|
I pick up extra shifts and slip twenty dollar bills into my top dresser drawer. After weeks of squirreling money away every night, I count the twenties and figure we have enough for the trip. I tell Scott to book the time off and I’ll call my mom and try to get a hold of Sophie.
“The most I can get off is two days in a row,” Scott tells me after checking with his boss. “And it can’t be a weekend.”
“That’s not enough. We can’t go all the way to Victoria and Salt Spring and back in two days.”
“You can go without me,” he offers. “Or we can wait. They’re going to hire another security officer in a few months and then I’ll be able to get more time off.”
So we wait. We go to work opposite each other, day after day, and wait to get out of the city.
Opportunity
In March, a light rain falls for six days straight. Water streams from the awning and splatters my jacket when I step outside. But I grew up in this climate, and I won’t let a little rain stop me. I feel like walking, so I’ll walk, rain or no rain.
I go left, away from the main road, and make my way through the neighborhood. Yard after yard is filled with leaves, sopping wet and decaying, leftover from fall. No kids play outside, and BBQs haven’t been brought out of garages yet. The only sign of life is the cars that go splashing by without slowing down, spraying up water as they pass.
My coat is soaked through when I turn around, and by the time I step back inside our rented house, I’m chilled. I put on a fresh pot of coffee and do up the dishes while it brews. Fresh cup in hand, I go into the living room to watch TV, and I find the answering machine light blinking. I expect it to be one of my fellow servers asking me to pick up a shift, but it’s our property manager. She needs us to call her right away.
I sit down and dial the number she left, sipping my coffee while I wait for her to answer.
“Thanks for calling back,” she says. Her tone is cool. “The owner of the house you’re renting has decided to sell and is breaking your lease.”
I put my coffee down. “Excuse me? I don’t think you can just break our lease.”
“We understand the inconvenience this places on you, so we’ll be compensating you for it. We’ll give you two months rent-free. Plus we’ll give you your full damage deposit back and even double it. Acceptable?”
“Yes.”
Scott’s still sleeping, but I can’t wait to tell him. I pour a cup of coffee and go wake him up to relay what the property manager told me.
“Wow,” he says when he’s awake enough for the news to register.
“Now we can finally get over to Salt Spring.”
“You know,” he says, sipping his coffee, “this is a real opportunity. If we put aside the money we would have paid in rent for the next two months, and put aside the deposit and bonus they give us, we’ll have like three thousand dollars. When else are we going to have that kind of cash to do whatever we want?”
He’s right. We never have that kind of money. It would take us a year, or more, of picking up extra shifts and stashing twenties away to save up that kind of cash. “What should we do with it?”
“Let’s use it to move to where we really want to be. This is our chance to make it happen.”
“Why don’t we move to Victoria?” I suggest. “Or Salt Spring? We can stay with my mom or Sophie until I find a job. You can apply for your work permit when we get there.”
“Don’t you want to go back to school, though? We have to go somewhere where I can work if you want to go to school.”
“Well where do you want to go?” I pushed him back in Moorhead to turn down that Customs job and for us to leave without a plan. Now it’s his turn to make the decision. “Your choice,” I say.
He smiles, and his eyes shine. “Let’s move back to Minnesota.”
Returning
Two and a half months later, we’re sitting in a U-Haul heading east out of the city. We’re not sorry to be leaving. Even though we spent a year of our lives here, we have no loyalty to Portland. In fact, we both feel like this city took from us a lot more than it gave, and we’re happy to be distancing ourselves from it.
We’re headed for Duluth, on the tip of Lake Superior in eastern Minnesota. It’s only three hours from International Falls, where Scott grew up. He used to go shopping for school clothes at the mall, and when he was a teenager, he’d go there with friends.
24/83 首页 上一页 22 23 24 25 26 27 下一页 尾页
|
