Nobody, Somebody, Anybody

by Kelly McClorey

  This afternoon, after initialing all the items on my checklist and clocking out for the day, I began the walk back to my apartment, an in-law tacked to the side of a two-story house, with a separate staircase up to its own entrance. The first half of my walk follows the coastline, and I contemplated how both liberating and frightening it is to live on the edge of such an infinite expanse. Along two miles of that coastline runs a paved walkway where people pace up and down as though on the brink of action, and on stormy days waves crash and creep over, reaching out for them. I don’t mind that it’s mostly families who live here, affluent ones, and not people like me—in fact I prefer it, as they shift with the seasons more than young single people do. During springtime, the sidewalks were covered in chalk art, and the adults came out early with strollers and jogging suits and organized all kinds of creative events, like Make Way for Ducklings Day, when they stopped traffic to parade a family of ducks through downtown. Even their houses change colors and moods. Now that it’s summer, they have green lawns and colorful blooms and bright plastic pails stacked together on their porches with little shovels sticking out, and some have signs hanging on their doors that say things like “Gone to the Beach” and “Life Is Better in Flip-Flops,” painted in a way that’s meant to look rustic and weathered. I read one that said “If You’re Lucky Enough to Live by the Beach, You’re Lucky Enough”—my favorite so far. My landlord, who lives in the house connected to my apartment, has a sign that features a bronzed parrot in sunglasses under a palm tree and the words “Broke but Tan.” My landlord is neither broke nor tan, and there are no palm trees in Massachusetts, but I get why he chose that one—something about the colors and the three-dimensional letters make you want to try to take a bite of it.

  The second half of my walk zags away from the ocean, and as I left the salt air and crinkling waves and twirly kites behind, I was aware of the weight of the world’s dust inside me, a tornado of it spinning within my abdomen, though it wasn’t a burden but a privilege. From dust to dust, I thought; everything else is us kidding ourselves. I paused to pluck one ripe berry from the bountiful row of raspberry bushes outside 8 Magnolia Drive, as has become my habit. As the fruit burst in my mouth, my feet and back ached, and what a nice sensation that was, to be sore from hard work. I thanked not God exactly but some greater spirit for my body, all its organs and tissues and cells—over thirty trillion cells, most likely, significantly more than the number of galaxies in the universe—and how they’ve been assembled in the right way so that I might do hard work and every day strive to do better.

  Also while I walked, I worked on my plans. August 25 is my last chance to pass the cognitive exam, and once I do, I will officially be a certified EMT, and I’ll take all I’ve learned and will learn as a chambermaid—precision and observation and controlling my gag reflex—and channel it into saving lives. Then I’ll go to work every day knowing that anyone who is afraid, anyone who needs help, will call me, trusting that I will come as fast as I can, ready and willing to do everything in my power. Like the rest of my team, I’ll wear dark blue pants and a button-down shirt with the blue-and-yellow EMT patch stitched on the sleeve so that everyone I meet will recognize who I am and the impact I have on a daily basis. Some might stop me to say thank you or to exchange harrowing stories, and we’ll get teary in our longing to preserve human life, squeezing our hands together as though we could squeeze out the very possibility of suffering inside us and everyone we love.

  But for now I am alone in my apartment, though my landlord is just on the other side of the wall, maybe at his desk composing a letter to his Ukrainian girlfriend, and my exam book lies open on my lap so I can quiz myself on the first signs of anaphylaxis and the number of vertebrae in the thoracic spine. I sit by the window as the street outside grows dark and my face becomes reflected in the glass. Then I hear an explosion, a loud pop and a crackling, and another one. I rush outside to see great buds of red and gold in the sky.

  Today is the Fourth of July, and I’ve forgotten it. I can’t help banging a fist against my leg, I’m so angry with myself. For weeks I’ve watched streamers and flags go up on front porches and on the boats in the harbor, and somehow I still missed it. I breathe and try to forgive myself—I’ve had a lot on my mind, and I can still enjoy a partial view of the fireworks if I don’t waste it with tears. I stand on the sticky pavement and watch through the trees, clapping for what I think is the grand finale, then for the true grand finale, which booms and sparks for two full minutes. Then it is dark and quiet again, and there is nothing to do but go back up to my chair by the window.

  I am alone here, but not completely, because of the heavy book on my lap and the knowledge glowing within it and because of the fervent promises I made earlier today, which still hover in the air: promises to stay focused and to carry my book to the clubhouse to study at lunchtime and to never, ever give or take any excuse. Once in a while I get discouraged and slack off, but it’s okay, because a part of me understands that it won’t last forever and anticipates the time when I will study hard again and knows that when I do, like I am today, I’ll feel renewed and recommitted, once again set on the correct path. Florence Nightingale said nursing is an art that requires as much devotion and preparation as painting or sculpting, even more so, because what is an old canvas or hunk of marble compared with the living body? Well, art also requires inspiration, and sometimes we must be patient and allow inspiration to arrive. Perhaps it’s good that I failed my first two attempts to pass the exam; perhaps something deep in my subconscious even instructed me to fail, because now there will be more joy when I pass, euphoria even. And perhaps it’s good I spend so much time alone, because whether I’m slacking off or working hard, I can still trust myself so long as no other eyes are burning at me, plus I’m inhabited by all the dust and grime and television characters I’ve absorbed during the day, so there’s hardly room for more company. And if I need to, I remind myself how I am quite lucky and still so young.

  Two

  Last time I took the exam, I had a degrading job at the call center of a credit union, though I started showing up less and less after I got the results back. I took refuge in my apartment all day and all night, until the difference between them no longer had meaning. I didn’t care that I needed the money; eviction, starvation—I hardly flinched. I watched an exceptional amount of pirated television on my laptop. Whenever I did summon the courage to take out my flash cards or flip to a page of practice questions, loneliness would stomp its feet, demanding my attention—it had a fiery temper and didn’t like to be ignored. It was the final stretch of winter, and mornings and early evenings I’d go to the window to watch my neighbors bolt between their driveways and their homes, all bundled up in heavy clothes and accessories. It inspired me to write a poem about the importance of togetherness based on the difference between gloves and mittens, the way mittens would always be the warmer choice, but when I reread it later, it only made me roll my eyes.

  I dreaded spring, the harassment of a pleasant sunny day. But it came anyway, and with the trees budding outside my window, I said, Okay, time to live again. By then I’d been placed on disciplinary probation, with my hours cut back to two shifts per week, leaving me with a daunting amount of free time. On my off days, I forced myself out, right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot, crossing first through downtown in case something should be happening that might involve me, then branching off toward the woods, where peace and epiphany supposedly lived.

  In the woods, fresh air would streak in and out of my nose and I had nothing to do but ramble and notice things, a patch of mushrooms, a mossy branch, the skeleton of a leaf lit up by the sun. I would make bets with myself about whether I could jump from this log to that log or how many Mississippis it would take to get from one tree to the next. I’d sit by a narrow stream and watch sediment float down, snag on something, then float free again, until my butt went numb and my skin turned yellow with pollen.

  Some days the world
was oblivious to me and the hours ticked by so slowly that I couldn’t remember if it was today or yesterday or some time long, long ago, and I began to doubt what I was and had to touch my face to remember it. When a tree trembled with the spastic movement of squirrels, I would tremble too. The crows had many grievances, and they’d terrorize the rest of the woods with their bickering, until even the grubs punched their heads up through the ground in exasperation. But most days, the world was friendly and recognized me. Every stone gave the impression it had been placed on its back just for me to find and rub and flip over. What had I done to deserve this smooth round stone on its back? This little acorn in its checkered cap? Even the garbage I grew an affection for. In fact it was the garbage I often enjoyed most: Popsicle sticks and beer cans and plastic wrappers skittering in the wind, and each of them like a token of solidarity. They had been discarded by people, and here I was, a person just like those people—it could’ve been me to drop you, you Popsicle stick.

  On those good days, I’d have to bribe myself to leave the woods by promising to stop at a certain supermarket where the deli workers knew my name and never required me to pull a number. On the way, I’d clear the dirt under my nails and pick the burs off my clothes, making myself presentable. My favorite deli worker was a woman with a faint mustache—the fluorescent bulbs illuminated every hair, though she never showed any sign of shyness—who immediately upon my arrival would launch into a description of whatever was on special. She knew how much I relished the details, the part of the cow such-and-such cut came from or the spices in this marinade, and I’d listen intently through the familiar haze of glass cleaner and freezer burn, revitalized by the peppy sound of sneakers squealing up and down the aisles behind me. When she finished, I’d watch the quiver of her mustache, the hairs in a neat line as though she had combed them in place, and say, “I’ll take one. No, make it two!” She’d wrap whatever it was with care. As she handed the package across the counter, sometimes our fingers would meet and I would walk away feeling the ghostly residue of her touch and hearing the echo of my own voice, often for the first time all day: Make it two, make it two.

  The truth was that I didn’t always have a need for whatever was on special and couldn’t usually afford to be buying two of it, so occasionally I had no choice but to abandon the package on a random shelf. It would break my heart to leave it behind, peeking out from behind a box of graham crackers or instant oatmeal, wondering where I was going and whether I’d be back.

  Eventually I’d have to return home and loneliness would be waiting for me there—along with my landlord’s mailbox. My own mail, when there was any, was dropped through a slot in my door and consisted of coupons, credit card offers, and occasional postcards from my brother in Burkina Faso with the Peace Corps. His postcards pictured the New York City skyline—he must have packed them in his suitcase—and they usually started by suggesting I call or visit Dad and then turned breezy, telling brief anecdotes and ending with humorous requests: Please send king-size mattress; Please send high-speed internet; Please send Starbucks latte, grande, no foam. My landlord’s mail, on the other hand, was consistently abundant. The mail carrier loaded so many mysterious envelopes into the box that at times the front flap would gape open, beckoning to me. Reading a neighbor’s mail would be illegal, and I never would’ve fathomed doing it a few years ago, but I’d grown desperate to know someone, not in the profound way like when people say “Can you really know someone?” but just in the most basic sense. Reading a neighbor’s mail seemed better than marching up to a door and knocking, since that door might open, and then I’d be standing there with nothing to say except “Sorry, wrong door.”

  I’m not shy by nature, but I’ve come to understand that for many people a door is sacred. That’s why they’ve divided up the world with walls and fences; I see it every day as I walk through my neighborhood. Most of the front yards are small and inviting, with a moat of mulch or shiny white stones, but the backyards are different: sprawling, impenetrable fortresses. The walls are made of tall wooden pickets or densely packed shrubs, and they are solid, with only a few exceptions, such as a bowl-like window built into a fence on Cliff Street so the family dog can look out and bark at you. They don’t have barbed wire or high-voltage electricity, yet only the occasional ivy plant is brave enough to scale them. Even the local movie theater, with its chilled air, is partitioned by fences, in the form of stiff armrests. I suppose people want to believe that all these walls and fences and sacred doors will protect them from outside contamination. But, as anyone with any medical training or knowledge of the biomedical sciences knows, the most important enemy is microscopic, and pathogens travel as they please, through a sneeze, a pipe, a gust of wind. They crop up when we least expect it, in a high five or an undercooked ham. And they’ve shaped far more history than any emperor or president.

  One Thursday in March, I hurried from the woods to the deli, knowing my favorite woman was due back after a week-long vacation—I wasn’t sure where, but I planned to ask. A vacation opened up new possibilities for conversation, and I’d planned a few questions in advance and let my refrigerator go bare so I’d have the confidence of legitimacy. I spotted her from across the store, extra color in her cheeks.

  “Special’s sold out,” she said, so devoid of spirit that I looked around to confirm she was indeed talking to me. I almost said something goofy about whether she’d forgotten all of us after her vacation, but the fact that she’d brought up the special suggested that she knew exactly who I was. She blew air in my direction. Her demeanor was all off. “Why don’t you just tell me what you came for?” she said finally.

  I was speechless, almost frightened, imagining some imposter had taken over her body. “W-we,” I stammered. When I feel ambushed, I have a tendency to say “we” instead of “I.” “We need, um, a pound, one pound, of turkey. Sliced thin.” I dashed off while she was still running the turkey through the slicer. I ran all the way home, scooped up my landlord’s mail, and set a kettle on the stove. I held each envelope in the steam with a pair of tongs, doing a dance with my hips as I worked. I’d seen this steaming technique performed on a television show where a woman hired a team of investigators to find out whether her husband was having an affair with a teller from their bank. The envelopes wrinkled a little, but after some finessing with a butter knife, the flaps slipped open, discreet and inviting.

  Over the next few days I perfected the technique, working as fast as possible, my adrenaline coursing, to allow sufficient time for the envelopes to dry, which was the most agonizing part. I never failed to get the envelopes resealed with fresh glue and returned safely to their positions well before my landlord’s car pulled into the driveway. Though the process was exciting, the results were flatly underwhelming—mainly bills and special offers on credit cards or car insurance. But just as I began to lose interest, a thick, notebook-sized envelope arrived, conspicuously plain, the typeset return address a PO box in Houston. I had a weightless feeling as I slid a packet out from inside. It had a stock photo on the cover, a light-haired woman and a dark-haired man, and the heading “Sincere Romance’s 10-Day Singles Tour Experience: All you need to know before you go!” Then a letter on the first page:

  Congratulations on your purchase of the 10-Day Singles Tour! We hope you’re ready for an unforgettable experience meeting hundreds of attractive single women as you travel through Odessa, Nikolaev, and Kherson. The information provided in this packet will help you make the most of your time and get the results you’re hoping for.

  Remember, there’s a reason our international dating service has become so popular—it WORKS! On our “Testimonials” page, you will hear from men just like you, who took the leap of faith and joined our thousands of satisfied customers. We hope you will be our next success story!

  Sincerely,

  Ken & Oleksandra Bryant

  Travel Directors for Ukraine (Married for Fourteen Wonderful Years and Counting!)

  I was gripp
ed, immobilized, my finger turning damp on the page. I read through the whole packet once, then again. There was a list of dos and don’ts, like DON’T:

  Stop yourself from approaching a woman because you think she’s out of your league. Ukraine is home to some of the world’s most beautiful women, but their strong family values is what really sets them apart. You’ll find that many of them care more about qualities like stability, maturity, and intelligence than outward appearance or age.

  Take her shopping. It might sound fun to spoil her, but it’s important to put off making large purchases until you have a relationship commitment. This will avoid any misunderstandings and help you both feel more secure about the relationship in the long run.

  Allow her to make arrangements for a date, particularly location.

  But DO:

  Start now! With your purchase, you enjoy unlimited access to the thousands of profiles in our database. If you haven’t already, we encourage you to begin reaching out to any women you have interest in and forming connections. Through the website, you can send invitations to our social mixers or set up a private date, with on-call interpreter services available.

  Be selfish and have fun! You’ve put your own time and money on the line, so leave your hang-ups at home and don’t walk away with any regrets.

  The testimonials page featured quotes from men identified by first name and last initial, along with photos of the women they’d fallen in love with. The last page had a list of frequently asked questions about currency, plug adaptors, the metric system, and suggestions for small gifts to pack: “Perfume and dark chocolate are universal.” It took all my self-control to eventually close the packet. As I shuffled the envelopes back inside his mailbox, my conscience tugged at me for the first time. I knew something I had no right to know, and no matter how bad I might feel, I could never unknow it. When we crossed paths in the front yard a couple days later, I kept my eyes down. But then he stopped me to ask if I’d be willing to collect his mail and water the lawn while he went away on vacation, so I decided to take that as a sign of forgiveness and permission.