“I thought if you didn’t see me, maybe I could buy another day.”
He rubbed the edge of the envelope with his thumb.
“Every time someone walked down the hallway, I thought it was you.
I kept expecting a message or an eviction note on the door.”
“I wasn’t preparing an eviction note.”
“You should have been.”
“According to whom?”
“My mother, for one.”
A tired smile flickered across his face and disappeared.
“She always warned me about renting from private landlords.
She said the moment you fall behind, you stop being a person and become a problem.”
“Some landlords probably think that way.”
“Most people do.”
He looked around the studio.
“I didn’t want to become one of those tenants people talk about.
The lazy one.
The one who has excuses.
The one taking advantage of some older woman because he thinks she won’t do anything.”
He gestured toward the boxes.
“I thought leaving before you asked would prove I wasn’t like that.”
“Leaving would only prove you were homeless.”
He flinched at the word.
I had not meant it cruelly, but sometimes a word needs to be spoken before its danger can be faced.
“Where were you planning to go?” I asked.
“A friend said I could sleep in his car for a few nights.”
The source of that plan was not important.
What mattered was how little of a plan it was.
“And after that?”
“I would figure something out.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
The final answer left him without defenses.
He sat on the arm of the sofa and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees.
His hoodie hung loosely from his shoulders.
He had lost weight since the beginning of the month, though I had not noticed how much until then.
I remained near the counter, giving him enough distance to keep his dignity.
After a while, he spoke again.
“I sold the television.”
“I noticed.”
“Canceled my phone plan too.
I can still use wireless internet when I find it.”
His eyes settled on the groceries.
“I’ve been skipping meals.”
My chest tightened, but I said nothing.
He took a breath.
“It got to the point where I was deciding between buying gas or picking up my inhaler from the pharmacy.”
That was the sentence that broke through my patience and reached the anger beneath it.
Not anger at him.
Anger at the speed with which one lost job had reduced his life to choices no one should have to make.
Food or transportation.
Medicine or a chance at work.
A roof or pride.
He was barely in his twenties, and already he had learned how quickly hardship could attach itself to a person’s name as though it revealed something about his character.
“Did you collect the inhaler?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“And then?”
