Judy Blundell - What I Saw and How I Lied

It would certainly increase my standing in the cafeteria. I would no longer hover there with my tray, looking for an empty seat. Girls would slide over to make room for me. For us. Margie would be by my side, the interpreter of what had happened to me. I could see her mouth moving, I could see it all, my story served up on a tray with the grilled cheese.

Now I have a story, Peter.

"I don't want to talk about it," I said.

"But—"

"I have to unpack." I said the words so curtly that she reared back, her cheeks red.

"Well, honestly! You don't have to be so rude!"

I reached over and took a blue skirt out of the suit­case. I smoothed it and put it on the hanger carefully. By the time I hung it up, Margie had gone.

On Sunday morning, I saw Ruthie Kalman come out of the drugstore as I was heading to the subway. She speeded up when she saw me. I almost had to run to catch up.

"Ruthie!" My breath came out in a cloud of steam. It was cooler today, a fall day as crisp as an apple.

She turned slightly and said hello while she kept walking.

I matched my steps to hers. "Ruthie. Please stop walking." I knew she didn't want to, but she did. "How are you, Evie?" she asked in a flat voice. "Terrible. How are you?" I saw a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. "I can hear you in chorus," I said. "You have a nice voice."

"Yeah? You do, too."

"Maybe one day we could go to the record store together. Do you like Sinatra?"

"He's okay. I don't get all swoony about him, like some girls."

"Well. I'm not the swoony type. Maybe you could tell me who you like. And we could listen to some songs."

"Maybe."

"Good."

Ruthie's gaze moved to the bag in my hand. "Are you running away?"

"No," I said. "Not today."

I knew how hotels worked now. I knew it would be okay to walk into the lobby, go to the front desk, and give a name. A telephone would be lifted, a name would be said into the phone, and the clerk would say, "Go right up." Or not.

Still I hesitated on Forty-eighth Street. Right now Mom would be making lunch. Joe would be home. Grandma Glad would still be at Mass. Joe told her last night that he'd be looking for a house for us, and she'd be staying behind. She wasn't talking to anyone at the moment. Maybe the phone would be ringing, neighbors calling up now that we were home. Everyone knowing what happened but not asking about it, wanting to be the first to hear the real story.

When the doorman started looking at me funny, I pushed open the door to the Metropole. The lobby was busy, people checking in, people checking out. Newspaper stand, bellhops pushing carts, elevators dinging. People dressed up and ready for a Sunday in New York. Other people pushing through the doors and going into the swanky-looking restaurant.

So this was what a real hotel was like.

A bellhop offered to take my bag but I shook my head. I went to the front desk and waited while the desk clerk gave a couple directions to Toffenetti's. Then he turned to me.

"Mrs. Grayson, please," I said.

"Is she expecting you?"

"No. But she knows me. Could you tell her that Evie Spooner is here to see her?"

He picked up the house phone and dialed. I waited, trying not to squirm.

"No answer," he said after a minute.

"Can I wait?" I couldn't have come this far without seeing her.

He looked at me and I saw him soften. "I know where she is. Eddie will take you up to the roof.”

“The roof?"

He smiled. "The roof. Take the elevator bank to your right."

It was yes-miss and watch-your-step and thank-you-miss and going-up-miss all the way through the lobby and onto the elevator.

"The roof, please," I said.

The elevator man looked over to the desk, and the clerk gave a quick nod.

"Right away, miss." The doors swished closed. I felt the pull in my stomach as it rose. My hands were damp inside my gloves.

"Here you are, miss. Go to your right, and take the third door on your left."

I stepped out. The carpet here was thin and brown, not like the green one I'd sank into in the lobby. I walked past the doors. One of them said Tailorand I surprised a maid coming out, still tying on her apron.

She smiled at me. "Looking for Mrs. Grayson?"

At my nod, she led me a little way down the hall and opened the door marked Roof.

"Go right on up."

I found narrow concrete stairs and an iron railing painted dull red. I pushed at the door and stepped onto the tar surface of the roof.

The first thing I saw was the sign, twenty feet high, maybe thirty, and with light bulbs all screwed in. HOTEL METROPOLE. Behind it, skyscrapers bristled, and I could make out the green rectangle of Central Park.

Mrs. Grayson sat on a camp stool a few feet away, painting at an easel. Her dark hair was in a pony tail, and she wore a smock over a turtle neck sweater and slim trousers. Flat shoes were on her feet. I picked my way past the air vents toward her. When she saw me, she opened her mouth in a comical O of surprise. She laughed as she stood up. I could see how happy she was to see me, and my nervousness lifted a little bit.

"Evie! What a lovely surprise. Come look at this mess I'm doing."

I stepped over to look at her canvas. She was painting the view, tall buildings and the park, all in thick black lines and blue shadows going every which way. Tiny squares of gold marched up and down in vertical rows.

She was right, it looked like a mess.

"I like it," I said.

"You sweet liar. It's not good, but I keep trying."

"That's what you did in Florida — you painted. When you'd go off by yourself."

"Sketching, actually. Do you want to go down to the apartment and get some tea, or stay up here?"

I was dying to see the Grayson's apartment, but I felt better up here in the cold fresh air.

"Up here, please."

"Oh, good. I was hoping you'd say that." She tossed her smock on the stool and led me to a small paved area with folding chairs and a small round table. "Tom and I sit up here in the evenings in the summer. Best view in town."

"Is Mr. Grayson here?"

"He's in his office downstairs."

"Is he still yelling at God?"

She smiled at me. "Yes, he is. But he's all right."

"I came because you invited me, and because I wanted to ask you ... I wanted to talk to you."

"I'm glad." Mrs. Grayson rubbed at a splotch of blue paint on her thumb, like she was working up to some­thing. "Evie, I read all about it in the paper. I think by the end I started to understand what was happening. You loved him, didn't you? I'm so sorry for your loss."

My loss.

Loss.

That's what it was, a hole I could never fill. It would be bottomless. I would have all the not knowing what happened to him, and beside it would be this loss. Never to see him again, never to see his walk or his smile. That was gone from the world forever.

The first time he kissed me it had been an impulse he regretted.

The second time he kissed me it had been a man to a woman. I wasn't too young. He wasn't too old. My mother hadn't existed for us. Everything had gone away except us.

There had been love between us at that moment. He had loved me, at that moment.

"Nobody ever said that to me," I told her. "Nobody ever said they were sorry. I hadn't even said it. Not even to myself. He's dead, isn't he?"

In Mrs. Grayson's eyes was the sadness I'd always seen. Now I had it, too.

"Yes, petal. He is."

He was dead, really dead. It was all gone, his beauti­ful forearms, his throat, his laugh.

I felt tears build up inside my chest, and even though I was good at pushing tears away, this was something I could not stop.

The first sob escaped, and I rocked forward, bury­ing my face in my hands. I was embarrassed but I couldn't stop.