After that, I force myself to slow down, reminding myself the aim is to look vulnerable and easy to catch. Also, I don’t want Sam to fall so far behind that she can’t rescue me if the need arises. Eventually I settle into a nice, even pace and head south along the path hugging the shore of Central Park Lake. I see no one. I hear nothing but the occasional car on Central Park West and the scuffing of my soles against the ground. To my right is a sliver of empty park bordered by high stone walls. On my left sits the lake, its placid surface reflecting a smattering of lights from buildings along the Upper West Side.
I’ve lost track of Sam, who’s still somewhere behind me, creeping through the darkness. I am alone, which doesn’t unnerve me as much as it should. I’ve been alone in the woods before. In situations more dangerous than this.
It takes me fifteen minutes to make a loop back to my starting point. I stand right where I began, my skin slimy with perspiration and two damp patches under my arms. Now is a rational time to find Sam and head back to the apartment, to bed, to Jeff.
But I’m not feeling rational. Not after the day I’ve had. A hollow ache has formed like hunger in my gut. My single pass through the park isn’t enough to make it go away. So I set off on a second one, again walking beside the lake.
This time, fewer lights reflect off the water’s surface. The city around me is winking to sleep one window at a time. When I reach Bow Bridge at the lake’s southern end, everything is darker. The night has swept me into its arms, wrapping me in shadows.
With that dark embrace comes something else. It’s a man, drifting through the park on a separate path fifty yards to my right. Immediately, I can tell he’s not one of the prowling men looking for sex. His walk is different, less confident. Head down and hands thrust into the pockets of his black jacket, his progress is more amble than walk. He’s trying hard to look inconspicuous and nonthreatening.
Yet he’s watching me. I notice how his Yankees cap keeps turning my way.
I slow down, taking half-steps, making sure he’ll be in front of me when our paths connect roughly twenty yards ahead. I long to check behind me and see if Sam has caught up, but I can’t. That might tip him off. A risk I need to avoid.
The man whistles as he walks. The nondescript trill cuts through the silence of the park, high-pitched and airy. I get the feeling he’s trying to put me at ease. An attempt, innocent or not, to get me to let my guard down.
Up ahead is the spot where our paths meet. I stop and mime rooting through the purse, making sure he notices. He has to. The purse is too big to miss. Yet he pretends not to see it, continuing his exaggerated stroll until he’s on the same path, just ahead of me. He keeps up the whistling, trying not to scare me, trying to get me moving again. The Pied Piper.
I start walking. One, two, three steps.
The whistling stops.
He does, too.
Suddenly he’s whirling around to face me. His pupils ping-pong around his sockets, crazed and dark. The eyes of an addict in need of a fix. On the surface, though, he’s hardly threatening. Gaunt cheeks. Body as thin as a broom handle. He’s practically the same height as me, maybe even shorter. The jacket gives him some girth, but it’s all show. He’s a featherweight.
The hardness of his face is amplified by the sweat slicking his high forehead and razorblade cheeks. His skin is as taut as a drum. He practically vibrates with hunger and desperation.
When he speaks, his voice is a sluggish mumble. “I don’t wanna bother you, okay? But I need some money. For food, you know?”
I say nothing. Stalling. Giving Sam enough time to get closer. If she’s even there.
“You hear what I’m sayin’, mama?”
The silence continues on my end. I leave everything up to him. He can leave. He can stay. If he does and causes trouble, Sam will certainly strike.
Maybe.
“I’m real hungry,” the man says, gaze flicking to my purse. “You got food in there? Some cash you can give?”
I look behind me at last, seeking out Sam’s approaching shadow.
She’s not there.
No one is.
It’s just me and the man and a purse that’ll make him really pissed if he looks inside and sees it’s stuffed with nothing but paperbacks. I should be scared. I should have been scared this entire time. But I’m not. Instead, I feel the opposite of fear.
I feel radiant.
“No,” I say. “I don’t.”
I stare at him, monitoring his movements, waiting to see the flex of an arm or the curl of a fist. Anything to suggest he’s thinking of doing harm.
“You sure you got nothin’ at all in there?” he says.
“Are you threatening me?”
The man raises his hands, takes a step back. “Whoa, mama. I ain’t doin’ nothin’.”
“You’re bothering me,” I say. “That’s something.”
I turn, start to walk away, the purse dangling limply from my hands. The man lets me go. He’s too strung out to put up a fight. All he can muster is a parting insult.
“You’re one cold bitch.”
“What did you just say?”
I spin around and stride toward him, pushing close enough to smell his breath. It stinks of cheap wine, stale smoke, and rotting gums.
“You think you’re tough shit, don’t you?” I say. “Bet you thought I’d quake at the sight of you and hand over whatever you wanted.”
I give him a shove that sends him rocking back on his heels. His arms pinwheel as he tries to maintain balance. One of his hands knocks against my face, so light I hardly feel it.
“You just fucking hit me.”
The man’s face goes slack with shock. “I didn’t mean—”
I interrupt him with another shove. Then another. When the man crosses his arms, blocking a third push, I drop the purse and start to swat at his arms and shoulders.
“Hey, stop it!”
He ducks away from my blows, dropping to his knees. Something tumbles from his jacket and plops onto the path. It’s a pocket knife, folded shut. My heart seizes at the sight of it.
The man reaches for the knife. I slam into him, hip against his shoulder, nudging him away from it. When he stands, I start slapping at him again, swinging wildly, hitting his chest, his shoulders, his chin.
The man lunges forward, pushing back now. I fight him off, still swatting, kicking at his shins.
“Stop!” he yelps. “I didn’t do nothin’!”
He grabs a fistful of my hair and yanks. The pain tugs me into stillness. My eyes close against their will, lids dropping. Something flickers in the sudden darkness. Not a pain, exactly. A memory of it. Similar yet foreign to the one I feel now as the man pulls me backward.
The memory pain explodes like fireworks across the backs of my eyelids. Bright and burning hot. I’m outside. Near the trees. Pine Cottage vague in my muffled vision. Someone else has grabbed my hair, is pulling me back while people are screaming.
My fingers wrap around the man’s jacket collar, dragging him to the ground with me. We hit the ground hard, me on my back, him on my chest, both of us puffing out shocked breaths.
We’re eye to eye now. His are dark and scared. Mine are ablaze.
The man notices and tries to squirm away. But his jacket is still in my grip. I hold him down, feeling his weight on me, enjoying the pressure, waiting to see how much more he’ll fight back.
When he goes for my hair again, I’m ready. I roll my head along the ground, evading his tug. Then I tilt forward, slamming my head against his own. My forehead connects with his nose, the cartilage bending.
The man cries out and rolls off me, a hand to his blood-gushing nose. He rises to his knees. His fingers are stained red.
Real pain and the memory pain spark through me like live wires on a car battery, jump-starting my muscles. It cracks the brittle shell around my memory. Tiny flecks of it fall away, beneath which are shimmering glimpses of the past.
Him.
In a similar crouch on the floor of Pine Cottage.
A bloody knife within His grasp.
Although I’m vaguely aware this is a different place in a different time, I see only Him. So I dive on top of Him, curled fists smashing against His face. I punch Him a second time. A third.
Rage takes over. Like a black ooze that’s filling me up, spilling out of my pores, covering my eyes. I can no longer see. Or hear. Or smell. The only remaining sense is touch, and all I feel is pain in my fists as they smash into His face. When it becomes too much to bear, I rise to my feet, directing a kick at His face.
Then another.
And another.