thing all day.”
“You’re right, I haven’t. And I will eat something, I promise. But I don’t feel like crying anymore, Bernie. I feel…I feel like I could practically sing.”
“Then do that,” he said.
* * *
And Suzanne, sitting in her car at the rest stop on the turnpike, did not sing. But she sat there for a long while, thinking about their conversation. She thought she would never forget it, it was as though huge windows above her had been smashed—the way the firemen must have smashed the windows of her childhood home— and now, here above her and around her, was the whole wide world right there, available to her once again. She watched as the mother and the young boy got back into their car, laughing at something together. In front of her was a small maple tree, the leaves pink from top to bottom. “Oh, Bernie,” she whispered. “Wow.”
* * *
Bernie sat at his desk, staring out at the river. A kind of quiet astonishment went through him. Somehow, Suzanne had remained uncorrupted; her guilelessness in talking to him was a gift of no small proportion. She was an innocent, this came to her as naturally as breathing, and he felt right now as though her innocence had washed over him, removing some of the areas of disquiet he had gathered over the years in his profession. In a moment he would go downstairs and tell his wife that they need not worry about Suzanne. About the particularities of their conversation he would say nothing; the way Suzanne had helped him would remain his secret. Harmless enough, he thought, standing up, when you considered the variety of secrets people had been keeping to themselves for years.
Light
Cindy Coombs pulled her shopping cart out of the way of a young couple and saw the man look at her. She saw him look away, then she saw him look at her again. Somehow the man’s look made her touch the zipper on her winter coat—it was a pale-blue quilted coat and the zipper was halfway open—and she walked past the two of them down the aisle even though what she needed—two cans of tomato soup—was exactly where the couple was standing. Up the next aisle she went, slowly, the shopping cart, with its wobbly wheel, making a bumping sound. In her cart there was milk and a loaf of bread. She stopped and turned toward the raisins, unzipping her coat more in order to tighten her belt. Then she kept going, not sure what to do. Tomato soup and—what was it? Butter. In her head she kept saying butter, butter, and tried to think where the butter was, and it was where it always was, over past the milk, many kinds of butter waited.
Where was the kind they always got? Where was it? Cindy leaned forward to get a different kind, what did it matter, and then she saw the kind they usually got, and as she leaned over to get it, she started to fall, and caught herself on the handrail of her shopping cart. She pictured her legs as two little stagnant streams, with twigs and dirt; how could they hold her up?
From behind her, a large elderly hand reached and took the butter that Cindy had been reaching for; it got tossed into her cart. Turning, she saw Mrs. Kitteridge standing there, and Mrs. Kitteridge just looked at her, straight in the eye. “Hello, Cindy,” Mrs. Kitteridge finally said. “You’re having a hell of a time.”
Many years ago, Mrs. Kitteridge had taught Cindy in a junior high math class; Cindy had not especially liked her. Cindy said, “I am, Mrs. Kitteridge. I am having a hell of a time.”
Mrs. Kitteridge nodded once, and still she stood there. “Well, let’s figure out what you need, and get you out of here.”
“I need two cans of tomato soup,” Cindy said.
“Let’s get the soup.” Mrs. Kitteridge did not have a cart, just a basket, and she put the basket into Cindy’s cart and took hold of the rail of the shopping cart, but she left room for Cindy to hold it as well; the sleeves of Mrs. Kitteridge’s coat were bright red, and her hands around the rail of the shopping cart were puffy and old-looking. “Where is the damned soup? This place is such a barn these days, you can walk for miles and miles. And it’s a Saturday, so a lot of people are in here.” Olive