Sketchy

by Samms, Olivia

  “I know.” I’m still looking into his eyes. “Surprises me, too.”

  “Okay, well.” Daniels breaks the stare and pulls on his gloves. “I’d better get back to my run. I’ll see you around, right?”

  “If you keep following me, yeah, Dan, you will.”

  He smiles, starts to walk away—turns back. “You know, you can call me, anytime, like if you need anything.”

  “Okay. And you can always call me if you need any help—like in catching someone.” I smile. “I could be your personal Bea catcher.”

  His sweaty blond eyebrows push together and connect. He nods a couple times and laughs. “Right, right. My Bea catcher. I’ll keep that in mind.”

  I watch him jog off. I take out my Moleskine and turn to my favorite page.

  It’s a drawing of me. A sketch I drew while sitting across from the sergeant during Professor Woolf’s arraignment hearing.

  He was thinking of me. I was on Daniels Daniels’s mind.

  I close my sketchbook, smile, and hug it tight to my heart.

  Kicking the caked snow off the bottom of my fabulous new mukluks, I drape my coat over my arm and step into St. Anne’s recreational hall.

  We sit, hold hands—young and old, fat and skinny, pretty and ugly, male and female—all different, all the same, all as one.

  Karin “with an i instead of an e” starts the meeting. “First on our agenda… Bea, you have four months today, congratulations!” The group applauds. “Would you like to share tonight?”

  I nod and walk to the front of the room. Karin gives me a big hug. I look out at the flawed fellowship in front of me and take a deep breath. “Wow… four months today. Pretty damn cool. But, shit, it hasn’t been easy this month, that’s for sure. Almost every day I think about using, and I almost slipped up a couple times.”

  “Who hasn’t?” Granny raises her knitting needle in the air.

  “I don’t know if you noticed, but I wasn’t too crazy about you all at first.” That gets a big laugh, especially from Hawaiian-shirt guy. “But you’re all kind of growing on me, I guess. You believe in me—even when I lie to you. And when I’m here, inside these walls”—I look around the tacky room—“I find that I’m… myself. You’ve somehow, magically, drawn the truth out of me. The truth of Bea—and don’t seem to mind her. And, hell, the coffee even tastes better.”

  The door creaks open in the back of the hall. I hear a faint, familiar voice. “Oh, sorry I’m late.” All eyes turn as she sits in the back row on a cold folding chair—the same place I sat when I first came. She sits between a tranny and the trucker, looking beautiful as always but scared as shit.

  Tears well up in my eyes and stream down my face as I see that Willa is wearing my paisley velvet coat. I’m so beyond happy that a piece of me has been there with her all along, keeping her warm, giving her comfort.

  She takes a deep breath and looks up at me with frightened eyes. I nod with loving approval, and she says, softly, “My name is Willa, and I’m an addict and an alcoholic.”

  “Hi, Willa.”

  After the meeting, we walk out into the parking lot and give each other a big hug. I watch Willa drive off and am about to get in my car.

  Beep. Beep.

  I look across the street, and there he sits in his idling Prius, summoning me to join him.

  Marcus.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To my husband, daughter, and son, you surround me with an impenetrable triangle of love every minute of every day. I am so lucky and grateful to have the three of you. I love you so much.

  I thank my mother and (late) father for your unwavering love and support throughout the years; for your creative, artistic genes; and for sitting patiently through years of plays and musicals. You were always the first to clap—and the loudest. I carry your applause in my back pocket and pull it out whenever I need a boost of confidence.

  To my huge extended family: to my six siblings, thank you for staging the “garage shows” back on Asher Court. I believe the bug bit me then—or maybe it was one of you. Regardless, it was a great ensemble, and it still is. I send big hugs to my in-laws for making the life of a starving actress in New York rather easy and for your continued support, encouragement, and love.

  Every writer should have an agent like the beautiful Lisa Gallagher. Her intelligent, copious notes, solid belief in me, and hard work brought me here today, typing these words about how unbelievably wonderful she is. Cheers, Lisa!

  To the team at Amazon Publishing—Larry Kirshbaum, Tim Ditlow, and Margery Cuyler—thank you so much for reading my manuscript and loving it and for providing me with my editor, Marilyn Brigham, who continues to guide and inspire me through her keen second set of eyes; and for Katrina Damkoehler, my art director, who honed and shaped the work of amazing cover artist Sammy Yuen.

  I am indebted to James Patterson, Steve Bowen, and Leopoldo Gout for reading my pages, encouraging me to continue, and slipping them onto Lisa’s desk. None of this could have happened without your help.

  Alvin Sargent, you took me seriously years ago as a writer and graced me with your wry, unforgettable advice. I’ve tethered your wise words to myself with superglue. Thank you.

  To all my friends (you know who you are), reaching back to when I was a little girl swimming in the muddy lakes of Michigan till now, hiking the hot trails of Southern California, thank you for your ears, your heart, for sharing your own stories… you are my living Post-it Notes, reminding me, giving me the inspiration and courage to forge ahead.

  And finally, to my dog and cat, the most loyal of all, who book-ended me every day as I wrote. They listened to every word written and still adore me. Go figure.