Are you sick?” It was a question I could have asked months before; now it seemed impossible to avoid.
“I’m cold,” she said weakly. “I—don’t seem to have any energy.”
“Should I call somebody?”
“No, it’s all right. Usually if I stay in bed all day I’m all right by the time the boys get home from school.”
“How often does this happen?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Every other day or so now, I guess.”
I had advanced into the room, stood by the side of the bed. I was reluctant to touch her. I now know that the contagion had nothing to do with physical contact with Kelly, that I was safer alone in that house with her than I’ve been at any time since. But that morning all I knew was cold fear, and alarm for my friend, and an intense, exhilarating curiosity. “Where’s Ron?” I demanded. “Is he still out of town? Does he know about this?”
“He came home late last night,” she told me, and I had no way of appreciating the significance of what she’d said.
“What shall I do? Should I call him at work? Or call a doctor?”
“No.” With a great sigh and much tremulous effort, she lifted her feet over the side of the bed and sat up. I could feel her dizziness; I put my hand flat against the wall and lowered my head to let it clear. Kelly stood up. “Take me out somewhere,” she said. “I’m hungry. Let’s go to lunch.”
Without my help, she made it out of the house, down the walk, and into the car. The sun had been shining in the passenger window, so it would be warm for her there. There was definitely a fall chill in the air, I decided, as I found myself shivering a little. “Where do you want to go?” I asked her.
“Someplace fast.”
In Denver I have always been delighted, personally and professionally, by contrasts, one of which is the proximity of quiet residential neighborhoods like Kelly’s to bustling commercial strips. We were five minutes from half a dozen fast-food places. Kelly said she didn’t care which one, so I drove somewhat randomly and found the one with the least-crowded parking lot. She wanted to go inside.
The place was bright, warm, cacophonous. I saw Kelly wrap herself more tightly in the fur jacket, saw people glance at her and then glance away. She went to find a seat, as far away from the windows and the doors as she could, and I ordered for both of us, not knowing what she wanted, taking a chance. There was a very long line. When I finally got to her, she was staring with a stricken look on her face at the middle-aged woman in the ridiculous uniform who was clearing the tables and sweeping the floor. “I talked to her,” Kelly whispered as I set the laden tray down. “She has a master’s degree.”
“In what?” I asked, making conversation. It seemed important to keep her engaged, though I didn’t know what she was talking about. “Here’s your shake. I hope chocolate’s all right. They were out of strawberry.”
When she didn’t answer right away I looked at her more closely. The expression of horror on her face made my stomach turn. Her eyes were bloodshot and bulging. She was breathing heavily through her mouth. Her gloved hands on the tabletop were clawed, as if trying to find in the Formica something to cling to. “That could be me a few years from now,” she said hoarsely. “Working in a fast-food place, for a little extra money and something to do. Alone. That could be me.”
“Don’t be silly,” I snapped. “You have a lot more going for you than that woman does.”
Suddenly she was shrieking at me. “How do you know that? How can you know? I’ve let everybody down! Everybody! All my teachers and professors who said I had so much potential! My father! Everybody! You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Then, to my own horror, she struggled to her feet and hobbled out the door. For a moment, I really thought she’d disappeared, vanished somehow into the air that wasn’t much thinner than she was. I told myself that was crazy and followed her.
The lunchtime crowd had filled in behind Kelly and was all of a piece again. I pushed through it and through the door, which framed the busy street scene as though it were a poor photograph, flat and without meaning to me until I entered it.