Read Online No Footprints by Susan Dunlap - Free Book Online

modernized past any individuality. The paint was the kind of beige they use on public park buildings and the stoop held not so much as a doormat. Even the ‟40” had been painted beige. But it was there and I rang the bell.

10
    It’s an abandoned breakfast burrito. Before— before— she’d have felt queasy just picking up the half-gobbled glob to toss it in the trash. Now she doesn’t even bother eating from the other end. The pinto beans are still warm, the cheese still gooey, and the salsa not gringo pale. Yesterday she’d have quipped that it looked like this was going to be its second trip through a digestive tract. Now she doesn’t even pause to smile at that, nor to savor every bite. She’s too hungry to stop wolfing.
    She’s in a wide alley that passes for a courtyard between a Mom-and-Pop store and an electronic repair shop. Minutes ago bike messengers lounged against the grocery wall, next to their wheels, eating, grumbling, laughing. She used all her patience hanging out a block away till she saw the whole gang of messengers take off, flying downtown to circle around, ready to swoop in on the first emergency pick-up. They’re an odd, splinter group, choosing to start out this far away from most of their business. But it means when they go, they’re gone for the day, and now the place is hers. She’s just lucky the guy with the burrito didn’t beg his buddies for another two minutes to finish. The phone is virtually burning a hole in her pocket, but the wind is blowing free and she’s still high from the ride up here.
    The block’s empty now. Wind would be whipping leaves if there were any trees. In the repair shop window a TV flickers. It’s turned to Channel 4,
the local station that lost its network affiliation and is now heavy on news, reruns, and infomercials. She watches a piece about a neighborhood garden somewhere in the East Bay, without sound, which doesn’t matter because she neither cares about gardening nor the East Bay. What she cares about is putting off dealing with the phone.
    Sighing, she pulls it out. How bad can the message be? It’s not even her phone. Maybe it’s been there for days. In any case, no one’s going to be calling her.
    She glances back at the screen, as if for comfort from a friend, but the anchor’s now interviewing a man in front of an official-looking building somewhere.
    Before she can come up with another excuse she clicks the phone. Text:
    From: United Airlines
    Dear Tessa Jurovik: We regret UAL#212, SFO to Miami canceled. We will hold a seat on UAL#422, Oak to Miami lv. 5:04; 1 passenger, pls confirm by 4:04.
    Yesterday at 5:04 pm! She remembers a digital weather/time sign outside a bank announcing 5:05, telling her she was too early for the bridge, that she had to kill a quarter of an hour. She—that woman yesterday—was annoyed, like her bus was late. She had an important appointment. She wanted to go deal.
    She laughs. ‟No wonder I didn’t jump; I was flying to Miami!”
    Life, it gets stranger and stranger. She slides her back down the wall, squat-sitting there opposite the repair shop window. The anchor—
    Suddenly she connects this day to the flow of days that stopped for her last night. It’s the day of the award ceremony, the one she never expected to see. It’ll be at ten o’clock, and the video will be on Channel 4, at the end of the hour, the feel-good story time. She can’t believe she’s actually going
to see it, sitting here watching the clip. She’s smiling so widely she can feel the wind on her teeth. She could float off into the clouds.
    Life is indeed strange.

11
    Dale had to back-and-forth three times before he could drive out of the alley. I gave him points for resisting the temptation to back out into traffic. The whole process was long enough and loud enough that it took me only one light knock to bring a woman to