Taking It by Michael Cadnum Page B

grease fall on you and get in your hair.
    All the while I tried to forget that I was the same person of just the day before. I tried to forget, and I succeeded.
    For a while.

14
    I dropped by Whole Earth, the computer warehouse off Sixth Street where Stu works. I dressed like someone hunting for work, a linen skirt, wicker brown, and a linen top, a cornflower blue the woman at Maxi’s called it. It was a nice blue, like the blue in the U.S. flag, only a little more pale. I carried a leather purse exactly the color of caramel. My aunt had sent it to me, and for once I liked one of her presents.
    I timed it so I caught Stu on his lunch break. One look at him and I saw why I had liked him. Even eating a jumbo burrito he looked good.
    He went to fling his arm around me and I stepped back. “Want a bite?” he said.
    I surprised myself by biting off a little flour tortilla and some refritos and a little sour cream.
    I looked good enough for Stu to want to be seen with me, and he glanced around the computer storeroom, but there was no one there but a heavy, bearded guy with a box cutter, slicing up boxes and stacking them.
    â€œNeed me to show you how to set anything up?” asked Stu. He had that smile, smart, easy to like. “We stand behind all our equipment.”
    â€œAssistant Manager,” I said, fingering his badge. “That’s new.”
    â€œGive me six months and I’d be running this place,” said Stu.
    He crumpled up the burrito wrapper and bounced it off the rim of the trash can. It fell in. Stu was fun and good-looking, and bragged in a way you knew he only half-believed.
    We both knew he wouldn’t be here six months. He was going to Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo in September, majoring in some sort of science fiction math, three hundred miles away. We both knew how bad we both were at picking up the phone. Stu was complete and liked himself, a life-supporting planet.
    â€œYou’re looking for trouble,” said Stu. He was joking, the way he does, everything about Stu a sort of easy banter.
    â€œNo more than usual,” I said.
    â€œThen someone better be careful.”
    I shrugged, acting the way I knew Stu liked me to act, teasing, mocking everything, the way he did. Stu never wanted to talk about what he called the Time Wasters, God or death or fate. He said life was all accident.
    â€œHow about tonight?” he said, not having to make any preliminary conversation, leaning back against a stack of boxes. “Take the Mustang up to the view. See what develops.”
    I knew what he meant by the view, and it wasn’t just a view of the Bay and the city lights. I used to think it was wonderful, the way he was so casual about everything.
    â€œI’ll pick you up about eight,” I said, although I hadn’t really intended to say anything of the kind.
    He looked happy, but a little thoughtful, maybe hoping we could go to Just Desserts for fudge cake, or maybe see a movie. “Are you all right, Anna?” He gave me a look like he cared, and like he was puzzled by something, as though my mind was a computer program that wasn’t turning itself off and on the way it was supposed to.
    â€œDon’t they need some more help around here?” I said. “Maybe someone to watch the doors, make sure people only take out what they paid for.” I bumped him with my hip as I turned to leave. “Someone could walk right in and help themselves,” I said.
    I indicated an open box full of Styrofoam noodles, the tops of smaller boxes, imprinted with Nikon , barely covered by the packing stuff. I looked back at Stu and his expression was bad, worried and unsure. There was a carton of Pentax binoculars. One of those would fit in one hand, lightweight.
    I told myself that Stu was just nervous, here on the job, assistant manager, acting like he invented wiring. Besides, Stu didn’t really know me that well, even after all this time.
    â€œWhat