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  “But I will still be your friend,” Rashid said brightly. “Would you like another beer?”

  Chapter 27

  Among Emerson’s responsibilities as an orderly was, upon request, to assist the families in packing their loved one’s belongings when the infirmary’s services were no longer needed.

  He didn’t mind doing this if the patient was going home—if the broken hip had healed, if the stroke had stabilized, if the diabetes had improved. He’d get cards and homemade cookies, offers of introductions to unattached granddaughters, and occasional updates on the conditions of “his ladies,” as he sometimes referred to them. But when one of them died, and almost always by fate’s thumb in the eye this was someone he’d grown especially fond of, it was like losing a member of his own family.

  This time, a cold, raw day in November, two of them had passed on, one after the other. Packing up after these two ladies had been especially hard. Mrs. Nickerson’s family, who rarely visited, had insisted on handling the job themselves, convinced that the infirmary staff was not to be trusted, and had left Emerson only the tasks of mopping the floor, pulling up sheets, and scrubbing the toilet. He’d been flattered to be asked to help with Mrs. Fanelli’s things, since he’d grown close to her daughter and son-in-law, who visited often and somehow had discovered his weakness for chocolate donuts. But he’d been completely undone when in Mrs. Fanelli’s dresser drawer her daughter found a package wrapped in Christmas paper and tagged with Emerson’s name. He would have waited the six weeks until the holiday, being a big believer in traditions, but they’d encouraged him to open it immediately. Inside he had found a muffler hand-knitted in wool dyed the pale blue of his eyes. This had astounded all three of them because Mrs. Fanelli had been three-quarters blind.

  Emerson was wearing this muffler as he got into Rashid’s car. The muffler probably didn’t go with his pea-green army coat. The wool scratched, but it didn’t matter. If someone had cared enough to make him something to wear, he’d wear it. He thought that somewhere in what he imagined to be heaven, Mrs. Fanelli was looking down at him and smiling. Then she told him to sit up straight and get a haircut. He pulled himself up a little taller in his seat, pushed his hair behind his ears, and checked the effect in the rearview mirror. Maybe he might do it, for her. Someday.

  “Can we go now, or are you still making yourself beautiful?” Rashid said, grinning.

  Emerson relinquished the mirror and sank into his usual slouch as Rashid backed out of the driveway. He had secretly hated that grin for days, but there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it. Emerson himself had said he didn’t mind if Rashid stayed friendly with Sarah, if he helped her move into that despicable new apartment or rearranged her furniture or repotted her philodendrons. The thought of Sarah with plants was laughable. He hadn’t seen or heard of a single one in her care that languished into anything more than a desiccated hunk of sticks and soil. But according to Rashid, they were lush and green, and as proof, he took home cuttings to root on the shelf over their kitchen sink. There were pieces of Sarah in salsa jars, Pepsi bottles, chipped beakers he’d rescued from the lab. If Rashid couldn’t get Emerson to her, he seemed determined to bring her home to Emerson.

  Just for spite, Emerson was convinced.

  That afternoon, he found the grin especially loathsome. Because in a few hours, Rashid would be making Sarah dinner: curry and lentil goo and flat bread and the special beer he had to drive to Manlius to buy. Which was why Rashid wanted to hurry to the mall, find his fiancée a birthday present, and get back.

  Which was why Emerson was taking his damned sweet time.

  * * * * *

  Rashid bought a bottle of expensive perfume, a scarf, a watch, and a pair of pearl earrings. A casual observer would think he had something to feel guilty about, the way he was spending his money. Especially when the casual observer was Emerson.

  Something inside him began to burn.

  “I need to get a few things,” he said. “I’ll meet you back at the car.”

  He stomped out of the jewelry store and into the mall, where his senses were assaulted by tinny Christmas music, the glare of green and red lights, and the whining of children in line to sit on Santa’s lap. His head throbbed. He walked faster, knowing only that he had to get away, out of the crush of people and their false cheer. Parents shielded their children from him as he stormed by. He must have looked monstrous to them, a modern Frankenstein in his big green coat, blue scarf, long hair, and winter boots.

  Oh, fuck you, he snapped at them in his head. They couldn’t possibly imagine the raw, pulsing ache inside him, the gaping hole in his body he had created by pushing Sarah away. He willed a meteorite to fall out of the sky and crush them all—Santa and the decorations, the bratty, sniveling kids, the speakers, and Rashid and his American Express card.

  It can take me out, too.

  This last thought paralyzed him with self-pity. He collapsed onto the nearest empty bench and dropped his head into his hands, hating Christmas and the memories it stirred up, feeling sorry for himself that he wouldn’t have Sarah this year to make it almost pleasant for him. He took deep breaths as he tried to gather up the fractured pieces of his mind and let the cool air and the relative quiet soothe him.

  He’d landed in a spur of the mall, a little-used back entrance between, he noticed for the first time, Victoria’s Secret and the bookstore. He filed away the irritating coincidence of where he had wound up, the two stores as metaphors of the disparate parts of his psyche.

  Later, he would find it amusing. In the moment, it was just pathetic. He wanted to look up his old college roommate and kick his ass for rescuing him from that window.

  Then, out of a general hum of distant conversation, of sleigh bells, crying babies, and Muzak carols, he thought he heard his name.

  He looked up. No one met his gaze, no one he knew. Not in the hallway, not in the bookstore. But at Victoria’s Secret, two pretty salesclerks arranged shimmering green and red lingerie on a table near the entrance. Like a magpie he was drawn to their shiny charms: the way they moved in their tight little dresses, the music of chatter between them.

  One of the women reminded him of Sarah, by the shape of her body and her long, smooth hair. But something else was familiar about her. Then he remembered: Mrs. Fanelli’s granddaughter, Daisy. She’d visited a few times and came to help her parents clean out Mrs. Fanelli’s room. And with a generous hug, she’d thanked him for taking such good care of her grandmother.

  He found himself on his feet, walking toward them. She turned and blinked quizzically at him for a second, as if she, too, knew him from somewhere.

  Then she smiled, going from cute to gorgeous. His knees turned to jelly. “Emmett, right, from the infirmary? I thought that was you over there.”

  “Emerson,” he mumbled at his boots. Good-looking women still intimidated him. He didn’t know how he had ever gotten up the nerve to talk to Sarah in the first place. Probably because she’d been in trouble. Sarah in trouble always brought out the best in him.

  “Emerson. Right...” She nodded, her voice trailing off, the way women sometimes did when they tired of you and wished you would go away. Then she said, “It looks good on you.”

  “What?” He looked up and noticed that the other salesclerk had mysteriously vanished.

  “The scarf, dope.”

  His hand went to it as if realizing for the first time there was something hanging around his neck. He fingered the scratchy wool. “Yeah, I...this really knocked me out. I mean, she was almost blind, I know you can still knit by feel, count the stitches, but how did she know what color...that it would be exactly...”

  A mischievous look bloomed on her face. “Because I told her. Nana said she wanted to knit you something for Christmas and asked me to pick out a good color.” She took a long look into his eyes as if appraising her choice. “Yep. It works.”

  First he was disappointed. He wanted to believe it had been magic, that nearly bl
ind Mrs. Fanelli knew by some sort of extrasensory perception, by the sound of his voice or the feel of his touch what color would be best. But this was better. That a pretty girl had thought so long about the color of his eyes. It rendered him temporarily speechless.

  A managerial type hovered near a rack of frilly things on satin hangers. “I should get back to work,” Daisy said. “Really, thanks so much for taking care of Nana. She was lucky to have you.”

  The words fumbled out of his mouth before he could stop them. He asked her if she wanted to get together for coffee sometime. It hadn’t come out that coherently, and he didn’t even drink coffee, but she understood the general drift. And shook her head. “I’m sorry. I sort of have a boyfriend. He wouldn’t like it.”

  He nodded. Of course she had a boyfriend. What had he been thinking? “That’s okay,” he said. “I’m sort of not really over my last relationship. It wouldn’t be any good. I’d be thinking about her. I’m the one who should be sorry.”

  Her face softened. She blinked moistly at him. “Whoever she is, she’s a total idiot.”

  “Huh?”

  “Never mind. Look,” she lowered her voice, “we’re having a sale. And I get this employee discount? Pick something out for her for Christmas. I’ll buy it for you and you can pay me back.”

  He smirked. Her logic was hopelessly adolescent. A gift wouldn’t make Sarah love him. It had never worked before. Although for the last ten years, his greatest—and many times only—joy of the season had been shopping for the perfect present for Sarah.

  “Just do it,” Daisy said, grabbing his elbow. “Come on. I’ll help you. And if it doesn’t work,” the look on her face reliquefied his knees, “call me.”

  * * * * *

  It didn’t hit him until Emerson had returned to Rashid’s car that he’d spent far too much money on a gift he had no business buying, let alone giving. But the promise in Daisy’s smile had led his reptilian brain to select emerald green silk pajamas. Not because he thought it would change anything between him and Sarah, although this would be the perfect gift if they were still friends, because she should sleep in something nicer than other people’s T-shirts. It was because he felt like he had betrayed her by thinking about another woman. Worse, the other woman looked an awful lot like Sarah. He felt just as guilty as Rashid.

  “Something nice for your mother?” Rashid said, when he noticed the pink bag being tossed onto his back seat.

  “Shut up,” Emerson said.

  Chapter 28

  That day, Sarah wasn’t going home to her Emerson-less apartment, flowered armchair, and shot of Amaretto.

  At least not right away.

  Displaying a good consultant’s knack for timing, a sandy-brown head and a well-cut suit appeared in the doorway of the office Sarah shared with two other assistants, both of whom had gone home to their husbands over an hour ago.

  “Sarah, you ready?”

  “Just a minute.” She put the week’s haul of transcripts into her purse for Emerson, wondering why she still bothered. “Okay, we’re out of here.”

  Her first-date smile was a little slow, a little tarnished.

  He held up her coat. “Slight change of plans,” he said with a twinkle in his voice, as she put in one arm and then the other. “I hope you like Indian food.”

  Sarah sighed. At least it wouldn’t remind her of Emerson.

  All during dinner he talked about himself, confident in his highly valuable and expensively acquired skills. Obviously groomed fingers dabbed pieces of fried bread into a dish of tamarind masala. Green and red Christmas lights shaped like chili peppers blinked on and off. He told her how successful he was, how busy. He told her about the assignments he had to turn away, the holiday shopping he couldn’t find time for, and the water skis and summer cottage he never got to use.

  Sarah pretended to listen.

  She longed to speed up time and get this mistake of an evening over with. It had started with a short, stupid thought a few days ago that maybe it was just sex she’d been missing. Again displaying impeccable timing, the focus-group consultant had been in town, wrapping up a project before all the suits in the office disappeared on end-of-year vacations, and asked to take her to dinner. He seemed nice enough, and handsome, in a rugged, un-Emerson kind of way, and she thought it would be good for her to go out with him, as a distraction, or maybe an antidote, but it was only making her desire for Emerson worse.

  She never thought she would miss him like this, so physically. As if he had done something to her body beyond words or thoughts, tuned her to a specific key only he could play, and she hadn’t realized how subtle and how profound the change had been until he cut himself out of her life.

  Cold duck. She could use a few glasses of that herself.

  After spiced tea and dessert, the check came. The consultant pulled corporate plastic out of an expensive-looking wallet. “It’s still early,” he said, twinkling at her. “Anything in particular you’d like to do?”

  Go home, she thought, but that would be rude. While he didn’t have any sway over her job, she would have to work with him again.

  “Maybe go hear some jazz?” It was about as un-Emerson-like an activity as she could imagine.

  Although he was amenable to her offer, and even knew a nice club a few miles away, her attempts at inoculation still weren’t working, and she realized how foolish she had been to think it would make any difference where they went, what they did, or how much he talked about his success or his material possessions. It would still be Emerson she wanted, not just a warm body with a handsome face and good credentials.

  After the first set, she pleaded a migraine and asked to be taken home. She sent the consultant back to his hotel with a handshake and a smile, a thank you and a promise to do this again real soon, a promise she knew she would never fulfill.

  * * * * *

  No more men, Sarah decided. Except for Rashid, who didn’t really count, since he was engaged, a friend, and therefore, safe.

  Plus he was her only link to Emerson.

  The following Friday, transcript file growing a little fatter, they met again at the pizzeria on Westcott, where he told her everything Emerson had been up to. It was absolute torture, but still she hungered for every detail. He’d had bronchitis, Rashid said, and she worried if he was dressing warmly enough. Two of his patients had died, and she wanted to call and offer her condolences because she knew how attached he got to them. And a girl had visited Emerson at work, one day when Rashid came by to pick him up and take him to where his car was being repaired.

  “Girl?” Sarah swallowed her beer the wrong way and coughed for a while. “What girl?”

  Rashid chattered on. “A granddaughter of a former patient. Friendly. Maybe a little too friendly.”

  How could he, she thought. So soon? “You mean she’s cheap?”

  Blood crept into his face. “I think maybe that is the word.”

  “Are they dating?”

  He hesitated. “I’m not sure. I think I remember him saying she has a boyfriend, but that he isn’t very nice to her.”

  She could have killed the little slut. “So she’s using Emerson to get back at her boyfriend?” A more painful thought occurred to her. Perhaps he was using this girl to forget about Sarah.

  Rashid looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Perhaps we shouldn’t be talking about him like this.”

  Sarah sighed.

  “We will talk about something else,” Rashid said. “Like the dinner I will make for you this weekend. Better even than the last.”

  He told her what he would be making, how his cousin who owned a restaurant taught him how to prepare it, and where he had to go to find all the ingredients. But Sarah wasn’t really listening.

  Chapter 29

  Emerson weathered the holiday season at the infirmary, scooping up all the extra hours he could, content to scrub, fetch, carry, and let Charlie beat him at game after game of checkers. He did everything he could to avoid thin
king about Christmas. And Sarah. And Christmas without Sarah.

  By the middle of January he was exhausted and more than ready for a Saturday off. It was his first decent break in a week of double shifts, Medicare screw-ups, and more new patients than any county infirmary staff should have to handle.

  He slept until noon and then hit the shower. While fumbling half-blind for the shampoo, he sliced the pad of his left index finger on a pastel-colored, razor blade foot-callus-shaving doohickey that used to be hers.

  He swore blue steam at the dangerous personal grooming device and its former owner while he squeezed the cut halves of his flesh underneath the shower spray, letting the hot water and the bleeding clean the wound.

  It never failed. Just when he began to feel optimistic about one day getting past Sarah, something she’d left behind kicked his ass—a carelessly placed bottle of vitamins, a forgotten book underneath the sofa—forcing him to think about her all over again.

  But this was the first time she’d drawn blood.

  After bandaging his finger, he buried the implement beneath a wad of tissues in the trash can in the room he still thought of as hers, in the process uncovering a spent lipstick and a pair of mint-green nylon panties with sprung elastic that he had to restrain Dirk Blade from taking.

  Declaring himself mentally incompetent to be in the house a moment longer, he dressed quickly, grabbed his wallet, keys, and a stack of overdue library books and then fled.

  Miraculously, his car started, and he thanked God for sparing him at least this one symbolic nose-tweaking. He drove to the bank and deposited his overtime pay in the savings account he’d started for nursing school. While there, he took out enough cash to keep him afloat until the next month, when he would start seeing checks from the magazines again. It wasn’t much money, but he didn’t need much. Sarah had been his only extravagance.