Yellow Mama E zine

JANEY’S GONNA LOSE IT

 

by Jesse Binger

 

 

          It was a place Janey could never imagine herself being in. Buzzed in by a staticky intercom. A hard voice: Whatcha want?

          “Pablo sent me,” she said with as much confidence as she could muster.

          When the door finally buzzed open, she saw inside—darkness. A rickety old staircase that led up to…somewhere. It was cold in there, at least twenty degrees colder than outside, and she smelled something resembling the fuel at a gas station. But even more pungent.

She pulled her sweater up a bit, covering her nose and wobbled up the steps, counting each one as she walked. Remnants of her OCD that had gotten better. As a kid she’d count everything—her father’s incessant sniffles, the shit that their Pomeranian Muffy would leave all over the backyard, even the amount of times she peed.

        At the top of the stairs, the office door was already open. Janey wandered in. Guy behind the desk was standing. Tall like a basketball player. Stick thin arms. White pasty skin. He had the type of high fade that looked good on those buff soldier types but on him just made his head look like a mailbox. He rubbed his chin like he thought it made him menacing.

       “You know Pablo?”

       “He sent me.”

        “And what does that mean to me?”

        “Umm, I don’t know. We like…make a deal or something?”

         “A deal,” he snickered.

          The diesel smell had faded but the office smelled like cough drops. Cherry. Menthol. Reminded her of all those days lying to her mother to stay home sick. Then being placated with soups and teas until she was ready to burst.

       “Yeah, like I give you money,” she paused, “You give me something.”

         “And what something is that?”

       “You tell me,” she said.

         He reached slowly down to his pocket. Pulled out a toothpick. Popped it in his mouth like he was taking an antacid.

         “Why don’t you tell me what you need it for?”

        Good question.

        “It’s for a….friend.”

***

         Janey’s Macbook pinged. That chime she learned to hate. An IM popping up in the bottom of her screen. A name she didn’t recognize: ChowderHead1717.

        But of course. This was one of the reasons she avoided the internet. Same reason she ripped the phone line out of that ancient cordless she had here. Even pulled out SIM cards. Kicked routers until they lay shattered on the floor.

          Hell.

         Wasn’t all fire and pitchforks.

         Jackson.

        Please don’t block me. Just give me a second. I need to talk to you. It’s good news. It really is. See.

       A screenshot. Some bitcoin repository. A ledger. His name. What the fuck.

         I did good. I made a lot of money. Six hundred thousand. In bitcoin. See I am smart ha ha. Anyway you deserve it Janey. Some of it at least lol. Can we meet? Please don’t block me!!!!

        She clicked the screenname and blocked. If only it was that easy.

        Slammed the MacBook shut.

        Janey filled her mug up with Lavender tea, sunk down on the couch, put her feet up.

Her phone pinged.

        Wow, took him two actual minutes. He’s slipping.

        A text from monkeymansquaredance11:

        Fuck Janey. What did I tell you. NO BLOCKING! You’re smarter than that. Anyways I guess you don’t wanna share in my good fortune. Nope. Still a stupid bitch that’s for sure.        Well have a great fucking life.

          My glorious life, she thought.

          Just go to the cops, they’ll help. Her mother’s advice.

          Officers nodding like they heard it all. Then turning their back on her. Nothing new. Just another obsessed asshole. Write it up and send the girl back on her way.

          Back to hell.

         Two more pings. Janey shut her phone off, sipped her tea and remembered when she actually had a life she could live.

***

          She soaked her body in the narrow bathtub. Sipped from a wine glass—some old Chardonnay Janey found in one of the cabinets.

          Her phone sat next to the sink. No point bringing it in with her, dropping it in the water and dealing with all those Internet solutions (did she even have rice somewhere?). It had been surprisingly quiet since the afternoon.

        Maybe Jackson….don’t say it.  She stopped herself. For months she’d been saying the same thing. Maybe Jackson will find a girl. Someone. And forget all about me. Yeah, fat chance.

         She fucked Jackson out of pity one night after too many drinks. After that, it was just like…a thing. She didn’t really like him. Didn’t see any future. But it was sex (albeit, not great) and companionship. Something her life was lacking.

        Until he got crazy. Crazy-er.

       Then bat-shit holy-fuck crazy. Current stage.

        Her phone vibrated and stuttered off the countertop, falling to the ground.

        She froze. Not again.

       Then another noise. Knocking. Pounding? Her door. What time was it? Eleven? Later?

She jumped out, splashing water all over the floor. Wrapped a towel around her and wandered out into the hall.

         More knocks. Louder now.

         The peephole. The doorman. Pablo?

        “Pablo? Everything okay?”

        “Miss Henry,” muffled through the door. “I talk?”

***

         Janey, now clothed in yoga pants and a hoodie, sat across from Pablo at her little kitchen table, each sipping coffee from chipped mugs.

         Her phone sat open to the photo. That one she always kept, just in case. Her and Jackson out at Houlihan’s for his birthday. One of the few times they went on an actual date. His face beaming, his arm wrapped around her shoulders. Her eyes drifting off into space like she was looking for an escape hatch.

        Pablo nodded.

       “That’s him.”

         It was getting worse. The texts. Phone calls. Internet stalking. All of that was one thing. But once they start hovering around your actual home. Well. That’s when the bad stuff happens. She watched enough of those goofy docs on Netflix to know.

        “We call cops, yes?”

        “They’re not gonna do anything, Pablo.”

         “But they help. Restrain. Document?” he struggled to get out the words.

        “I never did it. It was just too much a hassle. Every time I showed up at the station, I felt like they just couldn’t wait to send me back on my way. Like I was the problem.”

        “You no problem, Miss Henry—”

        “Janey, Pablo.”

        “Miss Janey.”

         She smiled. Pablo looked down to the ground, couldn’t meet her eyes for this one.

          “That thing you ask. The guy….”

         “No,” Janey said.

           Pablo broke out into a big grin. Nodded his head.

          “Good, good.  Mistake, y’know.”

          She knew.

***

         One a.m. and her phone’s blowing up again. Janey hadn’t slept a wink. Tossed and turned in bed, still half drunk, Pablo’s warning echoing in her head: Guy don’t look right.

She jolted up. Seven new texts. My God, Jackson. The usual parade of them. From love bombing (Respond please my princess) to hope waning (If you only give me a chance to talk to you) and finally the usual landing spot.

          Bitter desperation.

          Bitch, I’m telling you. You don’t know what I’m capable of.

         Followed up two minutes later by:

         I’m sorry, I don’t mean that. I love you Janey.

          Like he’d even know what love was. She was a plaything; he was a phase. Neither wanted anything real.

         When she broke the news, set him free, he bitched and moaned, then finally left. Thought maybe that was the end of it. A clean break.

        It was never gonna be clean.

        Hey, was all she could muster.

        One simple text.

        All it took.

         Her phone already ringing like it was crying out for help.

         She picked it up.

         Heard the usual. Pleading, whimpering, wishing, hoping, threatening. Too many words in too many seconds when the answer was already there.

        “Meet me,” she said. “The alley behind O’Hara’s.”

***

        He was already there when she made her way down the alley. Hands in pockets, one of those long overcoats that cried out school shooter. Hair long and wispy, glued down with some dollar store pomade. Smoking a Marlboro.

         “Hey,” Janey said.

          His eyes brightened. It was like his world opened up and he could see light again.

         “Janey. I didn’t think you’d show.”

         She leaned up against a garbage can. Dark here, the lights from 8th Avenue far off in the distance. Something scurried across the floor. Rat? Mouse? She was a New Yorker; those things didn’t faze her anymore.

        “It’s good to see you,” she lied.

        “Get lonely or something?” Jackson grinned, “Of course. She comes a-knocking now.”

         He took two steps towards her and she found her hands clenching into fists. It was desolate here. Hard to find anywhere in New York City empty at 2 a.m. but this was one of those places. Even the crooks and gangbangers avoided it.

         “I ain’t gonna hurt ya. C’mon. Baby.”

         His eyes were empty. They were always vacant but now it was different. Like no one was there anymore. Like his world had shifted and she didn’t even mean what he thought she did to him.

         “And look,” he said. “I was telling the truth.”

         He held out bills. Hundreds. Maybe twenty of them.

         “Crypto?”

         “Well. Not really. But….you gonna come home with me?”

         “Jackson…”

          “Or we can go to the Landmark. Try to get our old room,” he smirked. A missing incisor. A darkness now in his eyes she never saw before.

          “No Jackson. That’s not why I’m here.”

          Something changed in a heartbeat. Harder. Meaner.

           He reached into his coat and pulled something out. Dark. Metal. A little glint in the alley light. She didn’t look directly at it. She didn’t have to.

            Jackson laughed like it was the funniest thing in the world.

           “Okay,” Janey said.

            Then reached into her pocket. Pulled it out. Held it out to him.

           “But first. A gift.”

           He did a doubletake. “Oxy? So it’s gonna be like that?”

          She handed him the pills. A little bag. Mailbox Man had counted them out in front of her.

         Not just oxy.

        One-two-three-four.

          “Two each?”

         “I’m done with those.”

          He shook his head. “Suit yourself. Four for me then.”

          He popped them in his mouth, drained them all in one swallow.

          For a second, neither of them spoke. The city hummed far away, like another world entirely.

         Janey waited for the inevitable. It happened quicker than she expected. And when it did, she imagined she’d feel something.

          But she didn’t.

***

       Pablo was tired of banging on the door. Fifth time this week and no Miss Janey. So he did what any real hermano would do.

         Pulled the skeleton key from his belt buckle. Opened the door. Walked in. Still smelt like Miss Janey in here—raspberry and cherry blossom. Reminded him of the fruit stand in his barrio. Ripe with life and energy.

         “Miss Janey,” he called out. “You here?”

         A tap-tap on her bedroom door. Hesitation at the door knob. Could just picture it – Janey half-dressed with some boyfriend. The scream and then Harrigan handing him his walking papers.

         But, Pablo was a man of action.

         He pulled the door open.

         Bed tucked in. Room tidy. But no Miss Janey.

         She lost.

***

          Janey sat back in the lounger in the backyard of some Airbnb she had found and made into a home. Her feet were bare and she rubbed them over the cool dew-covered grass.

         In front of her, off in the distance, mountains. Big, glorious mountains. Rust-colored, twisting and sloping, as far as the eye could see.

        The Airbnb would run out in a few weeks. Jackson money. After that, she didn’t know. Maybe she’d head back east. Not to New York. That ship had sailed.

          Or maybe.

          Maybe she’d just stay right where she was.

           And enjoy the silence.

 

 

         Jesse Binger is a writer from New Jersey. His debut novel The Penitent Hours is currently on submission. His work appears in or is forthcoming at Rock and a Hard Place, Cowboy Jamboree, Bending Genres, Punk Noir, Stanchion, Yellow Mama and elsewhere. Find him at jessebinger.com, X: @jessebinger and BlueSky: @jessebinger.bsky.social.