Building A Reputation

Jose brings the bus too fast and almost puts it in the river.

Grant is still sitting on the dock. Mary is already counting heads because one hundred twenty-seven new women do not load themselves. Eve has the tree line. Zoya has the wrecked trailer. Harlan is still in the shallows. Nobody pulls him out.

“Up,” Mary says. “If you sit there the next problem walks in on us next to a man who just got done drowning.”

Grant stands. The two hundred is in him. The mile is open whether he wants it or not.

Dale, still east. Still only thirteen points. Not turning.

North lot, still sitting. A man-weight heavier than Harlan. He felt the dock die. He did not send anyone down the road.

“No one is coming,” Grant says. “Not yet.”

Jose looks at the crowd and laughs once with no humor.

“I can fit maybe sixty if they stand in the aisle. Not one twenty-seven.”

Mary does not blink.

“Two trips. First load home, dump them on Ashlyn, come back. Grant stays with the rest.”

“Eve and Zoya on the first bus. Magdalena and Garret with me. Jose, empty road. No blanks. No talking.”

They pack the first sixty. Mary points at Grant.

“Thirty minutes.”

The bus leaves. The dock goes quiet. Melissa and Quinn give their names. Twenty-eight minutes.

Mary: “Foyer is a mess. Ok load up.”

The second sixty-seven go on. Grant does not stop at the grocery store.

The foyer smells like sweat and too many people.

Ashlyn: “Welcome home boss!” She jumps excitedly into his arms.

Grant almost corrects her to call him Grant, but just sighs and gives her a broken smile. She starts kissing him and he gently pries her off. “Good to see you too Ash.”

She remembers to focus, “How many total?”

“Two thirty-six.”

“That’s...a lot.”

“I know.”

Mary looks at the room crowded with Harlan’s girls.

“That is the problem.”

Grant opens his map focused just inside the tower. His people on top. Empty rooms. Hiding unclaimed. And on six, one pair that is not his.

Noah. Cindy. The deal.

“We take the building,” Grant says. “Every floor. Noah stays. Him and Cindy. His room. We don’t touch her. If I go back on that tonight, every man I leave alive stops believing a sentence I say.”

Mary’s mouth goes tight.

“He’s a pig.”

“I know what he is. The deal still holds.”

They go down.

Fifteen empty. Fourteen a man with a golf club, no girl. Out of the building. Thirteen, two unclaimed in a bathroom.

“Ivy.” Two-thirty-seven.

“Sasha.” Two-thirty-eight.

Nine, one in a tub.

“June.” Two-thirty-nine.

Eight and seven get assigned. Dara. Kate.

Six.

Mary knocks like she would rather kick it.

Noah opens in an undershirt, beer on his breath. Cindy is on the floor. Naked. On her hands and knees at his heel. When he shifts his foot, she crawls a half-step so her shoulder stays against his calf.

“Hey bro! It’s been a while. You have been busy I see,” Noah says. He looks past Grant at the hall full of women and grins. “That’s a lot more than last time. You want to trade again? Temporary of course. Like when we made our deal. They come in here naked and stay on their knees like before, still my house rule, and you do whatever the fuck you want with my bitch and I do it with yours. We can do it here together again. We each get a different fuckhole for a bit. Whadaya say bro?”

Eve’s jaw flexes.

Cindy stays down. She looks at Noah, not at Grant.

Grant keeps his voice flat.

“No. Not this time.”

Noah blinks, still smiling.

“You liked the idea well enough when you needed my floor quiet and I needed a body that wasn’t the same one all week. I’m not asking to keep anybody. Just a loan. Look at what you’re carrying. One bitch is nothing for you. Don’t tell me you are pretending to be better than me again.”

“I said no. We’re taking the building. Every floor. Your room stays yours. Cindy stays yours. That deal holds. The trade does not. You don’t collect anybody else either. You don’t put a hand on mine. You see a man in the stairs who isn’t me, you shut the door.”

Noah looks at Cindy and snaps his fingers, low. She crawls forward until her head is under his hand.

“Say hi, baby. Tell him you’re good on the floor.”

“I’m good on the floor,” Cindy says. Soft. Immediate. To Noah.

Mary looks at Grant.

Grant does not take the room.

“You stay. You keep your mouth off my people. You don’t call them holes. Cindy is yours. Nobody else in this building is.”

Noah laughs and scratches behind Cindy’s ear.

“Your loss.” He slaps her bare ass. She stays on her hands and knees. “You go play king upstairs. I’ll be in here using mine like a real man.”

“Fair enough,” Grant says. “Door stays shut.”

Noah snaps again.

“Bed. Crawl.”

Cindy turns and crawls, naked, toward the bedroom, without looking back. Noah watches her go.

“If you change your mind about the trade,” he says, “you know where to find me.”

The door closes. Grant hears Noah tell her to stay on the floor at the foot of the bed. He hears Cindy say yes. He tunes out the rest.

Mary is red.

“I know,” Grant says. “We are not doing this in the hall.”

“He asked to borrow ours.”

“And I said no. That’s the line. If he puts a hand on one of ours anyway, the deal is over.”

Mary nods and walks away.

Two unclaimed on four. They run. He claims them on the landing.

“Nia.” Two-forty.

“Libby.” Two-forty-one.

Bus and Explorer are still in the garage.

They climb back up.

Two hundred forty-one in the tower all unified under him. He expands the map. North lot still sitting. Dale still east.

Grant sits on the couch.

Mary stands in front of him.

“You got the building. You left a man on six who keeps a woman on her knees like a dog and asked to borrow ours. Leanne still needs support. Please don’t walk into North Lot in the morning.”

“I was going to look at the map. Try to learn more from it.”

“Looking turns into walking with you.”

“Eve takes a runner at first light. Two of you. Tell Leanne about Harlan, North Lot, and that the tower is ours. Noah stays on six. Nobody bothers that door. If a vehicle rolls up at 12th that isn’t ours, Leanne honks and she does not open.”

Eve nods.

Mary sits across from him.

“Say the rest so I can sleep.”

“The rest is I need more. Harlan almost put me under. Two hundred brought the mile map, more strength and speed, faster healing, the claiming blast, and night vision. It’s a lot, but it did not make me untouchable. When that man on the water comes, he will come ready. I’d rather have a fortified building and a plan when he does.”

“Then we hold the building. Not go to him.”

Grant opens the mile once more.

Two blanks west. Sitting.

Mary reads his face.

“Not for now.”

He shuts the mile.

The bus is empty in the garage, having done the job twice. The tower is his except for one room on six, where Cindy is still naked on the floor because Noah just sees her as a thing for his pleasure.

Grant leans his head back.

“Tomorrow I look from far away. Then we decide if looking is enough.”

Mary nods.

“That’s the plan.”

“Then you need to relax and get some rest tonight. I can help with that.” She gets on her knees and pulls off her top. She crawls to him and starts undoing his pants. Grant laughs to himself, realizing the irony of her actions after the meeting with Noah. He doesn’t stop her. She gives him the best blowjob he has had in what seems like forever. He leans back and tries to forget the stress of the day for now.

Outside, the city makes ordinary noise.

Inside, two hundred forty-one points hold still, and one door on six stays shut because Grant said it would.

Far in the distance, at North Lot, a man watches Grant’s newly organized home as they each fall asleep one by one.