End of Day
The woman stood and looked out the window. Below, some cars were stopped at a red light. A pedestrian crossed in the middle of the block and entered the parking structure.
The woman turned off the office lights. The city outside showed through the windows. She turned off the white noise machine. Her fingers touched the locking mechanism on the door handle. She closed the door.
She hung her leather messenger bag over her shoulder. The hallway was quiet. The wood plank floor had been freshly mopped. She walked down the hall. Voices came from a corner office. The conference room was dark.
The woman pressed the call button on the elevator. She waited. The doors opened. She stepped in and pressed the button marked “Basement.” The elevator moved, then stopped.
She walked out into an area with tables and chairs. Automatic lights turned on. A television played a news channel.
The woman walked a few steps to the bank of mailboxes. She turned her key in a box labeled 723. The clean floor held dampness where the tiles met.
She reached into the box and removed several letters. A local news flyer dropped into a nearby trash bin. She tapped the edge of the stack against a shelf.
She pressed the call button. The doors opened. A voice said, “Basement.”
She pressed 5A. The elevator moved.
A voice said, “Fifth floor rear,” and she stepped out. The woman walked past a corner office and into a carpeted hall. A sign above a door read EXIT. She walked out into the parking structure. Traffic moved on the street below. Two cars were parked nearby. Another sat farther away.
She walked to the right, then turned left around a cement pillar. Her car sat beneath a painted capital J. The doors unlocked with a click.
Inside the car, the woman started the engine and waited. Her hand moved to her gloves and parking pass. She drove through the parking structure, circling to the right. The painted letters moved from I to H. She kept circling.
The car moved through the structure. The tires struck the concrete.
There were no parked cars on level C. She met a car coming toward her as she turned at the end of level B. The car slowed and moved left. She looked at a parked car to her right and the moving car to her left. Her car completed the turn.
At level A, she turned left toward the exit. Large green letters reading EXIT hung above the lane. She held the lanyard with her parking pass out the window. The gate arm lifted. A man in dirty, ill-fitting clothes asked a question. Her car slowed and moved around him, then entered the street.
She turned left. She passed through two traffic lights and stopped at the next. Two cars were stopped beside her, engines running.
The light turned green. The woman followed the on-ramp to the freeway. Her car accelerated to traffic speed.
Later, the woman lay in her bed. Dim light came through three small windows on the far wall. Breathing came from beside her.
A body shifted.
The woman closed her eyes. A single car passed outside.
She swallowed. Her hand rubbed her face, then lay still on the covers.
The ceiling fan was still. The sheets were quiet. No footsteps sounded. Nothing happened outside the three windows.
She kept her eyes closed. The room was darker. The toes of her right curled and uncurled.
The woman sighed and opened her eyes. Now lying on her side, her eyes looked slowly around in the darkness.
Wood creaked.
The woman paused her breathing for 10 seconds and looked up at the ceiling. Then she let out her breath.