The Woman in the Window(62)

My shins brake. Metal. The gate. I wave my hand until I’ve grasped it and draw it open, step through. The soles of my slippers slap concrete. I’m on the sidewalk. I feel needles of rain pricking my hair, my skin.

It’s strange: In all the months we’ve been experimenting with this ludicrous umbrella technique, it never occurred to me or (I assume) to Dr. Fielding that I might simply close my eyes. No sense in wandering around sightless, I suppose. I can feel the shift in barometric pressure, and my senses prickle; I know the skies are vast and deep, an upside-down ocean . . . but I screw my eyelids tighter still and think of my house: my study, my kitchen, my sofa. My cat. My computer. My pictures.

I pivot left. East.

I’m walking blind down a sidewalk. I need to orient myself. I need to look. Slowly I unshutter one eye. Light dribbles in through the thicket of my lashes.

For an instant I slow, almost stop. I’m squinting at the crosshatched innards of the umbrella. Four blocks of black, four lines of white. I imagine those lines surging with energy, bulging like a heartbeat monitor, spiking and sinking with the rhythm of my blood. Focus. One, two, three, four.

I tilt the umbrella up a few degrees, then a few more. There she is, bright as a spotlight, red as a stoplight: that scarlet coat, those dark boots, the clear plastic half-moon nodding above her. Between us stretches a tunnel of rain and pavement.

What will I do if she turns around?

But she doesn’t. I drop the umbrella and cram my eyelid shut once more. Step forward.

A second step. A third. A fourth. By the time I’ve stumbled over a crack in the sidewalk, my slippers sopping, my body shaking, sweat sliding down my back, I’ve decided to hazard a second look. This time I open the other eye, lift the umbrella until she flares within my view again, a streaking flame. I flick a glance left—St. Dymphna’s, and now the fire-red house, its window boxes throbbing with mums. I flick a glance right: the beady eyes of a pickup staring down the street, headlights livid in the gloom. I freeze. The car swims past. I squeeze my eyes shut.

When I open them again, it’s gone. And when I look down the sidewalk, I see that she is, too.



Gone. The sidewalk is empty. In the distance, through the haze, I can make out a knot of traffic at the intersection.

The haze thickens, and I realize it’s my vision thickening, quickening.

My knees buck, then buckle. I start to sink to the ground. And as I do, even with my eyes reeling in my skull, I picture myself from overhead, shivering in my sodden robe, my hair pasted against my back, an umbrella dipped uselessly in front of me. A lone figure on a lonely sidewalk.

I sink further, melting into the concrete.

But—

—she can’t be gone. She hadn’t reached the end of the block. I shut my eyes, picture her back, the hair brushing her neck; then I think of Jane as she stood at my sink, one long braid plunging between her shoulder blades.

And as Jane turns to face me, my knees brace themselves against each other. I feel the robe dragging along the sidewalk, but I haven’t collapsed yet.

I stand still, my legs locked.

She must have disappeared into . . . I review the map in my brain. What’s beyond that red house? The antique shop sits across the street—vacant now, I remember—and beside the house is—

The coffee shop, of course. She must be in the coffee shop.

I lift my head back, raise my chin to the sky, as though I might fling myself upright. My elbows piston. My splayed feet press against the sidewalk. The umbrella handle wobbles in my fist. I swing one arm out for balance. And with the rain misting around me and the hiss of traffic in the distance, I build myself back up—up, up, up—until I’m once again standing.

My nerves crackle. My heart ignites. I can feel the Ativan in my blood vessels, clearing them like clean water gushing through a disused hose.

One. Two. Three. Four.

I scrape one foot forward. A moment later, the other follows. I shuffle. I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’m doing this.

Now I hear the traffic squalling closer, louder. Keep walking. I peek at the umbrella; it fills my vision, surrounds me. There’s nothing outside it.

Until it jolts to the right.

“Oh—sorry.”

I flinch. Something—someone—has bumped into me, knocked the umbrella aside; it rushes past, a blue blur of jeans and coat, and as I turn to watch, I see myself in a pane of glass: my hair in weeds, my skin damp, a tattersall umbrella protruding from my hand like an enormous flower.

And behind my reflection, on the other side of the window, I see the woman.

I’m at the coffee shop.

I stare. My vision bends. The awning overhead droops toward me. I shut my eyes, then open them again.

The entrance is within reach. I extend my arm, fingers trembling. Before they can grasp the handle, the door jerks open and a young man emerges. I recognize him. The Takeda boy.

It’s been more than a year since I saw him up close—in person, I mean, not through a lens. He’s taller now, his chin and cheeks a scrubland of blunt dark hair, but he still radiates that same ineffable Good Kid–ness I’ve learned to spot in young people, a secret halo orbiting their heads. Livvy’s got one. Ethan’s got one.

The boy—young man, I suppose (and why can’t I remember his name?)—props the door open with one elbow, beckons me in. I notice his hands, those fine-boned cellist’s hands. I must look derelict, yet still he’s treating me this way. His parents raised him right, as GrannyLizzie would say. I wonder if he recognizes me. I suppose I’d scarcely recognize myself.