These Toxic Things

by Rachel Howzell Hall

“Are you Allie?” This wasn’t the red Toyota Camry that was supposed to pick her up.

“You shouldn’t rely on other people to take you places. Because when you do, dangerous situations like this happen.”

It is a man’s smile, the smile that unwinds across a man’s face before he’s maimed by a woman’s razor-sharp nails and knife-edged words.

“You get the gist? The scope of this one? Please let me know if I’m not being clear or . . .” If I were a stronger, braver woman, his time of death would be 2:33.

“Crap. You didn’t think I asked you to come in today to . . . ?” Apologize for being an asshole? Take back wanting to break up with you? Say, “I’m stupid. I should’ve chosen you over The People, but now I do; I choose you.”

Girl, why are or were you dating your boss???

His Adam’s apple bobs in his throat. I want to cut it out—then nurse him back to health.

“Because you’re not a priority to him,” Dad told me. “Because in a relationship,” Mom said, taking the scenic route, “there can only be one flower and one gardener. You, Michaela Lambert, are the flower. Not that fucker.”

Nadia Denham. An elegant name that evokes lovers and dances, spiced teas in fragile cups, and secrets, lots of secrets. Old ladies keep the best secrets.

being mad at somebody’s ratchet grandma won’t change any of this.

“Cori,” Dad says, “I’ll pay for the damn dry cleaning. Relax, dude.”

Uh???

Some are still taped shut in case Chris calls to say that he misses me and wants me to move back.

Girl, don't be this desperate

Christopher broke up with me a week after we’d successfully tested ROAD TRIP!

Welp, he's going to steal her idea, isn't he?

Like the earlier note, this paper is also yellow and just as grimy. Narrow, left-slanted handwriting sits in the center of the sheet. YOU LOOK LIKE HER

Bye demons! Y'all not welcome here

My emotions are the cups and wrappers floating all over the parking lot.

after drunk-texting my ex-boyfriend a picture of my nipple and summoning him to my apartment because the cocktails didn’t banish all my stress—and him actually showing up with his own drunken grin . . .

This girl makes the worst choices. Stop sleeping with your boss who made it clear he doesn't want a relationship anymore, my gawd

“Who gets married on Thanksgiving?” Dad wonders.

Sasha returns to swiping through her photo album of penises. “A shame I’m gonna have to give these up next week.” I glance at Imani, then say, “I think you should’ve given them up when Tyler proposed to you back in March.”

Why are you keeping a collection of dick pics???They're not even pretty to look at

Death has a way of stealing everything. And it comes in threes. There was Nadia. Now there’s Allison. Who’s next?

one remembers half of what they think they remember.”

She was running away from her boyfriend, Rudy. He had hit her and forced her to do all kinds of sick, perverted things. She was now driving to California to be in the movies. “Skin flicks,” she said with that rascal smile. “Since I do it anyway, might as well get paid.” She didn’t know: the porn industry was a bunch of Rudys, just wearing better clothes.

No, this one I’ll keep for . . . What? No idea. But I will keep it like bacon grease or a Canadian penny because I may find myself in Canada or have a hankering for a spinach salad.

The detective’s hands are supple. He believes in lotion and exfoliation.

“My bad.” He grins, but malice rests in his eyes. “I didn’t know that people with law-enforcement families couldn’t break the law.” My skin hurts. His words swarm like horseflies. “That’s . . . that’s not what I mean.” “I know your uncle. I still need you to find that movie stub, though.”

This is starting to stress me out

Has this happened before—someone following me—but tonight’s the first time I noticed? Noticed because I tore my eyes from the phone and from the stereo to actually pay attention to the world around me? What scary shit have I missed simply because of Snap, Twitter, and ’Gram?

I have nothing, I know nothing, I’m just a digital archaeologist, a high-end scrapbooker, a gussied-up geek, goddamn it.

And I already know the ending: Allison Cagle is dead. I also know the moral: a girl child ain’t safe in the world of men.

“That woman I used to love, the one you look like? She’s dead now.” His coffee sloshes past the rim of the cup and splashes onto the tile floor. I hop back. Heart pounding, I say, “Sorry to hear that,” and march to the exit. “Hope you have a good night.” Behind me, the man shouts, “I killed that bitch!”

Chile, what?? 0 to 100 real quick o___O

You’re already high-strung. If you were a macaw, your beautiful feathers would be all over the breakfast nook. And nothing’s sadder than a bald bird.”

Since he didn’t do the hard work, he shouldn’t get the prize.

Dexter kisses my hand and looks deep into my eyes. “Meeting you was unexpected. A real-life Denise Huxtable.”

Denise? Why not Claire?

It’s only seven forty-five, but I decide then. Tonight, I will dream of Dexter Denham.

I’m not stressed or anxious, and so it’s a bother, but it’s a single–fruit fly bother instead of a hornet’s nest worth.

As for Dexter bashing the idea . . . I hate that men bully women to keep them from innovating and thinking big.

I must pack regular casino clothes and fancy casino clothes for Sasha’s wedding. And just in case Christopher shows up in Temecula, I toss lingerie, gifts from him, into my suitcase.

This girl...

“Okay, don’t freak out. People are weird. Just an observation. Like, ‘women be shopping’ and ‘white people walk like this.’”

Somehow, my dress unbuttons and falls to the ground. Newton was right. Every mass does attract every other mass in the universe, and the gravitational force between two bodies is proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Physics be real.

Outside, beyond those windows, only God—oh, and the residents in the apartments across the way—can see Dexter and me. Whoever’s watching? Hope you like my cake. Dexter’s smashing it.

This is like YOU all over again. Close your doggone windows!

I bristle. This is the second time in less than a week that a creative, hot man has chosen to take a business call over sharing a quiet, creative moment with me.

Waiting, the knife comes out, and breathing becomes harder. Like breathing is a new thing. Like killing is a new thing.

“Yeah,” but I’m not going mad because I’m premenstrual or because someone’s gaslighting me. Something is happening. But I can’t collapse into Riley’s arms, because she’d say, “Ew,” tighten into a ball, and kick me in the corner next to the owl-shaped cookie jars.

The stylist nods. “Yeah. I ain’t stressed.” But I see worry in her eyes. And I see fear, too. Both shine like the sun.

I plop into the chair. My soul moans, exhausted already at eleven in the morning.

“So convince Anna or . . . ?” “Or nothing. Me getting my way is just a matter of time, Miss Lambert.”

the grace of God that protects other cars from mine.

But my love for them is pushed aside by my dragon-anger. It swirls near my heart, bright and dazzling.

“Sit.” Riley moves the laptop from the stool to the counter. If she’s being this nice to me, I must look like death on a graham cracker.

I can’t handle any more than this. My origin story is as chaotic as Nadia’s shop. Not beautiful at all.

But I’ve escaped to my car. I’m leaving her even though I love her. And I race down the hill, rushing to Christopher even though I don’t love him.

He follows me to my car and doesn’t speak as I slam into the driver’s seat. He doesn’t wave as I squeal onto Wilshire Boulevard. He doesn’t do anything he should do because he doesn’t love me, either.

No, he doesn’t love me. True love is waiting in my apartment. Mom has changed the sheets on my bed, and she’s opened a bottle of our favorite red wine and popped popcorn.