On Second Thought
Page 42

“Okay. I can handle the rest without you. Thanks, Max.”
“Talk to you tomorrow.” He walked off. A nearby toddler looked at him and ran wailing to her mommy, making me smile. Good old Max.
I put my camera in the bag. “You sure you guys want me to come?”
“Yes!” Lizzie said. “Please. If you don’t mind.”
“No, no, it’s fine. It’s kind of...” Fun, I was going to say. But it was, sort of. So much better than being back home.
Daniel grabbed my bag and the light reflector. He already had Lizzie’s suitcase. “Want me to carry something?” I offered.
“Please. I’m a New York City firefighter. I could carry all this, you, her and a German shepherd.”
“Be careful. My ovaries are melting,” I said, getting a snort from Lizzie. “And are you a firefighter? I somehow forgot that.”
“Right?” she said. “I don’t think he owns a shirt that doesn’t have FDNY on it.”
“Hush up and lead the way, Lizzie,” he ordered.
Despite the fact that we were on our way to deliver a verbal and hopefully not physical ass-whupping (or because of it...there was something very appealing about the outraged Brooklyn male protecting one of his own), I felt unexpectedly...happy. I snapped a few candids of Lizzie, who was bouncing around like a puppy now, swinging around a lamppost, hopping up on a rock, even doing a cartwheel on the grass.
We came out of the park into my old ’hood. Oh, the buildings.
There must be a term for us real estate junkies, who cooed over every building, every door, every planter. I took a few pictures of them, too, the gentle brownstones. A boy of about seven or eight skateboarded past me wearing a David Bowie T-shirt and pink-printed jeans. Ah, the hipster spawn.
When was the last time I’d been back in Park Slope? Two months? More? Nathan and I had come out for the biannual dinner to benefit the Re-Enter Center in February, and he’d grumbled about the traffic on the West Side Highway. It was one of his rare bad moods; the weather wasn’t great, and parking, of course, was nonexistent, and the dinner was not the type of gala he usually went to; it was a spaghetti supper in the cafeteria filled with parolees.
Daniel hadn’t been there; he’d been working, and I remember wishing he’d been there to meet Nathan and see that I was happily married. And maybe—maybe—to show Nathan that I had an extremely good-looking friend. You know how we women are.
Speaking of the man, the legend, the hot firefighter, Daniel was half a block ahead of me, his long legs and fury making him a lot faster. I ran to catch up. Lizzie pointed to the door and then cringed as Daniel ran up the stairs and pounded on the front door.
A young man opened the door. “Is this him?” Daniel asked his sister.
“Yes,” Lizzie said.
Daniel grabbed him by the shirt, earning a yelp, and hauled him onto the stoop. Closed the door behind him so no parents would interfere (I assumed). The boy was cute, already manly but like a blade of grass compared to Daniel.
Daniel gave him a shake. “Did you threaten my little sister?” he growled. “This angel? This beautiful girl who means the world to me? Did you scare her somehow? Did you in any way make her life less wonderful for even one minute?”
The boy’s eyes were wide, and he wisely opted not to struggle. “I...uh—Hey, Elizabeth, um, I... No? I mean, if I did, I didn’t mean to?”
“What did he say to you again, Lizzie?”
“He said he’d make me sorry for breaking up with him.”
Daniel gave Ewan a disappointed look. “Well, I’d say that sounds like making her life less wonderful, Ewan. What did you mean by that?”
“Um...I don’t know. Nothing?”
“So you didn’t mean you’d hurt her or scare her or follow her or bully her or spread rumors about her or make her life less wonderful in any way.”
“No,” squeaked Ewan. “I...I wouldn’t do any of those things.”
“So you were just hurt because she’s moved on.”
“Yeah.”
“And she’s perfectly safe in every conceivable way a person can be safe, is that right?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know that in addition to me, she has forty-nine other firefighters in Park Slope who care very deeply about her personal happiness and safety? And not just that, Ewan. Did you know that we firefighters consider each other brothers and sisters? We do. So in a way, Lizzie here has more than ten thousand firefighters here in the greatest city in the world who are her brothers and sisters. Isn’t that great?”
“Um...wow, yeah, that’s great.”
“It is great, Ewan,” Daniel said. “It’s so great. Lizzie is probably the most loved and protected girl in all of New York, don’t you agree?”
“Yes.”
“Is there something you’d like to say to my precious, angelic, perfect baby sister, Ewan?”
“Sorry?”
“Now, Ewan. You can do better than that.”
I had to admit, this was really fun.
Ewan looked at Lizzie and swallowed. “I’m sorry if I scared you. I’d never do anything, not really. I was just...” He looked down. “Sad.”
“And in the future, you’ll just let yourself be sad, Ewan. Feel the feelings and leave my sister alone. Got it, son?”
“Yes.”
“Yes what?”
“Yes, sir.”
“If anything happens to her,” Daniel said, “if a dog bites her, if a bridge falls on her head, if she’s attacked by a shark, I’m holding you responsible.” He looked at his little sister. “We good here?”
She nodded, smiling.
“Okay, you can go, Ewan,” Daniel said, and the kid scrambled back inside the door.
Daniel and Lizzie came down the steps. “So much testosterone,” I said to Lizzie, getting a smile from Daniel. “Where does he keep it all?”
“In barrels behind the garage,” she said. “Can we still do the drama shots?”
“My place is way on the other side of the park,” Daniel said, hefting her suitcase.
“So?” she said. “I thought you were Superman. Just fly us there.”
“You know what? I’ll call my tenants and see if they’re in,” I said. “My old place is three blocks from here. Maybe we can use it if they don’t mind.”
I texted my tenants, both doctors, who were at work. I’d given them a nice price on the rent, since they were both residents in pediatric oncology, and they always included a nice note with their rent payment about how much they loved the place. Take as long as you need, the husband texted.
So Daniel, Lizzie and I headed over to 4th Street. I glanced at him as we passed the house he used to live in with Calista, but he didn’t look at it. If Lizzie was aware that he used to live there—she would’ve been a little kid back when he was married—she didn’t say anything.
Funny, how simultaneously familiar and odd it felt to be back in my old building. The walnut railing felt as smooth and cool as ever, but I hadn’t set foot in here since December. As we reached the third floor, it smelled different—a hint of curry and cardamom, and just the smell of someone else’s house. I opened the door.
Home, yet not.
Different furniture, bright tapestry wall-hangings, a row of potted herbs on the kitchen windowsill. In place of my pink-and-green couch, there was a futon, and the TV sat on the floor amid a nest of wires and an Xbox. Still, the view across the street, through the branches of the locust tree, grabbed my heart and squeezed.