Room 23

She walks with confidence, each stride of her 5’9” frame an intentional move towards her purpose. She’s not arrogant, but she knows she is a beautiful woman. She wears a flowing white dress that makes her golden-brown skin glow in the late summer sun. Her large brown eyes have always betrayed her every emotion. Drag queens are jealous of her long, curled lashes. She will use her looks as a means to an end, but only if necessary.

She knows he is following behind her. She does not know, however, how close he is. She can’t run, lest she call attention. She moves deftly through the throngs of people; left, and then right, threading the needle between them. Not daring to turn her head, she uses the reflections in shop windows to try to find him.

Tourists, overdressed because they didn't know when they were packing that the fog doesn't come to this side of the city. The sun beats down on their sweatshirts, stretch jeans and thick socks. They stop in the middle of the sidewalk, confused, looking for the city they were promised on the travel sites. 

"Back to school sale! 50% off!" in large tacky green font.

People frantically combing through racks of clothes like a death ritual in some strange culture.

 "The human in its natural habitat grieves for its lost hope," she thinks, with a sense of cynicism. 

She scans the reflection of a bridal shop where women try on ill-fitting dress after ill-fitting dress. She sees people walking with desperate determination, on their way to god-only-knows. Inside, mothers hide their sense of impending doom as their daughters model dresses. They know that in 10 years they will be holding their daughters as they cry heartbroken, dreams shattered into a million divorced pieces. 

She doesn't have time to feel anything for the daughters or the mothers. She strains to see if that is his reflection in the coffee shop she passes, but there is a long line of people blocking any possible view. People holding onto large silver car mugs, the mugs they had filled that morning on their way into the city. They are in too much of a hurry to look up from their phones to notice that there are even other people in the line with them. It’s hard to keep up with the pace of the city but they must. It's eat or be devoured. And every day so many people get trampled by this city. Built on an island, it's a mere seven-mile radius. Trapped on an island because it feels like a thousand miles between here and escape. And no one wants to escape until one day escape is the only option. By then, though, it's too late. You've been consumed by a city that doesn't, and never has, loved you. Only the city decides who lives and dies here. 

A man bumps into her and she is immediately pulled back into reality. She fights the urge to grab and throttle him. 

"Sorry," he mumbles. She carefully watches his reflection as he walks behind her.

Her shoulders relax some as he keeps moving, not looking back at her.

She holds her bag so tightly her hand is cramped. Inside it are several passports with her picture and different names, and more money than most people would make in a year. In the main compartment of the bag are enough weapons to do some serious damage. 

"Last resort," she thinks. 

She pulls the bag closer to her body. 

"Drama queen," she mumbles, laughing at herself. 

Just then she sees him in the window of the of a corner shop. His thousand-dollar suit, tailored to perfection, sticks out like a Rottweiler at a pug march. She laughs wryly at her own analogy. She moves faster now. He feigns disinterest.

"Nice try," she thinks. She pushes into a large crowd of business women hurriedly headed towards their diet soda, salad, and work out lunch-hour. She darts down a residential street hoping the crowd hides her movements. 

It's a neighborhood of row houses that haven't had a new coat of paint since the 1980s. People here have no privacy. Old women sit in windows watching as younger women, still mothers, yell. They yell in vain, angry that they struggle to feed their children playing in the street. They yell in Spanish, Russian, Mandarin, and even some French.

At the other end of the street, the corner boys stand around. They wear tapered athletic pants, and thick, sparkling white, and neatly ironed white T shirts. They have branded sneakers on that would impress anyone. They are joking with each other, shooting dice half-heartedly. A couple of them eating popsicles, after all they're not quite men yet, in spite of the very adult things they are required to do. At fourteen, they have families to look after. Two of them on the other side of the street kick a soccer ball back and forth. They look like they're just fooling around on a lazy afternoon. However, they see and hear absolutely everything that happens within a five-block radius. The soccer ball stops on a dime when someone comes to them needing a fix. Each boy/man has a job to do, and he does it with the seriousness, and efficacy, of a wall street executive. Although, the stakes are so much higher for these guys. They don’t commute to the suburbs at the end of their day. 

Finally, she sees the staircase on the left side of the street. To her right, a middle-aged man, probably the boss of the corner boys, sits on a stoop. She makes eye contact with him. He looks at her, and immediately lifts his eyes to something behind her and she knows now that he is close. Too close. She passes the stairs and moves quickly to the corner. She stands directly next to a corner boy, her shoulders touching his. 

He smiles awkwardly. She knows immediately that her plan is going to work. So many men and boys (and even some women) have wanted to be her hero. She’s never really understood why, but it does come in handy. 

"Do not look back," she speaks quietly. "There is a man following me."

She opens her bag and sees his eyes grow huge as he sees the weapons. He shoots a barely perceivable look at the other corner boys and they start to move in towards them. She shows him the cash. 

"I need him off my tail," she says. "I will make it worth your while. Nothing's free, and all of that." She smirks. 

No words are spoken between him and his colleagues as they move together and surround the man. 

She hands her new friend a thick stack of $100 bills and says, "Don't hurt him too much". He smiles back at her with a gentleness she knows is reserved only for his mama, and pretty girls.

She moves back down the narrow street to the staircase. The stairs creak and groan with years of mistreatment as she runs up them. The smells of boiled cabbage, cumin, cinnamon, and weed assault her nostrils. The sounds of the street below fade, and the silence of the hallway makes her ears buzz.  

She looks down once, and sees the man looking up at her. The boy follows his gaze and then looks back at him. “You don’t look at her,” The boy says and pushes him to the ground. “You don’t even think about her, do you understand?”

The hallway is only lit by the light from the other end where a matching staircase presents her with an escape route. It is lined on either side by doors made of cheap pressed wood. There are dead-bolt style locks on each door, but everyone knows that they are essentially ornamental. If a person wants to get inside, they can. And she wants to get inside. 

She counts each door as she walks down the silent hallway. She is no longer running, nor walking with confidence. Her shoulders tighten. Her breath quickens. The hair follicles on the top of her head vibrate. 

“Keep Going” says a voice in her head. “Go to the other side and run. Don’t look back”

Then she’s there. She is in front of number 23. She exhales. She knocks. Although she can’t explain why. 

"Always polite," she laughs at herself. 

Just as she leans her shoulder against the door to push it open, a man across the hall and two doors down opens his door. He's in a tank top and boxer shorts. The sound of his TV in the background is almost offensive in the silence.

They stare at each other for what seems like an hour. She opens her mouth to say something to him, but he slams his door. The slam echoes and reverberates down the hallway. She stands waiting for the silence again. 

She pushes the door open now and is assaulted by complete black darkness. It blinds her. Those doors may be light, but her shoulder twinges with pain as she rubs her hand up and down the wall looking for a light switch.

There it is. She clicks it. Nothing. 

“Damn,” she whispers.

Just then, she hears the click of a gun. 

She doesn’t move. She doesn’t breathe. She says nothing. 

"You better tell me what the hell is going on," says a voice from the dark. "And quick".