He wasn’t in a hurry for any particular reason, but he was just feeling kind of rushed to get out of the office quickly. It was Friday and he was getting out of work early, and he felt a push to leave, when you were young all you did was go home to watch shows or play games, but the urgency was palpable, an excitement, a pulp in your bones. He was heading to his car but stopped, deciding instead to go to the deli down the road. He didn’t have groceries in his house and he’d have to drive 10 minutes past his apartment to get to the grocery store. Besides he liked the deli, ate there several times a week. It was small, and had always been there, and though it had been renovated some since he was a kid and his father took him there it still had the same slow, greasy spoon atmosphere. It wasn’t far and it was during the brief window of good days that they sometimes had there, so he walked, which he liked to do, but never really did enough to make it part of his life. It was already after lunch and he passed few people on the sidewalk, and found few people inside. The interior had always been cramped, even after they’d bought an adjacent property, and the system for ordering was a holdover from when they tried to have as much space for seating as possible. The menu and cashier were right by the door, so you ordered on the way in and payed on the way out, and the line itself was farther inside by what was really just a half wall dividing the kitchen from the floor, covered by the counter at which you waited for your food. When he went to stand in line, he found himself next to Claire.
He’d met her before at a couple parties where the people were in their last years of school or starting work, ones his friends had invited him to. He’d never spoken much to her before the last party he’d attended. It had been a celebration for someone, and there he had the impression that he’d spoken with her much more, but had become much too drunk by the end of the night and his best recollection was barely helped by other people who had slept in cars or curled up in corners. Her back was to him, and he was agitated, trying to remember what they’d spoken about, he hadn’t yet said hello.
“Oh! Hello there, Impostor.”
“Hey, Hi.”
He didn’t know why she called him impostor but she was staring straight at him and hadn’t stopped smiling. He assumed that it was over something the last time they’d met, and didn’t ask, not wanting to embarrass himself by admitting the he’d become too drunk and couldn’t recollect most of the night.
“It’s weird to run into you here.”
“Yeah, my classes for the day are over, so I came over here to get something to eat before going home.”
He remembered that. She went to the school downtown and he’d been impressed with her when they spoke, because she was smart and very funny. She came from a lower-class background and had to commute everyday to school, from her parents home a good sometimes-hour away with traffic. It was her habit to sometimes stay with friends over the weekend rather than go home, in order to save herself the commute. All of her friends had by now moved to the area around the school, and to do anything on the weekend would mean a long drive to her house and back. At first her parents hadn’t like the idea, but as her grades stayed up and she advanced a couple years they’d stopped voicing any reservations altogether and let her do mostly as she wished.
“So, Impostor, what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be at work?”
“Yeah, I finished everything I’d had set for the day and talked my boss into letting me skate out early. I don’t know what I’m going to do today though, I don’t think anythings going on tonight.”
“That’s cool. I’m going home instead of hanging out here myself, it’s getting close to the Summer and I’ve got a lot of work to do before I feel comfortable with my classes.”
“That sounds like a good idea.”
He started thinking maybe he should visit his family as well. He was from the same part of town that she was, and during this particular part of the day he wouldn’t have to fight much traffic to get there. They were neither of them particularly involved in the conversation, just making the odd comment while they both waited for their food. He’d become distracted, thinking about whether to go home or find something else to do, when all he could do was think about how much his hand hurt. The kitchen had called out his number, and he was taking out his wallet to pay when the woman next to him turned into him and all of her coffee poured out all over his hand. He dropped his wallet on the counter, he was in intense pain and asked for something to put on his hand.
“Oh! Shit, are you all right?”
“Fuck. Yeah, I’m OK this shit fuckin’ burns though.”
While he was taking care of his hand she paid for his food and got it to go.
“Hey, we should take care of your hand. You live close by right?”
“Damn. Yeah, I’m not too far. I’ll be alright I’ll just drive home and put somethin’ on it.”
“No, listen, I’ll drive you over there. That way you don’t have to worry about your hand while driving.”
“OK, yeah, I appreciate that, thanks.”
The kitchen asked him if he was sure he was OK and the women apologized profusely but he told them both he’d be fine, he’d just go home and put something on it. She walked with him to his car and she drove him over to his place, following his directions.
“Hey, thanks, you can take my car back to yours. I’ll just walk over there to get it tomorrow, it’s not too far.”
“No, I’m gonna come up and make sure you take care of that thing the right way.”
They went up to his door. He was a little apprehensive, he hadn’t cleaned in a while, and he was something of a spartan in lifestyle, a young aversion to material goods and an almost perpetual hover at poverty through school making his apartment the least likely place his friends were to end up and something they would occasionally rib him over. But she didn’t say anything when she walked in, and he’d never been one to apologize or excuse himself, he’d rather argue than capitulate.
“Do you have anything to put on your hand?”
“Yeah, I think there might be something in my bathroom?”
He went to the kitchen and ran his hand under the sink, while she was in the bathroom looking.
“Hey, I found some balm, come over here. It’ll probably hurt for a couple days but you’ll feel better by the end of the weekend.”
He shut off the water and walked into his bedroom. He found her sitting on his bed, unscrewing the lid off a jar of balm he used to use when he played sports.
“Come stand over here so I can put this on you.”
The balm stung when it touched his hand but she was gentle and sure, and soon the pain had numbed a little. He was looking at her when she turned her face up into his. She wasn’t overly pretty, but she had long dirty blonde hair, and her eyes were expressive, and her lips were just slightly parted, and he only noticed all this now while he looked at her.
“Hey, Impostor.”
Low and sweet. He cupped her face with his free hand and bent down to kiss her. She didn’t flinch and laid back, pulling the hand she held in hers. He let himself fall forward, planting both his hands by her shoulders, the bed bouncing from their weight. His hand didn’t hurt anymore, and the light parted the blinds, falling across them both.