in new york
in new york, jane works two jobs even though ricky assures her she doesn't have to work any. she thinks about quitting the restaurant to have more time with mrs. fitts but she hasn't yet.
mrs. fitts doesn't say much still but told jane to call her Barbara since there really is no more mr. fitts. the colonel shot himself not long after he shot lester. ricky collected his mother and the three went to new york. jane doesn't think about carolyn. her mother has herself to rely on and that had always been enough.
the apartment is small but has good floors and is in a decent neightborhood as far as middle class areas of the island go. mrs. fitts has her own room the they have a computer with internet. the television all have cable and jane goes food shopping every few days. they don't go hungry which is more then a lot of families who live around them can say.
jane divides her time between the restaurant, the bookstore where she halfheartedly works a register, and the apartment where she has one sided conversations with ricky's mother while she waits for him to come home. she's tired from working on her feet all day and serving oversized cups of coffee to people in suits but she doesn't really mind menial labor and to get anything better, she'd have to finish high school, which she has no intention of doing.
mrs. fitts likes movies, and she spends a large portion of her day watching hbo or making lists of new releases for jane to pick up while she's out. she doesn't often leave the apartment and if she does, it's with ricky. they don't ask about where his money comes from. she knows it's drugs but she doesn't like pot anymore and worries that something will happen to him. he'll get shot or arrested or mugged. he likes her to lay on his chest at night when they sleep but she rolls away to sleep on her stomach once his breath gets heavy and even. she misses her dad and threw away the tape that ricky had carefully labeled "killing jane's dad". his blood was so red against her mother's white tile and when the police took angela away for questioning, they didn't look at each other. she buys magazines sometimes, but never sees her friend inside the glossy pages.
on veteran's day, mrs. fitts doesn't come out of her room and the trays of food that jane leaves at her door remain untouched. ricky brings her roses and she puts them in vases and her stands behind her at the sink and kisses her neck. she's nineteen now and he's twenty. he bought her a ring and she wears in like a promise but she feels so young sometimes, like her whole life is in front of her but she's going to spend it at a restaurant, a bookstore, and this apartment with ricky's pathetic, mute mother.
she is pregnant now, three months, and it's april and the rain is pounding against the windows that rattle. for the first time, she begs ricky to stop and get a real job. mrs. fitts asks rather calmly if jane would like her to leave to make room for the baby. jane hugs the woman and starts to cry and slowly mrs. fitts puts her frail arms around jane's shoulders. for a moment, they both feel normal and refreshingly ordinary.