When The Rain Falls

5. Not Homeless

5 NOT HOMELESS

AIMEE

Is there a man in my bed?

I wake up between the crisp sheets of my hotel bed in a mild panic. I don’t remember there being a man in my bed last night. But the hotel bedspread is bunched up suspiciously on the other side of this king bed and now I can’t be sure. I take a deep breath, slow my racing heart, and bring an arm down to flatten the comforter beside me.

Please don’t contain a body.

The comforter flattens with a crisp crinkling sound. A wave of air travels through the covers before escaping. No body. Just relief.

I sit up and check my phone for messages. Particularly, messages from Tate. But nope. Nada. She hasn't checked in on me.

I open my running app. I picked up running as a hobby two years ago. When Tate and Dom started spending most of their weekends together, I needed an activity I could do alone.

I instantly fell in love with running. It might have something to do with the runner’s high. Or the high of buying new running shoes every three months. Or the fact that running three miles burns enough calories to eat one of my favorite chocolate muffins. Look at me, doing math .

I’ve dabbled in 5ks, and 10ks, and then half marathons. Now, I’m training for a thirty-mile trail race. And while the rest of my life might be steadily unraveling, my training is not.

I stretch my arms over my head and try to work out the tension in my neck. I'm really thirsty. I must not have had enough water last night between drinks. Shit. Last night. How much did I drink again? I try piecing yesterday's events together. Everything is pretty clear until the bar dancing. There was that guy. The troll.

He was an ass to me all night. So, like any rational person would do, I kissed him . And I bit him . Ouch. Yeah, that happened. Oh well. I'll never see him again.

I get out of bed and begin the search for my pants. I immediately step onto the pointy end of my heel and wince as I nearly tumble to the floor where my clothes are strewn in a pile. I think that’s my bra hanging off the TV stand. I peek into the bathroom and find my jeans in a pile on the floor. I slide my legs into my pants and shimmy the waist over my hips.

At some point, I gather the courage to look at myself in the bathroom mirror. My hair is in a messy ponytail. Messy isn't quite the right word. It looks like a family of rodents occupied it last night. I hadn't removed my makeup before bed and now my mascara is smeared under my eyes. There's a streak across my cheek from where I was pressed up against the wrinkled bed sheets.

I wince at my reflection. Then I snap a picture and send it to Tate. While I have my phone out, maybe I should call Alicia.

A sense of dread fills my chest as I hover my thumb over her name again. My sister is a good person, I remind myself. We just had a falling out. A falling out that involved an unwitting possession of a stolen Jeep, a request for bail money, and an earful of her lectures about how I need to get serious and grow up. I’m trying to grow up. I really am. But adulthood doesn’t seem to like me so much.

I take a deep breath and hit call.

Maple Court is nothing like the crowded towers of apartments and condos in the city. It’s a sea of sprawling two-story houses with meticulous hedges lining the driveways. A row of trees dot the sidewalks, perfect little lollipops, not a leaf out of place. All the fences are white. And picket. And stand guard around a plot of vibrant, green grass.

It looks like a place where you might find kids biking the neighborhood unsupervised. A place where everyone knows their neighbor. A place where you can lounge in your yard without the stench of urine and garbage.

When I explained that I needed a place to crash for a bit, Alicia was quick to invite me to stay with her family. Almost too quick. Part of me expected her to not answer. Or to tell me to ask someone else. Our differences aside, I haven’t been a great sister. But I hope staying with her will give me an opportunity to get closer.

I locate Alicia’s house easily by the giant, black Escalade in the driveway. That would belong to Greg. Alicia's husband.

My sister had a rough start to life. She got pregnant with Julie when she was seventeen. Julie's dad was never in the picture. My parents were second parents to Julie, until they retired and moved to Florida. Alicia raised Julie as a single parent after that. She put herself through community college, then nursing school, and then landed a nursing job. Then she met Greg and got married and had another kid. On paper, Alicia’s got it all. House. Husband. Two kids. Respectable career. An elected position on the PTA of Julie’s high school.

In comparison, I look like I have…a suitcase, a duffel bag, a bad reputation, and a giant bag of quarter-life crisis worries.

I’m not a failure . I graduated with a degree in design five years ago. Since then, I’ve worked a series of part-time gigs—receptionist, coffee shop barista—until I finally landed what I thought would be my dream job in graphic design. I assumed as a graphic design associate, I would finally have a change to do, oh, I don’t know, graphic design . But, Murphy Creative, the agency I work for, is huge. And I’m starting at the bottom. Which means using templates to design catalogs and advertisements. Something that I’m certain any grade schooler could do. For years, I banked on a career to anchor my life. Help me find my way. But now I have one and it’s eating my very soul.

I grab my suitcase, duffle bag, and a package of cookies from my trunk before walking up to Alicia's front porch. Without knocking, I throw open the front door.

"I’m here!" I yell when I open the door. “And I brought cookies!”

I’m greeted by an empty foyer and a stack of unopened packages.

“Hey? Guys?” I walk all the way in and close the door behind me, juggling the box of cookies in my full hands. This is awkward. I probably should have knocked. A knot is starting to form in my stomach.

“Aunt Aimee?” I hear feet shuffling down the hallway before a tall, thin teenager appears. She’s wearing an oversized sweatshirt and ripped jeans. Her hair is in a messy bun on top of her head.

“Jules!” I gush. I drop my bags and run to her, wrapping her in a hug. The hug is all elbows and limbs.

“Oh my God. You’re like full sized now.” I pull back and take her in. She’s quiet, and shy, and way more responsible than I was at her age. I saw her five months ago, when her brother was born, but she already looks older and more mature.

I hold my fist out to her.

“Ugh, do we have to?” Julie’s shoulders slump.

“Yep. Consider it Aunt Tax.”

“What’s Aunt Tax?” Julie asks, her nose wrinkling and her neck slinking into her shoulder in disgust.

“Payback for the time you puked on me in the movie theater.”

“That was like ten years ago,” Julie groans. “And you’re the one who let me eat a jumbo box of Skittles. I was five. If you put candy in front of a five-year-old, she’s just going to eat it all until it’s gone.” I roll my eyes at her. Yeah. I know that now .

“My shirt looked like it was covered in unicorn piss,” I grumble, before clamping my hand over my mouth. Pretty sure piss is on the list Alicia texted me this morning. The list of words I’m not allowed to say in front of her kids. Along with half of my vocabulary. This is going to be hard .

I wiggle my extended fist in front of Julie’s face, telling her not to leave me hanging.

Julie reluctantly brings her fist against mine. We pull our fists back slowly, uncurling two fingers and circling them in the air to replicate Michael Jackson’s moonwalk. Then we do jazz hands. Or, rather, I do these things. Julie flops her arms around unenthusiastically like a dying fish.

It’s a really stupid fist bump. One I let Julie make up when she was five. It was fun back then. It’s even funnier now that we’re older.

“Girl,” I chide her. “That was lame.”

Julie’s about to answer when another girl enters the room. She looks the same age as Julie, but she has gorgeous dark features and curves that some adult women only dream of. She's twisting a lock of long, black hair around her finger and staring down at a bright pink phone in her hand as she walks towards us.

"Oh my god, Julie," she squeals, oblivious to her audience, eyes glued to her screen. "Rocky posted about taking me to homecoming!” She bumps into a side table and automatically turns ninety degrees before she continues walking, like a Roomba being redirected by a wall.

“This is Ruby,” Julie makes the introduction. “She lives across the street.”

Ruby stops walking and looks up at me with complete and utter disinterest. Like it's inconvenient that I exist in her proximity.

"Hey," she says dismissively before returning her attention to her phone. But then she does a double take. “Wait, you’re the aunt? Like the homeless one?”

“Homeless? Guys, come on. I’m not homeless. I just don’t have a place to live right now.”

“Isn’t that the definition of homeless?” Ruby asks. I don’t know if I like this kid.

“Ok, maybe. But I have a job. So, I’m not really homeless. More like, homeless-ish. Or housing challenged,” I offer. “Yeah. Housing challenged.”

“Or homeless.” Ruby shrugs. “Wait. Do you have a car?”

“Oh my God,” I sigh. “Yes, I have a car.”

“Cool, you wanna take us shopping for ho-co dresses?”

“Only if you want to,” Julie chimes in. “No big deal.”

“If she doesn’t do it then we’re stuck with my dad.” Ruby throws Julie a harsh glare. I feel like I’ve seen that glare before. But where? “And he’d probably make us buy pilgrim dresses.”

“I’ll totally do it. I love shopping. That sounds like fun,” I offer quickly. I have the sudden urge to prove to Ruby that I am neither homeless nor a lame aunt.

“If you think that sounds fun, you clearly don’t spend enough time around teenagers,” Alicia’s voice cuts across the room. I look up the stairs and see her making her way down with a sleepy-faced infant clinging to her chest. When I see her, it strikes me just how different our lives are. Here she is, in the defined roles of mom and wife. Walking comfortably around a home of her own. In a life that she’s built. Arms wrapped around an infant as she walks in front of a wall full of framed family photos. We exist in different worlds.

When we make eye contact, it feels like spiders are crawling around in my chest.

“Hey, Alicia.” I try to sound casual.

“Hey, Aimes. Didn’t hear you come in, sorry about that.” She bounces Logan against her chest.

“Thanks so much for letting me crash here.”

“Sure, no problem.” She nods up the stairs. “Come on up. We fixed the guest room for you.” I climb the stairs behind Alicia and follow her to the guest room. Logan gives me a chubby-cheeked grin over her shoulder. When I boop him on the nose, he belly laughs. I've never really been a huge fan of babies, but he's a cute one.

"Here you are," she says, walking into the room at the end of the hallway and flipping on the light. I throw my suitcase onto the bed and set the duffel bag on the floor. It's a small room, but it's clean and conveniently located next to the bathroom.

Alicia walks over to the window and raises the blinds, still bouncing Logan as I join her. Our reflections appear side by side, but in two separate window panes, exaggerating the distance between us. We watch the world below in silence. The quiet streets. The perfect row of street trees. The well-maintained houses with flower beds out front. No dumpsters. No traffic lights. No traffic sounds .

"How was last night?" Alicia asks. Her reflection in the window disappears as she walks across the room and takes a seat on the bed. She settles Logan in her lap as he sticks a chubby hand into his mouth.

"Oh, you know, the usual." I follow and plop onto the bed beside her. "Drinking, dancing.” Biting strangers on the mouth. I wince to myself.

"Sounds fun.” Alicia seems uninterested.

Alicia’s five years older than I am. Growing up, I idolized her. But I was always an exasperating wild thing that messed up her orderly games of house and school by pretending to be a monster. Ironic how that seems to perfectly reflect our current situation.

"So, what happened with your prior living arrangement?"

"Eh, just time to move on." I shrug. Because I am not admitting to Alicia that I ruined a perfectly good lease by banging my landlord. That goes to my grave.

"That's it? That's why you walked away from a one-year lease for a decent townhouse in Seattle? Because it was time to move on?" Here we go. Already cutting straight to the criticism.

"It was month-to-month," I say defensively. And sometimes, mouth-to-mouth .

"Right. Of course. I forgot you don’t do commitments.” She brushes a hand to smooth back Logan's hair and gives me one of her signature older sister looks. I hate how her comment explodes in my chest like a powerful, ugly, truth bomb. Because she’s right. I don’t finish the things I start. And not just relationships. I quit things when they stop being fun. It’s why I have one quarter of a master’s degree, a crocheted blanket that might cover your whole ass, and shelves of unread books.

“I do commitments, Alicia,” I say, my voice dripping with mock offense as I cross my arms in front of my chest. “I can watch an entire season of a Netflix drama in one sitting. And I never open a bottle of wine unless I’m prepared to drink the whole thing.”

“Really, Aimee?” The look she gives me is downright prickly. Tough crowd.

I sigh. Because it feels like, once again, I’m thirteen. And she’s dressing me down for something she considers to be careless and na?ve. Her disapproval twists deep in my gut. Because how can you try to be a better person when everyone keeps putting you in the same tired box?

“And I’m training for my first ultra-marathon,” I add.

Alicia’s ears perk up as she studies me with new interest. “An ultra-marathon? What’s that?”

“Any distance longer than a marathon. I’ve been training for a year.” And right now, that seems to be the only thing going right in my life. When Alicia only looks mildly impressed, I sigh and drop my crossed arms.

“It’s at Mt. St. Helens,” I add, trying to conjure a little bit of false cheer. I chose this particular race because it takes runners on trails around the mountain. Mt. St. Helens is one of Washington State’s five active volcanoes. My parents always talk about the day it erupted back in 1980. When the sky turned black with ash and when the highways were slick and dangerous for days afterward. My dad gathered some ash in a bottle and kept it on his dresser. I figured my first big race would be a great chance to see it.

“Mom and Dad called the other day.” Alicia raises a cautious eyebrow. Great. Speaking of my parents. “They were asking about you.”

“What?” I huff. “Did they call to see if I joined a cult or something?” Now that I think about it. Maybe I should join a cult. That seems like a quick way to make friends.

No, Aimee! Bad girl.

“They’re worried about you.” I try not to snort. They have a funny way of showing worry. Scolding me for the tattoo I got on my leg. Always nagging me about when I’m going to buy a house, and get married, and have kids. Always comparing me to Alicia.

“You’re flighty and all over the place,” Alicia’s verbal lashing continues. “They want to see you put down roots. Honestly, I don’t think they’ll be able to enjoy retirement until they know you’re settled down.” Something in her tone tells me there’s something else.

“And?”

“ And …they also asked if you needed more bail money.”

“Come on! If you haven’t been arrested once in your life, are you even living?” I huff with exasperation. Screw it. I might as well just be the person everyone here thinks I am.

Alicia gives me a deep frown and I roll my eyes. For fuck’s sake. There was a perfectly reasonable explanation for that arrest. When Tate was busy with Dom last year, I met a guy on a local Facebook group and we planned an impromptu trip to the Oregon sand dunes. I didn’t know his Jeep was stolen. The charges were dropped. Eventually.

“You tend to think more with your heart and less with your head,” Alicia says carefully. I know the word she’s really thinking. Reckless. She thinks I’m reckless. I’m pretty sure my whole family thinks I’m reckless.

“But, Pt. Evans is a great town,” Alicia says encouragingly while I silently sulk beside her. “It has a lot to offer. You can build a life here, you know. Something permanent." Just as I suspected. Alicia's hospitality comes with strings. "Now that you have that job, well, you are in a good spot to make something of yourself. We think it could be really good for you. Living here. Away from the city, and the nightlife, and…”

“Frat boys?” I offer.

“Distractions,” she clarifies. “It will help you focus.” What she really means is that this is a great chance for her to keep me on a short leash.

When I don’t answer, Alicia frowns at me and I realize that the creases across her forehead have gotten deeper since the last time I've seen her.

“Alicia—”

"Aimee, stay here as long as you need. Do what you need to do. I only ask that you not bring them home. Not here. Ok?” Oh my God. My reputation is following me around like a black cloud. Alicia runs her fingers across the back of Logan's head as he continues sucking on his hand, oblivious to the conversation around him.

“Yeah. Sure. I mean that’s why I came here. I already banged all the guys in Seattle. Thought it was time for some fresh blood. Got any hot neighbors?”

“Aimee, you’re not funny.”

“I’m Aimee Jones, the Queen of Casual. The Caller of Booties. The Fucker of Buddies. First of her Name. Debauchery is coming. To a neighborhood near you. Lock up all your men.”

“Aimee, I didn’t mean?—”

“Yes, you did,” I correct her. “I get it. I’ll try not to scandalize your family while I’m here. I’ll try not to sleep with all the dads at Julie’s school so you won’t be the laughing stock of the PTA.”

“Aimee, I’m sorry.”

“No, Alicia, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m a screw up. Ok? And thanks for the bail money last year. But I’d prefer if we scrapped the lectures and just hung out like sisters." I collapse backwards into the mattress and rub my temples. What I really need right now isn’t lectures or criticism. What I really need is a friend. Maybe even a sister. But we’ve never really had that kind of relationship.

“We can hang out,” she says quietly. “That would be nice.” The response surprises me. First, because she didn’t even try to deny that I’m a screw up. And second, that she wants to hang out with me?

"Really?” I ask hopefully. “Do you want to do something tonight? See a movie? Go out for drinks. The place I went last night had?—”

"I have to work tonight,” Alicia says, cutting me off. Logan reaches up and grips a piece of her hair with a wet, drooly fist. It's kind of gross, but Alicia doesn't even flinch. “Unfortunately, I got stuck with the late shift this whole week. Maybe another time, though.”

"Sure. Another time." I stare up at the ceiling. I can't imagine having Alicia’s burdens. A five month old, a teenager, a husband, an entire house to maintain, and working late shifts at a hospital on top of all that. I know we don't always see eye to eye. But I have to hand it to her. She works really hard to keep her life together.

“You work remotely, right? Do you need anything for work?” Alicia asks.

“Just the wifi password.”

“I never remember it. I’ll have Greg get it to you,” Alicia says. She pauses before continuing. "Hey, if you don’t mind, I was going to ask you a favor.” Alicia throws a pair of pleading eyes in my direction. "Homecoming is Friday and I have to work that night. Could you take Julie to the dance? You know, just drop her off and pick her up?”

“I'd love to,” I say quickly, “That sounds fun."

"Like I said, you clearly don't spend enough time around teenagers." Alicia chuckles.

“Maybe you can take Ruby, too. If you don't mind."

"The more the merrier," I say. But I wince inwardly. Because Ruby kind of scares me.

“Ruby lives across the street, so it shouldn't be too inconvenient. In that house." She points to the dark, creepy house across the street. Large pine trees hover above it in the back yard and their boughs hang limply down over the house, almost like they’re clutching it in their long, spindly claws. The whole place has this eerie, haunted look. I shiver.

"I know it would be a huge favor for Ruby's dad,” she adds. I’m suddenly wondering why I’d want to do a huge favor for some dude I don’t even know.

“What about Ruby’s mom?” I ask.

“Her mom passed away. He’s a single dad,” she explains. “As a former single mom, I have a soft spot for him. He's a really good guy. Salt of the Earth."

"What does that even mean? Salt of the Earth?” I ask. “How is that a compliment? I mean, who wants to be compared to salt?"

Alicia laughs. "It means hardworking and reliable.” Alicia gives me a look that suggests I have little experience with either of those concepts.

“Whatever. I know how to be salty.” I laugh.