It lived in my stomach. It tightened my chest whenever my phone rang. It followed me into every conversation.
Then I found a handwritten advertisement taped inside the window of a small grocery store.
“GARAGE APARTMENT FOR RENT. PALMER STREET. $800. ASK FOR ALVAREZ.”
I stared at the paper for so long that the cashier finally asked if I needed help.
“Is this still available?” I asked.
She glanced at the notice.
“You’ll have to ask him.”
“Do you know him?”
“Everybody around here knows Mr. Alvarez.”
The way she said it made me nervous, but I wrote down the address anyway.
The apartment was a converted garage behind an old blue house on Palmer Street.
It had one bedroom and a kitchen the size of a closet.
A window over the sink looked out at somebody else’s tomato plants.
The paint on the walls was faded, and the floor tilted slightly near the bathroom.
