Title: "Adversity On Gilman: Part 7 of 12"        

         Zero yawned. Hopefully, the brewing coffee would help wake him that morning. He sat at his kitchen table, smelling the air as the aroma leaked in. He propped back in his chair, watching the pot as it slowly filled with the black liquid.

         He had awoken at a bright 9:30 in the morning. His alarm still had thirty minutes to go before it would sound. There hadn't been a reason for the early awakening. He had merely opened his eyes, looked out, then threw a T-shirt and shorts on before fixing the coffee.

         The coffee was finished. He pulled the container out and poured himself some. Black, no other added ingredients.

         He walked into his living and sat down, grabbing a zine from off of the living room table. But no sooner than had he took one sip from his coffee, was there a knock at his apartment door. It was the grand luck of these things. Again, there was a knock.

         Zero didn't say anything. He just picked his coffee up and slowly walked to the door. Unlocking the sole lock, he opened the door up wide...

         ...And came face to face with Carenthia. "I told you I would come back by," she said, standing at the doorway and looking at Zero in his old T-shirt and shorts, coffee mug in hand.

         He knew she said she would say goodbye before she left. He just wasn't expecting her to say it so... early in the morning. He had to take another sip of coffee to open his eyes back up. Swallowing, he looked at her in the doorway and said, "So it's official?"

         Carenthia watched as Zero sipped on his morning coffee. It brought back memories of her and Mrs. Jenkins' last actual conversation, as they had talked over coffee. She put that memory in the back of mind, only trying to get through this last conversation with Zero during the present. "Yes. I've contacted my father." She inhaled. "He's already began to make some temporary space for me."

         Zero opened the door for you, motioning that she could come in. As she walked by, he closed the door and said, "I really don't think you should..."

         But Carenthia cut him off. "I've already spoken with Mrs. Jenkins." She was a very different mood that morning. Was it confidence? Or was it a personal defense mechanism, trying to block out how she really felt? "I don't think she took it too well." She sat down on the couch.

         Zero sat back down on the couch that he had been sitting on when Carenthia had knocked. He sat his coffee down on the table and looked to Carenthia. He thought about what she had just said as it pertained to Mrs. Jenkins. "But it was your choice..."

         Again, she cut him off. "Which is why I felt a satisfaction in telling her, then watching her reaction." Her personality was probably a combination of too much caffeine and an overload of stress, all accumulating into a quick remarked personality.

         Zero found that to be a little satisfactory, as well. He truly hated the woman's ways. "Traumatic that her little world is crumbling down around her."

         Carenthia sighed. "Yes, it is. But also, yes it was my choice."

         Zero finished the coffee in his mug with one last swallow. He rested it down on the table and looked back to Carenthia. "I can respect that." He sighed. "But I can't understand it."

         Carenthia's wall that she had built for that discussion seemed to whither away with her next response. "Look, it's like I told you last night." A soft, needing tone came out of her when she said, "I have to get away from this place. It isn't for me."

         Zero looked into her eyes, a way of trying to help her see his viewpoint. "But if you run from here, then you will run from Oregon."

         Carenthia began to stir in her seat. "That's not..."

         It was then Zero who cut her off. "Life's filled with obstacles, no matter which way you choose to turn." He paused before completing his thought. "It's all a question of how you handle it."

         Carenthia cocked her head to the side, looking at Zero through the corner of her eyes. "What are you trying to say?"

         Zero put his hands together and leaned forward. "Running from those obstacles is only temporary." He looked up at her cocked head. "Why not face them for just once?"

         Carenthia cut her head around to face Zero. "I will, I do." Her gaze wondered off from Zero. "I..." she said, bringing her gaze back to Zero, "just don't feel right here with these conditions."

         Zero leaned back on the couch and grabbed his pack of cigarettes. He had yet to get one that morning. "So tell me this," he said, with an unlit cigarette in his mouth. "Before you came here, where did you live?" He lit his cigarette.

         Carenthia stiffened back up, as she had been when she first entered the apartment. Quickly, but quietly, she replied with, "Albany."

         The city connected inside of Zero's head. He thought back to March of the last year. "Albany?" His thoughts drifted back to his drive he had had to make in order to find a specific person there. "Did you know Kate Winder?"

         Carenthia's eyes brightened, surprised that Zero would even know of the name to mention it. "Actually, yes I did," she said, the words coming slowly and pronounced from her mouth. "She was my neighbor." She finished that sentence almost in a way that was more of a question directed as Zero, asking how do you even know her?

         But Zero didn't go along with it. The whole history of he and Kate were related in terms of association was something he preferred to keep silent. "I see," was all that he responded.

         Her first method didn't work. Her option was to directly ask him. And so, she did. "How do you know her?"

         He didn't want to get into it. She was changing the subject. Actually, he knew he had changed the subject by even bringing her name up. He could get out of that and back into the subject of Carenthia moving, though. It'd just take a little creative wording. "We both knew someone." He exhaled a patch of smoke. "I met her almost a year ago."

         Carenthia figured that Zero was referring to the Theodore Balmore ordeal. Kate had told her the story, although she had just told her the story of how Theodore was now in jail. She never went into great detail about Zero, although she referred to Lint on occasion.

         But it had been nearly seven months since Carenthia had last seen Kate. She wondered if Zero kept in touch with her. She wouldn't mind saying hi to her again. Interested, she asked Zero, "Have you seen her lately?"

         "No, actually," Zero responded, rather matter-of-factly. He inhaled another drag from his cigarette, adding, "We have since moved on after we met each other."

         Seemed like an odd response for Zero to say. "Why don't you call her?" She stirred on the couch.

         It was Zero's chance to get back to the subject of the move. He first responded with, "Other things take that time." But then he took another drag from his cigarette, turned a little on the couch so to better face Carenthia, and asked her, "But I think the question right now is, why did you leave Albany?"

         She fell silent. Her head looked down to the floor for a moment, obviously not really sure what to say. Should she come out and be truthful? That was something she hadn't done with anyone in Berkeley. Or, should she just tell him the same story that she had told everyone else in Berkeley?

         She looked up, seeing him looking at her. It was something different with him. He wasn't going to condemn her, no matter which reason she gave him. Would it really hurt that bad if she told him the truth?

         She looked up to the ceiling, not really sure how to word it right. "I was in a relationship, but it wasn't working out," was the best she could do. It was the truth.

         Zero didn't say anything bad. She had guessed correctly. Instead, he just wanted to know what had happened. So, he asked, "What happened?"

         She was still a little hesitant to come right out with the details. "It just wasn't working out." She looked over at him. She was unknowingly biting her lip.

         He took one last drag from his cigarette before putting it out in his ashtray. "What was it? A conflict of interest?"

         She quickly replied. "No... it was me. I left him." Perhaps it was too quick of a response. Inside, she scolded herself.

         Zero was finding that something wasn't adding up. She was painting a pretty picture, but she was forgetting the focus object. "You just don't move hundreds of miles from someone because of that." He pointed to her as he continued to speak. "If you were the problem, then why didn't you just end it and move on... not away?"

         She was going to have to tell him. She didn't want to. She had never gone into it with anyone. Her words were slow and hesitant. "I... couldn't."

         "Why?" Zero looked over at Carenthia, as she looked off to the floor.

         She was hesitant, even more so than her last sentence. She wasn't sure what Zero would say. She wasn't sure what anyone would say if she ever told them her story. "He..." She looked up at Zero. "He was an alcoholic."

         Zero put his hands together as he leaned forward in his seat. He realized that her story was actually more serious than he had first thought it to be. "I see," he said in response.

         She went ahead with the story. She didn't know how much of it she could go into it, though. It was a dark moment in her life. It was something she was trying to escape and move away from. "He wasn't when I met him. He was just a casual drinker. But he changed once we moved in together."

         "It took control of him." Zero knew the type.

         She knew very well what he meant. "Yes." And for the real reason why she left... "He would become real angry when he drank."

         "Did he ever hit you?" Zero knew that it was a characteristic in some cases.

         Carenthia was quiet in her response of, "Yes."

         She shook her head and looked down to the floor. She questioned her own motives. She hoped she had done the right thing. "I was scared." She looked back up to Zero, a small tear running down her cheek. It wasn't a great show of emotion. She obviously had too well of a tolerance built up for something like that to happen. But even one tear meant something in her case. "But for one weekend, he never came home. So I left. I left him and came here."

         Zero wondered if he knew the man. Theodore came to mind, but the timeframe didn't match up. "Have you heard from him since?" He looked at her, knowing it was hurting her to discuss the topic.

         Carenthia shook her head. "No, It's been four months and still he has yet to get in contact with me."

         Zero made sure to get all loopholes filled. "Have you told authorities in Albany?"

         Again, she shook her head. "No. I have never even told Mrs. Jenkins." She nodded towards Zero. "You are the first who I have spoken of this to."

         He nodded back to her. "You done the right thing in leaving." He never considered leaving something as the better thing to do. Usually, at least. Carenthia's case seemed a little different, though. She had to leave. Her life may have been on the line.

         She put her face in her hands, obviously thinking back to the scenes that she endured during her time in Albany. "I question myself of it everyday." She still wasn't sure if she had made the right decision or not.

         Zero confirmed her decision as being correct. "No, you did." He added, "I might not agree with your decision to move right now, but back then, it was the right choice."

         She pulled her face from her hands, speaking up quickly. "Hey, listen..." It wasn't the greatest of discussion topics on her list. "I feel real uncomfortable talking about this."

         Zero nodded. "I understand." He reached for another cigarette.

         "And the day is quickly going away..." She was leading to the fact that she was about to leave.

         Zero put the cigarette back down on the table for a moment. "I'll just say it one more time: Are you sure you can't reconsider this move?" He stretched out his arm in reference to Gilman and Berkeley. "This place is just as corrupt as any other. You'll find the worst eventually in any place." He cocked an eyebrow towards. "But in this city, there is no physical abuse for you to leave from."

         That kind of stung. Carenthia knew that it wasn't intentional, it was just the honest truth. "I know." She wasn't sure what else to say. "I just... I have to." She needed to go ahead and wrap the conversation up and get on the road. "I have to leave right now." She then stood up from where she was sitting.

         "If you feel you're making the right decision..." said Zero, as he stood up as well.

         Carenthia didn't respond at first. Slowly, walking toward the door, she added, "...I am."

         Zero stopped at the door with her. He opened it for her and stood against it, as she stood half out. "Then good luck with your travel." The two looked at each other, like they had the previous night. Eventually, Zero wasn't sure how much time had passed, he said, "May we someday meet again."

         "May we," she said, her eyes looking into Zero's.

         They held that look for what seemed like moments to each of them.

         Zero broke the silence. He knew she wanted to go. "Goodbye, Carenthia." Although, he questioned just how bad she was wanting to.

         Her response was soft and pleasant. "Goodbye, Zero."

         Their eyes locked. At first they extended their hands for goodbye. It turned into a hug. She held tight. He fastened his grip.

         Under the terms of when time stands still, they stood there for an eternity.