When Tito Loved Clara by Jon Michaud Page B

Comes to Town,
he thought. He offered to lend a hand.
    â€œWow, that would be great,” said Tamsin, sweeping her fingers through her hair.
    With Tito's help, they got the couch into the elevator and took it up to the second-floor apartment, which had previously been thehome of two gay men his father was glad to have out of the building. (The management company handled the showing and leasing of apartments; Tito and his father often did not know until moving day who would be coming in.) He went back down and helped them with the last things in the truck: a futon and a dresser—not much work, really, to have earned the gratitude of the attractive new tenant. It was only after all that, when they were standing outside on the sidewalk saying goodbye to the friend, that he noticed the kid sleeping in the cab of the truck, his face half-hidden by a book with a train on the cover, the windows cracked open for air. Tito relished the idea that anybody watching the scene from one of the apartments across the street might have come to the conclusion that he and Tamsin were moving into the building together. While he was having this little daydream, she unlocked the rental truck and lifted the boy, still sleeping, onto her shoulder. “It's been a tough move on him,” she explained. “Thanks again for your help.”
    â€œNo problem,” said Tito, and held the door open for her.
    H E EXPECTED TO have to contrive ways of running into her in the lobby, or the deli, or the subway. He imagined these encounters, played them out in moment-by-moment detail in his mind—
Oh, hi. Sure, I'd love to come in
—and then, with the rapidity of a plot being advanced in a porno movie, he was taking off her clothes.
    All of that was wiped away the next night, however, when she knocked on his father's door. Tito, thinking it was a tenant looking for a package, answered. Tamsin wore a pair of denim cutoffs and a T-shirt with the word RICE across the front. It would be a week before he learned that Rice was the name of the college she'd gone to and not her favorite football player—or food.
    â€œHey,” she said. “Sorry to bother you, but I was just wondering: Is the park safe?”
    He stood in the doorway, next to the pile of signed-for packages, trying to minimize her view of the inside of his parents' apartment while simultaneously scoping her out. She had a heart-shaped face, reddish-brown hair, and sensitive skin that bruised easily—her arms were covered in black and blue marks from the move. On her neck and biceps there were large, jagged freckles, like pencil shavings. She looked slim but athletic, tensile. Tito could see that she was not wearing anything underneath her T-shirt.
    â€œAh, you know . . .” he started off, hesitant to tell her that a girl had been murdered in the park earlier in the year—a white college student. Not only that, but a white college student who had been a Cruz Brothers client. Rebecca Waverly was her name. Tito hadn't been involved in the move, but he'd monitored the coverage of her murder closely—as had everyone at work. The Cruz brothers sent flowers to the funeral. Attracted by cheap rents and an express subway line, so many people moved to the neighborhood without knowing anything about it. Tamsin was still looking at him, waiting for an answer. “I've never had any problems,” he said, finally.
    â€œSo you think it would be OK for me to go jogging in there?”
    â€œYes,” he said. “Only I wouldn't go in there at night.”
    â€œRight. Sure. And the playground? For Wyatt?”
    â€œI played there as a kid,” he said. “He'll be fine. Just not at night.”
    â€œThat's good to know. And thanks again for helping us yesterday. I'm not sure what we would have done without you.”
    â€œIt's nothing,” he said. If his parents had been away, he would have invited her in, but they were eating in the kitchen