Breaking the Bank by Yona Zeldis McDonough

remembered that she was carrying two twenties from the first time the machine offered its mysterious bounty. They were not in her wallet; she had taken to keeping the bills and any change they spawned separate, like milk and meat in a kosher kitchen. The fare was eight dollars; she handed the driver the twenty and said, “Keep the change,” as she somehow knew she would as soon as her fingers touched the bill.
    â€œThank you,” the driver said as he studied the bill, then sought her gaze in the rearview mirror. “Thank you so very much.”
    T HE APARTMENT was dark and quiet.
Lloyd and Eden must still be out,
she thought. The momentary glow Mia had felt when she handed the driver the money faded when she thought of her ex-husband. Sheslipped out of her boots and jacket and padded into the bedroom. On the way, she saw that she was wrong—Lloyd was asleep on the air mattress, his big, handsome face pressed into the new pillowcase she bought just for this purpose. The blanket she borrowed from Julie was pulled up only partway; his chest was bare. Probably the rest of him, too; she had never known Lloyd to wear pajamas. She checked on Eden, who was also sound asleep amid a riotous pattern of trombones and saxophones. Petunia sat propped at the foot of the bed, alert as a guard dog. Mia watched briefly, deriving that peculiar satisfaction experienced by mothers everywhere, as her child quietly drew and expelled breath.
    So they were here. Well, it was late, after all. She went into her so-called room and took off the rest of her things. Rummaging through a drawer, she pulled out a large man’s shirt. The collar and cuffs were frayed, and the fabric had that particular softness achieved after years of washing, drying, starching, and ironing. It was only when she was in the bathroom, brushing her teeth, that she realized the shirt once had belonged to Lloyd. This made her weepy all over again, and she sat down on the closed lid of the toilet and cried for a while.
It’s those dirty martinis,
she decided.
Dirty, dirty, dirty martinis.
For the second time that evening, Mia wiped her eyes and tried to get a grip.
    The new sheets were as smooth and luxurious as she imagined, and she fell asleep almost immediately. She began to dream, a complex dream in which she was navigating mountains of garbage. She held a staff, the sort of thing seen in a fifteenth-century painting depicting a pilgrim, only the staff was made of some lightweight metal, like aluminum. But that was okay; she was happy, a happy hiker, with her twenty-first-century staff, her canteen, and her binoculars. She was as nimble-footed as a goat, as joyful as a lark . . . until she wasn’t. She began to pant. The staff became a crutch. Her canteen was gone, and she was thirsty. Walking was a torment. But she kept going until shereached the biggest mountain of all, except it wasn’t really a mountain, it was a wave of garbage: broken dolls, blackened banana peels, sodden diapers, and rotting heads of lettuce all rising up, threatening to rain down on her. In a panic, she woke.
    Mia remained in bed, waiting for her heart to slow, but even when it did, she was unable to get comfortable again. She turned this way and that, listening to the sounds of the apartment at night: steam hissing through the pipes, a door banging shut down the hall. A muffled shout, from somewhere in the street. A car alarm, with its predictable, annoying
wee wop, wee wop.
Damn. Mia sat up in disgust. She was drunk and exhausted, but she couldn’t get back to sleep.
    She yanked off the covers and headed into the kitchen, for what she was not sure. Hot milk? Cold water? She stopped to look at Lloyd. He was on his side now, a position she remembered well. She used to snuggle into the attenuated comma created by his body, his long arm casually draping across her chest, claiming her, keeping her safe.
    Was it this memory or the backlash of the dirty martinis that