She calls out to the man on the street
He can see she's been cryin'
She's got blisters on the soles of her feet
She can't walk but she's tryin'

She smiled like she’d been expecting him and stepped aside to let him in. The room looked exactly as he imagined it would-- a hotel room reconfigured into a studio apartment. What might have been an hourly rental was now a small, dark space with sparse but eclectic decoration. It was a considerable upgrade to stiff, dry grass or a pile of garbage outside a dumpster. The entire square footage of the room could not be more than 12x12. She made use of nearly every inch available.  

The built-in desk was used to store baskets of everything from shoes and clothes to food. A thin, twin sized mattress piled with blankets and a sleeping bag lay on the floor. Across the room, which wasn’t very far, a19” TV set perched on two milk crates.

 Along the furthest wall was a vintage electric stove that looked like it was supposed to be white but had seen better days. It had two burners, one of which was occupied by a saucepan. Next to that was a compact refrigerator, the kind JC was used to seeing in dorm rooms that never kept anything very cold. The freezer just barely made ice cubes. A few baskets were stacked on top of it, one holding a few dishes, the other food. Next to a single sink was a space where a few dishes were set out on a towel.  There was a door, which was closed. JC guessed it was the bathroom.

“Be it ever so humble, and all that jazz.” She closed the door and walked around him to the “kitchen” to tend to the pot of bubbling something on the stove. “I know you probably ate, but I haven’t, yet. Can I interest you in some soup? I hate to eat alone.”

It smelled good and according to his stomach, there was room for food. “Sure, I guess,” he said. “Can’t turn down a meal.”

“No kidding. Have a seat. Anywhere.”

She dug through a basket for two bowls and poured thick, chunky soup from the pot into one bowl and then the other until they were even and the pot was empty. From a box in the same basket, she pulled two plastic spoons and joined JC on the edge of the mattress, in front of the TV.

He was mesmerized by the TV—he hadn’t watched any in so long. A re-run of Seinfeld was airing on a local station. “I used to watch this show when it was on.”

“Me too.  I always wanted to have Kramer as a neighbor.”

JC laughed. “No, you don’t. It seems like he would be entertaining, but I had a neighbor like that once. Pain in the ass.”

She spooned some of the soup, blew on it to cool it, and slurped first the broth then the vegetables. “I’ll be glad when it warms up outside.”

“It’s not too bad, right now. Warmer than it has been.”

“I guess I’ve been spoiled. I saw you out the other night and I couldn’t stand the thought of someone sleeping outside when it was that cold. Even tonight, I thought it was too cold.”

JC paused, his spoon halfway to his mouth. “That’s probably because you have a choice not to.”

“Yeah. Probably. ” She slurped more soup. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“I don’t know. I just am.”

He finished his soup, draining the bowl and got up to put it in the sink. He pointed toward the closed door. “Bathroom?”  She nodded. “May I?” She nodded her approval again, her eyes on the TV. He walked inside and closed the door behind him.

It was a small room, much smaller than he expected. A narrow tub, a toilet, a sink. Even that was more than he’d had at his disposal in awhile. He took his time in the bathroom, lingering to wash his hands and face.

When he came out, she had finished her soup and had scooted back onto the mattress until she was up against the wall. The empty bowl sat where she’d left it at the edge of the bed. He picked it up and took it to the sink, grabbed a sponge and washed out both bowls, setting them near the others that were stacked there.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

He chuckled at himself. His parents had insisted; nearly beat into him, the ritual of picking up after dinner. Some lessons were never unlearned. “Really, really old habit from childhood.”

“You’re very meticulous.”

“You’re very observant.” He walked around the mattress and eased down onto it next to her. “You never told me your name.”

She groaned. “Phoenix. Phoenix Gredvig.”

He laughed- almost giggled, he was so amused. “Phoenix? As in Arizona? Can I call you not-Arizona?”

“Whatever. My mother is a child of the 60’s, though you’d never know it now. My dad is German. Put it together and you get some sort of mythical bird who sounds like she’s part of the German army.”

“Or something strong. Like Phoenix Rising.”

“Yeah, or that,” she said, smiling and blushing a little. “No one I hang out with, except this guy I dated, knows about mythology.”

“So do people call you Phoenix?”

She rolled her eyes up toward him. “Not if they want to live. Some people call me Phee. Most call me Nix or Nick. Either one works. I’ll answer to it.”

“Nix is cool. That’s a rock star name.”

“Yeah. Look at me. Living the dream.”

“You are, compared to me.”

Her eyelids drooped as she relaxed, leaning heavily on JC’s arm. “Don’t say that. Don’t think it, either. I’m maybe a half a step ahead of anyone out there.” She pointed toward the door. “It’s like, you have all this responsibility. And then you’re out there, you know? And your only concern is where your next meal is coming from. But then that becomes real stressful so you work to get out of that place. You get a job and a place to live, right? And pretty soon, you’re back to responsibility again. There’s no middle ground.”

He nodded his agreement. She was repeating the same things he’d been telling himself, when he contemplated going back to his friends, to his old life, to taking Ernie up on his infrequent offers of help. Pretty soon, he’d be back to responsibility. He hadn’t handled it so well, the first time. In fact, he’d pretty much fucked up life for a lot of people.

“I decided that I’m going to call you Phee. So, Phee… what’s your story?”

She got up, went over to the desk and pulled out an oversized book. JC recognized it as a year book. She resumed her spot next to him and started flipping pages until she stopped and pointed to a picture of a girl with a bright smile. Her brunette hair had chunky highlights, her ears had dangly, sparkly earrings in them and her lips had a light sheen of lip gloss.

“It’s been a twisty road from that girl there, to me. Let’s just say there was a guy who duped a stupid girl into believing what he told her.” She fingered the photograph briefly, then closed the book and tossed it aside. “But honestly, she doesn’t regret a minute of it now. Your turn. You said you’d been out about a year?”

“Thereabouts.”

“Who did you used to be?”

“Just a guy with a job. Stock broker, working for a firm. Mostly tech stocks. Good living if you know what you’re doing. If you don’t, you can pretty much ruin lives. Your own and other people’s.”

“What happened?”

“Stupid mistake. I broke the two cardinal rules.” He listed them out on his fingers. “First, lose the emotion. I was all over the place. Second, don’t get greedy. I lost everything, being greedy.”

“You don’t seem like a greedy person.”

“This life is pretty humbling.” When she didn’t ask any other questions, he tried to switch the subject back to her. “How long were you out there?”

“6 years.”

“Yeah? That’s a long time.” JC thought the year and a few months he’d been out was a long time. He couldn’t even begin to imagine 6 years of sleeping in parks, on street corners, behind dumpsters.

“Mmhmm. After awhile you develop a routine. Like you—your routine is like clockwork, most days. You find a way to get through, to pass the time because tomorrow’s gonna come. You’ll go crazy if you don’t stay busy, keep a schedule. Have something to do. One day you wake up and realize it’s been three years. Five years.”

“Were you with that guy the whole time?”

She drew her legs up to her chest and rested her chin on her knees. “Yeah, mostly.”

“Where’s he now?”

Her eyes were closed, her voice registering barely above a whisper. “He’s gone.”

“Like… dead, gone?” She nodded without opening her eyes. “Oh.”

“After he died, shit got real, you know? I never realized that people die, out there. They die, and no one cares. Did you know that if no one claims your body, they dump you in a pile and bury you in a mass grave? No one fucking cares.”

A single tear escaped the corner of her eye and rolled down her cheek. She swiped it away and sniffled. “So I got my shit together. Because I wasn’t gonna die out there and get dumped into a pile.”

The room grew quiet, except for the sounds of the TV on low volume. Another show was on, a sitcom. The canned laughter came through every few seconds. Without warning, it was there again. The long uncomfortable pause.

“Listen…” He swung his legs around to try and get up. He may as well have been sitting on the ground, the mattress was so thin. “Thanks for the soup and stuff. I think I should go.”

“No!” Her eyes popped open and she reached out for him. Her thin fingers grabbed hold of his wrist and held on tight. “You don’t have to go. I mean, if you want to, I guess I can’t stop you. But I don’t want you to. Please stay.”

“Uhm…”

He was warm. And full. And she-Phee or Nix or whatever she wanted him to call her was nice. It wouldn’t be torture to stay.

She gave him a pat on the leg and seemed to brighten, if only for his benefit. “I want you to stay here where it’s warm. You want to take a shower? How long has it been since you could take a shower?”

Eight months, two weeks and eighteen days.

*****

“You ever been robbed?”

It was late, but they were up, talking and watching TV, side by side on the mattress. His shower felt better than eating fresh, hot food. He’d say better than sex if he could remember what that felt like. He slipped on a pair of warm sweats and a new t-shirt that he’d been saving for awhile and relished the feeling of being clean and warm and almost like normal.

“Right off,” JC answered. “Like my first week out. I was… well, in jail. Disorderly conduct, resisting arrest. I got out and they give you your belongings in an envelope and turn you out into the street. I didn’t have anywhere to go because I was living on this guy’s couch for a couple of months and when I got drunk, his wife kicked me out. I couldn’t go back.

“So I thought, this is easy. Get some food, sleep for awhile, figure it out tomorrow.” He shook his head, lost in the memory. “I wake up to nothing. Nothing left. No wallet, no ID. The last of my money. Gone.”

“Oh my God.”

“I know. I was pissed and totally helpless. It took weeks to get up the courage to ask my folks to help replace my ID. I have to have that to work. Ever since then, I keep everything on me, and I sleep on it. If you get anything from me, it means you took it by force. That happened too, a couple of times.”

“People get desperate. It’s like a guy could be the nicest person ever until he was hungry. Or needed a hit, and then he was an animal.”

“Yeah. I could see myself turning into that. If I got money, all I wanted to do was drink. I’d do anything for a bottle. I was an animal. Then I got picked up again for I don’t know, being drunk in public or something like that. It took a few days to sober up and realize what I was doing, you know? I can’t end up like those guys that have been out on the streets for 10 years. Haven’t touched it since.”

“I was never much into alcohol. I smoked some pot here and there. Cigs, obviously. Nothing too hard, thank God. Davey, he was into coke. He liked to lace his weed with coke.”

JC eyes grew large and round, the blue irises floating in a pool of white. His heartbeat sped up at the very thought of mixing the two. He was never that daring. “I’ve done some weed, but… coke? That’s some scary shit, man.”

“It was scary. He was a different person when he was cranked up. Just… angry and ranting and he blamed everyone but himself for everything that was his fault.”

JC wanted to ask, but didn’t want to pry. Maybe if he just let her talk, she’d say more about how Davey died, but she clammed up, folding her arms across her chest and pointedly staring at the TV. The late, late shows were airing. JC watched with her but wasn’t paying attention to the banter and jokes of opening monologues.

“Do you have to work tomorrow?”

“Nope.” She chuckled, a gritty laugh from the pit of her throat. “Do you?”

Thursday. Usually, he would get up, grab some breakfast, find a place to wash, shave and change and head out to the corner where the guys stood, waiting for work. He hadn’t worked in weeks. And it was cold, out. On the off chance that she would invite him to stay and maybe spend more time with her, he contemplated (and granted himself) a change in the schedule.

“I happen to be off tomorrow.”

“Wanna hang out?”

“And do what?” She shrugged, biting down on her bottom lip. It turned pink from the pressure. “I guess. Nothing better to do.”

“I’m gonna smoke a cig and turn in.” She rolled off of the mattress and reached for her coat. After rifling through her pockets, she produced a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. “You want to come?”

“Nah, I spend enough time outside,” he said, looking around at the very narrow, very thin twin mattress, mentally measuring space. There wasn’t enough room for two people. “Uhm. Where…”

She laughed while heading for the door. “I don’t take up that much room.”

Except for the shelter, JC hadn't slept in a bed in more than a year. Once upon a time, he'd had a whole apartment to himself, with a King sized bed and furniture and a couch, a kitchen table and a microwave, even. Then he lost everything. Now he had nothing, and hadn't had anything in so long that he was grateful to sink onto a nylon cot at a shelter instead of curl up under a tree in the park, or the forest on the edge of town.

Phee's mattress, though thin and narrow, was surprisingly more comfortable than a cot. It must have been the silence, or the warmth, or the understanding of and feeling of peace. Tonight, he fell into a deep, uninterrupted sleep and awoke, not in the elements or in a room full of people lazily beginning another long day of merely existing, but in Phee's room to the scent of toast.

As soon as he could pry an eye open, he yawned and sat up. Phee was standing at the stove, or rather was bending over in front of it. On the counter were two paper plates, each with a pile of eggs on it. The oven door squeaked as she opened it and reached inside with a towel to pull out an aluminum pie plate-- the throwaway kind that you get at the grocery store. 4 slices of bread were arranged around the edge of the pie plate and toasted a dark brown. She closed the oven, doling out the toast to each plate and reached to open the refrigerator. That was when she saw him, sitting up on the mattress and watching her. He blushed, not realizing he had been staring.

"Hey.” She pulled out a small tub of margarine and began buttering each piece of toast. "I didn't mean to wake you up, if I did. I was hungry. Figured you were too."

"Yeah." He leaned forward onto his hands, uncrossed his legs and pushed himself up. "I'm gonna..." He grabbed his backpack and pointed toward the bathroom before stepping inside.

"Take your time. You like coffee?"

He grunted an affirmative response before entering the bathroom and closing the door behind him. The chill of the tile floor shocked away what sleep was left in his body. He hurried through his routine, washed his hands and brushed his teeth and came back out. Phee was sitting on the edge of the mattress in front of the TV. Some talk show was on-four women sitting around yapping. He rolled his eyes.

"Is that The View or something?"

"Yeah," she said. "It was on when I turned the TV on. I could turn it if..."

“It's fine." He picked up his paper plate and plastic fork and noted a Styrofoam cup next to his plate, as well as a container of Folgers instant sat on the counter. A pot of water was boiling on the stove. He measured out a few teaspoons of crystals and poured the hot water over them, reconstituting them into a cup of strong, black coffee.

"I don't have any milk, but I might have some packets of sugar in the basket on top of the fridge."

He found a stash of sugar packets from various restaurants-- Denny's, IHOP, a few from an upscale hotel chain. "Are these from the place you work at?" He held up the packet so she could see it.

Phee glanced away from the TV long enough to peer at the packet and nod. "Yup. I told you, I'm a thief."

"Nasty habit." He settled next to her, setting his plate on the ground and sipping his coffee for a few minutes. She was watching the TV. He was watching her. "You dig TV a lot?"

She seemed embarrassed and recoiled, picking up her plate, again. Between mouthfuls of egg sandwiched between pieces of toast, she said, "The TV is new. I'm still getting used to having one. I haven't had a TV since I lived at home."

"Well, me either, but—“

"And when you get something back, after you haven't had it for a long time, you try to soak it in, to make up for lost time. You know?"

"I guess," he said. He didn't want to piss her off by protesting, so he picked up his plate and started eating. The eggs were bland but warm and not runny like the eggs at the shelter. The toast was hard and crunchy, as if the bread was stale before she toasted it, but it was nice to be eating and not have to share a table with twelve other people, to not have to drown out grumbling and fighting, to not have to count down the minutes until he was pushed out into the cold or the heat or the perfect spring day without a thing to do or a place to go. He could eat slowly, if he wanted to. In peace. At that, he relished every bite of bland egg and crunchy toast and instant coffee with stolen sugar packets.

"I'm gonna go out for a cig. Haven't had one, yet today."

She seemed proud. He smiled at her. "Good. That's a few more hours that you'll live."

Phee got up, tossing her plate into the garbage and her fork into the sink. "I save the plastics, just so you know." When he nodded, she stepped over his legs, grabbed her pack of cigarettes off of the desk, slipped on a pair of shoes and headed out.   

While she was gone, JC finished his breakfast and coffee, tossed his paper plate (saving the plastic fork) and washed the skillet, the pot from his boiling water and the forks, setting them out to dry.

By the time she was back, he had his shoes and socks on, a t-shirt, a sweatshirt and his jacket. She walked in, wearing only a t-shirt, sweat pants and slip on sneakers, shivering. She frowned, noting his attire.

"Oh. I meant to give you some stuff.”

She reached under the desk and pulled out a cardboard box, kneeled in front of it and with a deep breath opened it and started digging through it, pulling out several items— long underwear, a coat, a few sweatshirts and pairs of jeans.

“I have this stuff. I never got rid of it. I figured you to be about the same size, so…"

JC eyed the pile next to her, but didn't move.

“They're clean. I washed them. You're welcome to them, if you want them. I also have his backpack and his sleeping bag. It's bigger than yours. You know, if you want to trade up. Up to you."

He wavered, struggling within himself. Part of him wanted to take everything she offered and more. He could always use warm, clean clothes. A sleeping bag would be great. A bigger backpack would be useful.  The other part of him didn’t want the clothes and belongings of a dead man, someone who obviously still meant so much to her. Why she would keep them for so long, and then pick him to give them to?

“Anyway, they’re there. If you want them.” She stood and shoved the box and the pile aside. From the spot where the box had been pushed under the desk, she pulled out a rolled up sleeping bag and a large, oversized hiking backpack and piled them on top of the stack of clothing.

And then, as if that was all she could handle, she shoved her hands under her armpits and ducked her head, barreling toward the bathroom. The door slammed behind her. He thought he could hear her, crying as quietly as possible.

He packed the clothing, the backpack and the sleeping bag into the box and pushed them back under the desk, out of sight. He took the coat to put on over his jacket. If the blast of cold air that followed her inside was any indication of the temperature, he would need it.

When the bathroom door opened, Phee emerged looking like herself again. She’d brushed her hair and washed her face and a smile replaced her worried frown and bitten lip. JC had taken a seat on the mattress, his back against the wall, and was flipping through a book he’d found in a pile on the desk.

“I grabbed this book. I hope you don’t mind.” He held it up so she could see it: Catcher in the Rye. “I haven’t read this since high school.”

“Me either. Davey really liked that book. He read it a lot.”

“I can tell,” JC said. The cover was well worn and the spine cracked and few pages were holding on by a thread.

“He used to quote it all the time. Ironic, because if anyone needed a catcher, it was him.”

She dug through a basket of clothing, pulling on layers as she spoke—another t-shirt, a sweatshirt. To JC’s surprise, she pulled off her sweatpants and stepped into a pair of jeans, yanking them up her thighs and around her hips before buttoning and zipping them. She seemed amused, looking at him, giggling at his wide eyed stare. “You’ve seen a girl in her underwear before, right?”

 He looked away, suddenly irritated that the tips of his ears seemed hot. “Nothing. We going somewhere?”

“Yeah, in a minute.” She kicked off the slip-on sneakers, rolled on a pair of socks and put them back on, then put on her coat. JC stood up, shoving the book into his backpack and put on the new coat.

She reached for him. “Come here.” He walked across the room and stopped in front of her. She smiled, tucked his smaller jacket inside the larger one, threaded the zipper and pulled it up, all the way to his chin.  She seemed pleased, running her hands down each arm. “There. Now tell me that’s not warm.”

“It’s warm.” He couldn’t help a smile, staring down at it. It really was warm. Especially in the room, with Phee fawning over him. He threaded his arms through the straps of his backpack and heaved it up onto his back. “Ready?”

She picked up a bag, picked through it and dumped her pack of cigarettes and lighter into it. “Let’s go.”