Page 18 of The Quiet Tenant

Finally, he shrugs.

“Suit yourself.”

You slide off the mattress. With the slow, delicate gestures of a bomb disposal expert, you lie down on the floor. A knot unspools inside your chest. This is what you know. This is like the shed. You know how to stay alive in the shed. You can learn to do the same here.

He kneels at your side and grabs your handcuffed wrist. He extends your arm above your head, slides the free end of the handcuffs between two iron curves at the bottom of the bed frame. Flecks of paint peel off as he jerks the mechanism left and right, testing it.

When he’s certain you won’t be able to wriggle free, he gets up.

“If I hear anything—anything at all—I won’t be happy. Understand?”

You nod as best as you can with your head on the floor.

“My room is across the hallway. If you try anything, I’ll know.”

Another nod.

“I’ll be back tomorrow morning. I expect to see you in the same spot. Same position. Same everything.”

Again, you nod. He takes a couple of steps, puts his hand on the doorknob, and goes still.

“I promise,” you say. “I won’t move.”

He squints at you. It never ends, the uncertainty of his gaze on you. Can he trust you? What about now? What about in an hour? What about in a week?

“I mean it,” you add. “I’m so tired. I’m going to be out cold the second you step out.”

With your free hand, you twirl your index finger around the room.

“This is nice. Thank you.”

He’s turning the doorknob when it happens. A rasp on the otherside of the wall, a floorboard creaking. A call from the other end of the hallway: “Dad?”

Something like terror flashes in his eyes. He looks at you as if you’re dead, a body and blood on his hands and his daughter walking in your direction.

Just as quickly, he composes himself. His face relaxes. His gaze sharpens. He raises a hand in your direction.Stay out of this. Be very quiet.

In one lithe movement, he slips out of the room. Does she see him? Or is it too dark, and is she too far away? It’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do, not looking. Not lifting your head, not craning your neck. Keeping your mouth shut as the door closes behind him. A swift gust of air brushes against your face. You suck your lips in, chew on the inside of your cheeks.

Muffled noises seep through the wall: “Is everything okay” and “Yes” and “It’s so late” and “I know, I know” and “I tried to text you” and “I didn’t hear” and eventually “Go back to bed.” She must listen to him, because soon the sounds fade away and it’s just you. You in a room. You in a real house with furniture and heat and so many walls and doors. You and him, and somewhere down the hallway, someone else.

You can almost feel her. Cecilia. Like a force field. A glowing ember in the dark. For the first time in five years, a small hurricane. The infinite promise of a new person.

CHAPTER 12

Number two

He was engaged.

That’s the first thing he told me. After I closed down the store. After he demanded the cash from the register. After I realized money wasn’t the only thing he was after.

He said it while he took my ring. He had jewelry on his mind, because he had recently gotten engaged.

To a wonderful woman, he said.

The other thing about him: he was good at knots. “See this?” he told me after tying my hands together in front of me. “It’s a figure-eight loop. It won’t come apart if you pull. Pressure only makes it tighter. So don’t try. Don’t even fucking try.”

I tried, when he wasn’t looking. But the thing with that man was, he was not a liar. His knot never came apart.

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