At 12:30 am, I was sitting in the middle of the hardwood floor of my new loft. I was smiling at the walls, my new walls. I pulled the picture frame out of my pocket and my picture of Danny out of the front of my dress. I slid it into the frame and set it down, satisfied, directly in front me.
I tucked my hair behind my ear and spread my hands out behind me so I could get a better look at my mirror-less walls. There were big tall black framed windows, one on the smaller wall to the left, and two behind me. They had about 12 square panes of glass in them. The wall directly in front of me was exposed brick, that stretched to meet the wall on the right. It didn't quite touch the wall on the left, there was about 5 feet of space in between. There was a single step there, and straight back from that step was my door. If you walked up the step and turned the right, you would see my kitchen, which was right behind the brick-wall I was staring at. To the right of me was a door, which led to small bedroom.
My stomach growled, making me realize how hungry I was. I stood up and headed for my door. Standing in the hall, I turned the right and walked down to my neighbors door. I knocked on it. The door swung open. A woman with textured black hair and deep brown glowing skin opened the door. She was wearing jeans and a blue patterned sweater. "Yea?" she said.
"Oh, well, I live right down there," I pointed, "and I just moved there and was wondering if I could use your phone," I said as politely as I could. She looked at me, my oversized sweatshirt, the bottom of my blue dress. I realize now that I probably looked like one strange person. Despite that, she nodded "Sure," and let me right in.
I stepped inside and she closed the door. "I'm Helen," she said, holding out her hand to me. I pulled my right hand out of my sweatshirt pocket and shook hers. "My name is Amy," I said. We smiled at each other. She pointed to the kitchen "Phone's in there," she told me. "Thanks,"
I turned for the kitchen. I picked up the phone and dialed the well-known number easily. On the other end it rang once. Twice. "Hello?" he sounded tired. "Jer?" I said. "Yea, who is this?" he asked, confused. "It's Amy," I told him. Jer was my closest friend, the only one I had stayed in contact with after Danny's death. We had been friends since Jr. High.
"Oh. I didn't recognize the number on my caller ID. Where are you?" he asked. "Well..." I wasn't really sure how to say this. "I need you to do me a favor," I told him. "Sure anything Amy, you know I'm always there for you." he said. "Well, actually it's more like two..." "Ok, what do you need?" he said calmly. "First, I didn't eat anything yet and was hoping you could bring over some Chinese takeout," I paused. "Sounds great, I'll be there soon," he was about to hang up. "Wait!" I said. "What?" "You forgot about the second favor. I need you to pack up my stuff, everything from my apartment," I said. "What?" his voice changed completely, morphed, and I could hear the confusion clearly. It echoed in my head. "Jer, I bought a loft. Downtown. I moved," I said quietly. "What? When?" he said, still unclear of what exactly was going on. I gave him my address, and reminded him he had promised to be right over. "Yea, uh, sure Amy," he said. I could tell he was kind of dazed. "Jer, you don't have bring everything tonight, just some stuff to keep me for a day or, two," I said. "Right, sure," he said, a little more understanding in his voice. "Cause, you know, my place is empty right now," I told him. "Yea, well, I better go now, I'll be there as soon as I can," he said. "Ok, thanks, bye" "Bye". His voice was totally back to normal by then. I hung the phone on the wall and turned around, practically running into Helen.
"Oh! Sorry," I said to her. "No problem," she said, smiling. "Well, I have to go, but thank you so much for letting my use your phone, I appreciate it a lot," I said to her. "Oh anytime," she said, still smiling.
I opened the door to my loft and walked straight for that picture. I grabbed it and set it on the only surface I had, the kitchen counter. To pass the time, I opened every cupboard and looked at the new space I had. Then I jumped up onto the counter myself, waiting for Jerry to come over.
