rain in the valley

we lived in the cheap three bedroom on woodman for a year. we moved out because we didn't want to live with our other roommate. in her room she had a dresser she had painted lavender and stenciled silver stars and moons on it. she slept with a misquito netting over her bed. she always left tuna noodle cassarole on the stove to get hard and stick to the pan. Her boyfriend practically lived with us. He had a cat named Shoalin and he danced on Soul Train. His head was shaved except for a patch on the tip of his head that he kept braided. He also worked at the wax museum.

We moved into a two bedroom on coldwater between oxnard and victory. it was right by grant high school and every weekday at three kids would fill the sidewalks. the boys wore baggy jeans and i didn't like walking on the sidewalk with them. i felt like they were staring at me.

there was a pool in the back, right next to the river. the woman who lived next door to us was old and smelled like urine and told us she had lived there, alone, for fifteen years.

the night we moved in we moved all of our stuff by ourselves. we tied our mattresses on top of our hondas and drove the two miles at a slow pace. when we where done we went to taco bell and got seven layer burritos and baja chalupas with no meat and no beans.

the apartment was clinical. everything was white. we didn't have a dining room table, so off of our kitchen clean white linoleum streched out to the window. all we had, before we got a couch, was my tv and tv stand. we would lie on the living room floor and watch reruns of beverly hills 90210 and talk about how much we hated donna and her fake breasts. the carpet was new and stiff.

our balcony was huge, wide and deep, with ledges on either side. we could sit out on the ledge and smoke cigarettes and watch the traffic on coldwater. when it rained puddles would form and stay until they evaporated. there was no drain.