My Rock #6 by Alycia Taylor Page B

I-101. I didn’t need to go that way, I
could have gone straight through town, but I was taking the long way around. I needed
my ocean right then. I loved the feel of the cool ocean breeze that blew across
the city that time of year. Sometimes I think I like the ocean so much that I
should have learned to surf or fish…something. None of that was conducive to my
childhood, though, and by the time I was grown, I was wasted all the time. I
couldn’t work up much motivation to learn anything new. Besides, it was hard to
picture myself fitting in with the men who sat on the docks with their poles or
the surfer’s with their bleached hair and sunburnt noses.
    I was enjoying the early afternoon ride along the
ocean, but mostly I was stalling. I wasn’t really looking forward to going back
to the old apartment, with or without Elly. I just didn’t want to run into
Buck. Besides the fact that it was embarrassing that he’d evicted me, I knew I
still owed him three month’s rent. Buck might let it go for a while, but he had
business partners and they were professional slum lords. They owned properties
all over east and south L.A. and had lawyers on speed dial. I didn’t need that
shit right then. I guess I shouldn’t have worried so much about it. It wasn’t
like I had anything for them to take if they sued me. You can’t take shit from
someone who doesn’t have it.
    Still, when I finally got there an hour after I left
Elly’s, I parked the bike around back so that Buck wouldn’t see it and I snuck
in the back stairwell where I knew the lock on the door had been broken for
over a year. I made my way up to the second floor and then used the opposite stairwell
that landed right next to the storage closets where the rest of my shit was
stored. So far, I got lucky, no sign of anyone. As soon as I had that thought,
I saw Mrs. Petrillo, the old woman who saw me naked the day I chased Elly out
in the hall. That was months ago, but I could tell by the way her eyes widened
when she looked at me that she hadn’t forgotten.
    “Hello Mrs. Petrillo,” I said with a smile.
    “Tristan,” she said, disapprovingly. I kept smiling
until she was past me and then I finished heading down the stairs. When I got
to the bottom, the storage doors were on my right. I unlocked the door to mine and
went inside. I started going through my clothes and realized I needed some new
clothes. During the show, they gave us a clothing allowance. Everything I had
at Elly’s came from that. This shit was all years old and probably wasn’t worth
taking. I needed to take something with me though, or Elly would get
suspicious. I picked up a duffel bag and stuffed as much into it as I could. The
only thing I took other than my clothes were the notebooks I used to write down
my music; some of it was drug-addled crap, but some of it was salvageable. And
I took a big shoebox of some really old stuff I’d kept from when I was in the
band and touring. I didn’t need it, it was just sentimental shit, but who knew
if my stuff was still going to be there in nine months? I doubted it. They’d
sell it all or throw it away by then. I didn’t really care; by then I’d be able
to buy new shit—better shit.
    I threw the bag over my shoulder and was stepping
out of the closet when I came face to face with Buck. He was standing there
waiting for me with a pile of paperwork in his hand. I didn’t doubt that Mrs.
Petrillo called him as soon as she hauled her fat, old ass up the stairs to her
apartment. Fuck! I couldn’t catch a fucking break.
    “Hey, Tristan.”
    I swallowed my attitude and said, “Hey, Buck! How
the hell are you?”
    “I saw you win that show, congratulations. You’re
going to be a star again.”
    “Thanks, cool shit, huh?”
    “Yeah, very cool shit,” he said. Buck rarely cursed.
When he did, it sounded like a bad line out of a crappy movie. I had to wonder
if he was somebody’s brother-in-law or cousin at the management company. That
had