She, Myself, and I Read online

  “If they do find me,” I say to him, “I might have to go back.”

  He glances at me. “Then we’d better make the most of whatever time we’ve got.” He hits the brake, pulls over to the side of the road.

  “Maybe I should contact Sylvia’s boyfriend.”

  “I don’t know about the boyfriend,” he says. “But send Althea another message.”

  “I could do that while we’re driving.”

  He points through the window, at an ivy-clad stone building with narrow arched windows.

  I lean forward, and I see the sign: CARY MEMORIAL LIBRARY.

  I pick up Joe’s phone from my lap. After he reactivates it, I message Althea:

  Rosa again. It would mean so much to me to hear from you, I can’t tell you. Please.

  I know: I sound as needy as I am. But I’ll have to take that risk.

  Kind or unkind?

  Loves and hates?

  Happy or unhappy?

  Hopes and dreams?

  Better than me?

  Only a close friend could answer those questions. And I cannot go back to Boston without answers.

  24.

  I get out of Joe’s car, my heart doing its best impression of a Ferrari on an autobahn.

  I have to focus hard on what I’m doing so as not to stumble on the pavement.

  My wig is in place. My sunglasses are weighing down my ears. I’m reasonably disguised. But if the police do put out an APB—I’m not sure what the letters stand for, but I’ve heard it on TV—on Joe’s car, well, here it is, in full view.

  Joe is peering past a cluster of wooden benches outside the library, down the street. It must be the main street, I realize. Both sides are lined with low-rise stores and banks, fronted with broad sidewalks dotted with trees. I see signs for a shoe shop, a restaurant, more than one or two shops selling home-wares and craft supplies.

  “What do you bet they all sell the exact same pewter jewelry?” Joe asks. “If your mom does find you, you could always try placating her with a gift of an artisanal cheese board.”

  I guess I give him a look, because he holds up his hands. “I just think you’re probably worrying too much.”

  I’m about to head to the steps when I notice an inscription on one of the benches:

  Francis Judd Cooke, 1910-1995. A life of music generously shared.

  I think of that comment from Sylvia’s boyfriend: Awesome gig.

  She sang. Maybe she’d have had a life of music, if she’d had the chance.

  “Rosa, come on.”

  I start for the steps. Then something—a whimpering—enters my consciousness.

  It’s so pained and insistent that it makes me stop.

  Pulling its way along the sidewalk toward the library is a honey-colored poodle on a pink leash. Its claws are scrabbling at the concrete. The woman walking it tugs the leash. “Sadie, no!”

  The dog pays no attention. As they get closer, it strains harder. The woman shoots me a curious glance. She allows Sadie to drag her over.

  The dog jumps up, front paws on my knees, mouth gaping happily, tail wagging hard.

  “I’m so sorry!” the woman says. “Sadie, no!”

  I reach down to gently push it off, and the dog’s slick pink tongue licks my hand over and over.

  “It’s like she knows you!” the woman says.

  Yeah, I think. It’s like she knows me.

  I sense Joe’s eyes on us and I don’t look around. My heart is racing so fast I think I might pass out.

  “Do you work at Doggy Day Care?” the woman asks.

  I take her in: dark ponytail, fuchsia leggings, pink Nikes, aviator sunglasses, toned, thirties. I shake my head. The dog is still trying furiously to lick me. As I stroke its curly head, I hope the woman doesn’t notice that my hands are shaking. I’m not sure what to say to her.

  “Oh,” she says, “Monday night training class in the park?”

  I shake my head.

  “Wait . . . oh.”

  I doubt an “oh” has ever before carried so much weight for me.

  She removes her sunglasses and scours what she can see of my face. “You do look a lot like her.”

  My heart is racing so fast; I’m definitely going to pass out. Joe comes to stand beside me. I grab his arm for support, struggling to maintain a neutral expression.

  “Mom!”

  A girl, perhaps twelve, long-legged in white jeans and sneakers, is jogging toward us with another dog, also on a pink leash.

  As this dog gets close, it, too, starts pulling to get to me. Only this approach is frenzied. Its tail is wagging a hundred times a second. It’s white. Fluffy. Realization drop-kicks me.

  It’s the white dog from Althea Fernando’s photographs.

  The mom can’t be older than thirty-three or thirty-four. Too young, surely, to be Althea’s mother?

  The girl, who’s leaning backward against the pull of the dog, skids to a stop beside me. “Lexie, get down!”

  “It’s okay,” I tell her.

  Say it, I tell myself. Say it. “Who do I look like?” I ask the mom.

  Her sunglasses are halfway back to her face. She hesitates before slipping them back on. “A friend of my niece. This is her dog—my niece’s dog, Lexie. We walk each other’s dogs sometimes.”

  “Lexie must love your niece’s friend,” I manage to say.

  “Yeah. She’s—she passed.”

  Another voice, a girl’s, calls from farther down the street: “Hannah!”

  The daughter waves to the girl, who’s also in jeans and sneakers. She sets off again, dragging the dog. “Come on, Lexie!”

  The whimpering gets louder, until distance softens it.

  My brain screams, Ask her, ask her! “I’m sorry,” I say. “Did you know her well?”

  Eyes on her retreating daughter, the woman says, “I knew her mom, really. She was Althea’s—my niece’s—best friend. Seventeen, talented, smart, everything. Sang like Elle King.” She sighs. Tucks a fallen lock of hair behind her ear. “You look a lot like her. Different coloring. I guess that doesn’t bother the dogs.”

  The daughter calls, “Mom, we’re going to Ranc’s!”

  The woman spirals the leash around her wrist. “I’m sorry about all that. Enjoy the rest of your day.”

  She walks away, dragging Sadie, who is only a little less reluctant than Lexie to go.

  I stand there, unsure of how to face Joe. Identical twins must smell the same . . . I should have asked her more than two stilted questions. Yes, I was nervous. The encounter was a surprise. But perhaps I should go after her.

  I realize I’m twisting my fingers together. They’re glistening. Wet with Sylvia’s best friend’s dog’s saliva. Seventeen, talented, smart, everything.

  I can barely make out the woman—she’s so far down the street—and what would she think if I ran after her now?

  Swallowing back tears, I hurry over to the steps.

  “Rosa?”

  I don’t acknowledge him. I don’t even glance back. I don’t want him asking me anything. Not right now.

  Through a second set of doors, I find myself in the bright, light atrium of a public library. There are bookshelves and people with shopping bags, two kids with plastic lightsabers, a couple of girls with folders in their arms. I’m scanning for a sign for a bathroom.

  There.

  I shove open the bathroom door and practically fall against a sink.

  There’s no one else in here. So there’s no one to see my tears. I left my jacket in the car, so after taking off my sunglasses, I slip them into the pocket of my jeans.

  I hold my hands under a gushing stream of water. Then I pump soap into my palms and rub them and rub them as the water gets hotter. The mirror’s steaming up. But when I look in it, there it is: that expression that isn’t mine. My instinct is to turn away. But I don’t.

  Trembling, I hold my gaze.

  And I have the strangely not-unnerving sensation that I’m looking at Sylvia
. There’s a confidence in her gaze that I never saw in my own reflection.

  Seventeen. Talented. Smart. Everything. Sang like Elle King.

  I was not talented. I helped no one. I certainly didn’t save anyone’s life. I gave nothing to anybody. I made up stories about myself. If I could ask the world, I know it would say: It would be better if you’d died.

  I half slip, half drop to the floor. My back to the tiled wall, I feel crushed on all sides. I’m not sure I can take this . . . But I saw her reflection. And I have this strange, enveloping feeling that she is still somewhere here, in me.

  "Rosa?”

  The shell around us fractures but doesn’t quite break.

  Joe calls again: “Rosa. Are you in there?”

  But I can’t speak.

  "Rosa?” he calls. “Althea Fernando replied.”

  25.

  I haul myself up and out of the bathroom.

  Joe’s there, right outside, holding his phone. “Okay?” he asks doubtfully.

  I nod quickly, rubbing my eyes. “I’m sorry, I—” I take a breath. “What did she say?”

  He hesitates. I experience a sensation I’ve had a hundred before, generally in the gap before a doctor gives me test results. In that gap, all kinds of possibilities could still be true.

  He passes me the phone and I read: I’ll be at O’Neill’s tonight. My shift ends at 9. Could talk then. The kitchen.

  The stress of what just happened on the street floods away. It leaves me feeling kind of unbalanced. But only for a second or two.

  “O’Neill’s?” It sounds familiar. And it doesn’t take me long to remember why: The photo on Althea’s Facebook page of Sylvia singing was location-tagged at O’Neill’s Bar & Restaurant.

  “Here.” He holds out his hand to take the phone back. His fingers move quickly across the virtual keyboard. “It’s an Irish bar and restaurant. On the outskirts of town. Near an air force base.”

  “We can go?”

  “Of course we can go . . . Are you okay?”

  I nod. “Just that woman . . .” My sentence trails. I take a deep breath. “She thought she recognized me.”

  He nods. “Yeah.” He glances at my sunglasses, which are awkwardly stashed on my hip. “Maybe you’d better not wear those in here or you’ll only get more attention. But you’ll lose them like that.” He holds out his hand.

  I give them to him, and he slips them into his jacket pocket.

  I’m worried he’s going to ask me more about the woman, but he says, “I saw a sign back there saying the Lexington High School yearbooks have been moved to the Lexington Room. I guess the memorial book could be with them, wherever that is . . .”

  He glances behind him, at the atrium and the anterooms and a desk where an ash-blond librarian is sitting.

  “It might be better to ask,” he says.

  It’s Joe who does the talking. I stay close behind him, my wig pulled forward around my face, hoping no one looks at me too closely.

  The librarian informs us that two memorial books for students who attended Lexington High School are indeed held here.

  “It’s unusual, isn’t it?” Joe asks. “To have memorial books in a public library. And the school yearbooks. Is the Cary name to do with the high school?”

  “No,” she says kindly. “It’s to honor the original patron of the library, Mrs. Maria Hastings Cary, who first offered funds in 1867. But the library and the school do have a close relationship. Students like to study here. You’ll find all sorts of school-related resources over by the young adult section.” She hesitates. “I know the parents of the girl you’re asking about wanted her memorial book to be available to all students, past or present, at any time. That way, they can continue to add to it if they want to. They can come and choose a chair and take comfort from it, if they want to. It can be different, can’t it, holding something physical in your hands, rather than looking at a screen?” She points. “Over there. The far side. You’ll find it with a few other folders on a shelf by the windows.”

  “Thank you,” Joe says.

  “You are very welcome.” She glances at me, but I’m already turning away.

  We head in the direction she indicated. Beyond a series of bookcases, we come to a couple of long, light wood tables, at which kids—high school students, I guess—seem to be doing homework. One girl whispers loudly to another, “It could be present active?”

  I try not to stare—because I don’t want any of them to look at me—but it’s hard. Without a single exception, the girls all have long hair, held back from their faces in clips. The boys are mostly wearing chinos and T-shirts. Would Sylvia in her tie-dye and tight dresses have fit in?

  “Rosa.”

  I look around. Joe’s at a bookcase by one of the narrow arched windows. Next to every window, I notice, is an easy chair.

  These must be the chairs the librarian was talking about.

  This must be the shelf.

  Joe’s picking up a deep maroon leather-bound book. He holds it out to me.

  I take it. On the front is Sylvia Johnson in gold-embossed letters. Beneath her name are the date of her birth and the date of my surgery—of her death.

  Unaware now of anything besides this book, I take it to a chair. I sit down. Open the cover. On the first page is a single paragraph:

  In loving memory of our darling daughter, Sylvia Lauren Johnson. Please take a few moments to write down remembrances of her that you feel able to share. Share anything: your love, your anger, your sorrow, your grief, and any happinesses that you experienced together. Please also paste in anything you like—concert tickets, notes, anything that reflects time spent with Sylvia. Whenever we feel her loss most acutely, we can turn to these memories and know that so much of her will live on, as part of us.

  I have no idea how long I sit there, with the book.

  Each new entry hits my brain like an electric shock.

  You’d have been New York’s brightest star, Sylvia. Such a talent. And an even bigger heart. We’ve all lost so much. C.

  Music, when soft voices die . . .

  So devastated, Sylvia—but so thankful I was lucky enough to know you. All my love. Adam.

  Of all the memories, this is one of so many that I’ll always hold close: when Aidan B. was dating that girl from fencing club behind Sydnie’s back, and you stood up in the cafeteria and went over to him and you sang your twist on that Alanis Morissette song . . . “He’s a bitch, he’s a liar, he’s a sinner, he’s a cheat.” No one will EVER forget that . . . I will never forget you. Althea.

  And more. So many more.

  Page after page of comments, some distorted with what must be tearstains, and bits and pieces—wristbands, menus, certificates, theater programs—stuck in.

  At some point, I get up from my chair. I might even put Sylvia’s book on the shelf. Or maybe Joe does. Because the next time I’m properly conscious, I’m standing in the little vestibule by the main door to the library, feeling like I’ve just been hit a hundred times, all over.

  Joe’s there, too, right beside me. “You okay?”

  “. . . Yeah.” My voice sounds strange. Not like me. Or her. Or what I’m used to.

  “You sure you’re ready to go?” Joe asks.

  I lick my lips to loosen them. “Yeah.”

  “Okay. Look, before we go, I need the bathroom. Why don’t you come back in with me and wait by the desk?”

  “I can wait here,” I tell him. It’s cool and dark in here. And there’s no one else. Just a wastebasket, an umbrella, and a table with some leaflets on it.

  “If you come back inside—”

  “I can wait here,” I tell him.

  “Maybe I should wait . . .”

  “Seriously?” Deep breath. “You need to use the bathroom. I’m fine. I’ll be here.”

  “Okay.”

  He doesn’t look too certain about it, but he goes back into the library.

  I stand there in the vestibule, my head swimming wit
h everything I just read—all those memories of a person who is gone but is also standing here. Who, a few minutes ago, was reading her own memorial book.

  I shiver. The little stone vestibule feels cold as a crypt. The door is ajar. I slip out, into sunshine.

  As I stumble down the steps, I realize Joe still has my sunglasses, but I don’t stop.

  I lurch on, past the benches, onto the sidewalk. I’ll wait here, in the warmth. The brightness hurts my eyes a little. I turn my head, and I see, on one of the shops down the street, a familiar sign.

  Starbucks.

  It catches at me. For a moment, I wonder why.

  And then I remember.

  Althea Fernando must have graduated from high school, but she’s still here, in Lexington. What if Adam Sagan works here?

  I have no way of telling Joe. But if he finds me gone, surely he’ll wait. And I won’t be long.

  Sylvia’s boyfriend. I’ve only seen a photo. He was good-looking, in a grungy kind of way. Did this body have sex with him? What would it feel like to see him?

  26.

  I walk down the main street, alone.

  For the first time maybe ever, I’m out in the real world, by myself. Only, not quite by myself. Because I know I’m not really just me anymore.

  The Starbucks is a small one. Narrow. Busy. By the window, a couple of women in heavy makeup and gym gear are deep in conversation. A casually dressed dad with a kid who looks about fourteen, textbooks open on the table between them, is shaking his head. “This would be easier,” he says loudly to the kid, “if you didn’t eat so much sugar.”

  The counter’s over to the left. Five or six people are waiting in line. I make out one—no, two—servers in green aprons.

  Both are women.

  I’m about to walk around the line to get a better look when a male voice over my shoulder makes me turn sharply. “Turkeys are our friends. Don’t you think?”

  He’s about my age. Maybe a little younger. I mostly notice white teeth, regular features, and biceps stretching the fabric of a tight-fitting T-shirt. I think I must have misheard, but then he smiles—the kind of confident smile that’s accustomed to a positive reaction—and hands me a leaflet from a wad.