Page 16 of Fall I Want
Autumn exhales and glances out the window. The rain has subsided but the dark clouds roll overhead.
“Will you pretty please let me leave now?”
“What are you willing to trade?” I ask, keeping my grasp on her wrist. “I don’t grant favors.”
“And I don’t give IOUs,” she states.
I stare at her, wondering if I’ve finally met my match. My sister predicted it, after all. “Do you know who I am?”
“All I know about you is you’re a liar,” she says.
“Excuse me?” For a moment, I wonder if she knows who I am, and if she watched the docuseries about me.
“You shit on my ristretto. I tasted it after you left and I know it was perfect.”
Ah. Maybe this woman is my match.
“Interesting.”
“Why does everyone keep saying that to me?”
“Because it is.”
“Tell me why you lied.”
I let go of her, refusing to confirm anything, and move down the stairs. It takes all of my strength not to smile, because I know from this single encounter she will be the end of me.
She follows behind me, and having her here is too convenient. When my feet hit the bottom step, I walk into the kitchen and open the fridge. I pull a beer from the door and pop off the cap.
“Do you make it a habit of walking into strangers’ homes?” I ask, taking a sip.
She blinks up at me and I think I could paint her face with my eyes closed. “Does it matter?”
“Wow. So you’re a liability,” I state.
Autumn gives me the dirtiest look. “Frame it however you want. You don’t know how many times I’ve turned the knob to that door and it’s never opened. No way I was turning back.”
“How many?”
My question shocks her. She doesn’t know how to respond to me, and that’s okay, most people don’t. I was raised to be direct. We can blame my father for that, and for breaking me from being intimidated. I bow to no one.
“At least twenty,” she says. “This place has been a mystery for so long.”
“And you’ll keep it to yourself. No one needs to know.”
“If you let me leave, I promise I won’t tell a soul.”
“I should make an example out of you,” I warn. “Then if anyone else has the audacity to enter, maybe they’ll think twice about it. What if I’d have drawn a weapon? Or attacked you?”
“I have bear spray.”
“You and I both know I had you pinned. I could’ve done whatever the fuck I wanted and no one would know. I could’ve made you disappear. I still can.”
“Disappearing doesn’t sound so bad,” she says, and it reminds me of the conversation I had with my sister recently. “But my best friend knows where I am, and if I don’t text her back before dark, she’ll report me as missing, this being the last place I was.”
Maybe the two of us aren’t so different. I glance up at the window, noticing the rain has subsided.
“Tell me why you lied,” she says.
