"Hey" Mark said into the pay phone looking at the apartment window. "I'm back early. Um.... if your screening you should have answered by now. Ok... um I guess I'll come up to the apartment now. Don't feel the need to throw down the key or anything. I have my own. I just thought for old time's sake. Anyway..." Mark hung up the phone, grabbed his camera bag and started walking towards the apartment. He opened the front door to the stairs, walked up the three flights to the apartment door, which was unlocked.
"Hello?" Mark called through the empty apartment. "Shit" he said realizing they were evicted. "Hello?" he called. "Shit" he repeated after he realized they weren't there. "Shit, where the hell are they?"
He closed the door of Mimi's apartment, ran downstairs, checked to see if his apartment still had his furniture, and after he realized that he did, he dropped his camera bag in the hallway and ran down three flights of stairs to the sidewalk. He ran towards the park, looking over all the homeless people sleeping on benches or on the floor, looking for Roger or Mimi.
He ran until he reached the wall of a brick building with a group of young homeless people sleeping on the ground. He looked over the people until he saw Roger's head, the rest of him covered with a brown blanket. Releived Mark walked over to his friend, who he hadn't seen in 6 months.
"Roger" Mark said nudging Roger's shoulder with his toe. "Hey man. Wake up"
"Hey man" Roger said groggily, standing up, wearing a plaid shirt with ripped jeans. His eyes were tired and he had gotten paler since Mark had seen him last. "Your home early"
"Yeah"
"How'd the movie go?"
"Eh" Mark said. "it was ok. How did you end up evicted?"
"Yeah um... we didn't realize until you were gone how much you helped with the apartment. Mimi lost her job at the Cat Scratch club and um... I never really made much money"
"Ok well it's freezing out. I paid a year's worth of rent so you guys can come stay in my apartment. Your with Mimi right"
"Yeah" Roger said leaning down and shaking her shoulder. "Mimi. Mark's here"
"Hey" Mimi said leaning over and pushing her dirty black hair out of her face. She stood up and Mark was surprised to see that Mimi had a huge pregnant stomach under her red shirt. Mimi walked happily over to Mark and gave him a hug.
"Hey how are you?" Mimi asked as Roger linked her fingers in his.
"I'm ok. And your um..."
"Yeah baby" she said smiling putting a hand on her stomach.
"Um.. congratulations"
"Thanks" Mimi said.
"Here Mimi" Roger said picking up Mimi's black hoodie and handing it to her.
Mimi took it, slipping it on, and grabbed a grey striped shoulder bag from the ground. "Mark do you have heat in your apartment"
"Yeah I think so" Mark said. "Come on. You look freezing"
"I've been freezing for three months" Roger said.
"Ok well let's go" Mark said.
"So um.. how was filming" Roger asked.
"Not so great. That's why I came home early." Mark said awkwardly. "Um... not to be nosy but what are you doing about..."
"The baby" Mimi finished. "I don't know yet. I mean I lost my job and... I don't know. I mean I want to keep it. But he doesn't" she nodded at Roger.
"It's not that I don't want to I just don't think it would be a good idea."
"Same thing" Mimi said.
"Let's not talk about this right now"
"OK fine" Mimi said.
They walked the two blocks back to the apartment, and walked through the front door just as Benny walked out of the apartment.
"Did you know about this?" Mark said stopping Benny and nodding towards Mimi.
"When I evicted her" Benny asked. "Yeah I did. So what? The baby's probably going to be born infected with diseases and crap anyway"
"Shut the fuck up" Roger yelled pushing Benny hard against the wall and holding him there. "If you ever say anything else about my girlfriend, or me, or my kid" he reached out and punched Benny's jaw. "your dead. I thought I made it clear last time." he said, pushing him onto the ground.
"Mimi come on let's go" he said putting a hand on her back and leading her upstairs. "Mark you too. Did anyone see that?"
"No I don't think so. But hurry up"
They walked up to Mark's apartment opened the door and walked inside.
Mimi unlinked her fingers from Roger's and sat down on the couch.
"Um.. I"m going to go get some groceries" Mark said awkwardly leaving.
"Mimi" Roger said. "I'm sorry about that"
"I"m not mad about that I just don't want you to get in trouble or anything"
"I don't think I will" he said. "Don't worry babe" he said collapsing next to her on the couch.
"Hey, um.. we're here. You know. We're in this heated apartment. It's safe here."
"Babe" he said.
"But like we're here you know"
"Yeah but this is technically Mark's" Roger said.
"But if I could work and you could work maybe we could get out apartment back." Mimi asked quietly. "Please. Just consider it."
'Mimi please don't do this right now" Mimi sighed and pulled herself away from Roger. "Come on. I love you. I just don't want to talk about this right now." Roger insisted, putting his arm around her and pulling her close.
He didn't actually need groceries, or have enough money for them anyway. Instead he took a walk around the block to give Roger and Mimi a change to talk. But now he was walking back up the stairs to his apartment, the only groceries he had being a bag of chips. In the hallway of his door, he realized that he left his camera bag there. He walked back to the place it was to find a note, "Not that I was stealing anything but I didn't want someone to actually steal this so if it's yours come to my door" the note read. There was an arrow pointing to the door across from Mark's. He sighed, picked up the note and knocked on the door.
It took three knocks before a young girl, probably around nineteen wearing a flowy dress, boots, short wavy hair and green eyes answered the door.
"Hey" Mark said stunned at how pretty she was. "Um... I...." he held up the note.
"What did you loose?"
"Camera bag?" he said.
"Ok, yeah come in" she said. "I actually just didn't want it to get stolen. I wasn't stealing it" She handed it to him. "I didn't touch it I swear."
"Thanks, a lot. i shouldn't have left it in the hallway there's a lot of shady people around here"
"Really?" she asked, curiously.
"Yeah" he said looking around her neat apartment. "Did you just move here"
"Last week" she said with a huge smile. "First week on my own."
'Oh really?" He said. "So your like 18?" he laughed.
"What?" she said smiling. "And no I'm 19, going to be twenty pretty soon. And so what, you can't be that much older."
"I'm 25" he said.
"So what's six years? Almost nothing"
He laughed again. "Not really"
"I'm Irina" she said holding her hand out.
"Mark" he said feeling her soft skin as he took her hand. "We should have dinner sometime" he said dropping her hand. "And I can tell you about New York"
'I"l like that. So.. are you a filmmaker?"
"Yeah" he said. "Well kind of"
"Me too kind of"
"Seriously?" He asked.
"Well more of an artist"
"What do you do?"
"Pencil-drawing, charcoal, some paintings and short films"
"Cool" he said.
"I'd like to see your work sometime. If your any good."
"Ok I"ll take you up on that. Although it might not be that good. Tomorrow night?"
"Dinner and film making." she said with a smile.
"My place"
"Sounds good" She giggled quietly.
He smiled. "Alright I guess I will see you tomorrow"
"This is a good first sign" she said. "First week in New York and I meet you"
He smiled. "First week back in New York and I meet you"
"See you tomorrow" They both smiled at one another.