Louise sat on the edge of her bed staring at a bag she had just packed.  It was a ragged leather bundle with duct tape sealed memories. She ran her fingers along the frayed seam. Each scratch, every hole, meant a new location and an old pain. It held everything she owned. She wondered where she would take it this time.

     The room was bare. She had this little apartment in Brooklyn for almost a year and never turned it into her place.  It was a pretty nice little room, and she was sorry that she hadn’t noticed it before. The crack across the wall now seemed an old friend she didn’t want to lose.

     The landlord was waiting for her in the lobby, and he wanted to go to bed.  He was lenient with her for three and a half months.  She avoided him. She couldn’t pay.  Tonight, he waited by her door.  He gave Louise thirty minutes.

     She burned the details of the room into her mind so she could return to it as a memory. Someday, as an old woman, she’ll look back. She’ll remember that she was here.

     But Louise knew she couldn’t stay any longer. She checked one last time for anything she might have missed, pulled the string to turn off the lamp, and shut the door quietly behind her.

     It was one o’clock in the morning. Louise said goodbye and stepped out onto the rain-soaked street, the lights reflecting patterns of green and red and white so brightly it looked like Christmas.  It wasn’t raining anymore, just smelled like it.  She closed her eyes for a minute and took a deep breath.  It reminded her of a time when she was seven, traveling with her family in their Buick station wagon between Sparks and Winnemucca. Driving through Nevada, headed for Milwaukee. 

     They stopped for gas, and it started to rain.  It was the first time she realized how much she loved the combination of leaded gasoline and new rain. There was something exceptional about the smell the moment the rain comes down, and the hot pavement pulls the drops inside of it as if it were a secret.  The only proof of rain at the gas station that day was the few drops that melted off the Buick and the fresh, deliciously acrid mix of gasoline and ozone.

     Back in the cold, Louise opened her eyes.  She walked past Odelle’s camera shop to Four Star Pawn where she stopped to check the windows.  Behind the music box, she could see the initials L.C.M. on the nameplate of her father’s leather suitcase, and her grandpa’s trombone hung on the wall behind it.

     She didn’t intend for them to stay at the pawn for that long.  She tapped lightly on the window between the iron bars and said, “Hang on fella’s, I’ll be back to get you if I can.”

     Hard rain started to fall.  Louise ran into an alley and ducked into a dark vestibule.  Slow, cool, jazz was playing in the night air.  She was next to the back door of the Nightlight Club.  She peered through the window. She thought of her grandpa.  He played trombone in a jazz band. He was her part-time guardian. She was accustomed to the expressions in the room. 

     There was a booth close to the stage. A man sat alone with a bourbon in his hand, listening. He wore a smile that came from a place so far back in his mind that it took a skilled watcher like her to know he had found ecstasy. His brainwaves and the baritone sax were sharing the same frequency, harmonizing fifths at the back of his eyes. As a waitress, she wouldn’t have disturbed him for a thousand dollars, even now.  

A couple was dancing slowly. Alone on the floor. Alone in their hearts.  She wondered how long until one of them would finally raise the courage to call it a day...

Excerpt taken from Jenny K. Gilman's short story, "The Menagerie."

A word about this piece from the author: 

The Menagerie is a dark and seedy piece that takes place in New York in the '70s. Louise wore her thirty-nine years like someone else might have worn their fifties. An over-permed, blonde, waif-like, waitress who was out of work and out of options. She was forced to seek refuge with a former boss and ex-lover, Danny. He owned a restaurant and side show operation on the boardwalk in Coney Island. She hoped to keep him at bay while finally exploring the love she had longed for years ago with Tony, a fire-dancer, and performer at "Danny's." Will hope be enough to keep her grounded in Coney, or will she travel on again, never ending her cycle of transience?