Goodnight Beautiful(31)
Truth be told, I’m more than a little hurt that Sam didn’t tell me about his situation. That’s absurd, I know. Being trapped under $120,000 of debt is far too unhappy a topic for happy hour, but I could have helped him process what got him into this situation and devise a plan to tackle it. (On the other hand, I also have to admit to feeling a smidge better about things. Sam’s coldness these last few weeks wasn’t because of anything I did. He was worried about the debt!)
I’ve just finished cutting out the article when a flash of color passes by the window. I rise from my chair for a look. It’s the Pigeon. I consider slipping into the bathroom and waiting for her to leave, but it’s too late. She’s waving at me through the window. I put the scissors away, walk calmly to the door, and fix on a smile.
“Did you see the article?” she squawks the second I open the door. “About Sam?”
“I was just reading it.”
“I’m a wreck.” She squeezes her eyes shut and then does the last thing I would expect: she reaches out for a hug.
The last time someone touched me: A list
March 4, seven months ago, the day I left Albany.
Xiu, the oldest of the four girls whose parents owned Happy Chinese on the first floor of my building. I watched her and her sisters grow up in that restaurant, working behind the counter, taking turns accepting the two-dollar tip they knew was coming when they handed me the plastic bag of food—chicken-fried rice on Mondays, barbecue spare ribs on Fridays, every week for six years.
Xiu was sitting on the floor in the foyer near the mailboxes, chewing the end of her ponytail and reading The Diary of a Wimpy Kid. She asked me where I was going with such a big suitcase, and when I told her I was moving and wouldn’t be back, she stood up and hugged me goodbye. I couldn’t believe it, a gesture so sweet it brought tears to my eyes that persisted an hour into the Greyhound journey toward Chestnut Hill, New York. (Coach seats on Greyhound. I’d just deposited a check in my name for more money than I could have ever dreamed of and yet there I was, in seat 12C, staring down six more inches of leg room and a reclining seat three rows in front of me, just $29 more.)
“Saw the police stopped by your place, too,” the Pigeon says, finally letting go. She lowers her voice, as if she’s afraid the dog might hear. “What’d you tell them?”
“Oh, you know. That I saw Sam leave for the day, dashing to his car, probably hoping to beat the storm.”
“I saw him drive by, too. He was crazy for driving in those winds. A friend of mine got a tree through her roof, and most of the town lost power.”
“I heard.” I was up early, with local meteorologist Irv Weinstein, who could hardly contain himself on the 6:00 a.m. news (Hundreds of downed trees! Electricity out in the eastern part of the county!).
“Poor Annie,” Sidney says.
“She must be worried sick,” I agree.
“I saw them together, a few weeks ago, at a thing. They seemed happy. Still can’t believe someone pinned that guy down.” She pauses. “Sam and I dated, you know.”
“No, Sam didn’t mention it.”
She laughs. “Why would he? It was a long time ago. And brief. Anyway”—she takes a folded piece of paper from her back pocket—“I came to tell you there’s going to be a search. Some guys from our class are organizing it. Everyone’s meeting at the bowling alley in an hour.”
I take the flyer. “‘Community search for Sam Statler,’” I read.
“Well, for his car, I suppose. Chances are he was in an accident, right?”
“Or a fugue state.” I googled it last night: Why do men disappear without a trace. “There was a guy from Delaware who went out for doughnuts,” I tell the Pigeon. “Found him two weeks later, trying to get a face tattoo in San Diego. Had no idea how he got there. Anyway”—I hold up the flyer and take a step further inside—“Thank you for letting me know.”
I close the door and stay in the foyer, listening to her retreat down the driveway. When she reaches the hedges, I turn the lock and read the flyer again. “Meet at Lucky Strikes at 10 a.m.! Dress warm!”
In the kitchen, I take my clipping of Harriet Eager’s article and go to the library, where I slide open the pocket doors and remove the purple binder from the shelf. At Agatha Lawrence’s desk, I carefully punch three holes into the flyer and the article and then snap open the metal rings, putting them in place at the back of the binder. I close the rings and page forward through the contents, past Sam’s credit card bills, which I added this morning, to the very first entry in Sam’s binder. The interview he gave.
I’ll never forget the day I came upon it and first learned about Sam. I’d been living in Chestnut Hill for three months—alone, in this big house, filled with a dead woman’s memories. I called a contractor to come fix a leak in the living room ceiling, and came downstairs as he finished to find the wood floors covered with duplicate copies of the Daily Freeman, Sam’s face peeking out every few feet. I picked up a copy and read the interview. Local boy, he was moving home to take care of his mother, the former secretary at the high school. His answers were charming and funny and I went straight to Google, staying up into the night, reading about his work, and I knew right away that he was someone I wanted to know.