Chapter Ten— The Plan

Lena's Pov

"Oh yes, oh God, yes—"

Maya's moans came through the thin wall at two in the morning.

I pulled the pillow over my head but it didn't help. The couch was right next to her bedroom. I could hear everything. The bed creaking, the man's grunts. Maya's performance, because it was a performance, I had learned that much in three weeks.

By the time they finished I was wide awake.

I had arrived in Portland three weeks ago with a backpack and few dollars. I had been walking the streets looking for shelter when Maya found me outside a coffee shop.

She was coming out dressed for work and took one look at me and said, "You need a place to sleep?"

I nodded.

"I know a spot," she said. "No rent. Just don't ask questions and don't get in the way."

That spot was her couch.

The first week was the worst.

On day three a man came home with Maya. He was drunk and loud and he didn't care that I was on the couch five feet away.

By the time he left I had seen more than I wanted to see.

On day five another man showed up, this one was different. Quieter. He waited until Maya came out of the bathroom and then I heard him say something.

Maya laughed. Actually laughed.

Then she came to the living room where I was trying to pretend to be asleep.

"Lena," she said. "You awake?"

I opened my eyes.

"This guy wants to know if you want to make a hundred dollars," she said. Her expression was completely neutral. "Quick job. Ten minutes tops."

I stared at her.

"He's offering," she continued. "No pressure. But a hundred dollars is a hundred dollars."

The man appeared behind her in the hallway. He was older, maybe fifty.

He unzipped his pants and pulled out his dick.

It was small and sad and somehow that made it worse.

"Come on baby," he said. "Just a quick suck. Your friend says you're new."

I sat up on the couch.

"No," I said.

"I'm offering good money—"

"No," I said again.

He looked at Maya like she had somehow misrepresented the goods.

Maya shrugged. "She said no. That means no."

He zipped up his pants, clearly offended that his dick wasn't enough to change my mind. He left without paying Maya anything.

After he was gone I looked at her.

"Thanks," I said.

"For what? I offered. You declined. That's how it works." She paused. "But you can't stay here much longer without contributing something. Rent is due in two weeks."

That was three weeks ago.

I had walked into forty-three businesses looking for work. The answer was always the same — we'll call you.

But they never called.

I was eating once a day, instant ramen, cheap bread from the day-old bin. My shoes were falling apart. My stomach was making sounds I didn't recognize.

And Maya was making one hundred dollars every other night.

The math was impossible to ignore.

But I wasn't going to do what Maya did.

I was going to do something else.

On day twenty I was sitting on the couch thinking about my mother's house. About the kitchen. About the three years I had spent scrubbing other people's dirt.

And I realized something.

Everyone needed their house cleaned.

Everyone.

Rich people didn't want to do it. Middle-class people didn't have time. Poor people couldn't afford it.

But what if someone offered to clean houses for cheap? What if someone offered to do it well?

What if someone built a business out of it?

I called Nadia on day twenty-one.

It was early morning back home. Early enough that she might answer.

She picked up on the second ring.

"Lena?" Her voice was tight. Worried. "Oh my God, where are you?"

"Portland," I said quietly. "I'm okay. How's my mom?"

"She's okay," Nadia said. "Worried about you but okay. Her medication is fine. Lena, when are you coming back?"

"I'm not coming back," I said. "Not yet."

"Lena, you need to know something," Nadia said. Her voice shifted. "The wedding happened last week. Damien married Victoria.

I waited for the pain to hit me.

It didn't.

"Okay," I said.

"Okay?" Nadia said. "That's it?"

"Tell my mom I'm building something," I said. "Tell her I'll be back when I have something to show for it."

I hung up.

I sat on that couch and did the math in my head.

If I cleaned five houses a week at fifty dollars per house, that was two hundred fifty dollars a week. That was a thousand dollars a month.

In five years that was sixty thousand dollars.

Not enough to buy land yet.

But what if I scaled it? What if I hired people to clean houses under me? What if I took a cut of their earnings?

What if I moved from cleaning houses to managing properties? Buying rundown houses, fixing them up, selling them or renting them out?

What if I became someone who owned land instead of just cleaning it?

My mother had raised me to survive on nothing. I had worked in a kitchen for three years making twelve coins a day. I had walked into forty-three businesses and gotten rejected by all of them.

But I had never tried asking people if they needed their houses cleaned.

I pulled out a notebook and started writing.

Business plan, pricing structure, how I would find customers.

By the time the sun came up I had a plan.

I had something real.

I had a way out.

I had a way back.

And when I returned to Blackridge in some years because I would return, I was going to walk through those gates owning the land under his feet.

Not through revenge.

Through becoming completely undeniable.