Devils in Exile

Damsel

They broke early from the club, getting back to the Marlborough Street pad a little after one. Royce was still at Precipice, but no Danielle. Maven realized he hadn’t seen her in a few days. Termino stayed out on a midnight rendezvous; Suarez drank too many vodkas and not enough Red Bulls and passed out snoring on the sofa with his hand down his pants; Glade was doing his Glade thing with two legal secretaries, holed up in his and Maven’s room. Glade’s ministrations generally took him into the wee small hours, plying these girls with Midori, getting them used to the camera. The first ten, fifteen, twenty times Maven had watched the resulting video, it was great. Now it was like a porn he’d seen over and over. It had got so that he was blaming the victims for their pliability, rather than his sociopathic roommate, in the same way Maven used to get pissed off at Iraqis for making him shoot at them.

So he was shit out of luck and would have to bunk out here on the opposite end of the sectional from snoring Suarez. Maven wandered to the other end of the apartment, fishing a Red Stripe out of the beverage refrigerator and racking up balls on the pool table. He broke hard, scattering the balls, suspended in the leftover buzz of another lost night. He lined up a few shots, then set down his cue. Even the pool table had lost its allure.

Maven heard creaking above him. He looked up at the high ceiling. Footsteps overhead. Could have been Royce back home, but he didn’t think so. The footsteps moved toward the street, and he moved with them, to the French doors opening onto Marlborough.

He stood out in the night air, knowing she was above him. He was with her and not with her, the story of his life. Across the way, in a large, angled picture window, he saw Danielle’s reflection. Standing out on the top-floor balcony with a drink in her hand, wearing a short robe and not much else. She looked out into the night like a woman in a high castle. A damsel, only not in distress. Just a damsel.

A breeze came up, a whiff of ocean air brushing his cheek at the same time it shifted the hem of her robe around her thighs, and Maven had to turn away. Had to go back inside, and then, once there, had to get out of that place. He took off downstairs, moving to the sidewalk, hitting the chill and not knowing where he was going. He reached the corner before looking back, and when he did, the top-floor balcony was vacant.

He walked away from the river, toward Commonwealth Avenue, needing to move, working off the alcohol and the discontent. City Convenience at the corner of Massachusetts and Commonwealth avenues was a bright storefront in an otherwise darkened city. He went inside.

Similar to his convenience store in Quincy, only with prices higher by 30 percent. The guy working a laptop behind the counter gave Maven an unsmiling nod, checking him over for stickup potential, and Maven thought of Ricky and felt even worse.

He walked down the hospital-bright aisles, not wanting anything. So he was still smitten with Danielle — fine. He could live with that. In fact, it wasn’t so bad. Having his ultimate girl right there, yet out of reach — up on that balcony — freed him to be a little more reckless with other girls.

This was how he was feeling when a group of young women walked in, weaving and husky-voiced from talking over loud music all night. They wanted bottled water, Maven standing near the drink cooler. He glanced over without too much optimism — then took a second look at the one in front.

Brunette ringlets. A beaded choker around her neck.

She drifted near, choosing between flavored waters, her friends still farther back. Aware of him, yet sober enough to avoid eye contact.

“Unicorns and gift bags,” he said.

She shot him a so-not-interested squint — followed by a glimmer of recognition.

“That club,” she said. “Precipice. That awful place.”

“It is, isn’t it?” he said, smiling. “But this guy I work with, these people I know, it’s like their spot, so...”

She nodded. “You didn’t look like everyone else there. So thrilled with themselves.”

“It’s Samara, right?”

Her friends appeared, protectively backing her up. “How did you remember my name?”

“Well, it’s unusual.”

“So I’m told.”

“It’s also the name of this city in Iraq.”

She nodded. “I’ve heard it mentioned on NPR once or twice.”

“Once or twice,” he said, smiling to himself.

“So, were you... um...?”

“I was.”

“Ah.” She smiled uncomfortably. “Wow. What was that like?”

“Less awful than Precipice.”

She smiled again, aware that she had asked a dumb question. Her friends looked him over, not making this easy. Samara was Indian by heritage, and American by voice, but something about her — her name, and maybe her exoticism, but also something more — put him in the mind of that rarely glimpsed, peaceful side of Eden, during the war.

She was still smiling at him and not looking away.

Maven said, “I believe it was Nietzsche who once said that the most difficult thing a man can do in this life is to ask a girl out in front of her friends.”

Two of the girls laughed, while the other one, whom Maven recognized from Precipice, gave him a corny scowl.

“Okay,” said Samara.

They got out their phones, exchanging numbers side by side.

“One r,” Samara corrected him.

“One r.” He thumbed OK to save her contact info. “Okay. So I’ll call you.”

“Okay,” she said, closing her phone.

Outside, turning the corner back onto Comm. Ave.,the walk back to Marlborough Street made him remember the balcony.

He found her number in his phone and pressed SEND.

She answered, “Hi?”

“Hey. I tried waiting that two-day thing before calling you, but it just wasn’t working out...”