After smoking a bowl they were both ravenous. Timmy tried to order Chinese food, but at midnight on Christmas Eve, even Jade Garden was closed.
Claudia followed him into the kitchen, a room she had never entered: scabby linoleum and ancient appliances, an electric stove that looked grimy and possibly dangerous, its burners wrapped in yellowed tinfoil. Lined up on the counter were cereal boxes, a twenty-pack of Top Ramen, a toolbox, and a sack of rock salt.
They stood shoulder to shoulder, staring into the refrigerator.
“This is bleak,” Timmy said.
“Hang on.” Claudia rummaged through the drawers and came up with a half stick of butter, speckled with toast crumbs, and a few plastic-wrapped slices of American cheese.
She hadn’t made Cheesy Ramen in twenty-five years, but she made it that night for her weed dealer on her first orphan Christmas. They dined side by side in front of the television, the way she’d eaten every meal for the first seventeen years of her life.
“If I’m ever on death row, I want this to be my last meal,” Timmy said with his mouth full. “I want you to come make me these fuckin noodles.”
He said, “This is the most incredible thing I have ever eaten in my life.”
DON’T YOU WANT TO FIND HIM?
SHE TRIED ONE LAST TIME TO SEE HIM—MIDWAY THROUGH HER second trimester, when she was just beginning to show. She was counting on her belly to speak for her, to articulate what couldn’t be said.
Timmy’s apartment was empty. The tapestry had been taken down from the front window, and she could see clearly into the empty living room. His furniture was gone, the capacious couch and magisterial recliner and massive wide-screen TV. Claudia stood on the porch a long time, looking into the apartment, trying to memorize it. She knew that she would never return.
“Can I help you?”
She turned to see a pink-cheeked man in a Bruins jersey, holding a laminated sign. APARTMENT FOR RENT.
“I was just about to hang this.” He was maybe sixty, with longish hair and a gold chain at his throat. “The place is available first of the month. You wanna see it?”
“Yes,” said Claudia, her heart beating loudly. Yes, that is exactly what I want.
She followed him inside.
“I just listed it this morning,” said the landlord. “Already I’m getting calls out the wazoo.”
The apartment was clean and empty, filled with sunlight. Without Timmy’s outsized furniture, his imposing physical presence, the place felt smaller, not larger. It still smelled faintly of weed.
“Sorry about the smell. I’m having the floors redone next week. That should take care of it.”
She followed him into the kitchen. The cruddy linoleum had been replaced with wood-grain laminate, the moribund stove with a ceramic cooktop.
“That’s a brand-new refrigerator,” said the landlord. “Energy Star–rated.”
“Terrific,” Claudia said.
“You know the neighborhood? It’s a great location, walking distance to the Orange Line. At this price, the place will go fast. I’d put in an application today, if you’re interested.” His eyes dipped briefly to her waist, or maybe they didn’t. She was at the stage in her pregnancy when she was prone to imagining such things.
“Any questions for me?” he asked.
Claudia hesitated only a moment.
“The old tenant,” she said. “Where did he go?”
It was a bizarre question, but if the landlord thought so, he gave no sign. He looked a little sleepy, his eyes red-rimmed and bleary. It occurred to her that he was probably high.
“Moved away,” he said. “Out of state, I think.”
“Do you know where?”
“Couldn’t tell ya. He didn’t leave a forwarding address.”
A mobile phone rang in his pocket, the first few bars of “Danny Boy.”
“Excuse me, I gotta take this.” He handed her a business card from his pocket. BARRY PROPERTY MGMT. “You want to fill out an application, just give me a call.”
He stepped back into the apartment, closing the door behind him.
Claudia lingered a moment in the vestibule, staring at the closed door. She imagined it opening again, Timmy appearing out of nowhere in his stocking cap and layered T-shirts. What exactly would she say?
At that moment she heard footsteps on the landing. A small round woman was struggling with a package, an immense fruit basket wrapped in clear yellow plastic.
“Do you need help with that?” Claudia called.
“It’s arright, I got it. Can you grab those bags, maybe?” The woman nodded toward two large shopping bags sitting on the landing.
Claudia picked up the bags and followed her upstairs. The door of the second-floor apartment was ajar, a radio playing. Cooking smells wafted into the hallway, cumin and maybe garlic. Claudia’s stomach squeezed violently. She’d eaten just an hour ago. Now she was salivating like a hungry dog.
“Let me put this inside,” said the neighbor—Latina maybe, her speech accented. “Hang on, I’ll be right back.”
Claudia waited in the hallway—why, she wasn’t sure—until the woman reappeared. She took the bags from Claudia’s hands and set them inside the door.
“Thanks. Timmy used to do that. He was always carrying things for me. I heard you asking about him.” Her eyes lingered at Claudia’s midsection. “I’ve seen you here before.”
Claudia felt her face heat.
“He didn’t move away,” said the neighbor. “He went to jail.”
Claudia’s stomach groaned audibly.
“Jail,” she repeated. “Are you sure?”
“That’s what people are saying.” The neighbor raised her hands, palms up: What could you do? “I knew what he was into. But he wasn’t a bad guy, you know? I liked him.”
Claudia said, “I liked him too.”
SHE COULD FIND HIM IF SHE WANTED TO. IT WOULD TAKE SOME effort, but she could do it. She didn’t know his last name or his age or where he was now or how long he’d be there, but those questions had answers, and answers could always be found.
When she thought of him at all, which wasn’t often, she remembered the way they’d talked to each other, their conversations mediated by television. She could place him easily in her childhood, on the sagging couch between Deb and the fosters. Claudia gave Timmy his own TV tray, his paper plate, his plastic cup of cola. In this way it seemed that he’d been with her for her entire life.
He was her kind.
They weren’t in love and never could be, but for a time he’d felt like home to her. In the terrible year after her mother died, his apartment was the place she went to.
His porch light was always on.
TIMMY WAS GONE NOW. THERE WAS POWER IN KNOWING THIS. The knowledge made all things possible. She couldn’t imagine having a child with him. She could only imagine doing it alone, as her own mother had done.
When she fell pregnant, she had a choice to make. That the choice wasn’t automatic or obvious is a truth no one wants to hear. Falling makes for a better story: falling pregnant, falling in love. If she fell in love with Timmy, or with her future child, if she fell in love with the idea of motherhood, she would be a more sympathetic character. This hasn’t changed, and likely won’t: We prefer our heroines helpless. Helpless means blameless.