Willy. The generation of pigeons that roosted on her AC for as long as I’d been alive?

Two blurs of gray and blue darted into the apartment with savage coos. “Motherfu—” the man cried, shielding his face.

They came in like bats out of hell, rats of the night, vengeful terrors.

“The pigeons!” I cried. One of them landed with a hardthudon the countertop, the other took a round in the living room before landing in my hair. The claws scratched my scalp, getting tangled in my already knotted hair. “Get it out!” I cried. “Get it off me!”

“Hold still!” he cried, grabbing the pigeon by the body, and gently coaxed it out of my hair. It didn’t want to let go. I debated whether or not to shave off my entire head in that moment. But his hands were gentle, and it made my panicked heart in my throat beat a little more rationally. “I got it, I got it, there’s a good girl,” he murmured in a soft, low voice, though I wasn’t sure whether it was to the pigeon or to me.

I was glad he couldn’t see the blush that inched up my cheeks.

Then—we were free. I scrambled away from the pigeon, behind the couch, while he held it at arm’s length.

“What do I do?” he asked hesitantly.

“Release it!”

“I just caught it!”

I mimed throwing it. “OUT THE WINDOW!”

The pigeon whirled its head around like the girl fromThe Exorcistand blinked at him. He made a face and threw it out the window. It took flight into the air and left for the opposite rooftop. He gave a sigh. The other pigeon blinked, cooing, as it waddled itself to the edge of the counter and nibbled on a piece of mail.

“Erm, I take it this is... Mother and Fucker?” he asked, a little apologetically.

I patted down my hair. “Nowyou remember the note?”

“Could have specified pigeons,” he replied, and went to get the other one. It started running the other way, but he clicked his tongue to try and corral it.

I watched with mounting panic.

Seven years ago, I was supposed to go backpacking across Europe with my then boyfriend, but we broke it off just before our departure. I was more bereft about that, in hindsight, than him breaking up with me. Then my aunt had shown up at my parents’ house, traveling scarf tied around her head, in heart-shaped sunglasses, a suitcase at her side. She’d smiled at me from the front porch and said, “Let’s go chase the moon, my darling Clementine.”

And we did.

She didn’t know where we were going, and I certainly didn’t, either.

We never had a plan, my aunt and I, when we chased an adventure.

Had she said she’d subletted her apartment? I... couldn’t remember. That summer had been a blur of some other girl without a map or an itinerary or a destination.

“This apartment is magical,” my aunt’s voice rang in my ears, but it wasn’t true. Itcouldn’tbe true.

“I... I have to go,” I muttered, grabbing my purse beside the couch. “Be gone by the time I get back. Or—or else.”

And I fled.

5

The Time-Share

I stumbled out ofthe elevator, sucking in lungful of breath after lungful of breath, trying to get my chest to loosen up. To get myself to calm down. Breathe.

I was fine, I was fine—

I am fine—

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