Don't I Know You?

by Karen Shepard

  “I borrowed some of your socks,” he said. He’d pulled them up to his knees. The heel came to the middle of his calf.

  “No problem,” Phil said. “Did you get them from the basket in the closet? Those are the clean ones.”

  “You have the same sneakers as the guy,” Steven said.

  Phil stared. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  Steven shrugged. “Everyone does,” he said.

  They didn’t seem to have anything more to say to one another.

  “Ready to make some calls?” Phil asked after a while.

  They sat at the kitchen counter and glanced at the open address book. There were cross-outs and eraser marks. Things were written in pen and pencil. All in her handwriting. It was tiny and looked like it should only appear on small pieces of very thin paper.

  He studied the page hard to keep from crying. Lisa Altiere. Becky Amidon. Josh Armstrong. Who were these people? He felt like he’d felt that time a few years ago when he’d come out of his bedroom to get something to eat, and his mother was in the living room on the couch with her feet in a guy’s lap. He’d never seen the guy before. Kurt. His name was Kurt.

  He looked at Phil. Phil was crying.

  “We probably shouldn’t go in alphabetical order,” Steven said.

  Phil looked at him like he had no idea what he was talking about but was willing to hear him out.

  “There are probably people we should start with,” Steven said.

  Phil nodded.

  “Probably my dad,” Steven said after a minute.

  Phil nodded again. He flipped to the Es. There was the number. They stared at it.

  “He may not be there,” Steven said. “Those guys called him last night. He said he was coming here today.”

  If they didn’t call, he wondered how long it would take for his father to call him.

  “I guess we should call anyway,” Steven said.

  It was like talking to himself. Like the part of Phil that was a grown-up had decided to leave. He nodded again, got up, took his coffee, and left the room. He was crying the whole time.

  Steven checked the clock. It had twelve different versions of yellow smiley faces instead of numbers. It was noon. In San Diego that was nine. He knew that much. If his father was still there, he would be at work. His father was a plastic surgeon. His mother said that was the main reason she’d left him. She’d put him through medical school. He was supposed to be some other kind of doctor, something better than a plastic surgeon. But somewhere along the way he’d changed his mind and become someone his mother barely recognized. He had a wife in San Diego. Kids. A boy and a girl. Steven didn’t know their names. They were little. He guessed the whole plastic surgeon thing didn’t bother the other wife. He didn’t see what was wrong with plastic surgery. His father probably gave people who never looked in mirrors a chance. Once, he’d heard Mrs. Carpanetti tell his mom that not all doctors had to run free clinics in Harlem.

  The new wife had made it part of their marriage agreement that she’d never have to take care of Steven. He wasn’t supposed to know that, but he overheard his mother talking about it with a guy one night.

  He thought of her feet in Kurt’s lap. He wondered if she ever thought she and his father had done the wrong thing. He wondered if she’d been happy.

  He dialed. Then he had to go to the bathroom. He had diarrhea. He stayed in there a long time. Blood rushed to his head and stayed there.

  Back at the counter, he opened a can of ginger ale and dialed again. The woman who answered sounded like there wasn’t a problem she couldn’t fix.

  He asked to speak to Dr. Engel.

  She said he was with a patient; if there was a message, she’d be happy to pass it on. Who should she say was calling? She was merry.

  “His son,” Steven said.

  She was quiet. His son, she was probably thinking, was way too little to be making phone calls, to be sounding like this boy.

  “His other son,” he said, helping out.

  She was still quiet. He couldn’t tell if she knew about him or not.

  She told him to hang on.

  The phone played jazz. His mother had said his father used to take her to listen to music in the Village. They’d heard Tiny Tim sing “Tiptoe Through the Tulips.” Steven hadn’t been impressed, and his mother had scrunched her face at him. “Whadda you know?” she’d said, smiling.

  There he was. Right on the other end of the phone, saying, “Hello?” just like he was supposed to.

  “Hi,” he said. He didn’t know what to call him. “It’s me.”

  His father didn’t say anything.

  “Steven,” he added.

  “I know,” he said.

  Steven wasn’t good at talking with grown-ups.

  “She’s dead,” he said for the first time ever. “Last night.” He said these things though he knew his father already knew.

  “I know,” he said quietly. “The police called.”

  “I found her,” Steven said. He saw her again, lying there. He saw her face again. He felt as if he were standing at the edge of something high. Would thinking of her be like this from now on?

  His father was quiet for a long time. Steven didn’t know what else to say.

  “I’ll be there tonight,” he said, and Steven thought he might cry. He wanted so much for his father to be someone he’d like. He wanted even more for his father to be someone who liked him.

  Steven gave him Phil’s number, and his father said he’d see him tomorrow, and they hung up. He sat there at the kitchen counter, his hand on the phone, not feeling like throwing up at all.

  Phil called everyone else.

  three

  Detective McGuire called and wanted to talk to him. Phil handed the phone over and stood there next to him.

  “So,” McGuire said. “How’re you doing? Get any sleep?”

  “Some,” Steven said.

  “I need you to come down to the precinct,” he said. “I need your help on something.”

  “What is it?” Steven asked.

  “I’ll explain when you get here,” he said. “Don’t worry,” he added.

  “What?” Phil mouthed.

  Steven shrugged.

  “Sorry,” McGuire said. “You’re our go-to guy,” he said.

  “Okay,” Steven said. “Now?” he asked.

  “Whenever,” McGuire said. “Today. Soon. Now is good,” he said.

  “Okay,” Steven said again. He waited.

  Then McGuire said, “I guess Miss Mahoney didn’t work out.”

  Phil was standing in front of him. He held his hand out for the phone.

  “It might be better,” McGuire said, “if you could come down by yourself.”

  Steven looked at Phil. He still had his hand out. Phil had lied about knowing about Christine’s allergies. Steven remembered him suggesting a hypnotist; the guy had cured him of his fear of flying and his three-pack-a-day smoking habit. Christine should try him for her allergies.

  Steven handed him the phone.

  He’d been to the 24th Precinct twice before. Once to register his bike and once to report it stolen. It was a gold Raleigh ten-speed. His mother had made him a deal. She’d buy it for him, but he had to work off half of it. Mom’s Layaway, she called it. He’d thought the whole plan was unfair. She hadn’t even taught him how to ride a bike. She’d tried, on the sidewalk in front of their building, but he’d kept falling off, scraping up his legs and arms, yelling at her, so she’d told him to forget it, she wasn’t going through that again. One of her guy friends had taught him. The one Steven had introduced her to; the guy who’d helped him out that day he’d been lost. He’d been around off and on for a few months. One of the college kids. He had an old sports car and looked like he was trying to stare into the sun. He had an accent. In stores, he always joked about what Steven was going to buy him. It bothered Steven that he couldn’t remember the guy’s name. Steven had had some hopes for him.

  The thr
ee of them went to the field in the park that had a slope at one end. The guy told him to keep his feet off the pedals. The bike they used was purple, with a banana seat. It was too small, but the guy said that would make things easier. He set Steven up at the top of the slope and then let him go. It was hard to keep his feet away from the pedals, and he fell a lot. It felt like those dreams he sometimes had of trying to run down a flight of stairs too quickly. His mom watched from the bottom of the hill. The guy told him to aim for her. Steven was embarrassed when people noticed them. When Steven made it all the way down without falling, the guy clapped loudly twice. On his last ride, Steven kept pedaling, past his mother, off the grass onto the asphalt basketball court. He circled, his hands tingling from gripping the handlebars. He stopped across the court and watched her. The guy was walking over. In a minute, he’d hug her from behind and she’d turn to smile and thank him. She was laughing her real laugh. He started pedaling again. He circled in front of her. “It’s as good as I thought it would be,” he told her. “I’m glad,” she said.

  Manuel kept the Raleigh in the building’s laundry room until Steven had done enough dishes, set enough tables, folded enough laundry. When Manuel brought it up Steven and his mom were waiting in the hallway, and when the elevator doors opened it was like they’d both won a prize.

  It got stolen a few months after that from outside the Burger King on Broadway. Juan had ridden Steven home on his handlebars. Steven hadn’t used his lock, but when his mother asked, Juan lied for him.

  The station was as ratty as he remembered it. Fluorescent lights and paper cups, water coolers making their sounds. Out-of-date flyers on bulletin boards. Wanted people. Missing cats. Stolen bikes. An old man cop behind Plexiglas with a little hole in it. He didn’t want to think about what they’d found. Sometimes he felt like his whole life was a pile of things he didn’t want to think about.

  Detective McGuire came down the stairs. It looked like he hadn’t changed his clothes. He had his eye on Phil the whole way over. He came right up to him, hand outstretched, like Phil was the guy he’d asked to see. When he finally looked at Steven, Steven felt himself get hot, but all McGuire said was, “Hey, bud. Good to see you again.”

  “I told him I was supposed to come alone,” Steven said.

  “I didn’t think that was a good idea,” Phil said.

  McGuire shrugged. “Not a problem,” he said, but he hadn’t stopped watching Phil.

  He took them into a small room with a table and four chairs. There was a shoebox-looking thing on the table. Out the window Steven could see the tops of the trees on 100th Street. The windows had built-in wire.

  Panty hose had been inside her pants. They needed to know if either of them knew if they were hers.

  “Inside her pants,” Phil repeated.

  “What does that mean?” Steven asked.

  Phil couldn’t look at him. McGuire was sweeping him with his eyes in a slow, regular way, like he was following a hypnotist’s watch, like it was a system he had worked out. Once, Steven and his mother had borrowed Manuel’s metal detector and gone to Coney Island. It was like that.

  McGuire cleared his throat. “Rolled up,” he said. His hands moved unhelpfully in the air. “Placed,” he said, “within her undergarments.”

  They were all staring at the box.

  “Okay?” McGuire said, putting his hand on the box and looking at Steven.

  Steven nodded.

  McGuire opened the box and took out a plastic bag with the panty hose inside. His mother hated panty hose, especially in the summer. She was supposed to wear them to work, but sometimes she just shaved really well and oiled her legs with lotion and kept them a little tan. She used to sit in her window with her legs dangling over the edge to keep her tan up.

  When she did have to wear them, she started taking them off even before she walked in the door. Sometimes she hopped the last few steps into the apartment, pulling them off one foot and then the other.

  McGuire laid the bag out on the table like he was a salesman.

  “They’re hers,” Steven said.

  Phil was surprised. “How do you know?” he said.

  Steven pointed at the wide lace waistband that dipped in front. “She said she liked how this kind didn’t dig into her tummy.”

  Someone opened the door, looked in, and closed it again.

  Steven looked at the panty hose, trying to smell them from where he was sitting. Her work clothes always smelled a little sweaty. It was hard work, she said, taking care of everyone.

  McGuire asked if he remembered if she’d been wearing them the day before.

  He tried to think. She’d been drinking coffee at the kitchen table when he’d left for Juan’s. When he tried to imagine what she’d been wearing at the beginning of the day, all he could see was that bunched-up dress. Something bitter worked its way into his throat.

  “If she was going to work, maybe,” he said. “If she wasn’t, then no.”

  They kept looking at him.

  “I can’t remember if she was supposed to go to work,” he said. “Her shifts were always changing.”

  He looked at them. He shrugged. A scuffle seemed to be going on in the hallway.

  McGuire glanced at the door. “I better go see what’s up,” he said, standing.

  Phil said, “She was supposed to go to work. She was supposed to work eleven to seven. Come home. Have dinner with her son. Get ready to go out for ice cream. She was supposed to go out for ice cream.” He looked up at the detective. “You don’t even know whether she got to work or not?” He stood up a little, but kept his knees bent, like he might sit down again at any minute. “What have you been doing? What do you know?”

  Steven didn’t like it when grown-ups argued. He didn’t know he was supposed to have been home for dinner. He didn’t know about the ice cream. If he’d come home for dinner, maybe none of this would’ve happened.

  McGuire looked genuinely sad. Something hard hit the other side of the door. Someone told someone else to take it easy.

  “I’m on your side,” he said. “I really am.”

  Steven believed him.

  “She went to work. She came home,” McGuire said. “She got the mail. She didn’t make dinner.”

  Steven interrupted him. “If I wasn’t around, she usually didn’t eat,” he said.

  “We know what we know,” McGuire said. “We’re just trying to know more.”

  He told them to sit tight. When he opened the door, whatever had been going on out there seemed to have disappeared. A woman officer walked by with a big stack of folders. McGuire gave them the “one minute” sign with his finger and closed the door behind him.

  They sat there, the panty hose in their little bag between them.

  McGuire came back in. He wanted to know about Mrs. Carpanetti and her son, from upstairs.

  “What about them?” Steven asked.

  McGuire shrugged. “You know, whatever. Are you friends? What’re they like?”

  They’d been around forever. They lived upstairs. For a couple of years, Michael and Steven had done stuff together, stuff that made Steven embarrassed to think about. And then, when Steven was ten, it had stopped. “They’re good,” he said.

  “Was your mother friends with them?” McGuire asked.

  She didn’t like how much time he spent with Michael, but she didn’t have anything better for him to do, so mostly she’d left them alone, warning him sometimes not to be stupid. “She liked them okay,” he said. “They weren’t really friends. Sometimes they watered our plants and stuff.”

  McGuire wrote something down.

  “Did you and them have a regular Tuesday thing?” he asked.

  Steven didn’t know what he meant, and then remembered the nature shows. His mother couldn’t believe the things he forgot.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Nature shows. But I stayed out late with Juan.”

  McGuire nodded. “All righty,” he said.

  He had one more qu
estion. Had either of them seen her address book?

  Phil frowned a little, like he was working hard on the problem.

  McGuire was watching them.

  “Phil has it,” Steven said.

  No one said anything for a minute. Phil was still frowning.

  “We took it to make some phone calls,” Phil said.

  “I didn’t take it,” Steven said.

  They both looked at him. It was the kind of quiet that was really loud.

  McGuire nodded. “I figured there was an easy explanation,” he said. “There usually is.”

  He put his hand on Steven’s shoulder. “Let me have a minute,” he said. To Phil, he said, “Why don’t you have a seat by my desk. I’ll be with you shortly.”

  He got up and held the door open for Phil. There was a uniform guy waiting there. Steven looked out the window. Phil told the detective sure, no problem, and only glanced at Steven before leaving the room.

  He had the afternoon to himself. He spent it poking around Sam’s room, trying to come up with details that Juan would like. She hid her diary in her underwear drawer. It seemed kind of unimaginative. Her closet was filled with labeled boxes and file folders. She had a shoe rack and a special hanger for belts.

  He found an old pack of red modeling clay and warmed it and worked it as he slid open drawers and checked under the bed. The dye of the clay came off on his hands. He made a series of little monsters. One with an open mouth and bug eyes. One with a hat. Years ago, he’d made, and tried to sell around the neighborhood, his Tiny Terrors Series. Tiny versions of famous villains. His mother still had his Phantom of the Opera and his Creature from the Black Lagoon on the kitchen windowsill.

  He made a final curled, sleeping monster, and lined them all up on Sam’s desk. Maybe she would like them. He washed his hands, found a pair of drumsticks in a box marked INSTRUMENTS, and for the rest of the afternoon, drummed along to her record collection.

  His father didn’t take him to a restaurant. They took a taxi all the way to Forty-ninth and First. There was a tiny store on a part of First Avenue that slanted downhill. Harry’s Chicken. The left side of the sign was about two feet lower than the right. In the tiny window, you could see Harry cooking chickens on a grill that took up half the store.