Zhanna Slor - At the End of the World, Turn Left

“Most people hide a spare key somewhere,” he explains. I had assumed we would go through a window, but this is a better idea, I have to admit. Except that there are a lot of places to look. The patio is adorned with an array of knickknacks and potted plants, trees, flowers. “Try the front door. Under the mat.”

I stumble over the paved pathway in total darkness, grazing the brick of the house with my hand for balance, until I reach the front of the house. I expect a long exploration to commence but I find the key almost right away, under a turtle statue next to the welcome mat. I find my way back to the patio, where Tristan is still bent over, looking, and hand him the key. He grins at me.

“Nice job, Nancy Drew,” he says, opening the back door. I am half expecting someone to catch us as we enter the house, but the place is empty, as I had thought. I reach for the light switch and the giant chandelier in the foyer flickers on, illuminating the perfect wood floors, oriental rugs, and grand staircase. Someone must have come to clean it after the party, too, because the place is spotless; not an empty beer can to be found.

The second we put our bags down, an alarm begins beeping.

“Shit,” Tristan says, picking up his bag again. “I told you this is a bad idea.”

I hold up a finger. Without a word, I turn to look at the walls on either side of the door. I locate the alarm system pad next to the front door and type in the numbers I saw written down on the fridge: 1416. The alarm shuts off. Tristan looks at me with awe.

“Soon you’ll be better at this than I am,” he says.

“No,” I say, shaking my head. “I just notice things.”

“What do you think makes a good criminal?” he jokes. He puts his bag down on the floor, and lifts mine off my back and places that on the floor too. Then he carries me into a bedroom, a different one than the one we’d discovered at the party, and drops me on the bed like we’re newlyweds. This one is a huge king size with a tufted royal blue headboard and sheets so soft they feel like silk. They probably are silk, I later realize. It’s nicer than a hotel room. The bed is made military style, not a crease or unfolded edge. Tristan pulls off the comforter in one grand sweep and places me inside.

“Did I mention how sexy your brain is?”

“Only every day.” He kisses me again, and for a while, I forget about everything.

Afterward we both take showers at the same time—there are four showers on the first floor alone—and luxuriate on one of the couches watching bad TV for the rest of the day. I find a stash of wine in the basement and by the second night we’ve made quite a dent. We don’t dare venture outside, other than to smoke in the closed garage, enjoying the warmth and luxury of furniture that probably costs more than my parents’ entire home. We drink and watch TV and take tons of showers and sleep, as if we are on vacation. The following day is Friday, however—which means we will need to be out before dawn, since there is no way of knowing when the student will come by to feed the cat. I spend several hours beforehand cleaning, a sad attempt to make it look like no one has been there since the party. I don’t think I do a very good job. I’ve always been good about organizing and keeping things neat, but I almost never mop or wipe counters and keep imagining I am missing something that must be right out of sight. Margot was always getting mad at me that my room was spotless but I never remembered to wash my dishes, and didn’t know where the broom was. But Tristan tells me it looks great, so I choose to believe him.

After helping myself to coffee from the automatic espresso machine in the kitchen, I find Tristan in one of the bedrooms, counting cash. “How much money do we have?” I ask.

He doesn’t look up. “Almost five hundred dollars. Those frat boys really love to carry cash on them. I bet they were planning to score some coke or E for that party.”

I let out a little whistle. Despite spending half my life living in a middle-class home, I’ve never seen that much money at once. Between the house and Tristan and the cash, I’m feeling pretty good right now. I’m feeling better than before my life got derailed, somehow. It makes me wonder: What’s the point of following all the rules, when people still find ways to make you feel bad? Better to just do what you want and not listen to anyone. There is a freedom to making all of your own decisions, whether or not they are good or bad, that cannot be explained without real life experience. Had I known all of that, I might have made some changes far sooner. “Nice. Should we spring for a hotel?”

Tristan still doesn’t look up, just deposits the envelope into his bag.

“Not with this,” he says. He stands up, shoving the envelope into his back pocket. “You ready to go?”

I nod. “You go first, so I can set the alarm again. So as not to arouse any suspicion.” I bite my lip, looking at his back pocket, the envelope still in there. “Where are you sending that money?”

He shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it.”

“But…” I pause, feeling nervous suddenly. “I thought that was both of ours.”

“You’ll get your half. I promise,” he says. He reaches into the envelope and takes out two twenties, handing them to me. “Here, that’ll hold you over for now.” Then he grabs our bags and heads out the back door without further explanation.

We don’t talk for the entire bike ride, and when we arrive back in Riverwest, Tristan says he has an errand to run and leaves me by the door of Bremen Café, alone. “I’ll be back in a couple hours,” he says, then disappears down Bremen, towards Humboldt Avenue.

I lock up my bike and head inside, using the cash Tristan gave me to buy a breakfast bagel with eggs and cheese, a pack of cigarettes, and another coffee. Then, since I have nothing better to do, I sit down at the desktop computer near the side entrance to use the Internet. Bremen has two desktop computers with internet that any customer can use. Most people own laptops, and this will likely become redundant enough to remove within a year or two, but for now it’s a lifesaver, since I left all my things at my parents’ house and haven’t returned since.

I begin by looking for an apartment sublease; but there is nothing in my price range of almost no money, not even one with the five hundred dollars Tristan disappeared with, so next I begin searching jobs on Craigslist. Sure, I had stolen one wallet, and broken into someone’s home. But I’m not intending to continue going to parties and stealing wallets. Surely I could find a job, at least a temporary one till I figure out what my next move is. It wouldn’t even have to be in Milwaukee necessarily. It could be in Chicago. The Greyhound to Chicago is only ten dollars. I could swing that. The problem is that after an hour of searching, I don’t find anything I am qualified for that doesn’t pay minimum wage or sound horribly soul-killing. The closest thing to real money would be cleaning apartments, and even that is only $12 an hour to start. I even check if anyone needs Russian or English tutoring, but there’s not much demand for foreign language skills in Milwaukee. Only a couple of ads requesting Chinese lessons.

I take a break from this depressing endeavor and head to MySpace.

Ignoring the several apologetic and concerned messages I’ve received from Margot, I open a second browser window and login to my Facebook. I want to check in with Zoya. But Zoya’s accounts on both Facebook and MySpace have been deactivated. Strangely this doesn’t sound any alarm bells in my head. I figure there must be some kind of technical issue on her end. But then I log in to my university email.

In between some notices from UWM about my lack of securing payment for the next semester resulting in my temporary suspension from school, there are a few new emails from Zoya. The first one is dated yesterday.