Kelly Link: Get in Trouble: Stories

When she came home from work he was out on the patio again, trying, uselessly, to catch her favorite iguana. “Be careful of the tail,” she said.

“Monster came up and bit my toe,” he said.

“That’s Elliot. That’s what I call him. I’ve been feeding him,” she said. “He’s gotten used to people. Probably thinks you’re invading his territory.”

“Elliot?” he said and laughed. “That’s sick.”

“He’s big and green,” she said. “You don’t see the resemblance?” Her iguana disappeared into the network of banyan trees that dipped over the canal. The banyans were full of iguanas, leaves rustling greenly with their green and secret meetings. “The only difference is he comes back.”

She went to get a take-out menu. Or maybe Alan would come down to The Splinter with her. The door to Elliot’s room was open. Everything had been tidied away. Even the bed had been made.

Even worse: when they went down to The Splinter, every time someone sat down next to her, Alan made a game of pre tending that he was her boyfriend. They fought all the way home. In the morning he asked if she would lend him the car. She knew better, but she lent him the car just the same.

Mr. Charles knocked on her office door at two. “Bad news,” he said. “Jack Harris in Pittsburgh went ahead and sent us two dozen sleepers. Jason signed for them. Didn’t think to call us first.”

“You’re kidding,” she said.

“ ’Fraid not,” he said. “I’m going to call Jack Harris. Ask what the hell he thought he was doing. I made it clear the other day that we weren’t approved with regards to capacity. That’s six over. He’s just going to have to take those six right back again.”

“Has the driver already gone?” she said.

“Yep.”

“Typical,” she said. “They think they can walk all over us.”

“While I’m calling,” he said. “Maybe you go over to the warehouse and take a look at the paperwork. Figure out what to do with this group in the meantime.”

There were twenty-two new sleepers, eighteen males and four females. The new kid from the night shift — Jason — already had them on the dollies.

She went over to get a better look. “Where are they coming from?”

Jason handed her the dockets. “All over the place. Four of them turned up on property belonging to some guy in South Dakota. Says the government ought to compensate him for the loss of his crop.”

“What happened to his crop?” she said.

“He set fire to it. They were underneath a big old dead tree out in his fields. Fortunately for everybody his son was there, too. While the father was pouring gasoline on everything, the son dragged the sleepers into the bed of the truck, got them out of there. Called the hotline.”

“Lucky,” she said. “What the hell was the father thinking?”

“People your age—” Jason said and stopped. Started again. “Older people seem to get these weird ideas sometimes. They want everything to be the way it was. Before.”

“I’m not that old,” she said.

“I didn’t mean that,” he said. Got pink. “I just mean, you know…”

She touched her hair. “Maybe you didn’t notice, but I have two shadows. So I’m part of the weirdness. People like me are the people that people get ideas about. Why are you on the day shift?”

“Jermaine’s wife is out of town, so he has to take care of the kids. So what are we going to do with these guys? The extras?”

“Leave them on the dollies,” she said. “It’s not like they care where they are.”

She tried calling Alan’s cell phone at five-thirty, but got no answer. She checked e-mail and played Solitaire. She hated Solitaire. Enjoyed shuffling through the cards she should have played. Playing cards when she shouldn’t have. Why should she pretend to want to win when there wasn’t anything to win?

At seven-thirty she looked out and saw her car in the parking lot. When she went out, Alan wasn’t there. So she went down to the warehouse and found him with the grad student. Jason. Flirting, of course. Or talking philosophy. Was there a difference? The other guard, Hurley, was eating his dinner.

“Hey, Lin-Lin,” Alan said. “Come see this. Come here.”

“What are you doing?” Lindsey said. “Where have you been?”

“Grocery shopping,” he said. “Come here, Lindsey. Come see.”

Jason made a don’t-blame-me face. She’d have to take him aside at some point. Warn him about Alan. Philosophy didn’t prepare you for people like Alan.

“Look at her,” Alan said.

She looked down. A woman dressed in a way that suggested she had probably been someone important once, maybe hundreds of years ago, somewhere, probably, that wasn’t anything like here. Versailles Kentucky. “I’ve seen sleepers before.”

“No. You don’t see ,” Alan said. “Of course you don’t. You don’t spend a lot of time looking in mirrors, do you? This kind of haircut would look good on you.”

He fluffed Versailles Kentucky’s hair.

“Alan,” she said. A warning.

“Look,” he said. “Just look. Look at her. She looks just like you. She’s you. ”

“You’re crazy,” she said.

“Am I?” Alan appealed to Jason. “You thought so, too.”

Jason hung his head. He mumbled something. Said, “I said that maybe there was a similarity.”

Alan reached down and grabbed the sleeper’s bare foot, lifted the leg straight up.

“Alan!” Lindsey said. She pried his hand loose. The indents of his fingers came up on Versailles Kentucky’s leg in red and white. “What are you doing?”

“It’s fine,” Alan said. “I just wanted to see if she has a birthmark like yours. Lindsey has a birthmark behind her knee,” he said to Jason. “Looks like a battleship.”

Even Hurley was staring now.

The sleeper didn’t look a thing like Lindsey. No birthmark. Funny, though. The more she thought about it, the more Lindsey thought maybe she looked like Alan.

not herself today

She turned her head a little to the side. Put on all the lights in the bathroom and stuck her face up close to the mirror again. Stepped back. The longer she looked, the less she looked like anyone she knew. She certainly didn’t look like herself. Maybe she hadn’t for years. There wasn’t anyone she could ask, except Alan.

Alan was right. She needed a haircut.

Alan had the blender out. The kitchen stank of rum. “Let me guess,” he said. “You met someone nice in there.” He held out a glass. “I thought we could have a nice quiet night in. Watch The Weather Channel. Do charades. You can knit. I’ll wind your yarn for you.”

“I don’t knit.”

“No,” he said. His voice was kind. Loving. “You tangle. You knot. You muddle.”

“You needle,” she said. “What is it that you want? Why are you here? To pick a fight? Hash out old childhood psychodramas?”

“Per bol tuh, Lin-Lin?” Alan said. “What do you want?” She sipped ferociously. She knew what she wanted. “Why are you here?”

“This is my home,” she said. “I have everything I want. A job at a company with real growth potential. A boss who likes me. A bar just around the corner, and it’s full of men who want to buy me drinks. A yard full of iguanas and a spare shadow in case one should suddenly fall off.”

“This isn’t your house,” Alan said. “Elliot bought it. Elliot filled it up with his junk. And all the nice stuff is mine. You haven’t changed a thing since he took off.”

“I have more iguanas now,” she said. She took her Rum Runner into the living room. Alan already had The Weather Channel on. Behind the perky blond weather witch, in violent primary colors, a tropical depression hovered off the coast of Cuba.