Shadows At The Window

If there is another person I didn’t want to lie to, it’s Bridget, but again, I didn’t think I had a choice. We’ve shared this apartment for four years, and I value her wisdom and her friendship more than I can say. I could never lie to her and yet—and yet—I had and I would continue to do so.

I said, “I thought maybe of going home…I don’t know.”

“Are you that sick, Lilly?” Her eyes were wide as she sat beside me in her mauve designer suit. She pulled her stockinged feet up underneath her. Bridget works in a downtown Boston office. The first thing she does when she walks in the door from work is pull off her heels and groan about sore feet. She does this absolutely every day, even before she removes her coat.

Four years ago, when the rent on this place went up, it became apparent that with my music-store salary, I wasn’t going to be able to afford a somewhat pricey, top-floor walkup on my own. It has basically three rooms: two bedrooms and a large living space which is a combination living and dining room with a kitchen nook in the back. It’s a cute place, and even though it’s as expensive as the sky, I didn’t want to give it up. Plus, I love the location.

I let it be known around the church that I needed a roommate, and Bridget came and saw me. We’ve been best friends ever since. She seems so very sleek and sophisticated, but she bakes tollhouse cookies on the weekend, knits socks for her nieces and nephews and knows the names of all our neighbors.

She was sitting beside me, a worried look on her face as she raised her flawlessly waxed eyebrows. Even at the end of the day, her auburn hair shimmered and fell into place like in a TV commercial.

“And you’re going to need your music books there? A whole suitcase full of them?” She looked at me and then something seemed to register. “Oh Lilly, you really are sick, aren’t you? Does Greg know? When did you find out?”

I put up my hand. I had to stop her. “No, no. I’m not dying. I’m okay. Well, sick, but okay. I’m just organizing. I was feeling a speck better, so I decided to organize.”

“And you’re going home?”

“I don’t know. I’m just not thinking. I…” And then I began to cry deep, heaving sobs. I just couldn’t stop myself.

Bridget hugged me. “I’ll stay with you. I don’t have to go to that stupid company dinner tonight. I’ll call right now and cancel so I can be with you here. You shouldn’t be alone.”

“No, Bridget, you don’t have to. Really. Don’t miss your dinner on account of me.”

“My dinner is nothing compared to the welfare of my best friend.”

I looked down at my hands. Quietly, I said, “I lied to Greg. I’m not really sick, Bridget. I’m just afraid.” I looked at her. “I can’t go into it. It’s complicated and has to do with a whole lot of stuff that happened to me before I came here, before I met Greg.”

“But honey, everybody gets afraid. Everything is different for you now. You’re a Christian. The past is in the past and you and Greg love each other.”

I shook my head. Oh, if it were that simple. And as I looked up into the pretty face of my best friend, I thought about the pretty face of another best friend from a long time ago. Her name was Moira Peterson. At a time in my life when no one was my friend, we two clung to each other as if drowning.

THREE

I finally persuaded Bridget to go to her dinner when I told her I needed a bit of alone time to work through my thoughts and that I hoped she would understand. She left, but not without me promising that I’d call her on her cell if I needed her to come home. She’d come immediately, she said. Even if she were in the middle of a conversation with the owner of the company—even about a six-figure raise—she’d drop everything and skedaddle home. Bridget, who grew up in the country, freely uses words like skedaddle.

I couldn’t wait for her to leave so I could cry in private, but when she did, I felt lonely, afraid and desperate. I was actually getting a stomachache. At this rate, I really would be throwing up. That thought gave me a peculiar sort of comfort. At least then I wouldn’t be lying any more. I closed my eyes and snuggled down deep into the blankets on my bed.

I’d told Bridget I wanted to go home, when actually that was about the last place I wanted to go. Maybe I should go see Moira. I closed my eyes and it was ten years ago again—I was under a sheet in another house. It was muggy and hot, and mosquitoes whined at the broken screen. He had just left the room.

Mudd.

His name was Michael Binderson, but everybody called him Mudd.

My arm burned where he’d twisted it, and the back of my neck hurt from where he’d hit me. When I’d put my hand to that spot, there was blood. It had happened when I asked for my rightful share of the money. He told me I was no good, I’d messed up again, I was never good enough—Never. And then he raped me.

It happened all the time. When he was gone, I would lie under the hot sheets in the humid air and sob. Moira would hear me and come from the kitchen to hug me until my gasping tears settled.

“Mudd,” I whispered his name in the darkness of my room in Boston. Mudd was the only person who would send me that picture. But he was dead. He’d been murdered eight years ago in a drug deal gone bad. Or so I thought.

I needed to leave. But where would I go? I couldn’t go home. Once upon a time, a dozen years ago, I had a promising future but I walked out of my family’s house and away from a college music scholarship. I thought I knew better than everybody; my parents, my guidance counselors, my music teachers. Five years ago, I reconnected with my parents, but we’re not close. My mother still thinks I’m wasting my talents. She feels I should be studying classical guitar at a prestigious music school rather than at a local community college. And singing in a church? She really can’t understand that one.

I couldn’t go to Moira, either. Eight years was too long to wait to ask forgiveness.

My mouth felt dry. I reached over and checked that my cell phone was turned off. Bridget and I don’t have a landline in our apartment so if my cell was turned off, no one could reach me. I sat up in bed.

Heaped around me were the clothes that I’d ripped out of my closet when I’d gotten home. On the floor, my music books and composition papers spilled out of one suitcase, and some of my clothes were piled in the other. My guitar was in its opened case. I got out of bed, picked it up and cautiously began to pluck out a melody and sing. I put it back. I couldn’t get anything to sound right.

I glanced at my clock: 8:16. If I hadn’t gotten that e-mail this morning I quite likely would be engaged by now. Maybe I’d be wearing a sparkly diamond and we’d be walking hand in hand on the sea wall, our favorite place. Or perhaps we’d be wandering through the mall picking out dishes and kitchen furniture.

I lay back down and buried my face in my damp pillow. I tried to pray, but I felt as if my prayers reached no higher than my ceiling. In the middle of this most horrible night of my life, I heard the lobby buzzer sound to our apartment and then Greg’s voice over the intercom. “Lilly? Are you okay? I left you messages. I’m really worried.” And then more mumbling that I couldn’t hear.

I actually considered running out and letting him in, saying, “Greg! Come up and I’ll tell you everything.” But I couldn’t. I knew he would never be able to handle the entire truth about me. I barely could.

I kept my head under the covers and stayed perfectly still until I heard his car drive away. There is no mistaking the pattering engine of his old VW.

I dried my tears and started hanging up the clothes I couldn’t fit in my suitcase. How could this happen? I thought I’d worked all this through. When I’d come to Boston, I’d seen a counselor for a long time. I’d gone to that support group in the church. I thought I was over all of this. Obviously I wasn’t. It’s easy to get over something when nothing from the old life threatens. But when it does, all of the hard work—all of the working through everything and the long hours of journaling—are for nothing.

I needed to run, but how could I leave all this? Over in the corner was the dresser I’d bought at a garage sale and had stripped and refinished. Next to it, a beautiful antique wooden music stand. Hanging on the wall was a huge paper star light, a gift from Paige’s daughter, Sara. On the bed, the handwoven bedspread that I bought at the outdoor market. And on my mirror, photos of me with Greg, and with Bridget.

My thoughts were all over the place on that long and terrible night. Lord, I prayed at one point, let whoever it is lose my e-mail address. I prayed that the e-mail had been a mistake. I prayed that their hard drive would crash and they’d lose everything. Or they would leave their computer in Starbucks while they went to the restroom, and then when they came back, someone would have run off with it. I was coming up with all sorts of scenarios that God could use. It could happen, couldn’t it? God performed all sorts of miracles and I needed a miracle. Now.

At first, I thought the faint knocking was on the door of a neighboring apartment. I ignored it and stayed under my covers. But it persisted. Then I thought I heard someone calling. It wasn’t Greg—I had heard him drive away.

More calling. A high-pitched voice. Had Bridget come back without her keys? I roused myself and went toward the door.

More knocking, more calling.

“Yoo-hoo? Bridget? Are you there?” The soft voice sounded like it came from an older woman. Bridget’s mother? I put my eye against the peephole. The diminutive, round, ashen-haired woman was not Bridget’s mother. The woman outside my door wore an oversized, baggy gray cardigan that I was willing to bet belonged to her husband. Underneath that sweater was a smudgy, food-stained apron tied over crimson track pants. Her sturdy, square hands held out a silver metal cake tin that looked familiar. Curious, I opened the door.

“Yes?”

She looked past me, craned her neck, then looked back at me. “Am I at the wrong apartment?”

“What are you looking for?”

“Bridget.” Then she stopped and smiled widely. She was missing several top teeth along the side. “Oh, you must be the roommate.”

I was curious about something else. “How did you get in here, may I ask? How did you get in the main door without buzzing?”

“Oh, that,” she said, walking around me and into the apartment. “It’s the same with my place. People are always leaving the front doors of these places unlocked, or they’re propping the doors open. People just don’t want to be bothered with keys anymore so they leave a brick in the doorway. Around here it’s so safe anyway.” She placed the cake tin on the counter like she’d been here before. “You just tell Bridget, dear, that I loved the cookies, and that I do want her recipe.”

“Okay, then.” I just stood and watched her. She peered up at me with tiny, close-spaced eyes.

“You don’t look so well, dear. Is it the flu?”

“No, uh…” I put a hand to my face. Did I look that bad?

She pointed at me. “You know what you need? Some of Bridget’s chicken soup. She actually got the recipe from me, you know,” she said, aiming a finger at her heart. She shambled through the door, “Now dear, don’t forget to tell Bridget that I was here.”