The Little Men by Megan Abbott

At night, the sounds from the canyon shifted and changed. The bungalow seemed to lift itself with every echo and the walls were breathing. Panting.
    Just after two, she’d wake, her eyes stinging, as if someone had waved a flashlight across them.
    And then, she’d hear the noise.
    Every night.
    The tapping noise, like a small animal trapped behind the wall.
    That was what it reminded her of. Like when she was a girl, and that possum got caught in the crawlspace. For weeks, they just heard scratching. They only found it when the walls started to smell.
    It’s not the little men, she told herself. It’s not. And then she’d hear a whimper and startle herself. Because it was her whimper and she was so frightened.
    I’m not afraid I’m not I’m not
    It had begun four months ago, the day Penny
first set foot in the Canyon Arms. The chocolate
and pink bungalows, the high arched windows
and French doors, the tiled courtyard,
cosseted on all sides by eucalyptus, pepper,
and olive trees, miniature date palms—it was
like a dream of a place, not a place itself.
    This is what it was supposed to be, she thought.
    The Hollywood she’d always imagined, the
Hollywood of her childhood imagination, assembled
from newsreels: Kay Francis in silver
lamé and Clark Gable driving down Sunset in
his Duesenberg, everyone beautiful and everything
possible.
    That world, if it ever really existed, was long
gone by the time she’d arrived on that Greyhound
a half-dozen years ago. It had been
swallowed up by the clatter and color of 1953
Hollywood, with its swooping motel roofs
and shiny glare of its hamburger stands and
drive-ins, and its descending smog, which
made her throat burn at night. Sometimes she
could barely breathe.
    But here in this tucked away courtyard, deep in Beachwood Canyon, it was as if that
Old Hollywood still lingered, even bloomed.
The smell of apricot hovered, the hush and
echoes of the canyons soothed. You couldn’t
hear a horn honk, a brake squeal. Only the
distant ting-ting of window chimes, somewhere.
One might imagine a peignoired
Norma Shearer drifting through the rounded
doorway of one of the bungalows, cocktail
shaker in hand.
    â€œIt’s perfect,” Penny whispered, her heels
tapping on the Mexican tiles. “I’ll take it.”
    â€œThat’s fine,” said the landlady, Mrs. Stahl,
placing Penny’s cashier’s check in the drooping
pocket of her satin housecoat and handing
her the keyring, heavy in her palm.
    The scent, thick with pollen and dew, was
enough to make you dizzy with longing.
    And so close to the Hollywood sign, visible
from every vantage, which had to mean something.
    She had found it almost by accident, tripping
out of the Carnival Tavern after three stingers.
    â€œWe’ve all been stood up,” the waitress had tut-tutted, snapping the bill holder at her hip. “But we still pay up.”
    â€œI wasn’t stood up,” Penny said. After all,
Mr. D. had called, the hostess summoning
Penny to one of the hot telephone booths.
Penny was still tugging her skirt free from its
door hinges when he broke it to her.
    He wasn’t coming tonight and wouldn’t be
coming again. He had many reasons why, beginning
with his busy work schedule, the demands
of the studio, plus negotiations with
the union were going badly. By the time he got
around to the matter of his wife and six children,
she wasn’t listening, letting the phone
drift from her ear.
    Gazing through the booth’s glass accordion
doors, she looked out at the long row of spinning
lanterns strung along the bar’s windows.
They reminded her of the magic lamp she had
when she was small, scattering galloping
horses across her bedroom walls.
    You could see the Carnival Tavern from
miles away because of the lanterns. It was
funny seeing them up close, the faded circus
clowns silhouetted on each. They looked so
much less glamorous, sort of shabby.