Lisa Unger - Smoke

She felt a rush of emotion, a childish mix of anger and sadness. Then a familiar numbness washed over her. The letters felt awkward and heavy in her hand. She wished there was a fire she could throw them into.

“I don’t know what to say, Grandma,” said Lydia.

“You don’t have to say anything. Just read them or throw them away. It’s your choice now.”

Lydia got up and walked over to the window, looked at the glowing windows in the building across the street. She did a quick pace of the width of the room.

“It should have been my choice all along,” she said finally.

Lydia walked back over to the couch and sat down. She looked at her grandmother, who looked at the floor. Lydia released a long, slow breath, zoning out on the muted television screen where an older man held a young girl in an embrace while the girl wept.

“Well,” said Eleanor. “It’s like I said. We all do our best in this life, Lydia. I know I did my best.”

When she’d said that over the phone, Lydia had thought Eleanor was talking about her father, but she’d been talking about herself. She knew her grandmother well enough to know that this was as close to an apology as she would come.

Out on the street, the night seemed to have gone from chilly to bitter and Lydia pulled the cashmere of her coat tight around her as she walked down Riverside Drive toward the parking lot where she’d left her car. She could smell the scent of burning wood from someone’s fireplace.

She felt as if someone had smacked her in the head. All these years, she’d thought her father had abandoned her and never looked back. She’d been cold to him when he came to see her that day and she’d thought he’d never reached out to her again. And over the years her feelings on the matter had shifted from guilt and self-blame to anger, to disdain and back again. It had never occurred to her that he might have made attempts to contact her that her grandparents had blocked. She didn’t know how to feel about it. The wind picked up as she walked and she walked a little faster, clutching her bag with the letters tucked inside. She came to a wire garbage can and considered it a moment, just throwing them in and walking away. But, of course, she couldn’t do that.

She was so deep in thought that it took her longer than it might have to sense that she was being followed. Standing by the garbage can, she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. When she started walking again, she heard footfalls behind her.

Lydia ducked into a bodega and walked toward the back, not totally sure of her plan but keeping her eyes on the plate-glass windows that looked out on the street. She opened one of the cases and took out a Pepsi, watching through the glass.

He walked slowly and didn’t try to hide himself. A tall thin man with a shaved head, dressed in a long black leather coat, a black shirt beneath opened to the chest. His strides were so long and smooth that he seemed to be floating when observed from the waist up, as Lydia saw him out the window. He came to a stop and looked in the store. Lydia moved out of sight instinctively, letting the glass case close. But it was too late. Obviously, he’d seen her come in there. He’d seen her move into the aisle. She felt her heart start to dance in her chest as a wide smile spread across his face. He lifted a hand and then wagged a finger at her, in a gesture of reprimand. There was a terrible menace in his smile, a strange vacancy in his eyes. Where have I seen him before? she thought. And then she remembered, the abandoned building in the Bronx. Was it the same man? She couldn’t be sure. The man she’d seen in Riverdale had seemed stockier, not as tall. But it was the same leather coat. She was sure of that.

She reached into her bag and felt the cool metal of the Beretta she carried. She saw the skinny Arab guy at the counter look at the man on the street and then look at her uneasily. He quickly got down on the floor and she heard a cell phone dialing, then some rapid-fire Arabic or some other language she didn’t understand at all.

By now she’d wrapped her fingers around the grip of her gun, her breathing came faster, her lungs felt like they couldn’t get enough air. He started to move. She drew her gun from the bag and heard the clerk issue a little scream. He must have been watching her on a surveillance camera somewhere. She took cover, her body pressed against the metal end cap of the shelves, and watched the door from the mirror mounted near the ceiling at the far corner of the small shop. She saw his large form darken the doorway. She waited for the jingle of the bell announcing that he was coming in but there was silence. And more silence. Then a little whimper, a sniffle. The clerk behind the counter was crying. Then she heard sirens off in the distance. She saw the man in the door turn his head and then run off.

She moved out after him. On the street, she watched him run up Ninety-Fifth toward Broadway and then disappear around the corner. She turned and ran in the opposite direction toward her car.

You’re looking a little frayed, Lydia,” said Dax over the speaker at the end of his drive. “And you’re late. And your phone is off.”

She gave the finger to the camera near the speaker box.

“That’s a vulgar gesture, quite unladylike,” Dax said.

“Dax, will you just open the gate?” she heard Jeffrey say in the background.

The tall wrought-iron gate hanging between two huge stone ballasts opened slowly and Lydia drove up the circular drive. She was glad to hear the heavy metal clang behind her, not looking over her shoulder for the first time since she left the city. She was still shaky with the residual effects of adrenaline; she felt exhausted.

Jeffrey walked out the front door and approached, opened the door of her car for her.

“What’s up?” he said, as she sank into his arms.

“I’ve had a really bad night,” she said.

Was it the same guy?” Dax wanted to know, when they were all gathered in his kitchen after she told them what had happened. She ate a peanut butter and raspberry jelly sandwich Dax provided, an offer that represented the pinnacle of his culinary skills. But Lydia was starving and it tasted fantastic.

“I’m not sure,” she said between gooey bites. “It could have been.”

“Sounds like it,” said Jeff.

“Yeah,” she said. “But it could have been any bald-headed guy wearing a black leather coat. I mean this is New York after all.”

“But how many of them would be following you around?”

She shrugged. “No shortage of freaks in this city.”

“But it wasn’t random,” said Jeffrey, looking at her seriously. She could see that his shoulders were tense. “That wasn’t your vibe.”

“No, that wasn’t my vibe,” she said, shaking her head. “He shook his finger at me, like a warning.” She shuddered a little, remembering his smile, the empty, flat look in his eyes.

“Anybody who knows anything about you knows that a warning has the same effect as a dare,” said Dax. The only indication that he was worried or concerned at all was the slight thickening of his accent. He drew out dare to about three syllables: de-a-ear . Lydia had noticed that excitement, anger, and alcohol often caused him to become nearly unintelligible.

“Okay, so what were they warning you about?” asked Jeffrey.

“Maybe someone doesn’t want you looking into Lily’s disappearance,” offered Dax.

“Or Mickey’s suicide,” said Lydia.

“Or The New Day,” said Jeffrey, eating the crust of the sandwich Lydia had left on her plate.

“Well, you know my philosophy,” said Lydia. “The more people don’t want you looking into something, the more reason there generally is to look.”