Elizabeth sat immersed in her paper and scissors. I wasn’t sure if she had heard me or not, if she had even heard that story or not. My eyes had kept to either the wall in front of me or Willa’s card as I’d remembered her aloud. It was hard enough to share, harder if I had to look at the person with whom I was sharing. The few times I did glance at her, Elizabeth hadn’t been looking back. She’d just been cutting. But now she glanced up to me. “It takes some people a very long time to learn that lesson, Andy,” she said. “And sadly, many never do. They go to such lengths to avoid the pain in their lives that the lengths themselves become a pain that’s worse. You should count yourself fortunate.”
“What are you doing?” I asked her.
“What?”
“The scissors and paper,” I said. “What’s that all about?”
“Oh, sorry,” she said. She rested her project on her lap and gave me her full attention. “Nothing personal, just a habit I picked up a while back. There was a little girl in here named Constance. Very sick, the poor thing. She’d spend hours with scrap sheets of paper and a pair of scissors, cutting out these wonderful little shapes of animals and hearts and snowflakes. It was amazing. She said it helped her to remember and forget at the same time.”
“I don’t understand what that means,” I said.
Elizabeth picked up her paper and scissors again and said, “I didn’t either, but she asked me to try it one day. Can’t say it has the same effect on me, but it is soothing. Sort of allows me to put a picture to what I’m talking about.”
“Or listening to,” I said. “This little talk’s been pretty one-sided so far. I know next to nothing about you.”
“That’s because the point is you, Andy,” she said. “That’s why I’m here, and that’s my job.”
“I get that,” I said. “Pretty hard for a guy like me to keep opening up to a total stranger, though. Even one who’s…”
“Yes?” she asked.
I cleared my throat and said, “Easy to talk to.” It wasn’t a lie. It also wasn’t exactly what I almost said.
“Well, thank you. But in my defense it’s a by-product of my work. I’ve spent a lot of time listening to a lot of people. I was made for it.”
“So these people,” I said, “you fix them up on the inside and just send them on their way? Do you ever see any of them again?”
“Oh, sure I do,” she said. “I like to keep in touch.”
“What happened to the little girl? The one with the scissors and paper?”
Elizabeth slowly turned the paper upward—“She died”—and cut out a small arc.
There wasn’t a hardness to her words. Not much at all in the way of feeling. Elizabeth was stating a fact and nothing more. She might as well have said it was dark outside.
“That sounds a bit cold,” I said.
“That she died? Why?”
“I don’t know. Just sounded like it wasn’t a big deal. It must have affected you.”
“Of course it affected me,” she said, though not enough to stop with the scissors. “Everyone I see here affects me, and I love every single person I meet.”
I weighed the pros and cons of my next question and decided more bad than good could come out of it. Then I asked her anyway.
“Do I affect you, Elizabeth?”
She looked at me with those eyes and said, “Very much so, Andy.”
I didn’t push my luck further but hoped she heard what I’d left unasked. I wasn’t fool enough to think a person could feel anything close to affection toward someone they’d just met, especially when you were wrapped up like a boogeyman in a Scooby Doo cartoon. But as Elizabeth snipped her sheet of paper and looked at me, I knew I was beginning to feel something. I didn’t know what it was or what it could lead to, and I didn’t care. Feeling it was enough.
“So you’re okay with not being happy?” Elizabeth asked.
“Most times,” I said. “Happiness is an overrated emotion at best.”
She nodded. “I think you’re right, actually. No one’s here for happiness. Or rest. It’s all about work, Andy. Everyone has their job to do. That’s the important thing.”
“What sort of job?”
“God wants people to dry tears and mend hearts. That’s pretty much an impossible task until you’ve shed your own tears and had your own heart broken.”
“I suppose you’re right,” I said.
“What about love? Is that overrated, too?”
“By no means,” I said. My smile said more. “Of course, that’s just me. I’m sure other people would have a different opinion.”
“Anyone I know?”
I looked down and pulled the sealed envelope from the box.
“One comes to mind.”
Elizabeth studied the name that had been scrawled on the outside.
“I was wondering when you were going to get around to that one. Who’s Alex?”
“Never got his last name. Doesn’t matter, though. Because I think we’re all Alex, at least at some point.”