I collected myself in Katherine’s Corner Bookstore before heading back to the office. Few places brought such comfort. Few things as well. But books, well, books were living entities to me . They triggered as many memories as poorly chosen love songs or badly splintered park benches . They brought to mind vacations and good years, and I enjoyed just looking at them. And if I could get a few undistracted minutes, maybe I could actually finish the one I’ve been reading.
“Savannah, I haven’t seen you since lunch Friday.”
“A lot has changed since Friday, Katherine.” I smiled at the striking, petite, middle-aged storeowner approaching me with her undeniable freshness.
“I hear your mother has been at the monument since then.”
I tried to focus on the new-books section.“What you hear is true.”
She walked over and replaced a misplaced book on the shelf in front of me. I watched her graceful olive hand with short red-painted fingernails. Katherine was a former beauty queen herself. But she defied every stereotype known to the common population of man . Victoria was the personification of rhinestone tiaras, mascara cries, ridiculous talent costumes, and post-traumatic stress disorder. She is what every good novel or bad press coverage would define as the typical beauty pageant contestant. But Katherine, she was different. She was elegant and calm. Self-assured yet humble. Stunningly beautiful yet perfectly unassuming . We had met two weeks ago, when I discovered this world of hers for the first time. She had given me some of her secrets. But best of all, she had given me her friendship.
“How are you doing with that?” she asked me. “With everything that is going on at the courthouse?”
“I don’t know.”
“You mean you don’t have an opinion?”
“Oh, no, I have a multitude of opinions. I’m just not sure what I know about all the opinions that I have. Couldn’t you tell by my article?”
She laughed.“Savannah, you are too young to be so complex.”
“And I hear I look the worse for wear because of it.”
“Who told you that?”
“A stranger in a floral dress. She said I looked old, or maybe she called me tired. No, actually I think worn out were her exact words.”
She giggled at my pouty lips and droopy demeanor.“Savannah, you look beautiful. Are you talking about the elderly African American lady with the straw bag?”
“That’s her! Has she been in here too?”
“No, but I’ve seen her on the street a couple times . The dress caught my attention.”
I sat down on the steps that led to the fiction section of the bookstore.“What do you think is up with her?”
“Probably lonely . Maybe retired, or her spouse has died.”
“But don’t you think her children would tell her,‘Mother, let’s please don some different attire’?”
She laughed.“You crack me up, Savannah.” She sat down beside me, and her pressed khaki pants slid up at the ankles, fully exposing her cute little black slip-on sandals.
“And she follows me.”
“She follows you?”
“Yeah, and she wants my food.”
“What?”
“Serious. I had to share my lunch with her on Sunday. I mean, I didn’t mind, but with Mother up there strapped to cement, I’ve been a little sensitive about the whole food issue.”
“Well, who knows? Maybe she’s sent to teach you something. Get yourself a good book and put your mind at ease.”
“I’ve got one I can’t find time to finish. Besides, everything in life shouldn’t be a lesson.” I stood and scanned the books . The title Ten Minutes from Normal jumped out at me.“I’m glad Karen Hughes knows where Normal is. I couldn’t find it with a wall map and a day to waste.”
“Well, you could ask her where it is. I hear she’ll be with the president tomorrow.”
“Oh, my word, I forgot the president was coming tomorrow. He’s one president I won’t have to read about. I already know his life story.”
“You do, huh?”
“Oh, yeah,Vicky has the hots for him.”
“Savannah,” she said, giggling, “you shouldn’t talk that way about your mother. She is in love with your father.”
“She may be in love with my father, but I shall not tell a lie after the kind of day I’ve witnessed: the woman would love to be Laura Bush for a day.”
“She would whip your heinie for that.”
“I wish she was home to whip my heinie; that would mean she was cooking too.”
“You could cook for yourself.”
“Tried it. Didn’t work.”
“Some things have to be tried more than once.”
“And some things are better left to the experts.” I gave her a good-natured wave, and the bell gave its ding-a-ling-a-ling at my departure.
“You sure can find a way to get into the middle of things,” said a strange voice as I closed the door.
“Emma!” I was unable to hide my shock.“What happened to you? I mean, you’re clean . . . I mean . . . you’re . . .well, you’re just clean.”
“You made your point.” She tried to stifle a laugh. “Are you always so honest?”
I felt my face flush. “I’m sorry. It’s a curse. Man . . . you just look . . . you look fabulous. I thought I’d seen you around town a couple times. I just wasn’t quite sure it was you.”
“Well, it’s me.” She ran her hands along the seams of her tailored khaki sundress . The black piping lay strikingly upon her golden skin.
The sallow tone present just last week was gone.
“What happened?”
“Uh, humiliation maybe?” She looked straight at me.
I tried not to flinch.“Are you going to yell at me again?”
She smiled.“No. I was harsh. But you deserved it.”
“I deserved worse, actually.”
“I probably did too.” She lowered her head and fingered the bow at her delicate waist. I tried to change the subject.
“You been eating?”
“What?”
“You just look a little healthier.”
“Yes, I’ve been eating.”
“Do you want to go eat with me sometime? Maybe talk, like normal people?”
“No,” she said flatly.
“No?”
“No. I’m not really ready to be your friend.”
“Eating lunch together would make us friends?”
“Yes.” She turned to go.“Well, try not to add to anyone else’s troubles.”
“I’m really sorry for hurting you, Emma.” I hoped she knew I meant it.
She turned around to look at me with the beauty I remembered from her high-school days. “It didn’t turn out all bad, Savannah. Look at me.” She held her arms out at her sides.
I nodded.“Yeah. Look at you.”
She left, but I would see her again. And one day I’d buy her lunch.
Peggy Noonan’s book was lying on the corner of my desk. I lifted it up in my hands, and it opened to page 65 . The red underlines from my own pen caught my eye. They marked her reflection on Reagan’s character as it related to his stance on communism.
“It was in this drama that Reagan’s character was fully revealed,” she wrote.“In a time of malice he was not malicious; in a time of lies he did not falsify; in a time of great pressure he didn’t bend or break; in a time of disingenuousness he was clear and candid about where he stood and why. And in a time when people just gave up after a while and changed the subject, he remained on the field through all the long haul.”
I laid the book down and saw my article still resting on the corner of my desk. After the events of my lunch hour, it didn’t feel like the right story to tell. No, as backward as it sounded, the human-interest story I really needed to explore was mine: the story of the bystander, the uninvolved, the ill-equipped, the student, the one who hadn’t broken under the pressure but avoided it altogether. Maybe exploring this story would help to establish the depths of a relationship, the trust that comes with a writer and her audience . Maybe it would help them to understand me . Maybe it would help me to understand me . The city and I had both suffered our share of upheavals this week. Maybe in a few paragraphs I could help us both discover what we’d learned.
I worked hard until two o’clock. And at the last moment, with no time to spare, the pages slipped out of the printer, and I headed to Mr. Hicks to meet my deadline.
Jessica all but ducked under her desk when she saw me come around the corner.
“Hello, Jessica.” I peered over the corner of the low-walled cubicle that surrounded her desk.
She didn’t respond.
“You can’t stay under there forever.”
She didn’t respond again.
“I’ll catch you when I come back.” I proceeded to Mr. Hicks’s open door and knocked lightly.
A loud thump came from behind me.“Ow!” And the blonde carpet inspector came up rubbing her head.
“Come in,”Mr. Hicks offered.“What’s so funny, Savannah?”
“Oh, nothing much,” I said, trying to control myself.
“Is this your article?”
“Yes, sir. All finished.”
“Are you pleased?”
“Pleased? Let’s just say I’ve come to terms with myself.”
“Well, let’s hope that’s a good thing.”
“It is.” I turned back to the door and paused to ask a final question.“Am I going to be on the cover of the paper tomorrow?”
He looked up from his desk with a slight smirk. “From the reports from the field I have received, yes ma’am, I believe you are.”
“Arms spread-eagle.”
“That’s the one.”
“Declaring I’m a thief?”
“Very probable.”
“I figured.”
“You did?”
“Yes, sir, I’m pretty good at figuring nowadays.”
I sneaked into the ladies’ room before I went back to my cubicle . Three Cokes and no lunch made for an uncomfortable situation. I peered underneath the stalls just to make sure I didn’t walk in on any unsuspecting soul . There were feet in two but none in one, three, four or five. I settled for three. As I locked the door, another pair of feet came to occupy four.
I like to look at feet underneath stalls. Even wrote an entire short story on them for my junior year creative writing course. “The Stories of Shoes in a Stall,” I called it . Today’s feet both wore flip-flops. Stall number two’s flip-flops were black, and the toes were short and plump . They housed their small, unpainted toenails with great padding and protection. As if they just plumped right up around them. Stall number four housed white flip-flops.
I love this place. The owner of the white flip-flops had long toenails painted a deep metallic rust . The nails hung slightly over the toes and were long and narrow. Downright weird . Toenails tend to be a reflection of the individual . Vicky wears red. Always red. Paige wears clear. Always clear. I wear pink. Always pink. In-your-face Victoria. Always-brutally-honest Paige. Always trying to be not quite in your face and hopefully honest, at least when possible,me.
As we each arrived to wash our hands at the same time, I had known before I saw them what they would look like. Their feet had given them away.
“Knock, knock,” came the voice on the other side of my nonexistent door.
“Hey, Claire . Welcome to my office. Come in and have a seat.” This friend of mine was solely responsible for acquiring my apartment with her fabulous real-estate skills.
“I don’t have much time. I’ve got to go show a house in a few minutes. I just wanted to drop off your new keys so you could get your stuff moved in.” She held out the two keys that hung from a long metal loop with a Cora Betts Realty marketing tool at the end.
“This is it, huh?” I asked, holding out my hand cautiously.
She dropped them into my hand.“Yes,my sweet friend . These are the keys to a new way of living.” I looked at them as if they were some medieval torture device. “I’m not sensing an overwhelming rush of excitement.”
I looked up at her pretty yet uniquely proportioned face. “It’s just all happened a little quick.”
“This has been years in the making, Savannah.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I glanced down at my toes, then returned to her pleasant smile.“Where do I drop off my rent again?”
“Here,” she said, handing me a sheet of paper with a ten-digit number on it. “Go to Bank of America and make a deposit into this account . That’s all you have to do.”
“You still won’t tell me who it is?”
“He doesn’t feel it’s necessary. Makes his life less complicated if everything goes through me .Now, enough worrying. I’ll stop by later, when I get off work. I’ll help you move if you need me.”
“Oh, no. I think I’ll be fine. I don’t have a lot of stuff . Thomas and Paige are helping me.”
“Well, call me if you need me.” She lifted my chin and put her other hand on my shoulder. “This will be one of the most exciting things you have ever done.”
“Do I have the look of someone who needs added excitement?”
“This move is about you, Savannah. Not your father, not your mother, just you . This is a grown-up thing.”
“I need to be grown up?”
“Yes, you do .Now I’ve got to go.”And she gave me a hug and walked off.
“I’ll miss my mommy,” I whispered. But she was safely out of earshot. I was glad. I was wishing I hadn’t heard it either.