Escaping Reality

good
    for one night, a bridge to the next day in the face of a crisis. I’m on the
    other side. I hope.

    ***
    Thirty minutes later, I’ve showered, and I’m looking ridiculous in my
    new t-shirt and a skirt, with high heels I intend to replace quickly, but the
    t-shirt seems better than a gaping blouse.
    To add to my disorderly appearance, I stare at the light blonde
    poofball that is my hair in the absence of a styling product and a flat iron,
    and decide I look like I just stuck my finger in a light socket. I am what my
    mother would have called a “hot mess”, and I try to hear her voice in my
    head and fail, which is why I normally don’t try. Failing hurts.
    Giving up on my appearance, I snatch my small purse and head to the
    kitchen table, and put all my new cards and ID in my wallet. Gathering my
    lease and the cell phone I intend to return to Liam, I decide I need to take
    my now empty carry-on with me. I load it up with my purse, paperwork,
    and the phone. I’ll be dropping it by Liam’s hotel sooner than later to avoid
    any chance of running into him. And thanks to the to-do list I wrote and
    rewrote about five times before I dried my hair, I head to the door feeling a
    tad more in control than when I woke up. Lists do that for me. I write things
    out when I need structure. I rewrite them when I still don’t feel I have it all
    pulled together. Or I clean and organize. Or I write lists in between cleaning
    and organizing. Maybe that should be my cover. I’ll be a maid. No one
    would expect to find my father’s daughter cleaning up after other people,
    and it would control my stress. It isn’t my dream career, or what I went to
    school for, but I have to find a way to get back to where I was before the
    museum, where surviving was more important than dreaming.
    I step into the hallway outside the apartment (I’m not ready to call it
    “my apartment”) and I’m locking up when I hear the door directly behind
    me open and shut. I turn and jolt to find myself locked in the penetrating
    stare of a man as tall and devastatingly male as Liam, but that is about
    where the comparison stops. While Liam has a worldly, refined, and
    somehow edgy air about him, this man is a rugged bad boy from his torn,
    faded jeans to his long, light brown hair tied at his nape.
    “New to the neighborhood?” he asks, shifting a leather backpack to
    one of his
    impressively broad shoulders, and my gaze falls and finds his Dallas
    Cowboys t-shirt, and the link it represents to what was once my home
    momentarily knocks my breath away.
    “You okay?” he asks, and my gaze jerks to his. Was I obviously
    rattled? I’m never obviously rattled. “You look like you saw a ghost.”
    “Yes,” I say quickly, silently warning myself this could be a trap, a way
    to lure me into admitting some connection to a past I cannot claim. “I’m
    new to the neighborhood. I just moved in last night.”
    His gaze flickers over my clothing and lingers on my t-shirt, the way
    my gaze had on his.
    “Just a hunch,” he comments, “but moving here from New York?”
    “Yes,” I confirm, hugging myself, embarrassed by the reminder that I
    am a frizzy, mismatched mess, “and unfortunately, my clothes didn’t make
    it from the airport.” I sound nervous. I am nervous, and I only wish I had the
    luxury to let it be about his good looks, not his intentions. But I do not. “My
    outfit is certainly a way to make an impression.”
    “I’ve lost a few bags in my time,” he says, and his words are as warm
    as the interest I see his eyes. He’s warm and oddly familiar in some way
    that I cannot identify, but it doesn’t make me uneasy. In fact, it’s
    comfortable. “And,” he adds, his voice a little softer, “I don’t think you need
    a t-shirt to make an impression.” He motions to the elevators. “I’ll ride
    down with you.” He starts walking.
    I stare after him, trying to dissect what he meant. I don’t need a
    t-shirt to make an impression? Is that good or bad? Bad. It’s bad. No matter
    the reason, I don’t need to be leaving impressions of any sort on anyone.
    Double-stepping, I hurry behind him to catch up and again remind myself of
    what time has taught me. Bad hair and funny clothes bring attention just
    like being overtly sexy does. I have to fade into the background, play mousy
    librarian like I have in the past. Or clean houses, or whatever it might be.
    I’ve lost the library as a cover. Anything I once did I