Shadows At The Window

I nodded and she was down the steps before I even had a chance to ask who she was. I have to admit that meeting the strange little woman with the square hands and the cake tin had cheered me up for a few minutes.

Bridget came in around ten-thirty. She kicked off her shoes and came over to where I was nestled into a blanket, watching Law and Order.

“There’s some decaf on,” I said.

“Great. Thanks. Oh, these shoes. If I had to wear them one more minute, I swear I would be throwing them against the wall.”

“How was the dinner?”

She ran her slender fingers through her hair. “Oh, you know. Company dinners. They go on and on, speech after speech until not only do you want to start throwing shoes, but also pieces of the rubber chicken they serve.”

“Now there’s a sight I’d like to see.”

She went to pour herself a cup of coffee. “Oh, sweet. My recipe exchanger brought my cake tin by.”

“Cute little woman,” I said. “She told me I needed some of your chicken soup.”

“On Saturday, I’ll make you some. I surely will. It’s good for what ails you.”

“How about a broken heart?”

She came back over to me, all concern.

“I’ve been praying for you all evening. It’s what got me through the speeches. And it came to me that this thing with you and Greg, I think it’s just a temporary obstacle, like a speed bump in the road.” She sat on the couch beside me. “You two belong together. You’ll figure it out, Lilly. I just know it. He loves you, you love him.”

“I don’t know if that’s enough now.” I shook my head. “I’m this close to a commitment, and I find I just can’t do it. I can’t explain it.”

Bridget took off her suit jacket and pulled her legs up underneath her. “Honey, I know you and Greg belong together. You’ll find a way.”

I didn’t sleep well that night. Sometime in the wee hours of the morning, when it was still dark, I felt hungry. I got up, went into the kitchen nook and poured myself a bowl of Rice Krispies. I stood for a long time at the back window and looked out into the dark yard between the apartments. I could just make out the very old and mostly rusted chain-link fence dividing the so-called backyards. It had a number of ripped-out places, where small animals could easily get through. We’d never gotten around to putting up curtains, but being so far up, we didn’t worry too much.

As I gazed into the night sky, the thought came to me that things might be better if I was totally honest with everyone. People only knew half my story. Greg needed to know everything about me, and Bridget needed to know much more than the little bits and pieces I’d chosen to share. Because my story is so much more than living with an abusive boyfriend. My story involves murder, drugs and betrayal—and that’s just the beginning.

I looked toward Bridget’s door. If she were to come out right now, I’d tell her. I’d make her sit down on the couch and I’d tell her all about Moira and how I’d betrayed the one true friend I’d had in all the world.

And I’d tell Greg, too. I’d call him first thing in the morning and we’d meet for lunch and by the end of it he would know everything as well. And then he would leave me. I knew the particular heartache that Greg carried, and if Greg knew what I had done, what I was, he would run—not walk—away from me.

Greg had been married before. For two years, he was happily married to his high-school sweetheart. From all accounts, she was a dear, sweet girl—a pastor’s daughter. She’d been killed by a young woman who was driving while high on drugs. It had taken a long time for Greg to work through his grief and forgiveness. And I wasn’t sure he had, not completely. We’d talked about that. He’d told me how difficult it was for him to find any love in his heart for the person who had killed his wife, and how he carried these feelings of rage over to any drug user who got behind the wheel. I have told him a lot of things, but never that I had regularly used drugs. How could I? How could I tell him that I could have been the young woman who killed his wife?

I was about to pour myself another bowl of cereal when it hit me. If what I was beginning to suspect was true—that Mudd was alive and had tracked me down and sent the e-mail—then no one was safe. Mudd was vicious beyond all viciousness. I put the cereal back without eating any more. Had I actually seen Mudd die? Not really. I’d seen Mark, the owner of the bar holding the gun on Mudd. And that’s when I turned and ran. I heard the shot when I got to the van.

I couldn’t tell Greg I had been found. That would put him in as much danger as I was in. And I couldn’t tell Bridget—dear, sweet, innocent Bridget.

I put away the milk and went back to the rocking chair where I rocked quietly for a while in the dark, thinking, thinking. Because if Mudd had been alive all this time, then my betrayal of Moira was all the more acute.

I went to bed and practiced the sentences I would say to Greg…until I fell asleep.

In the morning, Greg called me at eight, just like I figured he would.

“You okay? I came by last night but you must’ve been asleep. I’ve been thinking about you all night. In the time I’ve known you, you’ve never so much as had a cold.”

“Greg?” I said. “Can we meet for lunch?”

“Sure, babe, are you up to it?”

I love it when he calls me “babe.” I clutched my cell phone and coughed to cover up a sob. “I need to see you, to talk to you,” I said. “It’s important.”

“Lil? You don’t sound good. You sure you’re okay?”

“Please! Please don’t call me ‘Lil.’ It’s a nickname I hate. Please.”

There was silence for a moment. “But I always call you ‘Lil.’”

“I know. I know. And I hate it.”

“Okay, then, uh, I won’t call you ‘Lil.’ Where should we meet, Primo’s?”

“No!” I said, maybe a bit too loudly. “Not Primo’s. How about—” I cast about for a place “—how about Griffi’s Café?”

“Griffi’s Café it is then,” he said.

Neil, Tiff, Lora and I had a study-group meeting that morning to work on our joint project. We were studying the composer Bela Bartok to show how his early life in Hungary and the music which surrounded him evidenced itself in his compositions. The whole thing seemed a little pointless now. Isn’t that what was causing all my problems? The stuff I’d surrounded myself with in my youth? Rock music, selling my soul to the devil for a chance to be a rock star. Someone could do a project on me.

I was usually the first to arrive at the table in the student-union building that we’d claimed as our own. While I waited for the others to saunter in late, I would work on music or homework, or check my e-mail. But today the three of them were already there, engaged in a spirited discussion. Tiff, who reminds me of a pixie with her spiky black hair and tiny body, was moving her hands exaggeratedly as she talked. Neil sat next to her, his expressive fingers aligning the edges of his books precisely as he listened.

I shoved in beside Lora. Neil’s eyes were bright. “So, you engaged now?”

I groaned. Why couldn’t I have kept my effusiveness to myself? “Do I look like I’m engaged?” I waved my empty ring finger in front of their faces.

“What happened?” Tiff asked, concern on her face.

“I was sick last night. We had to cancel.” In the future, I vowed, I would be more circumspect with my life. “We’re going to reschedule.”

Lora raked her dark fingernails through her long, heavy hair. “I personally don’t see the big deal with the institution of marriage anyway.”

I really didn’t feel like getting into this particular discussion with anyone, so I shrugged and opened my notebook.

Neil grinned, ran his hands with their perfectly clean nails down the perfectly aligned edges of his books and said, “Well, if he doesn’t want to marry you, you could always marry me.”

“Thanks, Neil,” I said as Tiff and Lora laughed.

I got to Griffi’s at ten to noon and found a booth by the window. I ordered a coffee and waited. The organic coffee and panini shop was getting crowded. Lots of students came here, but it was located among several office buildings, so the place filled up at lunch hour. It was a good thing I’d arrived before the rush.

I used the time before Greg came to read over the lyric sheet, looking for the final, elusive verse of the worship song. I may as well have been trying to read Greek.

Greg arrived on the dot of noon and scooted in across from me. I looked up at him, at the shock of sun-colored hair that fell onto his forehead, at those expressive eyebrows of his. Today he wore a red shirt emblazoned with Creation Music Festival.

I saw the look on his face, the tentativeness in his eyes. His movements were erratic and uncertain. It was as if he didn’t know how to be here with me. How could I do this to him? To us? How could I hurt him? Yet what choice did I have?