by E. C. Diskin
Abby nodded. He seemed harmless, and as he had alluded, he wasn’t an intimidating figure—maybe five foot seven, barely taller than Abby, and probably 140 pounds. She felt safe. “Can you get to Ashland?”
“No problem.”
“Okay. You can take Ashland north all the way to Belmont, and then turn right. I’ll show you from there.” This was enough information to keep Ali going for many miles and probably ten or fifteen minutes, so she took off her glasses to rub her eyes, rested her head, and stared out the window, hoping he would not want to make conversation during the ride home. The evening’s events already seemed like a bad dream. She just wanted to pretend it never happened.
“So what do you do?” Ali asked after allowing silence for a couple of miles.
“I’m a lawyer.”
“Ah, yes. You argue to judges, then?”
“Sometimes.” It sounded more interesting as a one-word answer, and Abby didn’t feel up to explaining that most lawyers like her spent a lot more time in their offices, dealing with mounds and mounds of papers, than they did arguing to judges.
“I was a chemical engineer in Iraq, but no one would hire me when I got here. I had to start over.”
“That’s too bad.” She tried to focus on Ali and his story. It was better than thinking about that dead woman’s face, those men and their laughter, the drugs. She closed her eyes hard, trying to erase the images.
Ali continued. “Yeah, but then I thought I’d live the American dream and be an entrepreneur!”
Abby gave him a half smile. She was exhausted. She looked back out the window for signs of home.
“And it’s been pretty good.” He obviously didn’t need her for the conversation. “It’s been tougher since 9/11, of course. I mean, now everyone from my country is a possible terrorist, right?”
She turned to him and cracked a nervous smile. He was obviously used to the fear. His monologue continued and she offered slight responses to suggest listening.
The Dunkin’ Donuts and Linens ’n Things appeared up ahead. Chain stores, the comforts of home. She began thinking about the large coffee and warm blueberry muffin she’d pick up in the morning. She needed to be up and out in about five hours.
“You are not from Chicago either, I imagine.”
“No.”
“You have just a hint of an accent…like…maybe you’re from the South?”
Abby nodded. “Georgia.”
“Where is that?”
“Pretty far away, out east, about a fifteen-hour drive from here.”
“You must miss your family.”
Abby continued staring out the window. “I do.”
“Me too.”
She advised Ali to head north on Clark and soon saw people on the street and her favorite restaurant, Mia Francesca’s, up ahead.
“You can let me out right here.” She was already grabbing for the door handle.
Ali’s arm shot out across her chest. “Wait a second,” he said.
Abby’s whole body tensed.
Ali pulled back and smiled. “You look like you’re going to jump. We’re still on Clark. Let me take you all the way to your place.”
“Actually, I live right up here on Roscoe, just down the block.” Abby was pointing east. “It’s one-way heading west, so it will be much faster if I just jump out here. Really.”
“No problem. Let me just pull over,” he said. “You’re obviously relieved to be home.”
“You have no idea,” she said as he pulled to a complete stop.
Finally sure that he was going to let her get out on Clark in the midst of people and streetlights, she was overwhelmed with gratitude.
“I can’t thank you enough for taking me home. Please give me your address, so I can send you some money for the ride.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“No, really. I insist on repaying you. Please.”
He looked around the car. “Well, here’s a flyer from the store,” he said, grabbing a coupon from the back seat. “The address and number are at the bottom.”
“Great. I’ll be in touch.”
“Take care, Abigail,” he said with a tone that sounded like he never expected to hear from her again.
She got out and leaned back into the door. “Thanks again, so much.” She slammed the door and watched him drive away.
ABBY trudged to her townhouse, weighed down by physical and emotional exhaustion. She would have to ring Mrs. Tanor next door in order to get in. It was now after one o’clock.
The buzzer on the gate was disarmingly loud. Abby looked up to the second-floor windows of all the other units, fearing that all the neighbors’ lights would immediately come on. A faint and scratchy “Hello?” came through the speaker.
“Mrs. Tanor, I’m so sorry to wake you. It’s Abby. I’ve lost my keys and I can’t get in.”
“I’ll be right down, dear.” The buzzer went off again, releasing the heavy iron gate so Abby could enter the courtyard. When Abby reached her front door, Mrs. Tanor came out in her trademark floor-length nightgown, matching robe, and fuzzy slippers. It was the uniform Abby had come to expect any time before eight in the morning or after eight at night.
“Is everything okay, Abby?”
“Oh yes. I had a really late night at the office and I misplaced my purse.”
“Honey, you look wet. Were you crying?”
“Oh no. I got caught in the rain. I’m just a mess. I’m so sorry to have woken you, but I’m so grateful that you have my spare.”
“That’s what neighbors are for. Get some rest, dear.” Mrs. Tanor unlocked Abby’s door and gave her the key. She still had that worried look, the one she had when David moved out. She was never satisfied by Abby’s brief explanations. But Abby was never willing to share more, for fear of motherly advice she was sure would follow.
“Don’t worry, Mrs. Tanor. And thanks again. Goodnight.”
Abby headed inside and pulled out the three-year-old laminated neighborhood information sheet Mrs. Tanor had presented her when she and David moved in. She found the local precinct’s number and pulled out a wine glass, hoping the police and the wine could calm her nerves enough to get some sleep.
FOUR
MARCUS watched as officers went in and out of Reggie’s. There were three cop cars on the street. Neighbors had streamed out of their homes to find out what was going on and Marcus blended in with the crowd. An ambulance pulled up, without lights or noise, and parked in front.
They all watched as two EMTs carried a covered body out on a gurney and pushed it into the back of their vehicle.
He had waited just beyond the entrance to the convenience store for about ten minutes, smoking a cigarette and watching the door, but the girl never came out. And now, watching the scene at Reggie’s, he didn’t think he’d get any answers here either. He would have to find out more tomorrow.
“Hey dawg!” Marcus turned to see Darnel running up to him.
“Hey, Darnel.”
“You catch up to that girl?”
“No.”
“Too bad. Looked like that could have been fun.”
“Yeah. So, what happened here?” He gestured to Reggie’s.
“Dude, we were in the wrong place at the wrong time. You got out just in time. Maybe two minutes after you left we heard sirens. Some of the boys headed out the front. Little D and I ran out the back. The place was surrounded in minutes. Looks like some bad shit went down in there.”
“What do you mean?”
“Fuckin’ dead body, man. Drug bust too, I think. Saw some cop carry out a big zip lock of smack.”
“Huh. And you didn’t know anything about that?” Marcus was doing his best older-brother-style grilling.
“Nothing! I swear! We had just gotten there. Saw the white girl behind the bar and we was just playin’.” He chuckled then. “She was scared shitless, dude. That’s when you came in.”
Marcus gave him an unconvinced look.
“S
wear!” Darnel held up his hand.
“All right. Well, I got to head.”
“Yeah, me too. ’Night, Marcus.” They did the handshake and parted ways.
Marcus walked another two blocks and headed west on Colfax to his apartment. He pulled out the five keys it took to get in and climbed the stairs to the third floor.
His sparse, beaten-down apartment greeted him with typical silence. He should have brought Lucy, he thought for the hundredth time. She always ran to the door like a dog would, and rubbed up against his legs. At the time, he couldn’t bear the reminder. But it was hard to walk in the door without thinking of that damn cat.
The apartment didn’t look much different than it had seven months ago when he moved in, other than the mounds of papers and files that now covered the coffee table. There was no point in trying to make it homey. It would never be home.
He opened the fridge, surveyed the leftover take-out containers and grabbed a Budweiser. Moving some papers around, he found a pen and took some notes about the evening. There wasn’t much to say. He sat back and closed his eyes. The silence of this room, even of the street outside sometimes, was suffocating. New York was always loud. Every minute of every hour of every day there was something going on down on the street. Horns, cabbies yelling, music, metal trashcan lids, dogs, even screeching cats. Here, he heard only sirens in the distance and the occasional argument from his neighbors next door.
He undressed, brushed his teeth, and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. The scar was changing colors. It was less pink now, healing. He wasn’t healing. Without even closing his eyes, he could still see the smoke, the tears, the screaming, that deafening crack. The day his world imploded. He touched the discolored pink skin that would forever remind him and his eyes filled with tears. He closed them hard, shook out his hands, like he could rid himself of the thoughts, and headed for bed. He watched TV until he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer.
FIVE
ABBY was running down the street, running from something, scared, confused. She heard a ring. She kept looking around to find the source. It happened again. And again. Why won’t it stop? She opened her eyes. The phone was ringing. She quickly sat up, rubbed her eyes and surveyed the damage. A box of Wheat Thins and a half-empty bottle of red wine sat on her bedside table. The television was on and Matt Lauer was chatting with the crowd in New York City.
“Shit!” She jumped up to answer.
“Hello?”
“Abby!” Sarah was yelling in a hushed voice. “What the fuck? Peter just came by. Looked pissed. Said you’re due in his office in a few minutes and he hasn’t seen you this morning.”
Abby was already out of bed, trying to pull it together. “Damn it. What time is it?”
“Eight o’clock—what’s going on?”
“Fuck! I was supposed to pull an all-nighter.”
“So why didn’t you?”
“Oh fuck. Fuck, fuck. I can’t explain it all right now.” Her mind was racing, trying to figure out how to control the situation. It was hard to focus. She spoke softly and slowly, trying to lessen the pain in her head and carefully consider her actions. “Listen, I’m never going to make it to the meeting. Please do me a favor. Tell Peter that I’m terribly sick—throwing up or something—and I’m running late. But I’ll be there in an hour. My draft is on the system if he wants to review it now. Oh shit!”
“What?”
“No, I can’t do that. I need more time. Please go tell Neil that he may need to pick up the slack for me.”
“What? Why would you get Neil involved? That won’t look good. You don’t want Peter to think you’re blowing him off.”
“I know. It’s complicated. But I have to do some things first. It’s an emergency. Listen, I need to go. Thank you so much for calling.”
THE hot water pouring over her felt intensely relaxing and with repeated deep breaths, Abby began her mental checklist for the day. She had to call her credit card companies. The police had emphasized that she needed to act quickly regarding her finances. They didn’t seem too worried that anyone would come find her and rob or kill her, but she was also going to call a locksmith right away. With house keys and her drivers’ license in the hands of those criminals, she couldn’t feel safe, and as the wine kicked in last night, her imagination had gotten the best of her. She tossed and turned and drank until at least four in the morning, wondering whether the thugs in the bar had murdered that woman and whether they were now after her, or whether they were just guys who thought it would be fun to find her and rape her, or whether the man who chased her was a drug dealer and was searching for her.
Now, under the vise grip of her pounding headache, combined with the hot water attempting to shock her system into a new day, some of her fears sounded pretty far-fetched and she just wanted to try to forget all of it and fix things at work. The officers last night had been comforting. They had not criticized her for coming home before calling, and they assured her that the information would be passed on to the appropriate district. Another officer would probably contact her to follow up, but for now, she had done all that could be done.
A little more than an hour later, Abby sat on the train, looking out at the rooftops of the neighborhoods she knew so well, and wondered what to tell Peter. This was bad. Peter was a hothead on a good day. He would blame her for trying to go home last night. Neil probably stayed all night. That’s what any dedicated lawyer, certainly anyone nearing partnership, would have done. She leaned up against the window and looked out at the neighborhood. She pictured the conversation and thought she’d come off looking like an idiot. Being sick seemed better. That woman’s face, the blank stare, kept popping into her thoughts and Abby shook her head, trying to erase the image. She looked up at the brown chart over the door and realized she couldn’t read the stops. She’d forgotten her glasses. It only took a second for her to remember: She had left them in Ali’s car.
ABBY waved at the receptionist without an explanation and headed for her office. It was now quarter to ten and life appeared to be business as usual. Like last night never happened. Just a bad dream. The mail guy was rolling the cart down the hall, stopping at all the in-boxes with the new day’s stress and several paralegals and secretaries were gathering for coffee and whatever sweet treat might have been brought for another birthday in the break room. Abby slowed as she approached Peter’s corner office and strained to listen for voices inside, praying he wasn’t there. She rushed past the empty office, turned the corner down the south hall, and made it to her office without being spotted. She hoped to find a note or an e-mail or a voice mail from Peter berating her. At least then he’d have gotten the rage out and she could go from there. But there wasn’t anything. No voice mail, e-mail, notes. She tried to pull up the draft motion, but she couldn’t. The document was open on someone else’s computer.
She checked her e-mails and saw one from Neil. When she opened it, she cringed. It was actually from Neil to Peter, but he had blind-copied Abby. “Don’t worry, Peter. I’ve got it covered.” The next one was from David, wondering what her voice mail message had been about last night. She sent a short reply: “Nothing. Sorry about that. Take care.”
ABBY was ignoring all work, staring out her office window at the traffic on Lake Shore Drive when Sarah showed up.
She entered quickly and shut the door behind her. “So? You ready to tell me what happened to you last night?” She sat in one of Abby’s guest chairs before Abby had a chance to respond.
Abby had to laugh. “What’s this?” Sarah had gone from jet-black to platinum blond overnight. Abby was used to Sarah’s tricks. She was a master of adding funk to an otherwise conservative pinstripe suit, but now she was going even further.
Sarah laughed. “What do you think? I thought the blond might be fun for the wedding!”
“Sure!” Abby couldn’t imagine changing hair color with the ease of changing a sweater, but that’s what was fun about Sarah. “You’ll be lik
e Marilyn Monroe. Oh, and I love the red.”
Sarah’s bright red lipstick was a perfect match for the red satin blouse that was trying to get out from under the black suit. “Yeah, blondes do more red, don’t they?” Sarah pretended to ask. “So, anyway,” she leaned forward, obviously bursting for a good story.
Abby sat back. “I’ll tell you all about it, but not right now. I’m just trying to dig myself out around here,” she said, acknowledging the piles of work on her desk. Sarah would enjoy the drama, but she would chastise Abby for working that late to begin with, and begin her diatribe regarding Abby’s priorities. Sarah would have found a way to turn down the assignment. She believed all-nighters were the result of unorganized partners and she’d rather leave their messes to be cleaned up by over-eager beavers. Of course, such comments always made them both laugh since they both knew Abby was one of those over-eager beavers. But Sarah had always been blunt with Abby. Her personal life came first. She didn’t care about partnership. She’d do good work and keep clients happy, but she had no fear of refusing work. Lawyers like that didn’t last, but Sarah only cared about paying off her law school debt with a fat big-firm paycheck. She had no intention of a life-long sentence. Abby wasn’t in the mood for the lecture.
“That assignment for Peter took over the last seventy-two hours of my life. You know how things just pile up,” Abby added, while checking her clock. It was now lunchtime.
“So, no lunch, then?”
“Not now. I’ve got to go see Peter and try to explain.”
“Well, I’m curious as hell, but obviously you seem okay now, so I’ll be an adult and let you decide when to tell me.” They both chuckled. When it came to juicy stories, Sarah was like a kid at the candy counter, begging for more.
Sarah began to stand, but stopped, sat back down, and leaned forward. “Hey, I’m sure this isn’t a good time to do this, but I’ve been anxious to catch up with you today for another reason.”
“What is it?”
“I need to tell you something.” She gave it a dramatic pause. “David and that girl are engaged.”