Chapter 2: Alleyway Accounting
The alley asphalt is cold and gritty under your knees. The damp seeps through the thin fabric of your dress, a cheap, stretchy thing you bought at a discount store. It’s black, low-cut, meant to hide stains and attract eyes. It doesn’t do much against the chill.
You can hear the baby crying.
The sound is muffled, coming from the single room you rent above the all-night laundromat two blocks over. Mrs. Agatha, the elderly widow next door, is watching her for twenty bucks. The wails twist in your gut, a physical pull stronger than any hunger. You left a bottle. She’s probably just tired. She’s always tired. You’re always tired.
A month. It’s only been a month since she was born. A tiny, squalling thing with a thatch of dark hair and eyes that seemed to already know too much. You named her Daisy. A soft name. A clean name. Nothing like the circumstances of her conception, a mystery etched now into the lines of her tiny palms.
You lost your job, of course. The official reason was “position eliminated due to restructuring” after your maternity leave. The real reason was in the silence on the other end of the phone when you called Richard Peterson’s office, in the way the HR woman couldn’t quite meet your eyes when she handed you the severance package—two weeks’ pay. It didn’t last. Nothing does.
The skills on your resume are a joke: proficient in Microsoft Office, excellent oral communication, maintains office morale. You tried for other secretary jobs. The interviews were short. You’d see the recruiter’s gaze drop to your waist, still soft from pregnancy, to the faint shadows under your eyes, to the desperate plea you couldn’t keep out of your voice. They’d smile politely and say they’d be in touch. They never were.
The money ran out. The formula is expensive. Diapers are expensive. The rent is a monolith. Your body is the only asset you have left that anyone has ever wanted.
So, here you are.
The back alley behind The Gilded Steakhouse is your new office. It’s dimly lit by a single, buzzing sodium light that turns everything a sickly orange. The air smells of rain on hot pavement, old garbage, and the greasy, rich scent of seared meat from the kitchen vents. Laughter and the clink of glasses spill out from the restaurant’s back door whenever it swings open. Rich men in suits, celebrating deals. You watch them sometimes, through the smudged window of your room. A different world.
A man exits the back door, letting out a burst of warmth and noise. He’s tall, wearing a suit that fits him well. He lights a cigarette, the match flaring in the gloom. He sees you. His eyes travel from your face, down your kneeling form, and back up. A slow, assessing look. Not unlike the looks you used to get across a desk, but stripped of all pretense.
He takes a drag, exhales smoke. “How much?”
Your throat is dry. You give him the number. It’s what the other girl, Lacey, told you to start with. “For a quick one,” she’d said, shrugging.
He nods, flicks his cigarette away. “Over there.” He gestures to a deeper patch of shadow near a dumpster.
You get to your feet, your joints stiff. You follow him. The brick wall is cold and damp through your dress when he pushes you against it. His hands are impersonal, efficient. He doesn’t kiss you. He doesn’t even really look at you. He hikes up your dress, pulls aside your underwear. There’s a brief, tearing sound—the cheap lace giving way.
He’s inside you before you’re ready. It’s a sharp, burning shock. You bite the inside of your cheek, taste copper. The rough brick digs into your cheek. You stare at a graffiti tag, a blurred name sprayed in angry red. His breathing is heavy in your ear, grunting with each thrust. His cologne is expensive, mingling with the smell of steak and wet garbage. You think of Daisy’s cry, a phantom sound over the rhythm of his body slamming into yours. You think of your old cubicle, the motivational poster about “Teamwork.” You think of the water-stain continent on Richard Peterson’s ceiling.
He finishes with a shudder, a hot spill inside you. He pulls out, zips up. He pulls a few folded bills from his pocket, tucks them into the top of your dress, his fingers brushing your cold skin.
“Thanks,” he mutters, already turning away, adjusting his cufflinks. He walks back to the steakhouse door, disappears inside. The laughter swallows him.
You sink down the wall, your dress falling back into place. The cash feels coarse against your chest. You pull it out, count it. He shorted you twenty dollars. You don’t cry. You just sit there on the cold ground, the wetness between your legs already going cool.
You just sit there on the cold ground, the wetness between your legs already going cool.
The bills in your hand feel insubstantial. They are a transaction, completed. You count them again in the orange gloom. Sixty dollars. It will buy formula. It will buy a pack of diapers. It will keep Mrs. Agatha’s tired eyes watching Daisy for a few more nights. You stand up, your body aching in familiar, deep ways. The ghost of the steakhouse man’s thrusts lingers. You walk back to your room, each step a tiny fracture.
The stairs to your room smell of mildew and detergent. You climb them slowly. Mrs. Agatha meets you at the door, Daisy sleeping in a worn wicker basket. “She fussed for a bit,” the old woman whispers, her eyes avoiding yours. “Took the bottle, though.” You hand her two twenties. Her gnarled fingers take the money quickly. She leaves without another word.
Your room is a box. A single bulb hangs from the ceiling. Daisy stirs, making a soft, snuffling sound. You pick her up, her warm weight a anchor in the chill. You hold her close, breathing in her scent of baby shampoo and milk. “It’s okay,” you whisper, though you don’t know who you’re reassuring. You change her diaper on the bare mattress. You prepare a bottle with hands that don’t shake.
You feed her in the silent room. Her eyes, so dark and knowing, watch your face as she drinks. You think of the men in the alley, in the offices. A gallery of faces. None of them are in her features. She is just herself. A separate, small miracle. When she’s done, you burp her, a soft pat on her back. She sighs, a contented puff of air against your neck.
You lay her back in the basket. Sleep is a mountain you cannot climb. Instead, you wash yourself at the small sink, the cold water a shock. You look in the mirror. Your face is the same. Your eyes are the same. The girl from the cubicle is still there, beneath the exhaustion. You put on another dress. A red one this time.
The nights blend into a relentless rhythm. You learn the patterns. The steakhouse alley is for the dinner crowd, men with full bellies and loose wallets. The bar district down by the river is for later, for the drunk and the desperate. The highway motel, the Starlight, is for the ones who want a bed, who sometimes want to talk. You learn their rituals, their quick, hungry sounds.
You don’t use protection. None of them ask. None of them offer to pay more for it. It’s an unspoken rule of this new economy. Your body is a convenience, a function. Safety is a luxury you priced out long ago. The risk is a cold stone in your stomach that you learn to ignore. The money is a warm fact in your hand.
Some clients are like the first man. Swift and impersonal against a wall.
Some want conversation. “My wife doesn’t understand me,” a man slurs in the front seat of his sedan, the engine still running for heat. His hands wander over you as he talks about his failing business. You make soft sounds of agreement, your cheek pressed against the cold passenger window. He finishes quickly, cries a little, and pays you with a handful of crumpled fives.
Others are rougher. A man with mechanic’s hands pinches your skin, leaves bruises in the shape of his fingers on your thighs in the back alley behind a closed auto shop. He doesn’t say a word. Afterward, he tosses the money on the ground. You pick it up, piece by piece, while he drives away.
You become efficient. You learn to separate the act from the core of you, the part that holds Daisy. That part you lock away, deep down, where their hands and their breath and their release cannot touch it. You think of it as clocking in. Your mind goes somewhere else. You replay Daisy’s first smile, a gummy, wondrous thing. You count the cracks in the ceiling of the Starlight Motel room 14. You make grocery lists in your head.
Months pass. The seasons change. The cold alley air gives way to a stifling summer heat that makes the garbage reek. Daisy grows. She learns to roll over, to sit up. Her dark eyes track you across the room. You buy her a stuffed elephant from a thrift store with one loose eye. She clutches it fiercely.
One afternoon, you’re with a regular. He’s a trucker named Roy who comes through every other week. He likes the Starlight. He likes to take his time. You’re lying on the scratchy bedspread, the air conditioner rattling weakly. He’s on top of you, his weight familiar. The room smells of cheap cleaner and his pine-scented deodorant.
“You feel different,” he grunts, moving slowly.
You don’t answer. You’re counting the water stains on the ceiling tiles. One looks like a rabbit.
“Softer, here,” he says, his broad hand splayed on your lower belly. He presses down, almost thoughtfully.
A flutter, deep inside you, answers his touch.
It’s not Daisy. Daisy is with Mrs. Agatha, stacking wooden blocks. This is something else. A tiny, interior ripple. Your breath catches. You stop counting stains. The recognition is instant and absolute. It’s the same feeling you ignored once before, in a pristine office bathroom, staring at a plastic stick.
Roy finishes with a sigh. He rolls off you, the bedsprings groaning.