pile and comes to help, tearing and stomping as needed. It’s after eight when we finish, and we’re both covered in dust. My hands are dark with grime and the dirt under my nails reminds me of the stranger, fixing my tire. Still a stranger. No name.
I shake my head. Until today I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about that night. He hadn’t left as many marks as I’d thought, and I was more disappointed than I should have been. Without the bruises as proof of the encounter, it could have been a fantasy, a story I concocted on my lonely drive home from prison.
We wash up in the tiny staff bathrooms and Rodney waits while I turn off the lights and check the doors. It’s dark and cold when we exit into the quiet parking lot, my car the only one remaining. The warehouse is in an industrial area, predictably isolated. Desolate, sometimes. No buses come in here, and it’s a ten-minute walk to the nearest Holden Rail, the city’s commuter train system.
“How’d you get here?” I ask.
Rodney didn’t put on a coat, and now he shivers as he huddles deeper into his hoodie, breath hanging in the air. “Rode with Colin.”
I look around, just in case. “He left?”
“Yeah.”
“You need a ride to the train station?”
“Yeah.”
We walk in silence to my car, the February cold especially jarring after the strangely warm day last week. The asphalt is speckled white with frost, the car windows opaque. I pull out my keys and click to open the doors, the taillights flicking on. Rodney gives the car a once-over.
“This is nice.”
“Thanks.”
“Why are you working at a food bank and driving this car?”
“I don’t work. I volunteer.”
“Huh.” I see him notice the scratch on the trunk, but he doesn’t comment.
We get in and wait for the car to heat up, the windows to defrost. I press a button to warm the steering wheel and Rodney snorts.
“What?”
He rolls his eyes.
“Whatever.” The area feels lonely and abandoned as I navigate the empty streets, the tires crunching over salt sprinkled on the roads as a precaution.
“Where do you live?” Rodney asks.
“Downtown.”
“I figured. Where?”
“Does it matter?”
“You afraid I’ll come rob you?”
“I’m afraid you’ll come visit.”
He snickers and rubs a spot on the window, peering outside. “Why you at the Food Bank, then? If you don’t have to be?”
“There are lots of volunteers, not just me.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Why do you work there?” I ask.
“Cause I have to. Lyla’s my mom’s second cousin and my mom made her give me this job.”
“You couldn’t find something closer to home?”
“I wasn’t exactly looking hard enough.”
I nod. Its remote location was part of what I liked about the Food Bank. Fewer people to interact with. To recognize me.
“I got a brother in prison and a brother in law school,” Rodney says. “I guess this is the middle-ground.”
“The middle of nowhere, maybe.”
“Well. It ain’t prison.”
“No,” I agree. “It’s not.”
Rodney scoffs as I pull into the parking lot at the station. “Like you’d know,” he says, climbing out. “Thanks for the ride.”
“Bye.”
I watch until he disappears inside, wondering if I should hang around until the train comes. I don’t know the frequency of the stops—I’d taken the train a couple of times years ago when I was too drunk to drive and wanted to see how the other half lived, but I don’t remember most of the details. The Carlisle family flew first class and had a driver on the payroll.
There are a few other cars and enough foot traffic that I don’t feel like I’m completely abandoning Rodney when I reverse out of the lot and turn toward home. Because of the spare tire, the car drives a little weird, but only if you’re paying attention. Like the faint bruises and the scratch in the paint, I’d left it on as a tangible reminder of that night. But I know better than to live in the past.
I pass a few darkened car repair shops on my way home, so I watch until I find one that offers twenty-four hour service and pull in. There are no cars in the lot, but I can see a couple on lifts inside the raised garage doors. I park and tug on a wool hat before walking into the small front area. Enough time has passed that people don’t recognize me too much anymore, especially with the dark hair and no makeup, but I still take comfort in my disguises.