Outside In

by Sarah Ellis

  The water glugged and slurped away, leaving a sodden shirt sitting in the sink.

  Kas started pitching towels. Mop wring, mop wring. They pulled off their soggy socks and rolled up their pants. The bathroom floor was one thing, but the hall was a giant sponge. They spread towels on the carpet and walked on them but the wet kept rising.

  Kas started to jump up and down to help squish out the water. “Weight and mass are our friends. But it’s not working that great. What’s that cloth thing they’re always advertising on the Shopping Channel?”

  “ShamWow. We so need that nutso hyper salesman guy.”

  In time, every absorbent thing was wet. Every bathmat, facecloth, ancient beach towel, every tea towel from the kitchen. Lynn stood and stared at the soggy mass piled in the bathtub and the shirt in the sink. She pulled off her sweatshirt and tossed it onto the pile.

  “She’s such an idiot.”

  They retreated down the still-soggy hall to Lynn’s bedroom.

  “What do you mean?” asked Kas.

  Lynn’s knee was throbbing and her fingers were pruney. She pulled on a sweater and then punched the bed.

  “Everything’s a mess. Last night she dropped pizza on her shirt. She must have put it in the sink to soak this morning. Of course she forgot about the drip. Since Clive left she’s been totally out of it. I am so finished with her.”

  “Is that Brandon guy still, like, in the picture?”

  “Yeah. Her latest thing is that I should meet him to ‘normalize the situation.’ Not. Going. To. Happen.”

  “Hardcore.”

  “Hey. Thanks for mopping up with me.”

  “Are you kidding? This was way better than reviewing for science. When else would I get a chance to do such an all-in towel toss? But … do you still hear dripping?”

  Lynn listened. She put her ear to the wall. The drip was definite and regular.

  “Okay, this is ridiculous. She needs to deal.” She pulled out her phone.

  Nice Noreen was on the desk. “Oh, hi, Lynn. Your mom? Oh. But she’s not … Um. She’s not available at the moment. Sure, I’ll take a message, but maybe you’d better try her cell, sweetie.”

  Lynn clicked off. “Weird. Nice Noreen sounded confused. And why try Shakti’s cell? She doesn’t have it on at work.”

  Lynn saw Kas glance at her watch.

  “You have to go, right?”

  “Yeah. Babysitting.”

  Lynn pivoted off the bed and rummaged in her bottom drawer. “Here you go. Dry socks. Least I can do.”

  ≈≈≈

  Lynn stood at the bus stop. Bus, bus, stay away. Come again some other life. Life at the end of this particular bus ride was life gone wrong.

  She had quit. Shakti had quit her job. Things had gotten a little “awkward” with Brandon’s wife and really it was a good opportunity because Shakti felt that it was time for a realignment of her energies and a reevaluation of her skills.

  This was all revealed last night, right after Lynn discovered the spongy damp wall in the basement. Shouldn’t Shakti get somebody to fix it? Not to worry, she’d email Clive about it.

  Lynn had to ask. Was Clive still in their lives and if not what were they doing living in his house? The answers were pure Shakti. Well, he was still being a bit “rigid” but he’d said that they could stay there for three months. And then? Then they’d have a wonderful opportunity to reimagine their lives. Lynn doubted that “wonderful opportunity” had been Clive’s words.

  At that point Shakti came clean about quitting. “Job, house, let’s shake it up a bit!”

  It was horribly familiar. Before Clive, Shakti bounced from job to job. She was very good at getting jobs. She charmed interviewers. She could always talk the talk. But after a short while there was always something wrong. The hours were bad, the commute was impossible, management were bullies, her coworkers didn’t appreciate what she had to offer, the culture was toxic. So she would quit and then there wouldn’t be rent money so they would have to look for a cheaper place.

  Was it all starting again?

  Lynn peered down the street. No bus. The guy with the parrot on his shoulder walked by. Some hyper kids pushed the Wait signal button about eighty times until a senior with a cane told them to knock it off. The woman with the free newspapers blessed everybody who took one.

  The only good piece of timing lately was Choirfest in Portland. Mr. Inkpen was squishing in all kinds of extra rehearsals to get the choir in shape. Having to stay late after school was perfect. Lynn could hardly wait to get on that coach headed south across the border and leave Shakti and her mess behind.

  Hssssss. A bus approached. Lynn looked up. Not in Service.

  Right. Whatever. Every day after school she stared at the same crosswalk, the same skinny tree, the same mailbox, the same stores. ClairVoyant: Registered Psychic was closed, as usual. Perhaps Clair just knew when a customer was on the way.

  No sign of another serviceable bus. Fine. The waiting crowd was getting bigger, and there were mild rumblings of complaint and the inevitable theories.

  “They just don’t return from the loop.”

  “I figure it’s that construction tie-up by the bridge.”

  “Less bus. Every day, less bus. Is no good.”

  Lynn rubbed her itchy eyes. Nature was playing along with the theme of irritability by bringing into bloom some plant that activated her hay-fever button. She reached into her pocket for a tissue.

  Crinkle? It was the bag of candies that Kas had given her. Werther’s Original toffees. Now there was something you could count on.

  When it was all over, the nearly dying that happened then, Lynn thought of all the potential hazards of the street. Drunk driver plows into bus stop. Stray bullet from gangland shoot-out. Metal fatigue causes shop awning collapse. Meteorite.

  You don’t think of a Werther’s toffee and a black dog with big feet. You don’t think of that combination.

  She had just slipped the toffee into her mouth when the dog appeared, bouncing at the end of a long and saggy leash. It had a waving feathery tail, a dog grin and an owner weighed down with bags and parcels.

  The minute it spied Lynn, it bounded over to her and jumped, jerking on its leash. Its big hard paws landed right on her boobs and it hurt like crazy and she gasped as the dog bounced off her.

  Inside the gasp was the toffee.

  The owner’s parcels went flying. The dog did a joyful half-twist. The bus crowd started to react. Lynn tried to inhale.

  There was a loud silence. Not one bit of air was getting in. Every part of her brain was screaming for her to cough but there was nothing, no sound, no air. Nobody was paying any attention to her, all busy with helping to gather up the dog lady’s scattered parcels as the dog, now off leash, ran around in circles, barking.

  From some survival file in her mind Lynn retrieved the sign for choking and put both hands up to her throat. Still, nobody was looking at her. Her brain started to buzz. She kicked the nearest person.

  “What the …”

  “Omygod, she’s choking. Can you speak?”

  “Get that damn dog out of the way.”

  “Help me here. Phone 911 somebody!”

  “Muggins! Off!”

  It seemed to go on for hours.

  And then, one quiet voice behind her. “I’m going to help you. I’m just going to slip off your pack.” She felt the pack slide off and two skinny arms encircled her, paused for a second and then, shockingly, squish-punched her in the middle.

  The toffee shot out of her mouth and pinged off the mailbox.

  One ping and that was it. Lynn doubled over and took one ragged, raspy breath and a second. Her chest and throat and head hurt but the lovely air just kept coming in and out.

  Nearly dead and then not dead at all. She straightened up.

&
nbsp; The bus people crowded around with questions and pats to her arms and offers of water. Muggins’ owner was practically crying. Someone held out her pack. Muggins, now tied to a tree, seemed to be having a nap.

  Lynn tried to find her voice. First there was just a froggy croak and then she pushed out one word. “Who?”

  A woman in a shawl pointed down the street. “There she goes. That girl.”

  Lynn turned just in time to see a figure in a plaid kilt and knee socks disappear around the corner.

  THREE

  I Saw You

  “Wow,” said Kas. “Clive leaves, you find out that you might have to move, and then you nearly choke to death, all in the same month. That’s a lot of stress.” She skooched her plastic lounge chair along the pool deck to the table and leaned forward. The music for the Nifty Sixties Deepwater Aquasizers bounced off the pool walls.

  “Yes,” said Celia. “Must be well over a hundred points.”

  “Points?”

  “Holmes and Rahe stress scale. For example, acquiring a physical deformity gives you eight times as many points as a family vacation.”

  “What do I get if I have more than a hundred points? HD TV? Cruise?”

  “No, you get to be sick.”

  “Oh. Big whoop.”

  “The question is,” said Celia, “who was she, that Heimlich girl?”

  Lynn shrugged. “I don’t have a clue.”

  Celia, using her flipflop as a gavel, pronounced, “There is always a clue. There is always evidence.”

  Lynn grinned. Celia was destined for law school. According to Celia, law school was what Korean parents thought good daughters should aspire to. Celia had an evidence-based approach to life.

  Celia continued, “Think. Relive the moment. What do we have? A kilt. What does this suggest?”

  “Exchange student from Scotland?” said Kas.

  “Yeah,” said Lynn. “On a bagpipe scholarship?”

  “Do girls even play bagpipes? If not, why not?”

  “Four! Three! Two! One! Good job, ladies!” The blond buffed-boy aquasize instructor danced on the deck. He never stopped moving, talking and teasing the nifty sixties. “Just one more rep, Marjorie, show us your stuff!”

  Celia gave Kas and Lynn a look of judicial disdain. “We are straying from the point. I believe what you meant to say was private school. And what else? Distinguishing marks? Height? Hair color? Style? Sound of voice? Accent? Smell?”

  “Um. A little taller than me. Her arms felt skinny. Brown hair, pulled back. I hardly saw her. Ordinary voice, not that I heard her say very much. Hang on … There was a smell. Dirt.”

  “Ick.”

  “No, not ick dirt. Like dirt-when-you-dig-in-the-garden dirt.”

  “Obviously the tartan is our strongest lead. Would you recognize it again?”

  “Um, maybe. It was mostly green.”

  “Kas, your assignment is to research the uniforms of all local private schools.”

  “Okay, but here’s a question. Why do we even want to find her?”

  “Oh.” Celia frowned. “I just assumed. Lynn?”

  “I’d just like to know who she is. You know, to thank her. Otherwise I would always wonder.”

  “Okay,” said Celia. “What other approaches can we take?”

  “There’s got to be something online,” said Lynn. “How do people find other people?”

  “I know!” said Kas. “I Saw You. In that free paper. Wait. There’s a pile of them near the entrance.”

  She scooted off down the pool deck and was back in a minute. She spread the paper out on the table.

  “Here it is. I Saw You. Have you looked at it before?”

  “Yeah,” said Lynn. “That paper’s usually around the house.”

  “Um,” said Celia, “I’m not actually supposed to read that paper. It has inappropriate content.”

  “You mean all those ads for escorts and massage therapists?” said Lynn.

  “Well, not just that.”

  “She means that sex advice column,” said Kas. “Not that I’ve ever read it. It’s gross.”

  “Me, neither,” said Lynn.

  There was a pause.

  Celia jumped in. “How do you know it’s gross if you’ve never — ”

  Lynn and Kas started to laugh so hard that Mr. Aquasize glanced over.

  Celia shook her head. “Oh, you guys.”

  “All right,” said Kas, “as my colleague Celia would say, we have strayed from the point.” She flipped through the pages. “Here it is. I Saw You. Okay. Here’s one. ‘Man to Woman. #9 bus. You: bright blue jacket, red hair. Me: green toque, beard. I gave my seat to a senior. You smiled at me. I wanted to talk. You, too?’ Aw, doesn’t Green Toque sound nice?”

  “This is the perfect tool,” said Celia. “And, look, it’s online, too.”

  “Let’s see,” said Lynn. She ran her eye down the list. “But it’s all, like, dating stuff.”

  “Who cares?” said Celia. “It might just work. Obviously lots of people read this paper, or at least, ahem ahem, parts of it. What details should we include?”

  The exercise music stopped and the nifty sixties emerged from the pool, teasing and laughing, tossing their noodles and belts into the bin, flicking their heads to get water from their ears. The blue water calmed to glass and invited the girls in.

  Kas stood up. “How about, ‘You: green kilt. Me: choking to death. You saved my life. Can we meet?’”

  “It’ll take some polishing,” said Celia, “but the basic idea is great. Kilt identification and an I Saw You notice. A two-pronged approach.” She stood up, licked the inside of her goggles, adjusting them over her eyes and did a tidy dive into the fast lane. Kas followed with more of a splash.

  Lynn sat on the edge and watched the churning water. She was never one for diving in.

  ≈≈≈

  The guinea pigs were loose on Celia’s kitchen floor, cautiously inspecting Lynn’s feet, rumbling and squeaking in their mysterious guinea-pig way. Celia, looking like a surgeon in her rubber gloves and armed with a bottle of spray disinfectant, was cleaning out their cage. Kas was taking artsy guinea-pig photos and posting them to her blog.

  “Come on, Hoover. Come on, Oreck, Miele. Smile for the camera.”

  “Okay,” said Celia. “It’s been a week. What progress have we made in our investigation of the identity of Heimlich girl?”

  Kas consulted her phone. “Where are those tartans? Here we go. The three closest private schools use Arbuthnot Ancient, Modern Douglas and Hunting Gordon.” She held out the screen to Lynn. “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know. Could be any of them.”

  “Inconclusive,” said Celia. She scooped out some pine shavings. “What about the I Saw You ad?”

  “A bust,” said Lynn.

  “No replies?”

  “There were lots of replies, but all of them were from creeps. Looks like ‘kilt’ is some kind of code word.”

  “For what?” said Celia.

  “Don’t ask. Inappropriate content. Slimeball stuff.”

  “But they don’t have your email address, right?” Celia was always careful about Internet safety.

  “Right.”

  Kas shook her head. “I think we’ve hit the wall on the search.”

  “Yeah.” Lynn slipped out of her sandals and wiggled her toes to give the guinea pigs a thrill. Some of the kilt replies had been seriously weird. Scary, even. Maybe it was time to let this go. “Do you think the Vacuums ever want to just make a break for freedom? Is Hoover saying, ‘Come on, guys, this is our chance!’?”

  Celia folded newspaper into precise squares. “Why would they? It’s guinea-pig paradise right here. Best-quality hay, fresh veggies, vitamin C supplements, cuddle cups, plastic igloo, excellent conversation
.”

  “I don’t know,” said Kas. “Sometimes cuddle cups aren’t enough. Even if things are pretty good, sometimes you just want to escape. Like, I can hardly wait for Sunday, to just get on that choir bus and go.”

  “Me, too. Two sleeps and we’re out of here.” Lynn picked up Oreck.

  “I’m kind of starting to get nervous,” said Celia.

  “Nervous?” said Lynn. “About performing?”

  “No. Oh, I don’t know. You’ll think I’m stupid.”

  “Come on,” said Kas. “When have you ever been stupid in your whole life?”

  “Yeah,” said Lynn. “Your bottom end of stupid is still above our top end of smart.”

  Celia exploded and laughed backwards up her nose. “My bottom end of stupid?”

  Oreck, who liked a quiet life, gave a high-pitched squeak of distress.

  “And, hey,” said Kas. “Speak for yourself. I’m sure that my top end of smart at least touches Celia’s bottom end of stupid. Once in a while. Well, once. Maybe in preschool. I was very smart in preschool. But, anyway, what are you nervous about?”

  “The thing is … it’s embarrassing.”

  “Oh, come on,” said Lynn. “The Vacuums won’t tell anybody.”

  “It’s those shared bathrooms. At the college dorm where we’re staying. I don’t even like the bathrooms at school and there are going to be all those girls we don’t even know and those rows of toilets. I bet they’re the kind with gaps. In my family we’re pretty private.”

  “Okay,” said Kas. “Here’s a promise. We’ll find you a single toilet with a door. There’s always one somewhere. A handicapped or something. You just have to look around and be a bit sneaky.”

  “But is that fair? What about if other people —”

  “Stop! Stop with the fair thing. You have special needs. End. Of. Story.”

  Celia smiled. “Thanks, you guys. You’re the best. Hey! Where did Miele get to? Miele? Miele?”

  “Next topic,” said Lynn. “What shoes are you taking?”

  “Flats and low boots,” said Kas. “Maybe runners.”

  “That reminds me,” said Celia from the floor where she was crawling around, brandishing a stick of celery. “That instruction sheet said we should pack light so, since we’re all going to be in the same room, should we share one hairdryer? I’ve got a travel one.”