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It was nicer than most places they stayed in, but Zeke had found that in small towns, nicer places had more anonymity. Small town people distrusted the people who skulked around slums and flophouses. They noticed them, so they could stay away. In big cities, nobody noticed the poor and criminal.
So, a decent place for a change, and they’d probably get to stay a few months. Zeke was not unhopeful that they might get to experience something close to normalcy. Casey’d been good; the child Casey, but still, almost high-school Casey at times. It was early spring, in Texas, and Zeke felt good.
The girl across the hall came knocking the first night. “Hi!” she’d said with saccharine brightness. “I just wanted to welcome you to the building!”
The girl (whose name was Lisa) squeezed past Zeke into the apartment. “Not much stuff, huh?” she observed as she took in the furnishings that came with the place, along with Zeke and Casey’s few belongings. “You should see my place – I barely fit in there anymore with all my crap!”
She wandered and touched and talked and sized both of them up and then honed in on Zeke. He told her good night and guided her out the door, but he let himself check out her ass as she walked back across the hall.
“She’s cute,” Casey said when Zeke turned back around.
“Yeah?” Zeke said. “She’s easy, too, Casey. You might finally get lucky.”
Casey muttered something and turned red; as far as Zeke could ascertain, he held an equal level of fascination with and terror of women and sex. Also, as far as Zeke could ascertain, Casey had absolutely no experience with either.
Sadly, Zeke’s own experiences since he and Casey had turned into Bonnie and Clyde were infrequent, and on their rare occasions, they were hurried, one-shot arrangements. Zeke considered it a serious relationship if they actually used a bed.
That night in bed, Casey snuffling his sleep-noises into the pillow beside him, Zeke decided not to guide Easy Lisa out the door so quickly the next time she let herself in.
_____
The woman next door had choppy dark hair and distrustful eyes. She let herself into her apartment as quickly as possible and then shut and locked the door as fast as she could. She was as far a cry from Easy Lisa as one could get, and they’d been there three weeks before she spoke to either of them.
“Your friend,” she said to Zeke one day as they both came in at the same time, “he has bad dreams?”
“My brother?” Zeke asked/corrected. “Yeah. He waking you up at night?”
“No,” she said, and disappeared into her little hole.
Zeke was coming out of Easy Lisa’s apartment late one night (he’d had those arrangements secured before the end of their second week) when she suddenly appeared in the hall before him. “Here,” she said, and thrust something at him. “Tea. For your ‘brother.’ He’ll sleep better.” Even through her strange accent (German, maybe? Not Texan), Zeke could hear the quotes around the word “brother.”
“Thanks,” he said, looking at the small bag she’d pushed into his hand. “I have to be careful what I give him, though.”
“No,” the woman said. “It’s safe. You could give it to a baby. Have him try it.”
“All right,” Zeke said, but she was already back in her apartment.
The tea worked like a charm, and Casey slept sounder than he had in years.
_____
It was always ebb and flow with Casey, good phase or not, and there would always be the inevitable evening when Zeke would have to go out for a job and Casey would have a whining fit. Zeke was in the midst of repeating, “Casey, it’s just a few hours,” for the sixth time when someone knocked on the door.
“You’re going out?” the strange tea lady asked. “Maybe Casey wants to watch movies with me?”
“Um,” Zeke stalled, caught off guard. Strange tea lady both gave him the creeps and inspired a bizarre sense of trust.
“Hi,” Casey said from behind Zeke, which was unexpected – Casey almost never spoke to strangers.
“Hi,” strange tea lady answered.
“You take pictures,” Casey said, and now Zeke was even more surprised, because he had noticed almost nothing about strange tea lady once he had determined she was not a threat.
“Yes,” strange tea lady said. “I’m Jane.”
Zeke left them alone.
_____
Jane had a darkroom in her kitchen, and she let Casey use it for the rolls and rolls of undeveloped film he had in his bag. “Lots of pictures of Zeke,” she observed one day.
Zeke had been in the backseat of the car, trying to take a nap while Casey jabbered at him and snapped pictures. “Casey,” he’d finally said in exasperation. “I gotta sleep. Settle down.”
Casey didn’t know where they were in that picture. He wasn’t even sure what car they’d been using then. He couldn’t say if he’d taken that picture two months or two years ago, but he could remember that moment, the smell of the air, the exhaustion in Zeke’s voice. There were more pictures from when Zeke had fallen asleep, and Casey could remember being quiet, watching Zeke sleep, and thinking that he didn’t seem so grown-up, asleep in the backseat of the car, as he did when he was awake and indomitable and the biggest person in the world.
“I don’t want to forget,” he said in the present to Jane.
“Forget Zeke?” she asked, but she wasn’t making fun. Jane never made fun.
“Forget what Zeke does,” Casey said.
“Mmm,” Jane hummed in response. Casey didn’t know if she understood, didn’t know if he understood, but it was enough.
_____
“Who is this?” Jane asked one day, pointing to a picture of Stokely. She was leaning forward, tilting toward him, smiling. To Casey, she glowed with love.
“Sister?” Jane prompted. “Girlfriend?”
“Sister,” Casey said.
“Mmm,” Jane hummed. “Sister like Zeke is your brother?”
“Yeah,” Casey said after a beat. He looked studiously down at the picture he was developing, and avoided Jane’s eyes.
“Then she is a good sister,” Jane said seriously, and the sudden tightness in Casey’s chest eased.
“The best,” he said.
“But not a girlfriend,” Jane said, and now she smiled.
“No,” Casey said, and he smiled back even as he blushed. “No, not a girlfriend. She’s married.”
“Mmm,” Jane said. “So, no girlfriend at all?”
“No,” Casey said, and his hands trembled a little. “No girlfriends. Zeke has girlfriends. Not me.”
“Zeke has Lisas,” Jane corrected, and Casey agreed, “Yeah.”
“It’s too bad,” Jane said. “You, with no girlfriends. You should have one.” And she stroked his hair with careful, gentle fingers before moving away to make them tea.
Casey finished the photos he was working on, but all the while, he felt those gentle fingers in his hair.
_____
A bad day. A bad, bad day and he knew Zeke had to go away that night and he had to get himself under control because Zeke would worry all night if Casey were having a bad day and God forbid he decide to lock Casey in the bathroom to keep him safe because it was a bad day and Casey couldn’t bear to think of being locked up today.
He’d gnawed at his fingers until three of them were bleeding, and when Zeke had grabbed his hands to make him stop, Casey had tossed himself heavily against the wall, bashing the side of his head against it, just to be obstinate. He’d deliberately choked on his first bite of dinner and then knocked the rest of the plate on the floor and watched Zeke clean it up with satisfaction.
It all served Zeke right, Casey thought, because his bad day was Zeke’s fault and his hurting head was Zeke’s fault and he was out of cigarettes and Zeke had said no more and it was all Zeke’s fault because he was going away and wouldn’t be back until almost morning and it was too bad a day for Casey to think about that and finally he just started crying and Zeke made him lie down on the bed and then lay down close beside him.
“It’s all right, buddy,” Zeke said quietly, and rubbed the back of Casey’s head. “You’re just all bent out of shape today.”
“Yeah,” Casey agreed, and reached out to put a hand on Zeke’s arm, just to touch him, just to know he wasn’t alone. “Don’t leave, Zeke, don’t leave me here and not come back.”
“Not a chance, man,” Zeke said. “Why don’t you take a nap?”
It was the first thing on that bad day that Zeke had said that seemed like a good idea, so Casey did.
_____
“You’re going away tonight?” Jane said when Zeke opened the door.
“Yes,” Zeke said.
“I’ll stay with Casey,” Jane said. “Tell me when you leave.” And she walked away.
“Thanks,” Zeke said, but she’d already shut the door.
_____
“Hey,” Zeke said, leaning over Casey and rubbing his head. “Hey, I’ll be back later.”
“’Kay,” Casey muttered, and went back to sleep.
_____
When he woke, Jane was on the couch watching television and drinking wine. Casey stared blankly at her and rubbed his face.
“You like this movie?” Jane asked. It was “The Breakfast Club.”
“Yeah,” Casey said. “It’s all right.”
“Does Zeke let you drink wine?” she asked.
“Um, not really,” Casey said.
“Maybe one glass?” Jane asked, and picked up Casey’s water glass from the coffee table.
“OK,” Casey said, and sat down beside her.
_____
“It’s funny because it’s like all the kids I went to school with, only they all just have these stupid problems that they think are real and aren’t really,” Casey said after the movie was over. He was warm and comfy lying back on the couch, and the wine was smooth and mellow on his palate and in his veins. “It’s all this stuff everyone thinks is important and none of it matters.”
“Mmm,” Jane said. “So what is important stuff?”
Aliens, Casey thought. Men in suits and lying doctors. He didn’t say it. Instead he just shrugged.
Jane drained the last of the wine from her glass and set it down. Instead of leaning back into the couch, she reached forward and under Casey’s shirt sleeve with quick fingers, capturing his wrist.
“This?” she asked quietly, running a finger along his scar. “This is important stuff? What was this important?”
Casey pulled his hand away, and she let him. “I’m not supposed to talk about it,” he muttered, not looking at her.
“Ah,” Jane said, and was quiet. Then she said, “I used aspirin and vodka. No scars.”
“Yeah?” Casey said. “How come?”
“A man,” Jane said, and sighed. “A man who broke my heart and broke my world and made me too tired and old.”
“Was it long ago?” Casey asked.
“Not so long ago,” Jane said, and sighed again. “But it is better now. I like this place. It feels good here. I like working on pictures with you. It makes me feel young.”
Casey thought that was funny, because Jane was at least a decade older than him, and he couldn’t help but smile.
“Oh, you think I am an old lady?” Jane said, and smiled back. “Well, maybe I am. But it feels good, spending time with you.” She reached a hand back out and touched Casey’s scar briefly, feather-light. “It reminds me that all this stuff, that I think is so important, it doesn’t really matter. There are other things, things that really matter. Yes?”
“Yes,” Casey said softly, and wasn’t entirely surprised when she leaned in and kissed him.
_____
They never stayed anyplace long.
“A picture for you,” Jane said when Casey knocked on her door to say good-bye, and she handed him a picture of himself. His chin was on his hand, and he was looking at something out of frame, or perhaps out of anyone else’s view altogether. In his own eyes, Casey could see his old self, and his new self, and his damaged self, and his undefeated self.
“Thanks,” Casey said, awkward and overwhelmed.
“So you don’t forget,” Jane said, and tapped the picture with a finger.
“Forget what?” Casey asked.
“What you do,” Jane said, and shut the door.