The shop wasn’t far, a block up and a block over in what had been designated a Historic District. A large black-brick building loomed next door with crenelated towers and a banner that said NOW RENTING. SECTION 8 WELCOME. On the other side a blood bank. The building across the street looked like it should have been condemned and maybe it was, but there were people in the windows and maybe they were, too. A deli store. Salvation Army. Brownstones. Some kind of urban development association with a big sign out front on a crew-cut lawn. A ragged woman came out of nowhere, hiked up her skirt and squatted behind the sign. She looked at a newspaper, then tore off a piece.
There was a safe in the window. Locks installed in cut-out door sections.
I went in and the door chimed. There was no one at the counter, no one else in the store. Someone called out from the back, a girl’s voice. She would be right with me. I looked around, at what hung above the counter, what was on the walls, but I wasn’t seeing it yet. The windows were dirty. I smelled dust.
“Can I help you?” She stood behind the counter, looking pressed. It wasn’t easy. I had to put it together . . . if she could copy one. Broken.
“Sure,” she said. “If it’s not all . . .” She made a face, held out her hand. She had a warm scratchy voice, almost a kid’s voice, the kind that called people sweetheart and honey, but she was pressed. I gave her the pieces and she held them together. “No problem.”
The walls that formed the corner behind her bristled with tiny hooks and on the hooks were hundreds of them, thousands, maybe, and I was close enough to see that they were all blanks, possibles, the edges straight and uncut. But the one she took came from a box on the counter.
“Kwikset,” she said. “Very common type.” She slipped on a pair of goggles, turned her back to me and put the pieces into a machine. There were a couple of stools in front of the counter but I kept standing. I couldn’t tell what she was doing but I watched her arms move. I watched all of her.
A high-pitched grinding you felt in your teeth. You could smell it. The door opened and a man walked in holding a newspaper. He sat down on one of the stools, unfolded the paper and covered his face with it. The dusty light crept toward him.
The girl switched the machine off. She blew on the key and inspected it briefly. The goggles sat on top of her head. She and the man with the paper ignored each other.
“A dollar forty-nine,” she said. When she gave me my change I asked her if she was a locksmith. The man made a sound.
“I keep the books,” she said. “I just help out up front as needed.” She hooked her fingers around the last two words. The newspaper rattled.
“You guys looking for help?” I asked. She didn’t answer, she was doing something with the register. I said it again, louder. Asked if they were looking for someone.
She looked at me. “Help?” she said. “I’m not sure,” she said. “Maybe . . . I think he might have mentioned something.”
The man behind the newspaper said, “He did say something.” She went on like he hadn’t spoken. “He’s just so disorganized—especially lately. I mean you wouldn’t believe.” Just no time to take out an ad or anything.
“Could I fill out an app—” It got tricky again, a bubble of spit sealed everything in. I slowed down: or were they looking for . . . ex-per-i-ence? Someone with?
I had history but no experience.
“I’m not sure.” She held her chin. “I know we need somebody. I think he’s just looking for help right now.” Raised a finger. “One second.”
She went back in the back. The man on the stool read his paper. Locks hung from the walls in plastic packages, by themselves or in doorknobs or levers. Outside a man walking by the storefront, spooning lunch into his mouth from a tray under his chin. The light pushing harder through the dirty glass, the blanks behind the counter glowing silver-white and brass-yellow.
“One minute,” she yelled. Papers shuffling, drawers opening and closing. The man on the stool yawned. I looked at the headlines between us. “I’m sorry,” she said, coming back, “I don’t know where he keeps them. But you know what?” She took a breath. “The best thing to do would be to talk to him in person. He’ll be in later. That way you can find out exactly from him.”
So when did she expect him back?
“Ibrahim’s time is all messed up,” the man behind the paper said. “Best time to catch Ibrahim is first thing, before it starts.”
“Read your paper,” she said but she nodded. “Do you want to do that?” She smiled. “Come back first thing in person? Before it hits the fan?”
She said I should leave my name and number, in case Ibrahim wanted to contact me. I told her all I had for now was a name, and she took that.
I bought a madras shirt at the Salvation Army. I also bought a pan, plate, spatula, cup, and a fork, knife and spoon. The shirt cost fifty cents.
There was a room called Collectibles where you could buy a Madonna or a hand-cranked film projector or a velvet painting of a matador or a fur stole with eyes and teeth. The musty smell of abandonment came in waves of loss. I didn’t touch anything, but took something with me.
One o’clock went by, but there was always seven. The store at the bottom of the Avenue had a cooler full of malt liquor, and one dozen eggs that sat on a shelf like the last of their kind and were so priced. I asked the proprietor if there was a grocery store around. He said he didn’t know but one of his customers did. Just a few blocks and the store was packed. I filled a basket. Bread, milk, margarine, eggs, instant coffee, peanut butter. Store brands, things that were five for a dollar. I could drink coffee without sugar. I could drink water.
I had something to eat for the rest of the week, and a little change. I skipped lunch and ate supper. Whoever lived above me started vacuuming. I heard it sucking at the other side of the ceiling, the lights dimmed and went brown. Seven o’clock went by; there was always tomorrow.
The second night wasn’t any better than the first, only different. Now the girl from the shop was in it. I lay in bed in my undershorts and thought about her, and when I was done thinking about her for a while I closed my eyes. My ear hurt. I had to lie on the other side but I’d roll over in my sleep and wake myself up. When I touched it, it felt numb, like somebody else’s. The stone in my stomach wouldn’t go away. I shivered. I got up and turned off the cold again, went past the closet door that wouldn’t close. Back in bed I thought about the girl again, a dirty movie flickering in my brain.
I half-slept and half-dreamt. Whoever lay next to me was much bigger than me but I couldn’t turn my head. My thoughts were made of static. Thunder woke me but outside it wasn’t raining. I went to the bathroom to try and piss through a hard-on. A roach crawled out of my shorts and onto the tip of me. You could barely feel it. I made a sound and brushed it to the floor, brought my bare foot down. When I lifted my foot the roach waited for half a second, then propelled itself into the darkness with some of the second to spare. They can live on just paper.
I switched on the light in the bedroom. Saw how they ran. I wanted to break the cycle of the air conditioner, so I left it off and opened the window. The air that came in was warm but smelled better. I could see a parking garage, streetlights, part of the freeway, another building on the other side of the garage. It was about the size of the Avenue and could have been an office building, but from the colors of the lights in the windows you could tell people lived there. I couldn’t see any of them. The city had its back to me, or mine was to it.
Then: someone, a voice, man or woman, far away, shouting or screaming. It was far away and at first you didn’t hear it, then you only thought you did, then you couldn’t help it. I couldn’t