Tampa Alissa Nutting Sample !!top!! Online

My newest client, Mrs. Hendricks, has skin the color of a faded Publix coupon and eyes that have been surgically widened into two wet, panicked coins. She wants a house “close to the good hospital” but far from “the changing neighborhoods,” which is code for everything she won’t say aloud. I show her a split-level in Palma Ceia with a pool shaped like a kidney. The water is the color of a melted peppermint patty. She stares at it and whispers, “My husband used to float.”

“The master bedroom faces west,” I say, gesturing to a room where the afternoon sun makes the dust motes look like airborne maggots. “You can watch the sunset melt the highway.” tampa alissa nutting sample

I drive back over the Howard Frankland Bridge, the bay below me the color of a dirty aquarium. I roll down the window and let the wind eat my hair. Another soul tucked into a stucco coffin. Another commission check for a woman who teaches tenth-grade English and thinks about her students’ fathers during third period. My newest client, Mrs

“People float here all the time,” I say, smiling. My teeth feel like Chiclets glued to a gumline. “It’s the buoyancy of denial.” I show her a split-level in Palma Ceia

She buys it. They always do. I hand her the keys, and the metal is so hot from the sun it burns a little brand into my palm: a cursive S for sold . Or maybe S for sucker . It’s hard to tell in this light.