Page 7 of The Jerk in Apartment 1B

“It’s fine.” I pour the tequila into the cup. “What ever happened to Rina?”

“I’m not sure,” she says, but her nervous tone implies she’s not being truthful.

“Come on, Sara. I know you’re friends with her. Is she still in Paris?”

“Yeah. She, um, met a French guy. They got married last summer.”

“She’s married?” I say, furious at myself for not taking that job. That could’ve been me, living in Paris, married to a French guy. But no. I stayed behind for a guy I thought loved me and wanted to marry me. “She’s only lived there for two years.”

“She met him a little over a year ago. He proposed a few months after they met. They seem really happy.” She smiles, then shuts it down. “I mean, I guess I don’t know. Maybe they’re not.”

“I’m sure they are, and it’s fine. I want her to be happy. I’m just jealous, which I know is wrong but—”

“It’s not wrong. It’s totally understandable after what happened today.” She comes over to me and sits down. “You’ll get past this. It just takes time. You’ll find someone else and forget all about Asher.”

“I’m done dating. I’ve decided guys are jerks, or at least the single ones, but some married guys are also jerks, so it’s pretty much all of them.” I gulp the tequila. “Forget men. My focus needs to be on getting a job and finding an apartment.”

“I might be able to help with the apartment. Jenna, this girl at work, is moving in with her boyfriend and has three months left on her lease. She’s been looking for someone to sublet her place. It’s in Murray Hill and she said the rent’s really cheap.”

“Sounds too good to be true. What’s the catch?”

“Well, it’s not much bigger than this. But you’d get used to it. I never thought I could live in a place this small, but now it feels kind of normal.”

“I guess I could look at it,” I tell her.

“I’ll text her and tell her you’re interested,” Sara says, picking up her phone. “I think there’s a few other people that want to see it.”

“Maybe it’s already gone.”

She shows me her phone. “She just texted back and said it’s available. You want to go see it tonight?”

I really don’t. I’m exhausted and I just drank a lot of tequila. But if I wait, it might be gone.

“Yeah, I’ll go see it,” I tell Sara.

She texts her friend and her phone dings with a reply. “She says to come by now. She’s going out with her boyfriend later.” Sara gets up and grabs her jacket. “Maybe when we’re done, we could get something to eat.”

“Sure,” I say, but I really don’t have money to eat out. Whatever money I have needs to go for rent. I need to find a job, and fast.

“Oh, there’s one little thing I forgot to tell you,” Sara says as we’re walking to the subway. “About the apartment.”

“What is it?”

“The person next door can be kind of loud.”

“How loud? And what kind of noise are we talking about? Music? Yelling? Crying kids?”

“No kids, but definitely music. Jenna said the guy likes to party. But that could be good. Maybe he’d invite you to a party and you could meet a new guy.” She smiles.

“I’m done dating, remember?”

“Yeah, we’ll see how long that lasts.”

I roll my eyes at her and she laughs, which makes me laugh, but only because I’m drunk. If the tequila, along with the wine I had earlier, weren’t flowing through me, I’d be crying instead of laughing. I kind of feel like I could do both. Alcohol messes with my emotions. I can be crying one minute and laughing the next.

“This is it,” Sara says when we get to the apartment building. It’s brick, several stories high, and has a bright blue door. “It looks okay, don’t you think?”

“You’ve never been here?”

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