The Me You See (22 page)

“I don’t think you do.”

She smirked.

“I know exactly what I’m doing.”

“Trying to push me away? Trying to make me hate you?”

“This is not about that,” she answered. “This is about
protection.”

“Who the fuck are you trying to protect?”

 “I can tell you who it isn’t.”

I waited for it, knowing she was finally going to reveal me
as the person she could care less about. The person who wasn’t worth her time.
The person she could just forget even existed.

“Okay, then. Who?” I taunted. “Tell me what pathetic soul
creeps around this earth and doesn’t deserve to be protected from whatever
chaos it is that you’ve tripped upon.”

She looked straight into my eyes.

“Me.”

My mouth was dry and I tried to speak but nothing came out.

“Don’t you get it, Elliot?” she said. “I’m trying to
protect you.”

 “That makes no fucking sense!” I yelled.

“Why not? Elliot, please. You’re like a brother to me. I
don’t want you to get hurt…”

“Jesus Christ, Stefia,” I said, kicking at the ground. “I
saw you with Niles. I saw what happened! And you say you're protecting me from
you?”

“I can’t explain it to you,” she said, her voice starting
to shake. “Just please believe me that I know what I’m doing…

“I can’t believe I got sucked into this mess,” I said,
raking my hands through my hair. “I mean, do you think he’s in love with you?
For fuck’s sake, Stefia, don’t you get it?”

“Get what?”

“He’s using you!” I screamed, my voice cracking with anger.

A tear spilled from the corner of her eye and her lip
quivered.

“Yeah. Well, maybe I’m using him, too.”

My stare of incredulity morphed into one of repulsion.

“My god,” I said. “You know what you are?” 

“What? I’m dying to know,” she said, sniffling. “Please
tell me what you think, oh great and mighty Elliot.”

“You’re a whore, Stefia. Plain and simple. You’re a fucking
whore.”

She exploded, lighting up like a firecracker and attacking
with everything she had. Her clenched fist cracked at my jaw with such force
that after the connection, the leftover momentum propelled her right to the
ground. I immediately grabbed my jaw, kneading the bone with my thumb, and
stared in disbelief.

She had hit me. She had actually fucking hit me.

She lay on the ground, holding herself up on her side with
one arm. She looked up and nervously studied my face, bracing herself for
whatever I would bring next.

“You know what, Stefia?” I said, my voice calm and
calculated. “Fuck you. Fuck Niles. Fuck this theater. I have
always
been
there for you.”

“Elliot…”

 “No. Shut up, Stefia. Now if you want my help,
you
come
find
me
.”

I turned and walked to my car, not waiting to hear anymore
of her excuses or explanations. I yanked open the car door, threw myself inside,
and slammed it so hard it threatened to fall off its hinges. Twisting the key into
the ignition, I shoved the car in gear before I even heard the engine rev. I
gunned it and sent a spray of gravel behind me, dust settling on Stefia who did
nothing but lie on the ground and watch me speed away.

I didn’t know it then, but that night was the end of the
end.

**

My father parked the car in the church lot. I had opted to
ride with my parents. Why, I’m not sure. Power in numbers, or something like
that.

My mom, ever fearful of the media, ditched the car
immediately and ducked into the church. I could have cared less who was
watching and decided I would sit in the car until I was good and ready to do
otherwise.

My dad stayed in the front seat.

“We can sit in here as long as you’d like,” he said. “No
rush.”

We stayed in the car with the engine idling. I thought
about telling him to turn the car off; that even though we were parked in a lot
bordered by snow and it was only twenty degrees, there was no way I was going
to get cold. But I didn’t. Whether the car was on or off made no difference to
anything.

“Dad?”

“Yes, son?”

 Our eyes met momentarily in the rearview mirror. I looked
away.

“You told me something once,” I said. “Something I never
forgot.”

I could tell he was still looking at me in the mirror but I
couldn’t meet his eyes. I stared out the window at the pathetic reporters and
their equipment. I hoped they all froze.

“What is it, son?”

“Well, you told me that Stefia knew where I lived, and that
if she needed me, she knew where to find me. You said she’d come around. ”

I saw my father shift uncomfortably in his seat.

“Dad, she never came and found me.”

I waited a minute for him to respond but the air inside the
car had grown eerily thick, like a bubble, pressing at the windows, that
wouldn’t break.

“Am I supposed to assume now that she really didn’t need
me?”

I looked down at my jet black suit pants. I picked at an
imaginary stray thread to keep from completely losing the flood of tears I was
holding back.

“Son,” he finally spoke, blowing out a heavy sigh. He
curled his fingers slowly around the steering wheel like he was imagining he
could drive himself right out of the conversation.

“I mean, I waited, dad. Just like you said. I waited for
her to come find me. Because I really thought she was going to.”

I looked up to the rearview mirror again, but dad wasn’t
looking this time. His eyes were pointed out the window in the direction of the
cameras and press, but I knew he didn’t see any of it.

“I believed that she was going to come. Know why, dad?
Because I believed you.”

A gray Kia pulled up next to us and parked. Two men and a
woman got out. I had no idea who they were. The woman pulled her black full
length dress coat around her tighter, and one of the men put his arm around her
shoulder. The three of them walked stoically into the church together. I
wondered who they were. I wondered how they knew Stefia. I wondered…well, I
wondered a lot of stuff.

I guess that had always been my problem.

 “Son, I’m sorry,” he finally said.

“You want to know the worst part? The worst part is that
now I’m never going to know if she needed me or not.”

“I know this hurts, Elliot.”

“Why her, dad?”

And suddenly there was something so real about her being
dead. Something so hard to swallow about the not knowing if where we’d stood
was real or if her stone-faced carelessness was all an act. I tried to breathe
in and choked on a whole glut of tears I’d held back. And then they wouldn’t
stop, a huge ugly sobbing flood slopping down my face.

“Fuck!” I screamed, slamming my fists down into the back of
the seat. “I fucking hate this!”

I bawled, almost suffocating on everything that was coming
up and out of me.

“Why her, dad? Answer me!”

I looked into the rearview mirror and met dad’s eyes again.

“Elliot,” he said. “I don’t know.”

“What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“I mean that sometimes we just don’t know. Sometimes we
can’t know.”

Dad looked away from the mirror, his voice constricting,
and I knew he was going to cry.

“Sometimes, Elliot….sometimes we’re not supposed to know.”

I stared straight ahead at the flat brick wall of the
church. I couldn’t look at him. Because as much as I hated to admit it, I knew
he was right.

I placed my hand on the top of the black matte frame that
hung on my wall, remembering how Stefia was so excited to be in that first show
four years ago. I remembered how she seemed to come alive on opening night,
uncovering a side of herself that no one knew she hid beneath her skin. She was
electric; a perfect sphere of sparks, blazing a streak as far into her future
as one dared to imagine.

I pulled the frame off the wall and laid it face down on my
desk.

I couldn’t look at that picture anymore.

Outside my window, the media perched like blood-thirsty
cannibals across the road, ready to devour anyone willing to speak on camera.
They hungered for the next quote. The next clip.

Signs had been placed in front of the church informing the
press they were not to set foot on church property. You wouldn’t think you’d
have to say that to another human being. You wouldn’t think you’d have to tell
someone that our town is in mourning and we want to be left alone. I wished I
could hang a black veil over the entire community, wrapping us back in the
bubble of anonymity we’d enjoyed before the whole mess began.

Randall, our police chief, had stood in the doorway of my
office three days ago after someone leaked details about the funeral to the
press. He said, “Walter, we’re going to need security for this funeral. It’s
going to be a mess.”

“Security at a funeral?” It was a new one for me.

He leaned against the doorframe and rubbed his forehead
like he was trying to rub the whole thing away.

“Yeah,” he said. “This funeral…it’s just going to be a
nightmare.”

“The whole damn thing is a nightmare. The funeral is just a
small part.”

“Yeah,” he said, popping four ibuprofen in his mouth and
swallowing them without water. He’d been chief for twenty-five years, longer
than I’d been a pastor, and I know he’d never seen anything like this in
Granite Ledge.

None of us had.

**

Generally, I don’t mind funerals.  I don’t have a problem
officiating them. Funerals are supposed to be a celebration of life. Two months
ago, Edith Fletcher passed away. She had spent her entire ninety-five years of
life as a member of the church and we were so sad to lose her here on earth. No
more almond cakes. No more lap quilts. And no more hearing her joyfully belt
out
Blessed Assurance
, slightly off key.

But she had lived almost a century. She died peacefully in
her sleep. She’d lived her life, fulfilled her dreams, marked everything off
her bucket list. She had lived happy, she died happy, and her funeral was, in
the truest sense of the word, a celebration of that long and full life.

But Stefia’s funeral is not.

I want it to be. I should be able to walk to the pulpit
with marked solemnity but effective hope and speak comforting words about
heaven. I should be able to smile warmly at the family and friends who gather
in her honor.

I should be able to do that.

But I don’t think I can.

**

One month ago, Stefia had quietly knocked on my office
door. She came in, sat down silently across from me and set her hands in her
lap. My cluttered desk separated us but I could tell she was nervous. 

It was uncharacteristic for Stefia.

Not once in the fourteen years she’d attended my church had
she ever asked if we could talk privately. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but
ran through several scenarios in my head, guessing at the path of the upcoming
meeting. One thing I assumed was that the conversation would flow freely.
Everyone knew Stefia could sell ice to an Eskimo or make a conversation with a
brick wall seem exciting, so it didn’t seem like a Tuesday morning conference in
my office would be any trouble at all.

But sitting across from me in the crimson padded chair,
Stefia was quiet. Too quiet to be the Stefia I’d watched grow up in church.

“Can I get you something?” I asked. “A water? Some coffee?”

She shook her head and absent mindedly rubbed at her
thighs, so I sat down in my office chair. I rested my elbows on the desk and
folded my hands under my chin. Our eyes met momentarily but she looked away,
saying nothing.

“You wanted to talk about something?” I prodded gently.

“Yes,” she cleared her throat. “I do.”

“Well, what a coincidence.” I smiled. “That’s what I’m here
for.”

She took a deep breath in.

“Pastor?”

I waited, thinking she would continue, but she didn’t. She
just took another deep breath and then smiled weakly.

As I watched her eyes move about the room, stopping to read
book titles on my shelf and identify people in pictures on my wall, I couldn’t
help but notice how beat down and drained she looked.

“You have a picture of me here?” she asked, interrupting my
thoughts of concern. She got up from the chair and walked over to the frame
that encased a memory of her on my wall.