Shelter Us: A Novel (12 page)

In their quiet eyes, bowed shoulders, and fallen faces,
We see ourselves
.

We remember we were strangers, too
.

And that we made a covenant not to turn away
.
We open our arms, we welcome them in
.

We keep our promise
.

I once asked my mom if she liked that poem because it made her think of Bibi. She said yes, but also that she connected with it herself. That surprised me. Growing up the daughter of a live-in maid in an affluent neighborhood created its own outsider status, she explained. Someone was always there to put her in her place. I read it again now and linger in the feeling that it stirs in me—this promise not to turn away.

It sits in my heart, unresolved, until I’m too tired to untangle what it means for me and I lumber upstairs seeking rest. Robert’s body heat welcomes me into the bed, but sleep eludes me still. I replay my morning, trying out different conversations I might have had with Josie. I put better lines in my mouth, though I can’t quite hear them. Then I hear my mother’s voice, firm and gentle, telling me what to do.

A
ll week long,
I was vigilant about protecting my Monday alone time, my opportunity to go downtown again. I made sure everyone got enough sleep, I washed the boys’ hands obsessively and made sure they stayed away from sick kids. My car, fresh from the repair shop, stayed in the driveway as much as possible. The days lagged, like the last days of school before summer vacation.

Now, at last, Monday is here. Robert is at work. Joan has Izzy. I have arranged for an after-school playdate for Oliver so I won’t be rushed, he and I have blown our good-bye kisses, and I have flown through the green-painted door. What Robert doesn’t know won’t hurt him. I don’t want him to worry.

I arrive downtown and drive past the address I found for the women’s shelter, but it looks closed. I park and walk back toward it. Broken Styrofoam cups soak up other garbage in the gutter. Shards of brown glass lie in a scatter pattern on the sidewalk over a stain that was probably a puddle of liquor yesterday. I step around it. The stench of urine hits my nose; okay, maybe it wasn’t liquor. My face hurts; I realize I’m clenching my teeth. I try to relax.
Deal with it, Sarah. If that baby has to come this way every day, you can, too
.

The buildings are all the same: concrete boxes, metal roll-down doors, graffiti sprayed on off-white walls, weeds poking through where foundations meet sidewalk. A man talking loudly to himself walks around the corner. As he gets closer, I can smell him, and I
try to become invisible. I can’t make out what he’s saying. It’s nearly English.

I get to the building and try the door. It’s locked. A small sign says O
PEN AT
5:00
P.M
. and provides a phone number. I remember now what Josie told me: she has to be out all day. I try to think where I should look for her. Then I remember: the swing.

Navigating downtown brings out the worst in me. “Goddamn one-way streets!” I complain. I also have some words for the sewer construction that delays me precious minutes. I finally get to Figueroa. “Okay, swing, where are you?” Finally, in an open square next to a four-story building, I see a woman pushing a small child in a swing, a stroller parked next to her. I roll a little closer. Jackpot.

I park in front, then freeze. Am I a stalker? Is there something wrong with me for being here? Oh, screw it. I am here. I get out of the car. I walk toward them, manufacturing bravery. “Josie?” I call.

She turns around, surprised to hear her name. She sees the source of the voice and her face registers surprise, followed by what I can describe only as bafflement. She stops pushing. “What are you doing here?”

I have rehearsed this moment since the sleepless night last week when my mom’s voice rang in my ears. “Would you like to get something to eat?”

She looks down at Tyler, then back at me. She evaluates the situation, no doubt considering my sanity. I appreciate the irony, given Robert’s admonition that I should be wary of her. “Okay,” she decides.

“There’s a place by Union Station. We can drive. Tyler can use my son’s car seat,” I say, pointing to my car behind me. I have interpreted the presence of Izzy’s car seat as cosmic proof that my connection with Josie and Tyler was inevitable, that we were meant to know one another.

Josie responds to my suggestion with disconcerting nonchalance. “It’s okay, I can just hold him on my lap,” she says.

“No.” My voice comes out more sharply than I meant. I try again, more softly. “It’s not safe. Besides, I could get a ticket.”

She exhales, purses her lips, and then complies. She tries to buckle him, but he rebels, wiggling and slithering until he falls out of the seat onto the floor of the car and bumps his chin. He lets out a wail.

She rocks Tyler back and forth, and his crying tapers off. “It’s okay, baby,” she repeats to him as he calms down.

“I’m so sorry. Is he okay?”

“He’s fine.” She quietly tells him he’s going to sit there and be fine, and then successfully buckles him in on the second try. I’m surprised by her patience. I think about the hours I spent in Mommy & Me classes, the number of checks I’ve written to professionals to have them teach me how to talk to my kids like she just did.

“You’re really good with him,” I say as she gets in the back seat next to him.

“Thanks,” she says. “Sometimes I feel like I have no idea what I’m doing.”

Our eyes meet in the rear view mirror. “Welcome to the club,” I say.

W
e drive
to Philippe the Original. My dad brought me here a couple of times when I was little and the firm had a “take your kids to work” thing. I remember it as dive-y and figure we’ll fit in with the scruffy vibe. The first indicator that I’m wrong hits us before we even enter the restaurant, when we pull into the parking lot and see it’s peppered with BMWs and Volvos.

I start toward the entrance, but Josie hangs back. Tyler, in her arms, holds tight to her neck. “Come on! I promise you’ll like it,” I encourage her, a trickle of worry seeping into my mind. I open the restaurant’s side door, and the smells of steak and au jus dipping sauce waft out the door, carried on the shoulders of sated customers wearing ties and carrying jackets over their arms. We walk inside, where multiple lines of office workers stretch from the front counter to the back wall, cooks buzz in the kitchen, and impatient cashiers roll their eyes at indecisive customers. It is packed, despite it being on the early side for lunch, and I realize it must be overwhelming to both Josie and Tyler. Neon B
UDWEISER
and M
ILLER
signs hang on the wall. Two other walls boast enormous clocks with P
HILIPPE THE
O
RIGINAL
in neon script. The main dining room is filled with red Formica community tables, surrounded by short wooden stools. A cashier’s display sells mints, gum, and Dodgers bobbleheads, along with today’s
LA Times, New York Times
, and
Wall Street Journal
. Under one of the clocks, framed reviews from
Gourmet
magazine
and the Zagat guide tell us where we are and why. I am regretting my choice of lunch spots.

It’s easy to catch snippets of conversations—young lawyers groaning about mountains of discovery they have to review, bankers evaluating the new Fed chief’s performance. Their loud voices proclaim their belief that the world belongs to them. At a nearby table, a man stares at his cell phone, thumbs racing, head nodding to indicate that he is listening to his companion while he reads e-mail or checks interest rates. When he looks up, his eyes linger on us before returning to his screen.

We get to the front of the line, order sandwiches, and carry our trays in search of a table. We go into the smaller dining room next door, looking for some privacy. To our left, the wall boasts old-fashioned circus posters and clown masks. On the opposite wall are photos of old trains. I choose a table under a glass case with dozens of model trains, thinking they’ll be a good distraction for Tyler. He stands on the bench of our booth, reaching up to try to see them. Josie is tense. She warns him not to touch. Her voice is sharper than I’ve heard before. I tell myself people are not staring at us.

“I’ll go get us some water,” I say. I want to give her some space to regroup—give myself a breather, too. I’m not sure this was a good idea. I walk across the dining room to the self-serve water fountain and fill two glasses. As I’m deciding whether I can hold a third, I hear my name.

“Sarah? Sarah Shaw?”

I turn around, caught.

“I thought that was you.” I am looking at the face of a man I once knew, trying to bring up his name and how I know him. “How’ve you been?” he asks me. “How’s life after law?”

Oh, right, he joined the NRDC as I was beginning my maternity leave with Ella. What was his name? I’m guessing by his normalness that he doesn’t know what happened. My mouth opens in the hope that if I just take a breath and exhale a sound, his name will come out. It doesn’t. “Good,” I say. “Life after law is good. I don’t miss it at all.”
That should put an end to the conversation. “Anyway, I’d better get back to my friend.”

“Anyone I know?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Okay. Say hello to Robert for me.” He says “Robert” as though he can tell that I don’t remember his name and he’s showing off that he remembers my name and my husband’s, too. I’d better leave before he begins asking about my children. “I will. Bye now.”

I walk back, balancing three small glasses of water, and place them on the table between Josie, Tyler, and me. I coach myself to be normal, but I’ve never been good at small talk. I flash back to what my mom told me about her sorority rush. The older sorority sisters coached them how to talk with the young ladies who sought to be tapped for sisterhood, to ask them about their hometowns, their hobbies, and their families. They used this “speed dating” approach to blow through five conversations in fifteen minutes, and then selected the prettiest ones regardless. What she told me made me choose a college without sororities, but I figure I can give the conversational tips a try.

“So, where are you from?” I begin.

“Oakland.” She swallows a bite of food, waits for another question.

“Oh, I went to Mills!” I guess that sorority stuff works. We’ve got something in common already.

“What’s Mills?” she asks.

“My college. It’s in Oakland. Mills? You haven’t heard of it?” She draws a blank. “Never mind, it’s pretty small. Lots of people haven’t heard of it.” So much for the connection. “I lived in Berkeley for a while, too, in law school,” I add.

“You’re a lawyer?” She looks surprised, but at least our conversation is picking up.

“I was. Not anymore.”

“Why not?”

How do I explain why not, that I left my job for what was supposed to be my second maternity leave, but then my world imploded and I couldn’t go back? That I am still disintegrating, cell by cell? Such
words and fragments float in my head, refusing to connect into sentences. I could tell her about Ella, to show her I’m not what she may think I am—I am not without heartache—but I can’t make the requisite words leave my mouth. So I answer her with, “Maybe I’ll go back when my sons are older.” Then I change the subject. “What about you? I mean, what do you like to do?”

Without a pause she answers, “I want to be a teacher.”

“Really?” My turn to be surprised. The juice from my sandwich drips all over my fingers. I reach for a napkin from the tin dispenser. “Wow, that’s great.”

“Yeah, after high school, I was a teacher’s aide at a preschool. I really loved it. Little kids are great.” Our eyes move to Tyler. “I started taking my certification classes, and then I got pregnant.” It’s hard to imagine her pregnant. She looks so young, so small, like she could still be in high school. But I can picture her in a classroom with small children. She is pretty with no makeup. Her long, dark hair is brushed. It must be hard to look presentable when you’re homeless.

“When I told my mom I was pregnant, she told me I should have . . . well, that I shouldn’t keep the baby, because she didn’t want me to make the same mistake she made, becoming a mom too young.” She stops talking to clear her throat. “I mean, not that she wishes I wasn’t born, but I guess it was hard to be a single mom.” She stops. She wraps Tyler’s half-eaten sandwich in two napkins, then stacks his plate on her empty one. “She wanted me to be a teacher, and she worried I wouldn’t do it if I had a baby. We had a huge fight about that. I told her, I can do it. I’ll live with Frederick, and we’ll have a baby and be a family. I didn’t care that we weren’t married—I mean, my parents were married, and my dad still took off.” She wraps another napkin around the sandwich before putting it in a pocket of the stroller.

“So we got an apartment together. My mom was so upset with me. We weren’t even talking to each other. I worked in the mornings and went to school afternoons and nights. Frederick waited tables and practiced with his band. When Tyler was born my mom tried to make up with me so she could see him, but I was still mad at her. I was like,
‘See? You said I should have an abortion!’ And she was like, ‘I just want what’s best for you.’ She told me to leave Frederick and move back home with her and my little brother.”

“Oh, you have a brother?”

“Michael. We’re eight years apart. He’s twelve. I used to help my mom take care of him.”

“You must miss him.”

Her head dips, her eyes shut, and she goes somewhere away from this table. “Yes, a lot,” she says, opening her eyes.

“I always wanted a sibling. I thought I’d feel less alone.”

We both watch Tyler meander around the room. “Tyler looks a little like Michael,” she says.

“Michael must be gorgeous.”

She smiles.

“So how did you end up in LA?”

“When Tyler was a year old, Frederick said he wanted to come here for his music. I didn’t want to leave my job and school, but I also didn’t want Tyler to lose his dad, so I said, ‘Fine, let’s go.’ And he was like, ‘I’ll go first and get settled.’” She pauses, like she needs to mentally prepare herself to continue the story. “So he leaves, comes down here, and I keep calling him, saying, ‘When can we come?’ And he keeps putting me off, saying, ‘Not yet.’ The problem was, I couldn’t afford our rent in Oakland alone. I didn’t want to ask my mom if I could live with her, because I was still angry, and I still thought that we were going to be a family. I didn’t want to prove her right about Frederick.”