by Steven James
“Did you eat?”
“Just dessert.”
This woman always ate dessert first.
A quirk I’d come to love.
And emulate whenever possible.
Her blond hair shimmered in the golden candlelight. She was a few months older than me, but could have passed for five years younger.
Never married, Christie had gotten pregnant in college, opted to keep her baby, and eventually dropped out of school to raise her daughter. I didn’t know the story about Tessa’s father, why he’d never been in the picture, or how Christie and Tessa ended up in New York City from rural Minnesota. It seemed like a sensitive topic and I figured she would share the details when she was ready.
These days, she worked at a small design firm developing logos, identity packages, and marketing campaigns for start-up tech companies. She made enough to live on, but I knew things were tight.
She took the chicken to the microwave. “This’ll only take a minute.”
I set down my computer bag and took a sip of the wine she’d poured for me.
I was as clueless when it came to grapes as she was when it came to coffee beans, so I had no idea what kind of wine this was—except that it was sweet and light and fruity, and right now it hit the spot.
She placed the food in the microwave and punched the reheat button.
“I would have been here earlier if I could,” I said.
“I know.”
“Things got a little crazy.”
“I understand.”
The dated microwave hummed somewhat chunkily in the background.
“Would you like a slice of Key lime pie?” she asked. “It’s vegan, but it’s good.”
“Two slices would make my arm feel better.”
“Really.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“And how is that?”
“A little-known fact: Key lime is famous for its healing properties in treating knife wounds.”
She raised an eyebrow at me. “If it’s a little-known fact, how is it also famous?”
“Good point.”
“We’ll go with one piece to start.” She took a sip of her wine. “I heard a new one today.”
“Tongue twister?”
“It’s a tough one: ‘Irish wristwatch.’ Five times fast. Go.”
I tried and it wasn’t pretty, but it did bring a smile to her face. “Your turn.”
“I’ve had practice.” She tried. Nailed it.
The day we met she’d told me a tongue twister and she’d been trying them out on me ever since.
The microwave dinged but she didn’t take out the chicken.
“And do you know why I wanted to see you tonight?” she asked.
“Because I’m irresistible?”
“Besides that.”
“Adorable?”
“Do you remember when we first met, Mr. Adorable?”
“Of course.”
A slight smile. “What day of the week was it?”
“Ah. A Wednesday.”
“Uh-huh. Good. And what brought us together?”
“That storm. It was very serendipitous.”
“I would call it providential.”
“A spring rain.”
“And you let me share your umbrella with you. Such a gentleman.”
“As I recall, you were pretty taken with me at first.”
“Oh, really? Is that how you remember it?”
“Yup. Very taken.”
“And what makes you think that?”
“Your eyes. The way you looked at me.”
“My eyes?”
I did my best imitation of her.
“I seriously hope I didn’t look like that.”
“Well, something along those lines. I might not be remembering it exactly.”
“Why is that?”
“I might have been a little distracted by seeing such a gorgeous woman coming in from the rain.”
“Good answer. And how long did we stand under that umbrella?”
“I don’t really remember. It’s all a blur after that.”
“After what?”
“After I looked into those eyes.”
“Two for two.”
“And then when we went out for coffee, you told me your first tongue twister.”
“And that was?”
“Cryptic stripped script crypt.”
She nodded. “Very good.”
“And so that’s it, then—why you wanted to see me this evening. We met seven weeks ago tonight.”
“And we went on our first official date one week later.”
“A double anniversary.”
“So it is.”
“Well, you oughta get a kiss for each one,” I offered generously.
“Is that so?”
I took her in my arms to pay up.
And sort of wished it was a triple one.
At last she stepped back, brought the pie out of the fridge, and said, “Okay, I need to just go ahead and say this: I know you can’t tell me the details about what happened and I’m not going to press you, but the bloodstain coming through that bandage worries me. If you can’t tell me, I get that. But it’s . . . it’s hard not knowing how it happened, besides that it was a knife.”
I was quiet, unsure how to respond.
She knew I couldn’t share the specifics of my cases with her, but I usually told her as much as I could to allay her concern. Figuring out where to draw that line was always a challenge.
“So.” She dished some pie onto a plate, laid a fork beside it, and handed it to me. “At least tell me this much: am I going to hear about what happened when I turn on the news in the morning?”
“You might,” I said, then added, “Yes. You will.”
I felt caught between the desire to let her into my life and the need to keep her out of my work. How do you draw someone close while at the same time keeping her at arm’s length? It’s not easy and I hadn’t done so well with it over the years—at least the drawing-someone-close part.
Christie divided the chicken Parmesan onto two plates, and we returned to the table.
After evaluating things, I finally explained what I could. “A man took his own life. I tried to stop him, to save him, but I couldn’t. It appears to be linked to a homicide last night.”
“And he had a knife?”
“Yes. We struggled. He cut me.”
“Is it deep?”
“I’ve had deeper.”
“Okay.”
“Listen.” I reached across the table and took her hand. “I’m fine. And I’m here now. I’m putting all that aside.”
“I’m going to hold you to that, alright?”
“Alright.”
Christie was a woman of deep faith and before we began our entirely-too-late-to-be-good-for-you dinner, while still holding my hand, she closed her eyes and said a prayer of thanks for the food and for my safety. Then she asked God to comfort the friends and family of the man who’d died. “Let them see a bigger plan at work, find hope even in grief, and love, somehow, despite their sorrow. Amen.”
“Amen.”
I wasn’t sure where I stood when it came to matters of faith and religion. I knew there was evil in our world, no question about that. I’d seen too much of it over the years to doubt that, but I needed people like Christie to remind me that there was good here too.
Work this job long enough and you’ll start to believe in sin—whatever label you want to give it. Grace, forgiveness, redemption, those are harder to find. Christie said to me one time, “When you look at the world as it is, how can you not be racked with grief? But when you look closer, how can you not be overwhelmed with awe?”
I was still working on the awe part.
+++
I started with dessert, and while we ate, I tried to keep my promise to her, tried to leave my work behind, to make that difficult and yet necessary switch from professional life to personal life, but it didn’t go as well as I’d hoped.
Questions about the scene, about Randy—if that really was his name—about the note, all pecked away at my attention.
Christie was concluding telling me about her day when Tessa emerged from her room, staring at her phone, texting someone as she walked to the fridge. She glanced up just long enough to nod a greeting in my direction.
“Hey, Tessa.”
“Hey.”
Fifteen years old. Independent. A loner. Her obsidian hair swished idly across her shoulders when she turned her head to look at us. Black eyeliner, black fingernail polish, and sometimes, although not tonight, black lipstick to match it. She was as ambiguous about school as she was fiercely intelligent, and I had the sense that she was searching for a place to belong, but at the same time couldn’t care less what people thought of her. A bit of a paradox.
She slid a slice of pie onto a plate, hesitated, then dumped the last two remaining pieces on top of it. I didn’t think Christie noticed. Then Tessa dug a fork out of the drawer and without another word, texting with one hand now, took the pie with her back to her room.
“You’re going to put that plate in the dishwasher when you’re done with it, right?” Christie called after her.
“Uh-huh,” Tessa replied noncommittally.
“Uh-huh,” Christie said to me with a small smile, then mouthed, We’ll see.
When I first moved to NYC, I was surprised by how late in the summer school stayed in session here. Even though it was mid-June now, Tessa still had one more week of classes. When I was growing up, I lived for the summertime and I would have hated being in school in June.
Christie and I talked for a few more minutes, but finished the meal in relative silence.
“I should probably be heading home,” I said.
“It’s late, Pat. Stay here. Get some sleep.”
I knew her well enough to realize that this wasn’t a sexual invitation. As rooted as she was in her faith, Christie had strong convictions about the sanctity of marriage and, although I had a dresser drawer set aside here for the nights when I did stay over, every time I’d spent the night so far it’d been on the couch.
Often, with my work schedule, the only chance we had to see each other was late at night, and since I lived across town it made sense to just stay over when we did manage to get together. I respected her views, but I had to admit I looked forward to the day when I would graduate from the couch.
I had my laptop with me, everything I would need for tomorrow morning, and I couldn’t think of any good reason to go back to my place at this time of night just to sleep in my own bed.
“Okay. Thanks. I think I will stay.”
After we’d deposited the dishes in the dishwasher, she gently cradled my wounded arm in her hand. “So you’re sure you’re okay?”
“I’m good.”
Then she took my hand in both of hers, and the warmth of her touch reminded me that she was alive, that I was alive, here in this moment, here on this day.
Such an obvious fact, so self-evident, but one that we don’t often pause to consider.
Today is a special occasion.
Every day we’re alive is.
Earlier tonight, the man’s skin had still been warm when I placed my fingers against his neck to check for a pulse.
Lifeless, but still warm.
It would have cooled by now, though.
It doesn’t take long.
It’s a mystery to me: We live, we die. It all happens in the blink of an eye, in the grand scheme of things.
If there really is a grand scheme to things.
I drew Christie into my arms and after we’d said good night with a kiss that I was glad Tessa didn’t interrupt, Christie left for her bedroom and I got situated on the couch.
Tessa never returned with her pie plate and fork, but I did hear Christie down the hall informing her that I was staying over so that she wouldn’t be surprised to find me here in the morning.
In lieu of turning on the air conditioner, I left the living room window open. Outside, the familiar sounds of my city kept me company.
The rain had started again and it was drizzling and dripping in a lonely, pitter-splatter-drop pattern onto and then off of the windowsill.
I tried to sleep, but the words of the man who’d leapt off that balcony kept cycling through my head: “You have no idea how far this goes, what they’re going to do if . . .”
He’d stopped as soon as I told him I was a federal agent.
So, who did he think you were before that?
Who’s Aurora and what’s this file concerning her birthday?
Hopefully, tomorrow would bring some answers with it.
When I closed my eyes, I saw him again in midair, falling away from me through the night, almost gracefully, in a reverse swan dive that stopped abruptly at the pavement.
And I heard the sound of impact.
Heard it again and again.
There’d been that pause between him hitting the concrete and me hearing the crunch of impact, but then the screams of the bystanders came pretty much right away.
That was my lullaby when I closed my eyes.
The sound of a body hitting the ground and the screams that followed in its wake.
So much can change in the blink of an eye.
5
Francis Edlemore was in charge of changing the posters.
He didn’t work full-time at it, no, there was no need for that, but it was a positive contribution he could make to St. Stephen’s Research Hospital, a positive contribution he could make to the community, and he was thankful for the chance to do it.
The cardboard tube he carried contained eleven rolled-up posters of Gracie and one final one of Derek; it was his that Francis would be putting up in the subway terminal over on the northeast wall along the side of the tracks.
The hospital had provided him with Derek’s poster—a smiling ten-year-old boy with a type of terminal brain cancer Francis couldn’t pronounce, along with the words “You can make Derek’s dreams come true.” It included the toll-free number and the website that people could use to contact St. Stephen’s to donate money toward their ongoing cancer research.
Francis didn’t know the boy’s specific prognosis or how long he was expected to live, but he did know it was unlikely that his dreams would ever come true. He’d been in to visit him five times and Derek wasn’t getting any better.
The hospital’s community volunteer coordinator, Mrs. Durkin, didn’t explicitly state the reason why they needed to change the posters from Gracie’s. No one liked to talk about it. Instead she’d just announced to Francis that they had “a new development campaign beginning.” Then she smiled in a way that was meant to fend off any questions he might have had. “I’ll need you to put up twelve new posters.”
“How’s the research going?”
“We’re making steady progress. Plugging right along, but there’s still more work to do. Always more work to do. Can you take care of the posters tonight?”
“We’re replacing Gracie’s?”
“You know how these things go.”
She didn’t need to explain the reason why the campaign featuring Gracie, a girl who’d just turned eleven a few months ago, had ended.
Francis knew that it was the same reason Derek’s campaign would end in a few months, or maybe, if things went well for him, next year sometime. It usually happened about once a year, putting up the new posters. Once, though, Francis had been called on to replace the posters after only two weeks.
That time was the hardest.
Francis
was twenty-eight years old, single, and sometimes he wondered if he would be single forever. But, since he didn’t have too many friends or pastimes and no family obligations, he had the time to help with projects like this. It was one of the advantages of living alone.
Though his job at the International Child Safety Consortium kept him busy during the day, he had his evenings free.
A train must have just arrived, because a clump of people was coming his way up the steps as he descended into the tunnel that led beneath the streets of the city. Pedestrians in New York City have learned to keep their gazes to themselves when they pass others. So now, tonight, no one looked at him.
It was so different from growing up in east Texas, where people smiled and waved at strangers and thought it rude and presumptuous if you didn’t at least nod to them when you passed them on the street.
He swiped his MetroCard and stepped through the turnstile.
Just like cattle on the ranch. One animal at a time. Patience. Patience. Patience. Wait your turn. One by one through the turnstile. Be polite and obedient on your way to the slaughter.
What does that even mean, Francis? Animals don’t know what it’s like to be polite. They only know what it’s like to exist, to eat, to breed, to bleed, to die.
It’s just that they’re oblivious, though. That’s what I meant.
Use “oblivious,” then. Use the right word, Francis.
I will. Next time, I will.
He had to tilt the cardboard tube upright to maneuver it through the turnstile.
The under-the-city reek of the subway tunnel met him: oil or grease or something from the trains, along with the vague ever-present stench of garbage that most New Yorkers get used to, but visitors notice right away.
It’s a little bit like when you have bad breath but you don’t notice it. Other people’s breath? Sure. Yes. No problem there. But not your own. Why not? Well, your brain gets used to it and shuts it out, stops noticing it.
Brains are good at that—at shutting out the disagreeable truths of life so we don’t have to continually face them. Things like the stench of the city. The faces of the homeless. The sad eyes of strangers passing by, keeping their gazes to themselves as they do.
But Francis tried to notice things both big and small, had been ever since the accident when he was eleven.