That Summer(40)

I just looked at her.

“Do you?” She picked up a shoe, one that was yellow and blue and pink, with what looked like Smurfs on it. “I’ll give you ten bucks for this pair. If you have a five and a half.”

“I don’t know . . . ,” I said, looking for Burt, who had disappeared for a bathroom break a good twenty minutes ago. “We don’t really bargain on shoes.”

“You don’t, huh?” she said in a nasty voice, like I’d been rude to her. “Well, that’s just fine. Just find me a five and a half, would you?”

Burt appeared next to me now, smelling like the hand soap we used in the bathroom. “Is there a problem here, Haven?”

“Five and a half,” the woman said loudly, shaking the shoe in my face. I watched the Smurfs blur past, blue and pink and yellow.

“Find the woman a five and a half,” Burt said to me, prodding me in the back with one hand. “I’ll deal with the table for a while.”

I went back in the storeroom and climbed up to the discount shelf, looking for the ugly Smurf shoe. There was a six and a four but no five and a half, of course. I went back out to the table.

“Sorry, it’s not in,” I said.

“It’s not in,” she repeated flatly. “Are you sure?”

“I am indeed,” I said, realizing that I was being a smartass and not really caring. Burt was looking at me. I felt that whooshing in my ears, that powerful evenness. I imagined myself floating down the Lakeview Mall, tied to nothing, the silk of those banners brushing my shoulders.

“Haven, perhaps you can interest the woman in another style,” Burt said to me quickly.

“I want this one,” the woman said, shaking the shoe in front of my face again. Behind her, someone else was saying, “Miss? Miss? I need some help with this shoe, please?”

“We don’t have that shoe in, ma’am,” I repeated to her in a singsong voice, my customer-pleasing smile stretching across my face.

“Well, then, I think I should get another shoe at the same price.” She put one hand on her hip and I watched as the fabric of her bathing suit scrunched, folding over itself at her stomach. People just shouldn’t wear beach attire in public. “It’s only fair.”

“Ma’am, it’s a sale item, we’re out of that size, and I’m sorry,” I said, but already my mind was drifting. Burt was busy untying a bunch of shoelaces and the people were all around me and the Muzak in the mall seemed louder, suddenly. I wondered if I was going to pass out, right there in the middle of the Hot Summer Deals Sidewalk Sale.

“Well, that’s just fine,” the woman snapped. I watched as she tossed the shoe at me. She meant for it to hit the pile probably, but it bounced off a stray saddle shoe in the bin and nailed me in the head, a direct Smurf hit. I was hot all of a sudden, the whooshing in my ears loud and calming, and I felt awake, my skin tingling.

She was walking away, flip-flops thwacking against the floor, as I grabbed the shoe, ducked around the table, and went after her. I could still feel where the shoe had hit me, but that wasn’t what spurred me on and made me rush through the crowd of bargain hunters, following the pudgy lady in the straw hat. It was something more, a giant mass of Ashley’s snide remarks and tantrums, of Lorna Queen’s tiny ears and my father’s new hair, of Sumner standing on our front lawn, abandoned, all those years ago. It was the tallness and Casey’s Rick and Lydia Catrell and Europe, and my mother standing in the doorway watching me leave for my father’s wedding. It was the whole damn summer, my whole damn life, leading up to this moment with this stranger in the middle of the Lakeview Mall.

“Excuse me,” I said loudly as I came up behind her, gripping the shoe in my hand so tightly that I could feel the plastic ends of the laces pressing into my palm. “Excuse me.”

She didn’t hear me, so I reached forward and tapped her shoulder, feeling the smooth rubberiness of the bathing suit beneath my finger. She turned around.

“Yes?” Then she saw it was me, and her eyes narrowed, nasty.

I just looked at her, not sure at all what words would come out of my mouth. We were in the middle of the mall now by the giant gumball machine where the ceiling is high and glass. The sunlight was pouring in across the center court, hot and so bright I was squinting. The noises and voices were loud and rising above me, pushing their way to the skylight and the world outside. People were rushing by and the banners were floating above me as I faced this woman, this stranger, every inch of me tingling, electric.

“You forgot this,” I said to her, in a voice that didn’t sound like me, and threw the shoe back at her, hard, and stood watching as it hit her square in the forehead, the same spot where it had hit me. Then it fell to the floor, bounced once, and landed upright, as if it was waiting for a little foot to wiggle into it.

She was stunned, staring at me open-mouthed. She had gold fillings on two back teeth. I noticed this offhand as the crowds pressed around us and the sun beat down and I was suddenly tired, sure I’d never make it the short distance back to the store.

“I’ll have you fired,” she snapped, squatting down to grab up the shoe, and then added on the way back up, “and I’m calling mall security and reporting this. This is an assault.” She looked around at the few people who had seen me throw a shoe at this woman, and pointed to each of them as she added, “Witnesses! You are all witnesses!”