A storm was coming; I could feel it in my bones. I got up and put the kettle on and filled a few pots with water in the event the power went out again. I had been trying to write for weeks, but nothing more than drivel bled onto the pages. I had hoped with perseverance that the words would come. They used to come — the words — before. They would flow from me, at times unstoppable, pouring themselves onto scraps of paper, the insides of cigarette packs, or the shrinking space around the edges of a discarded newspaper. It was as though something took control of my fingers and made them magically dance — whether on scraps of paper or a keyboard — like a mad pianist’s fingers. And when they would rest, I was eager to read what the possessed fingers had scribed.
I had managed to finish writing the other stories I had intended, as best I could. Some were from memory, some from people’s accounts, and some from all the old scraps I had written on; words and sentences that deserved to be remembered and documented. The stories were snapshots and vignettes of other evening entrepreneurs or belles of the boulevard, as I liked to refer to us — softer terms by far than the numerous, harshly unimaginative ones too often used to describe the work of so many extraordinary women trying to survive.
But the story that was mine to tell — the final one — demanded to be told before time, distance, and memory further dulled the horrific events in an attempt to shield me from them at long last. The story was evasive and resisted forming coherently in my scattered mind. My struggle was proving to be a difficult one. I couldn’t help but feel a deep and wrenching fear of what the spilling of words would condemn me to, but I was still compelled to write them in spite of consequence. I felt the urgency as news broke, yet again, of another murdered woman. And my thoughts returned to the harsh reality of the streets.
There is an incurable epidemic of violence that exists in the darkened spots where women make efforts and take pains to survive. We are too often in isolation, far from a place where a scream for help might be heard, a struggle observed, or the possibility of protection provided. There is an ever-present and unnerving sense of fear that festers behind the smiles. The fear was present each time one leaned down to peer in at a customer for only seconds before making the decision to open a car door and step in … or not. We couldn’t make an accurate appraisal for fear of being spotted by police, fear of arrest, fear of confinement, and for some like me, the fear of inevitable withdrawal if arrested. We were not often afforded more than a fleeting assessment of the man who occupied the driver’s seat, even with the knowledge that he could be the next rapist, strangler, or killer. It was wrong, and had always angered me.
The whistle blew, startling me, and reminded me that I had put the kettle on. I turned off the stove and opened the little spout to silence the screaming whistle. I picked up the tea bag, dropped it in the mug, and poured the mineral-rich water over it. The aroma and the gentle curls of steam usually had a calming effect, but not today. I settled at the counter overlooking the forest beyond with tea in hand.
I was exhausted. I had been lately plagued by dreams that were vaguely familiar — so much so that I would wake viscerally affected. These dreams were somehow linked to the life I had tried to leave behind — dreams of another time, dreams I tried desperately to get back to just to know what happened next. There was a continuity to them that played out each time I slept, as if they were chapters in an old book that I had once been familiar with, but had never read in its entirety. I couldn’t quite make sense of them, but that didn’t stop me from going to bed earlier and earlier each night just to get back to them.
The wind picked up and began to howl in that creepy, high-pitched way it sometimes does. In the distance the now audible rumbles of thunder grew louder and closer, and my dogs began to pace. I shuddered as if by reflex and allowed my fingers to touch the scars that had become a part of my face. I moved my fingers back and forth over the long scars across my forehead, down my left cheek, and then back up again to the permanent small hollow at the tip of my right cheekbone, and let my fingers rest there. It was a habit I had been trying to break for years.
The windows rattled as I peered outside them, transfixed. I watched and listened as the grand old trees bowed and moaned as if crying out in pain, contorting as they did. The wind, an entity in itself, always seemed to arrive before the darkness; it suddenly picked up as though in a rage, whipping and breaking through the trees violently. The skies darkened belying the time of day. The storm I knew was coming had begun. I was hypnotized by it. The storm remained for hours, bringing with it blinding sheets of rain, thunder, and lightning. The power flickered on and off, struggling against the storm, this time winning the battle.
Other than reheating water for my tea, and soothing my dogs, saying, “It’s okay, guys, it’s okay. Good dogs,” I hadn’t moved from my spot. When the storm was spent, I couldn’t help but feel I had made it through another one from the safety of my beloved old farmhouse, the home I once rarely ventured out of. I had stared the storm down, watching its havoc as I sat there at the window in defiance against it. I had experienced many storms, but today I had refused to give in to the fear it demanded of me. I was tired of always being afraid — so tired. Let the old house shake, the windows rattle, and the trees fight it out as they must. As the wind died down and the trees regained their individual, elegant postures, and as the clouds broke, I knew it was time to write the last story.