Connections (14 page)

Eileen’s blue eyes took inventory of 83
^rd
Street as they scanned both sides of the street, east to west and back again. Her head nodded unconsciously in time with her right foot tapping impatiently on the stoop. Fibber McGee whined. Eileen Hargan held on to the concrete banister and let him pull her down the steps. He led her to the next brownstone and circled the scrawny tree in front of it. Now that she couldn’t leave him home alone and had to take him with her wherever she went, he was outside more than ever. She wondered how he could possibly have anything left to make. He looked at her for approval as he lifted his leg over the miniature fence and dribbled a few drops. “Good boy, Mr. McGee. That’s my little man. Aren’t you good?”

Eileen stood on the sidewalk, squinting into the sun. Waiting. She waved to Wally, who was sweeping the sidewalk a few doors up the block. She timed a black delivery boy going into the house across the street with groceries, making mental notes in case she was asked in court exactly how long he was inside—that was assuming they found the hacked-up body and caught him! When he came out not even two minutes later, whistling as he mounted his bike, Eileen shook her head vigorously from side to side to clear her ridiculous thoughts. Too much television. Too much imagination. Too much fear. But after what had happened to her—what almost happened to her—she had every right to suspect everyone. Of everything.

Ah, the postman’s cap was outlined in the white haze, his Bermuda shorts exaggerating the geometric angles of his bare legs. The silhouette of his three-legged cart looked like a strange creature from another planet. Eileen walked toward the corner to meet him, silently rehearsing her complaint.

“Morning, miss,” the postman called to her as he took his bundle up the steps of number 429 and disappeared inside. Eileen waited at the curb, with Fibber sniffing the ivy surrounding the tree trunks and leaving a few drops at each stop.

“You come later and later each day,” Eileen said as he walked out, beginning to talk before the door closed behind him and he started down the steps. “Why, when I first moved here, the postman came at 10:00 every morning. Sharp. And then again at 3:00 in the afternoon.”

“Two deliveries a day?” the postman responded in surprise. “How long ago was that?”

“It doesn’t matter. The service has been deteriorating for years, while the postage keeps going up. Now here it is, the seventeenth of the month, and my phone bill hasn’t come. Or Con Edison. They’re always here by the fifteenth. That’s when I pay them. That day.” She walked along next to him as he pushed the cart. He stopped and went into the next building, and when he came out, she continued the conversation as if he had never left. “I don’t like to be late, not even one day. I always pay everything on time. If they shut my phone off, it will be your fault.”

“Now, you know they’re not going to shut your phone off if you’re one day late paying. Or a week late. You know what? They wouldn’t even shut it off if you didn’t pay at all. Not after all this time.” Joe Briney smiled good-naturedly, took the thick rubber band off a bunch of envelopes, and went into the next building.

If it wasn’t Eileen, it would have been one of the other old ladies. He supposed they had nothing better to do than wait for each bill to come. When it didn’t, they yelled at the mailman. They were all like that. It must be a symptom of age, he thought, like arthritis. He’d have to warn his wife to look out. First time his bones creaked out loud in the morning or he asked why the Verizon bill hadn’t come on the appointed day—whichever came first, bones or bills—she’d better put him away.

“That’s not the point,” Eileen said, as if there had been no interruption. “I just don’t want to be late. I like to pay everything when I’m supposed to. Keep my records straight.”

“I know. I bet the phone company—and the gas company—wish all their customers were like you, Ms. Hargan. Beautiful out, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but it’s too hot.” Eileen looked up at the sky. “We need some rain.”

“Here we are.” He took out his stack for her apartment building, and she followed him inside.

“So, you taking the missus to California again this year?” Eileen asked.

“Naw.” He fanned out the envelopes and started placing them in the boxes. “Too hectic. I just might stay home and do some stuff around the house—painting, things like that.”

“Well, when you do, you’d better tell the other guy—the relief, the temporary helper—to be careful. Or I’m going to go down to 34
^th
Street if I don’t get my mail on time.” Her wagging finger threatened him. “Or write to Washington!”

“Tell you what: I’ll put up a note on the bulletin board to be extra careful about 83
^rd
Street. But don’t worry; I’m not going ’til the fall, probably.” He passed her an envelope.

For a minute, Eileen’s stomach turned queasy. But
they
didn’t actually mail anything; they delivered their messages in envelopes for her. No, with the service being what it was, how could anybody rely on the post office if they wanted to send a ransom note or one of those letter bombs she sometimes read about in the papers? “Hmmmph, it’s just an ad.”

“Well, let’s see, we’ve got some more to get through.” It was a good thing Joe Briney was easygoing by nature. Because next, they’d get mad at him for what people sent to them. But this one, she was one of the few who at least gave him a Christmas gift. Talk about inflation! She complained about stamps going up, but she was still giving him the same three dollars—crisp new ones in a money envelope—that she gave him nine years ago when he started this route.
Poor little old lady
, he thought.
Poor? Hah, probably has a million bucks stashed away or close to it
. He noticed the brokerage statements she got every month. What good did it do her, though, if she had nobody to spend it on…except her raggedy old dog?

The temperature had hit 88 degrees by 11:00 a.m., and with the heat index at 97, the air was thick. It clung to bodies with a heaviness that weighed people down and sucked their energy. Breathing was exhausting. Like you were inside a cloud. The concrete sidewalks turned sticky and stuck to shoes. The steel and concrete and glass of tall buildings absorbed the sun’s rays and intensified their power. The humidity was oppressive.

🙧

Lenny Marcus’s tie hung out of his seersucker jacket like a mottled tongue. Coming out of the restaurant after lunch into the dense heat had momentarily shocked him. He walked up Madison Avenue quickly, anxious to get back to the office. His body felt as rumpled as his suit. Even the soles of his feet were burning. Maybe he’d stay late and clean up some of the stuff on his desk. At least it would be cool. And there’d be no arguing. He could time it to get home just when dinner was put on the table. And he double-checked his iPhone calendar—this was a Center day for Clifford, so they’d eat about seven, and Jessica would be busy asking about his swimming lessons and crafts.
Nuts!
He tried to snap his fingers, but they were too wet. The water tower in the building was turned off at 6:00, so there wouldn’t be any air conditioning after that. No matter what, he wouldn’t go home. Maybe he’d stop somewhere and have a drink.

🙧

Rosa rolled the tissue up and down the trough between her breasts where the perspiration had accumulated. She spread her legs and tented her skirt to catch the hot breeze from the floor fan. It was probably cooler outside than in her stuffy apartment. But for the one or two really uncomfortable nights they had had so far, it didn’t pay to buy an air conditioner. If she did, she wouldn’t even know where to put it—in the bedroom or the living room. And who would put it in for her? She could ask Wally, but she’d have to give him something, at least twenty dollars. She’d manage. What did people do before they had air conditioning? They survived. They went to work, they went about their business, and they never knew any different. But they got spoiled; they expected air conditioning everywhere now. “Right, bambina?” she asked.

Princess struggled to stand, her mouth open, her little body panting hard. She shuffled toward Rosa, strenuously pulling her back paws after her. Poor thing. She should have at least gotten one for her baby. Princess could barely breathe as it was, but the temperature made it such a great effort. Rosa was afraid her heart would just give out. Relieved to have made it halfway across the room, Princess’s four legs folded under her, and she collapsed on her side in front of the fan. With a grunt that was part wheeze, part sigh, she closed her eyes. She was so still that Rosa leaned forward and stared at her chest until the faint ripples confirmed that Princess was still alive.

🙧

Laurie inserted her flash drive with one hand and removed the plastic lid from her cup of iced tea with the other. She broke a packet of sugar over the tea, replaced the lid, and punctured the slit for her straw. Then she leaned back in her Posturepedic secretarial chair and took a long pull on the cold drink. She carefully set it down on a napkin, as far from the keyboard as she could, and logged in to her computer. When she was prompted for her password, she entered FELIX11. Anybody who knew her well and wanted to break into her files would try her cat’s name first. Same with her bank card. But that password had the seven easiest characters for her to remember.

She accessed a Word document from her directory—as long as she was doing it on her lunch hour, it didn’t matter. Someday maybe Dr. Pomalee could use her information for the book he was always saying he was going to write. It might even be the inspiration he needed to get started. He’d probably be excited too, when he saw the data she had collected. But she’d save it until it was all finished—if it ever was.

She spelled out ODDCOUPLE to retrieve her protected file and slid her notes and pamphlets closer to her. Adding to the information already in the document, she typed: “Three-and-a-half to four million dogs and cats destroyed every year in US, one animal every three seconds, twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year. Approximately ten thousand a day.” Give or take.

🙧

Jason almost caught her in the act. Since he had to go to the meeting right from the store tonight, he went home after the lunch rush to walk Sabrina. As he came into the lobby, the elevator door whooshed on its spring, the arrow above it lit up green, and Nettie Pedersen’s face flashed in the round window before the car left its mooring. Jason stuck his tongue out, pushed the button, and then went into the small cubicle to get his mail. There it was, next to the notice about the exterminator coming on the second Tuesday of every month, crudely lettered with a black felt-tip pen:

He ripped the paper down, leaving its corners still Scotch-taped to the wall, crumbled it up, and stuffed it in his pocket. Then he went back to the elevator and rattled the knob as hard as he could, the door banging against its lock. The whirring motor got louder as the car got closer. He pulled the knob again and shouted up the crack, “You stupid bitch.”

Clifford tripped on a rock. As he went down, he flattened his hand to brace his fall, letting the leash slip out of his fingers. “Ma! Ma! Kola!” he screamed at the top of his lungs, not even feeling the rawness where the skin was scraped from his knees and the dirt rubbed into it. His panic was far greater than his injury. His shrieks pierced Jessica’s ribs and made her heart jump. She dropped her book on the bench and ran toward her child. As she got closer and saw the streak of fur become a golden-white blur behind some trees, her instinct made her go after the dog rather than her son. She ran in the direction she thought Kola had gone but couldn’t catch sight of her. Clifford’s cries turned to a wail. Jessica started to cry herself. “God, no, not after all this. She can’t run away. Oh, God, don’t let her get lost.”

It was useless, so she turned around and headed back toward Clifford. He was sitting in the same spot, his arms folded over his head, hiding his face. Two women were trying to console him, not knowing how deep his anguish was. “Clifford, darling.” Jessica reached for him. His arms tightened around himself, and Jessica felt such hopelessness, such despair, that she wanted to crawl into the darkness with him. He couldn’t—he
couldn’t
—go back. Oh, God, don’t let him. And the money was all for nothing then. Kola lost and the money too. A wave of thankfulness washed over her as Clifford stood up and came close enough to her for Jessica to wrap her arms around him.

Kola’s tail stiffened in the wind she created with her speed. Her legs stretched long, her ears pulled back, her nostrils spread, her head reaching for the currents. She yelped with joy. As she sped past concrete paths and wire garbage pails and metal vending carts and the wheels of baby carriages, toward the open field, she saw the countryside that reminded her of where she’d come from, and she ran faster to get to it.

She emerged from an opening and darted across the moat of traffic that formed an island for the Grand Army Plaza. Then she ran toward the tumult of Fifth Avenue. She stopped abruptly and looked all around. The noise confused her…of horses whinnying in front of their buggies, of the cars and busses, of people stampeding across the street as the light turned. Where was her boy? Why wasn’t he on the other side of the leash? He should have been attached to one end of her leather umbilical cord. She was used to the city. But it took a second of utter fear for the transition from her happy fantasy to the lonely world surrounding her.

She turned in tight circles, fast, trying to get her bearings. Then she backed up as far as she could, ignoring the screech of tires and horns as cabs tried to avoid her. She took a running leap onto a metal bench and vaulted over the wall. Back into Central Park. Because Kola knew, without knowing, that the last thing she wanted was freedom.