Page 3 of The Panther’s Edge

The note felt thin and fragile in my hand. I looked down at it again.

“A bathhouse,” I said quietly.

“A bathhouse,” she confirmed. “You don’t have to go. But you should. My boy swears by it. And if you don’t want to go to that one, you should go somewhere else. Go to a bar. Go to a club. Go meet someone who isn’t bleeding or dying or scared out of their mind. Just go somewhere that isn’t your apartment and find a way to feel alive again.”

She pushed off from the pillar and slung her bag higher on her shoulder.

“Your four days start tomorrow,” she said. “I expect you to do something with them besides Costco.”

Then she walked away, her footsteps echoing across the concrete, leaving me standing there with the address in my hand and the early morning cold settling into my bones. I looked at the note one more time, then folded it back up and shoved it into my pocket.

I got in the truck and wiped the tears from my cheeks. I drove home as the sun climbed higher in the sky, painting the world in shades of orange and gold that I usually slept through. The note felt like it was burning a hole in my pocket the whole way. By the time I got to my apartment, I’d convinced myself I wouldn’t go. It was absurd. It was Roz overstepping. It was⁠—

I pulled into my parking spot and sat there with the engine off, looking up at my building. The same brick facade I’d been staring at for six years. The same blackout curtains visible in my window on the third floor.

I took the note back out and unfolded it again.

The address stared back at me.

I sat there for maybe five minutes, just holding the folded paper, watching the morning light move across my windshield. A jogger passed by in neon colors. Someone’s cat trotted its way across the parking lot. The ordinary world going about its business while I sat in my truck trying to talk myself into staying home.

The truth was, I was tired. Not the good kind of tired that sleep could fix. The kind that went all the way down to the bone, the kind that made everything feel like it was happening to someone else. And Roz had seen it. She’d been standing in that parking garage like she’d been waiting for me to fall apart, and maybe she had been. Maybe that’s what it meant to have someone actually pay attention.

I folded the note back up and shoved it in my pocket again. But this time I didn’t turn the key in the ignition. Instead I sat there, engine off, and let myself think about what it would feel like to walk into a place where people were alive. Where they wanted things. Where they touched each other on purpose, not for a salary, but because they actually wanted to.

My phone buzzed. A text from one of the other night shift nurses. Heard about Mr. O. sorry man.

I didn’t respond. I just sat there watching the world wake up around me, listening to the tick of the cooling engine. Somewhere in the buildings around me, people were making breakfast. Making plans. Living.

I got out of my truck and headed up to the apartment. I had one more shift until my stretch started. Then, whether I liked it or not, I supposed I was probably going to take Roz’s advice. It was time to get out in the world, to actually feel something for the first time in years that wasn’t just pure exhaustion.

My last shift was uneventful. We had a psych patient who’d been admitted the day before, a woman in her forties who kept insisting the nurses were stealing her thoughts. There was a kid with strep throat whose mother wouldn’t stop apologizing for bringing him in. And a guy with heartburn who was convinced it was a heart attack until the EKG came back normal, then suddenly couldn’t wait to leave.

It was the kind of shift where I felt like I was wading through molasses all night and nothing felt urgent. I found myself checking the clock every twenty minutes, which was weird because usually I wasn’t that kind of person. I just got lost in the work.

But this time I kept thinking about the address in my pocket.

I’d left it on my nightstand this morning after I woke up. I’d stared at it for a solid minute before forcing myself to look away, to shower, to eat some cereal standing over the sink like always. Then I’d gone to work and tried to forget about it, which hadn’t worked at all.

Around three in the morning, during one of those lulls where the board had actually emptied for maybe ten minutes, I found myself in the break room staring at nothing in particular. Roz came in to grab something from the fridge and didn’t say anything about it, just gave me a knowing nod. She wasn’t waiting to see if I’d actually take her advice. I’m sure she knew the moment she wrote down that address that it would haunt me until curiosity got the better of me. That woman was a master at her craft.

By the time I clocked out at eight, I knew I had no other choice. I was going to that bathhouse, one way or another. And, even if nothing came of it, at least I’d know what I was missing. That I could live with.

I drove home in the full light of morning, watching the city come alive around me. People in business clothes headed to their offices, a food truck was setting up on a corner, and I even saw someone sitting on a bench with a coffee and a newspaper, like they were an extra in a movie. I tried to remember the last time I’d done something like that. Sat somewhere just to sit.

I couldn’t.

At the apartment, I showered thoroughly, scrubbing myself down until my skin was flushed and pink. Then I stood in front of my closet for at least five solid minutes trying to figure out what to wear. Most of what I owned was scrubs or gym clothes and nearly all of it needed to be washed. I managed to find a pair of jeans that didn’t have a stain on them at last and a button-up shirt that was only slightly wrinkled. I looked at myself in the mirror and barely recognized the person looking back.

He looked almost normal.

Then I picked up the note from my nightstand and read the address one more time. The warehouse district on the east side of town. Traffic would be light after rush hour. I just hoped they were open.

I folded it carefully and put it in my pocket. Then I grabbed my keys and headed out before I could second guess myself. Even if they were closed, at least I would be out in the daylight for the first time in years. It had been too long since I knew what midday sun felt like on my skin.

The warehouse district was quieter than I expected. Most of the buildings looked quiet, their windows dark and their loading docks empty in the morning. The parking lots were full though, all the workers inside and doing their normal people jobs at normal people hours. I drove slowly down the street, checking addresses, wondering if Roz had pranked me or if the place had closed down years ago.

Then I saw it. A nondescript metal building with no signage, just a small neon sign above the door that said OPEN. The address matched. There was a small parking lot on the side with maybe a dozen cars, most of them looking like they belonged to people who could afford to be somewhere nicer. I pulled in and sat for a moment, my hands still on the steering wheel.