by E. M. Parker
“You can see how something like that might be taken the wrong way, can’t you? I mean, if I was lingering outside your front door, you would probably call the cops.”
Fiona edged away from the table, neither willing nor able to engage Noah any further. “This is really awkward and uncomfortable, so I’m going to end it by apologizing for standing outside your door. Okay? I apologize.”
“What about Olivia?”
“What about her?”
“Do you apologize for that?”
“Olivia initiated the conversation with me. I don’t have anything to apologize for, and neither does she.”
“Your conversation caused a major incident in our home last night.”
“The things that happen in your home have nothing to do with me.”
“Tell that to Natalie.”
“What is that supposed to mean? I haven’t done anything to Natalie. I’ve never even seen Natalie.”
“Yet you talk to her daughter like the two of you are the best of friends, asking questions, getting her to say things that she has no business saying. Natalie is very protective of her family, as any decent mother should be. This world isn’t always the safest place, especially for kids, and she goes out of her way to make sure that hers is safe.”
“She wasn’t unsafe talking to me.”
“Natalie doesn’t know that. If you walked in her shoes even for a minute, you would understand why she feels the way she does.” Noah paused, allowing his smile to return. “But wait, you do understand, don’t you? You feel it with your own son.”
“How in the hell do you know about my son?”
“Like I told you, that bitch that we call home can’t keep a secret to save her life.”
“I’m not going to stand here listening to any more of this nonsense. I don’t care who you are, or who your girlfriend is, or what you’ve heard when you’ve eavesdropped on my conversations. Just make sure this is the last time you and I speak, okay? Whenever you see me, whenever I see you, we keep it moving. Same goes for Natalie.”
“Same goes for Olivia. Don’t talk to her anymore.”
Fiona had walked away from the table, but Noah’s words brought her back. “And what if I do?”
“She is told explicitly that she is never to talk to strangers. Ever. She knows it’s for her own good. Yet she does it anyway. So, she was punished. Do you want that to happen again? Do you want Natalie to come down on her even more than she already has?”
Fiona stared at him in silence, afraid to contemplate what he meant by ‘punished’.
“I didn’t think so.” With that, Noah stood up from the table. “I have to go back to work now, but I would sincerely like to end this on a positive note.”
All Fiona wanted was for this man to disappear from the face of the earth in the fastest, harshest way possible. “After what you just said to me, how could you think that we could conclude with anything even approaching positivity?”
“Because like I told you, it’s not an accident that we’ve come together like this. The struggle that we share, it’s very real.”
“What struggle?”
“The struggle to maintain a sense of sanity in the insanity that defines our lives. The struggle to trust your eyes when the things they show you constantly defy explanation. The struggle to not give in and say ‘fuck it’ the moment the slightest thing goes wrong, which is almost impossible because shit goes wrong way too often. I was there when you walked inside that liquor store last night. I watched you hesitate before picking up that bottle of whiskey. I recognized the relief on your face when you finally made the decision to take it. I stood behind you while you paid for it, watching your hands shake like crazy as you signed the receipt. I completely understood you, and I understood why you couldn’t bring yourself to knock on our door. You couldn’t trust the words that would come out of your mouth. Most of us who share the struggle feel the same way, especially when we’re on the edge of disaster like you obviously were. I genuinely felt sorry for you, because I was there too, and I felt sorry for myself. The significance of it all didn’t dawn on me until I saw you this morning. Then I knew.”
Fiona could barely control her shaking. “Knew what?”
“That you were here to help me. That we were here to help each other.”
“But I’m not here to help you. I have absolutely no desire to help you. Nor do I need your help. What I need is for you to leave me the hell alone.”
Something came over Noah that looked like profound disappointment. He quickly shook it off. “Whether you realize it now or not, you will need my help. I promise you that. When the time comes, and it will, I may not be so willing.”
Having finally heard enough, Fiona walked past him to the door. “Have a wonderful day,” she said bitterly.
“Just so you know, I don’t control anything that Natalie says or thinks. Once she’s made up her mind about something, there’s no changing it. She’s already made up her mind about you. I’d like to be able to change it for her, but since you don’t need my help, maybe you can do that yourself.”
“I don’t really care what Natalie thinks about me.”
“But you care what Olivia thinks, right?”
Fiona’s lingering silence answered the question.
“And therein lies the problem. You’ve made yourself perfectly clear in not wanting my help, but I’m going to offer it one last time in the form of a friendly warning. Don’t talk to Olivia anymore. For your sake, for her sake, hell, for my sake. I’m the one who has to catch the full extent of that woman’s wrath when you do. Focus on your own goddamn child.”
Without saying another word, Fiona walked out the door and to her car, barely making it before the dam of pent-up emotion burst wide open. Through the haze of angry tears, she saw Noah walk out of the café. He briefly paused to scan the street, presumably in search of her, before climbing into his truck and peeling off.
All she could think about as she made her way home was Olivia. What was once a passing curiosity about the girl’s life had suddenly morphed into a preternatural desire to protect it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ONCE SHE WAS BACK INSIDE HER APARTMENT, Fiona headed straight for the bedroom. It was four-thirty in the afternoon, so if Olivia had been in school, it was a safe bet that she was now home; assuming he had been in school at all. Given the apparent instability of her home situation, Fiona put her odds of regular attendance at less than fifty-fifty.
She had the idea to knock on the wall and call out to her right away, but thought it best to listen first. If there were obvious signs that the girl was in her bedroom, then Fiona could go about making contact. To do otherwise could only make an already bad situation even worse.
Fiona had already felt a twinge of guilt for her role in the situation that led to Olivia’s punishment (whatever that was), even though it made no rational sense for her to feel that way. Of course, nothing about the current state of her life made rational sense, so that probably wasn’t the best criteria on which to judge.
Just as she had done when she woke up this morning, Fiona put her ear to the wall, held her breath, and listened. Unlike this morning, there was no offensive reality television show blaring in the background. In fact, there was no noise beyond the low hum of the central heating unit pushing air throughout the building.
After a few moments, Fiona decided against her better judgement by tapping lightly on the wall, just loud enough to be heard by Olivia, but quiet enough not to disturb anyone else. With no response on the other side, she tapped slightly harder. This time she heard something. A light shuffling of feet perhaps? She dismissed the wishful notion when the fluttering ended almost as suddenly as it began.
“Olivia?” The name was spoken no louder than a whisper, but against the stillness of her bedroom, it sounded very loud. “I just want to know that you’re okay. If you don’t feel comfortable talking, I understand. Just give me a sign, any sign, that you can hear me.”
> Fiona held her breath in anticipation of Olivia’s answer. When it didn’t come, she released a frustrated sigh and walked out of the bedroom.
Perhaps she would try again tonight. Perhaps she would do the right thing and leave it alone altogether. Perhaps she would break her promise to Iris and move out of Corona Heights before anyone could figure out that she was gone. That was the ideal scenario, of course, but Fiona could afford neither the potential fee nor the additional blight on her credit score that breaking the lease would result in, so it was also the least likely.
She entered the kitchen to the sound of her cell phone ringing. When she looked at the caller-ID and saw that it was Paul Riley, she ignored the call and walked to the refrigerator. Before she could open her bottle of water, the phone began ringing a second time. Paul Riley again. Fiona was hard-pressed to ignore the call twice.
“Hello.”
Fiona heard nothing on the other end of the line.
“Hello? Paul, are you there?”
Static, followed by dead-air, followed by the sound of Paul’s voice. By the time she heard it, he was in mid-conversation. “…it’s entirely up to you, of course. But I think he actually sounded sincere.”
“Paul, slow down. I didn’t hear anything you said. Your connection is terrible.”
More static as Paul spoke. “It shouldn’t be. I’m on the landline in my office.”
“It’s still really hard hearing you. Why don’t you call me back?”
“Okay, I’ll use a different line.”
Paul disconnected. He called back a few seconds later.
“How –‘his?” is what Fiona heard when she answered. “An– ‘etter”
“No Paul, it’s not any better. Are you standing in the middle of a magnetic field or something?”
More static, then Paul’s voice disappeared altogether. A loud ding informed Fiona that the call had been disconnected. When she looked at her phone, she saw NO SERVICE where her four signal bars should have been.
“Oh God, please don’t tell me I forgot to pay the bill.”
After turning the phone off and on several times, she could only manage one bar of service. It was enough to allow Paul’s call to come through.
“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were trying to avoid me,” he said from a place that sounded very far away.
“It’s not me, it’s my phone. I’m not getting a signal in here.”
“Well, I’d better be … before I lose … again. I got an …. call from …”
“Paul, you’re still cutting out,” Fiona said as she furiously paced her apartment in search of a spot that would allow a signal to come through. She couldn’t find one that gave her more than a single bar.
“I said I … … call from Kirk.”
Fiona stopped pacing. “Kirk called you?”
“Well, … lawyer did, but he… to deliver a message … Kirk.”
“Hold that thought,” she said as she raced out of her apartment into the hallway. Two bars. “Can you hear me better?”
“Barely,” Paul responded from that same faraway place.
Fiona continued down the hall, past 607. Back to one bar. “Still there?”
A garbled response.
She turned down the hall toward apartment 612 and the waiting elevator. She tried to ignore the yellow tape across the apartment door as she walked past it. When she stepped onto the elevator, she lost the signal completely.
Shit.
As she walked into the lobby, one bar returned. When she made it to the door, there were two. It wasn’t until she walked outside, past the parking lot, to the back of the apartment building, that the full strength of her signal finally returned.
She immediately redialed Paul’s number. He answered after the first ring. “I didn’t realize that phone tag was still a thing. But apparently, it is. So, you’re it.”
Fiona felt relief at the sound of Paul’s full, clear voice. “Sorry about that. I couldn’t get a signal in my apartment at all. I’m actually standing outside.” She took a second to look up at the building. She spotted her east-facing apartment six floors up. Hers appeared to be the only unit with the blinds opened. Even Iris’s were shut tight. This meant one of two things: either no one wanted to be seen, or no one wanted to see the world beyond their window. Either way, the sight gave Fiona the chills.
The sound of Paul’s voice refocused her attention. “Are you still there?”
“Yes, I am. You mentioned something about Kirk?”
“Right. I received a call from his lawyer today.”
Fiona’s stomach tightened as she braced for bad news. “And?”
“Kirk wants to meet with you, one on one.”
She nearly dropped the phone. “What?”
“Apparently, he felt bad about the way your last meeting ended. He wanted to reach out to you personally, but his lawyer advised against it. Can’t say I blame him.”
“Why does he want to meet with me now?”
“He didn’t provide his lawyer with many specifics, only that he wanted to have a personal meeting.”
A million thoughts entered Fiona’s head at once. Why would he want to talk now? What was his angle? He had made his feelings abundantly clear, so why the sudden change? Did he want to rub even more salt in the wound? Perhaps. But she also allowed for other possibilities. Maybe he genuinely felt bad about his actions. Maybe Jacob told him how much he wanted her back. Maybe, just maybe, there was a part of Kirk that still loved her, and he finally allowed that part of himself space to breathe.
More wishful thinking. Fiona had allowed herself to fall into that trap once. She wasn’t going to fall into it again.
“I gave him the chance to be civil. He chose another route, and that’s fine. I’m over it. Right now, my focus is on me. I don’t need him for anything.”
Paul took a moment to process her words. “Don’t you at least want to hear him out?”
“I heard him, Paul. Loud and clear. He can apologize until he’s blue in the face, if that’s even his intention. But he can’t undo the damage he caused between us.” Despite the emphatic tone of her words, Fiona did not believe them. But the pain in her heart would not allow her to admit it.
“So should I inform his lawyer that going forward all communication between you and Kirk should be strictly through your lawyers?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, if that’s how you truly feel. I’ll call Michael right now.”
“Great.” Fiona began pacing around the children’s play area, ducking under the slide, pushing past the rusted swing-set, increasing her pace with each step. No matter how fast she walked, she could not outrun the feeling that she was making a terrible mistake. Still, she pressed on. “Anything else?”
“I think we should meet soon to recalibrate our game plan. Any new developments on your end?”
“I went to an A.A. meeting this morning and may have found a sponsor. It’s too early to know for sure though. I also applied for a job.”
“Excellent. Sounds like we’ll have a lot to discuss. Let’s plan to meet in the next couple of days. I’ll check my calendar and get back to you.”
“Sounds good.” Tired of pacing, Fiona sat down on the edge of the slide. She looked up at the open window of her apartment, suddenly wishing she didn’t have to go back inside. “I’ll be waiting for your call.”
“Okay. Take care of yourself.”
Fiona sat on the swing for a few moments after the call ended. As she looked around the lot, she saw nothing that impressed her. Brown patches of grass surrounded by dirt, an overflowing trash dumpster that was undoubtedly home to the neighborhood’s wildlife, and several cars that looked too beat up to be drivable. This crowning jewel of downtown urban living was nothing more than a wasteland of abandonment and decay. It was no wonder that she hardly ever saw any of the other tenants; they were probably ashamed to even be associated with this place. The more time she spent here, the more she understood the senti
ment.
When she stood up to go back inside, she looked at the building again. For a moment, her eyes struggled to find the open window of her apartment, even though she was sure she was looking in the right place. She counted from the bottom of the building, six floors up, until she found the window that should have been hers. But the blinds were closed, so it couldn’t have been hers. Blinking away what must have surely been a hallucination, she looked up again. She found her open window this time. It was exactly where it was supposed to be, in the same spot she had looked in ten seconds earlier. Mind tricks, Fiona. Nothing more.
What she saw next was not so easy to dismiss.
The window next to hers was now open. And in it, as visible as the junked-out cars in the lot underneath it, was the figure of a small child.
Worried that her mind tricks were still at play, Fiona closed her eyes, shaking loose the cobwebs, before looking up again. The child was still there, this time with her hand raised as if she were waving. Fiona looked around but saw no one else in the lot where she stood. When she looked to the window again, the girl’s hand was pressed against the glass, and there was no doubt in Fiona’s mind that she was looking at her.
Olivia was her first thought, even though the distance did not allow her to make out any of the girl’s features beyond the eyeglasses on her face and the pigtails in her short, dark hair.
Fiona moved toward the building in hopes of getting a better view. She didn’t know what Olivia looked like, so there was no way to compare her to the girl she was looking at. She only had the feeling in her gut to go by.
When Fiona raised her hand to wave, the girl responded in kind. As she moved closer, she realized that the girl was smiling. Warmth filled her chest as she smiled back.
Fiona kept walking until she reached the building. Once there, the girl waved one more time, then slowly moved away from the window until she was gone. Fiona stood still in anticipation of her return. When it became clear that she wasn’t coming back, Fiona made her way to the front of the building, walked through the empty lobby, and onto the empty elevator, where she landed in the empty corridor of the sixth floor.