by Jack Parker
Typically, the weekends were saved for running errands, paying bills and whatever other personal tasks she didn't have time for during her workweek. This weekend, though, she decided to dedicate as a recuperation weekend. She had motivated herself and put extra effort in the last few days after work to get anything and everything accomplished that she would have otherwise put off for the weekend. All she had left to do was to stop at the market to re-stock her food supply. She guiltily recalled that she was out of ice cream . . . again. Exercise would definitely have to be stepped up on her agenda. The block and a half walk to and from the light rail station near her home could not possibly counteract her recent increase in ice cream consumption.
At least this evening she would have to get off the rail one stop early so that she could hit the market before getting to her apartment. That meant she would walk a whole three blocks loaded down with grocery bags. Still, she knew that wouldn't be enough. Ess had to face the reality. Birthday's no longer meant getting wiser and gaining privileges, they meant getting older and gaining body mass; and her mother used to warn her time and again that with age goes metabolism – meaning it goes much slower. She probably should start listening pretty soon.
Ess reached the light rail station just in time to make the current rail car. As usual, it was full at this point in the city, so she grabbed a pole and planted her feet, ready for the jolt when the car began to move. Most passengers would get off at the next stop by the mall where there were clusters of restaurants, so she felt sure she should be able to take a seat then.
The discomfort Ess had felt last week, when she thought people were looking at her and recognizing her face from a certain scandalous sculpture hadn't completely subsided, but it no longer felt as intense. She did still glance around her on occasion to make sure no one was giving her undo notice. All too often, though, she held eye contact with strangers a moment longer than comfortable, and her confidence wavered.
One gentleman in particular made eye contact with her more than once on the rail car, and she couldn't help but continually glance back in his direction. The contact became an ongoing cycle that made her more and more self-conscious each time. She felt herself blushing a little, and knew that she better refrain from looking his way again, because her blushes caused her cheeks to become bright red blotches. Very noticeable and obvious, and extremely embarrassing.
Soon enough, the next station came, and people started to get off the car. Having been extremely full when she got on, though, the stop did not free up as many seats as expected. The seat next to the gentleman had vacated, but she felt too awkward to take it. Having passed so many glances with him already, he might take it as advancement. Manda or Lisa would have found it to be a perfect opportunity to hone in on their next boyfriend (or, more appropriately, prey); but Ess always felt a little too introverted to be so forward. So, she just continued to clutch the pole and focused her stare out the window as the light rail began its next course.
Her stop came a few minutes later, and she departed with several other people. One last time, as she turned towards the exit, she unintentionally made eye contact with the same gentleman, and noticed that he had risen from his seat. Apparently, he was getting off at the same stop. Ess took this moment to think if she had ever seen him before. Maybe he was new to the area, and she would come across him again. That wouldn't be so bad. Eventually, she might work up the courage to start a conversation with him.
He looked sort of cute, with his brown eyes and short dark hair. The few wispy bangs that came down over his forehead gave him kind of a charming look. He wore slacks and a tie under his well-made trench coat, so he must be a businessman of some sort. That notion had promise, since it suggested success. It did seem a bit odd, though, that he wore the trench coat on a fairly warm September day. That certainly couldn't feel comfortable.
She walked on, thinking about smiling at him the next time they made eye contact, if there was a next time, of course. She didn't see which way he went, and didn't dare to look. If she appeared to look at him too much, she might encourage him to approach her, and she wasn't feeling poised enough for that right now. Or worse, she decided, he might not actually be interested, and she could give him a bad impression. The thought of rejection discouraged her further and made her stomach sink slightly.
Fortunately, it didn't take Ess's mind long to trail off towards another subject. She made a mental list of needed grocery items as she walked into the corner market. After grabbing a basket, she headed for the produce isle, her strategy always simple and routine: produce to meat to frozen foods and dairy, with a careful avoidance of the snack food isle.
As she made her way to the frozen foods to stock up on her microwaveable meals, her eyes happened to make contact with the same man she noticed in the light rail car. It took only a second to identify him, and she turned away blushing in recognition, while chastising herself for her inability to keep the redness from her cheeks.
He must live around this area, she thought. That could be convenient for running into him on future occasions . . . occasions when she felt a little more social and readily flirtatious. At the moment, though, her intended solitary weekend had stifled any desire to make anyone's acquaintance.
Therefore, she slipped out of the isle before she had a chance to peruse the ice cream. She'd have to backtrack to the freezer section before she hit the check out counter, because she wasn't about to go ice cream deprived all weekend.
After adding milk and half a dozen eggs to her basket Ess headed back to choose her ice cream flavor, relieved to note that the familiar stranger was gone. It took her more time to select the ice cream flavor that suited her mood than it had taken to do the rest of her shopping thus far, but she eventually made it to the checkout counter.
Mr. Baksheesh stood at attention in his customary position at the register. Ess smiled and greeted him, but Mr. Baksheesh, as usual, was all business. Even though Ess shopped there on a weekly basis, it seemed like he never recognized her, even after three years. Mrs. Baksheesh, however, smiled in recognition from where she stocked soft drinks in the cooler. She didn't seem to speak a lot of English, but she always communicated with a warm smile and a nod of the head. Ess smiled sincerely in return and wiggled her fingers in greeting.
She turned her attention back towards Mr. Baksheesh, and had to force herself not to grimace at his frowning features. What an unexpected pair Mr. and Mrs. Baksheesh made, she thought to herself. Apparently opposites do attract.
It didn't take long for the old grump to ring up her purchases. Ess waited as he bagged the groceries. She recalled one occasion that she had tried to help him with that task. She would never do that again. He reacted as though it was the worst insult anyone had ever committed on another person, even slapping her hand away from the bag she attempted to stuff. Ess wondered if that was quite possibly the reason he acted so cold towards her now. Then again, he wasn't exactly jovial before her former error of judgment, either.
After Mr. Baksheesh completed his task, Ess skillfully balanced the bags on each arm, and turned for the door. As she did, she nearly smashed her nose into the chest of the familiar stranger. This caused her to blush in mortification, yet again. She mumbled a nearly coherent "excuse me", and headed straight for the automatic door. As the door closed behind her, Mr. Baksheesh called out, "Thank you. Come again."
Once outside, Ess reflected on her humiliating display of clumsiness. Why on earth did that man make her so nervous? It was certainly true that Ess could be rather bashful, but it's not like she never associated with the opposite sex. She had dated, she worked with male colleagues, and she even had a few male friends in college, albeit they were gay. Still, there was no reason to be that ridiculously timid in his presence, or any one else's presence for that matter. She couldn't quite place her finger on where this nervous awkwardness came from.
In the three block walk it took for her to get to her apartment, Ess managed to let the incident go, and think
of other things, such as getting the ice cream in the freezer before the precious substance liquefied in the predatory warmth that lingered into the late afternoon.
At the front entrance to her apartment building, Ess set her grocery bags down so that she could more easily fumble for the keys in her purse. Once she retrieved them and unlocked the door, she held it ajar with her foot and bent down for the bags. Stretching for the last one, she nearly lost her balance, and had to remove her foot from its post as a temporary door jam in order to right herself. She felt her frustration well up as the door began to close despite her efforts at a speedy balance recovery. Just before it slammed shut, a hand grabbed the door and swung it back open. Ess looked up into the face of her rescuer, and saw the familiar stranger once again.
Several thoughts rushed through her head just then. This man seemed to be practically following her; a convenient – and yet, embarrassing – opportunity that he was there, once again, in her presence. Could it be fate? Or some effort of her own subconscious mind to put herself in the path of this guy so that she could meet him – or perpetually embarrass herself in front of him? And much to her chagrin, she felt her face heat up with that horribly obvious blush.
"Allow me," the man said, holding the door for her. With an awkward half smile, she croaked out a thank you in reply and clumsily maneuvered her packages and person into the lobby. At the stairs she picked up her pace, wanting to be far away from the embarrassment that this man seemed to arouse in her as soon as she could.
Luckily, she noted, the man did not follow her up the stairs, but went for the elevator instead. She noticed that he entered the lock code to open the elevator doors, so he must be a resident of the building. It was a bizarre coincidence that she kept running into him, but if fate was involved, then Ess was not doing a very good job at rising to the opportunity. She thought on that with some extensive self-loathing while she entered her little third floor, white washed apartment, and closed the door behind her. She locked the dead bolt out of habit, and headed for the kitchen to save her failing ice cream.
* * *
It was late Friday evening. Max had no reason to think that Roden would get the voice message he left on his office phone until Monday morning. Max had Roden's cell phone number, so if he truly felt the need to get a hold of him, he could have dialed him there. This went through Roden's mind over and over again as he replayed the message, two, three, four times.
Roden didn't often come to his office after hours, but earlier in the day he had mistakenly left his house key in his jacket pocket, which he left behind for the raincoat when he saw some ominous clouds heading in from the east. Since he returned now for the keys, and found his message light blinking, he thought he might as well check it. Good thing he did, too.
Shock and confusion were his first reactions to the message. Quickly, this shifted into panic, anxiety and anger as he determined what his course of action should be. What should he do? As a psychiatrist, he knew he should be calm and level headed in the face of such news, but it hit too close to home. This wasn't just a patient he was dealing with, it was Max.
He played the message for the fifth time, massaging his temples in frustration.
"Mike, it's Max. Listen, I think Esther might be in trouble. I don't want you to get upset, but I have to do something to protect her . . . The whole thing's my fault . . . I think I have to get her out of there . . . I think I might have to take her away. I just want you to know that I have her, and she's safe with me . . . I'll call you later and let you know what's going on . . . Bye."
Roden knew he had only three options: He could try to find Max, though he doubted Max would be anywhere close to home or his usual haunts at the moment. He could attempt to locate Esther, but this seemed unlikely as he'd only seen her once and didn't really know anything about her, not even her last name. Or he could go to the authorities. Again, he didn't have a last name to report, and he didn't want to put Max in the face of the law until he was sure of the young man's intent. Max didn't seem capable of violence, yet he finally had the object of his lifelong obsession within his reach. Roden couldn't be sure without further observation what this new circumstance would do to the young man.
With no real obvious option, Roden slumped in his office chair, and hit the replay button again, hoping that this time he might find some clue as to where to start. There could be no clear way out of this predicament. He was stumped.
CHAPTER SIX
Good grief, what a long day. The evening hadn't gone exactly the way Ess had intended. Lounging, reading and simply relaxing were what had made up her to-do list for the night, but she wanted to take care of a few odds and ends, a little housework, before she stationed herself on the couch.
Well, as often happened, one thing led to another. Once she started with a load of laundry and turned on the dishwasher, she noticed that the kitchen floor was due for a good mopping. The logical thing to do before mopping would be dusting and sweeping away excess dirt. Of course, she might as well vacuum while she was at it; and as she put the vacuum cleaner back in the broom closet, she glimpsed the glass cleaner and turned to examine her rather grimy-gray living room window. And so, one chore led to another.
Before she realized it, the sun had finished it's descent and her tummy had commenced its rumbling. She hadn't yet made any dinner for herself, and her lunch break had been cut short by a ballroom remodel catastrophe earlier that day. Finally, Ess collapsed on the couch with a bowl of nuked vegetable soup and a bologna and cheese sandwich. As she reclined, she stared at the stack of books on her coffee table, chewing thoughtfully. Then, she looked over at her small, overcrowded bookshelf in the corner. The book that held the place of honor there caught her eye, just as she knew it would. It had been a few years since she had re-read her favorite classic. She bit her lip and furrowed her eyebrows in guilt as she glanced back at the unread books on the coffee table, but she felt determined to go for the dog-eared volume on the shelf.
Ess resettled herself back on the couch, sandwich in one fist, Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice in the other. While trying with one hand to open the book to her favorite ear marked scene – Mr. Darcy's first and rather oratorically inept proposal at Rosings Park – she managed to dislocate the cover from the spine. The pages fell to the floor, fanning open in a messy heap. Cursing at the destruction she caused her beloved book, she leaned over to rescue it. Under the heap lay a folded piece of paper, slightly aged. She slowly went for it in curious confusion. As she opened it, recognition dawned. She blushed – again, and shook her head at the memory it brought back.
It was a letter to her high school ex-boyfriend, one that she never delivered. She recalled her teenage-self chickening out just before handing the hate letter over to him, so she had just kept it, and stored it in Pride and Prejudice because the book had been her pacifier in her pain.
She sighed at her cowardice, and reflected on the event that prompted it. Matthew. She winced in indignation. That lying worthless cheater! She caught him with her own eyes, making out with some lanky blonde from an opposing high school. The worst part was that he had been doing it in the back corner of Randy's Eatery, which was their hang-out. It added humiliation to the degradation of his wandering hands that he had the audacity to "suck face" with some other girl in a location that belonged to them, a place where her friends and peers could see his obvious philandering.
That happened her senior year, with prom just a week away. She didn't go. Her father told her she would regret missing such an important event in her life; but, oddly enough, she still didn't feel disappointed at missing out on it ten years later. Apparently, not every missed opportunity was regrettable.
What she did regret was how the experience affected her over the years. After that incident she never could quite establish a relationship with a man again. She always distrusted, and never let her guard down. With this impenetrable shield of wariness, men didn't bother for long. None found it worth their time to diffuse her d
efenses.
Ess knew she had issues. It didn't take a psychiatrist to tell her what her problem was. Still, she had yet to manage it, to get over it; and she was disappointed in herself. This flaw looked like it would keep her from happiness forever. She would die an old maid; and since she was allergic to felines, she wouldn't even have cats to keep her company. Ah yes, she knew the consequences of Matt's cheating far outweighed the act itself.
She brooded over this for quite some time before a knock at the door startled her back to the present. How unusual. Since visitors could not get in unless they rang up and she buzzed them through the door, it could only be a resident of the building. Unless, of course, someone slipped through when another person had opened the door at the building's entrance. Manda had done that before.
As she approached the door, she reflected on the lack of a peephole. She would prefer one right now, so that she could pretend not to be home if the visitor turned out to be an unpleasant one or a stranger. She unlocked the deadbolt, but kept the chain in place as she opened the door a crack to peek out.