Killer Move

I saw, however, that the building that had replaced the Lido Beach Inn could itself do with a lick of paint, a chunk of render missing up on one side. The next generation was already getting old. I recalled, too, that only two days ago I’d been caught up in lobbying Tony Thompson to refresh The Breakers, and found it hard to remember why. I knew I would do so again, at some point, but right now it seemed far less important than the fact that a gangly kid with my name and DNA had once passed over this stretch of sidewalk without realizing that twenty years later an older version of himself would be weaving there, drunk, missing a wife, his life in disarray. It seemed strange that we can do this, stand in a place and not be able to feel the breeze of a future self walking past. We wouldn’t be coming back, after all, had we not been there before—so the events must be conjoined. How had he not been able to see my shadow standing here? Had he not happened to look in the right direction? Or not listened hard enough? Or had I in fact caught a glimpse, and was that why I was back here now, to try to find my way back to that self? I thought about asking something like this out loud, but guessed I probably seemed drunk enough already. I let my hand drift back to my side.

“Come on,” Cassandra said. She stepped closer and looped her arm through mine. “I think you need to sit down for a while, big guy.”

It was only another ten minutes’ walk, down at the far end of the drive. Just before the road abruptly downsized to a single lane before winding off into the palms and scrub of the undeveloped part of the key, there was an old and dilapidated apartment block, a little back from the road on the nonocean side.

Cassandra led me through the metal gate. The building was three stories high and arranged in a horseshoe, an empty water feature in the middle with a long-dead fountain at the center. It was all straight lines and semicircles and looked like it might have been kind of a big deal in the 1930s. Giant grasses were running riot around the courtyard now, obscuring it from the road. Patches of once-white render had fallen off, revealing a pinkish layer underneath. I’d vaguely noticed this place many times before, assumed it was derelict and waiting a wrecking ball under the control of one of the local developers. Most from that era had already vanished, including the old Art Deco casino that older locals still spoke of with pride.

“You live here?”

“For now. It’s mainly empty, which is cool. Nice and quiet. Got kind of a vibe, too.”

“It’s an abandoned ship, is what it feels like.”

“Adrift, and far from home.”

She led me up some spiral stairs at the end of the right arm. As we came out onto the top floor, I tripped on a chunk of plaster that had fallen off the wall.

“Sorry,” she said, as she got out her keys. “The maid hasn’t been in a while.”

“Maybe the rats ate her.”

“The only major rodents I’ve seen are roving packs of developers—wondering if the time is right to pull down something fine and throw up something cheap and profitable in its place.”

“Touché.”

Feeling seedy, I followed her along the balconied walkway to a door halfway along the arm. I peered down into the overgrown courtyard as she undid the three separate locks in the door to apartment 34.

“Welcome,” she said, as the last one gave a thunk.

A short corridor beyond led onto a living room. Cassandra flicked a switch and three small lamps came on, shedding yellow-orange glows in the corners. There were two doors on the right-hand side of the room, a frosted glass one at the end. A single bed had been pushed against the other wall and piled with cushions. There was a desk fashioned out of cinder blocks and an old door, a set of shelves made of bricks and short planks. The walls had been painted some dark color. There were a lot of computing books and magazines and bits of computer hardware and in general quite a lot of stuff, but it would be hard to find an object that looked out of place or as if it wasn’t designed to go exactly where it was.

“You’re . . . tidy.”

She set the grocery bag down on the table, momentarily seeming awkward about having a stranger in her space. Despite her poise, it probably wasn’t very long since she’d been living in a room in her parents’ house. She looked around. “Well, I guess. Do I win a prize?”

“It’s just that women aren’t, always. I thought they would be, but you live with a few and find it ain’t so.”

“Well, then, Bill—if I may call you that—I’m pleased to have restored your retro faith in my kind.”

I felt myself coloring. “I didn’t mean women should be tidying the whole time.”

“Well, no, indeed. Then whenever would we have the time to cook and sew?”