Woman on the Edge of Time

She blinked at the prices and fear took her in the belly. She had to grip the counter. This did not look like a fancy cafй, the people sitting at the counter looked ordinary enough, that man in worn pants and a shirt frayed at the cuffs, that woman in white plastic shoes cracking at the toes, a scuffed plastic purse, a dress puckered at the seams. Had prices risen terribly during the few months she had been hospitalized? She had not eaten breakfast in a restaurant since … since Claud. It wasn’t a thing she could do on welfare. She tried to make herself get up and walk out, but the sight of people eating made her knees dissolve. So many things! How could she choose? She hadn’t had a choice in months. If she had two eggs and coffee only (the toast came with), it would still be $1.59 and that was the special. Her ten dollars shrank in her fist to a crumpled damp ball.

Nevertheless, gripping the counter she ordered the breakfast The waitress behind the counter gave her a quick disapproving glance, a once‑over of her hair and face and denim jacket.

“Where’s the bus station from here?” she asked, and the waitress mumbled an answer so quickly she could not follow and had to ask again.

“What’s the matter, you don’t speak English?”

But the woman with the white plastic purse took over. It was only ten or eleven blocks. The woman seemed shocked that she intended to walk, but patiently explained the directions.

The clock said eleven minutes after ten. The eggs arrived overcooked and the coffee bitter from sitting on the stove, but she ate everything, ate it slowly and gratefully. She ate everything one small bite at a time, down to the last crust of toast wiping up the last smear of egg on the platter, and even the little package that said it was grape jelly. Then she paid and ran out quickly, because she could not leave a tip.

She tried not to limp, nothing to call attention. She watched the street signs and counted the blocks. The bus station was obvious as soon as she saw it.

At the ticket counter she tried to figure out what to do. There were two different schedules for two different lines, and they didn’t have prices on them. Finally she had to ask questions. That was awkward, the young man behind the counter bored. She had to find out how far she could get toward New York as soon as possible on five dollars.

He was reading a book. She could not see the title. He wanted to get back to it and kept his finger stuck between pages while he talked to her. When he had to let go to get the schedules out, he was irritated. He stuck a pencil in. On the cover two naked women embraced while a man about eight feet tall dressed all in black leather cracked a whip around them. Why would anyone read a dirty book in a bus station, sitting behind the counter? Could he bring himself off back there? Would he go into the john? She felt embarrassed wondering such things as she looked into his blank young face, sallow under the fluorescent lights.

“Don’t you know where you want to go, lady?”

Finally she ended up with a ticket that would take her all the way to the Port Authority depot, on a bus leaving at twelve‑thirty. She sat down to wait. It was eleven‑eighteen. Someone had left a newspaper on a chair and she began to read it through, from the front page onward. Soon she would be in New York. Running up the street. Otis, first she’d try to reach Otis, Claud’s old friend. Then Dolly. She read on. She reached an article in the women’s section describing the regimen of Countess Rataouille, a beauty from a simple banking family of Park Avenue, Seal Harbor, Palm Beach, and Monterey, for remaining gorgeous forever, which involved performing isometric exercises, never taking hot baths above the waist, and rubbing fresh strawberries into the skin daily. As her mouth was watering with the thought of fresh strawberries, a shadow fell on her page and a grip took her arm.

“Could we see your identification, you.”

The young man whose dirty book she had interrupted had turned her in. By twelve‑thirty she was back in the hospital, on her ward.

THIRTEEN

“But you said I could room with Sybil!” Connie argued.

“That’s before you messed up,” Valente said firmly. “Listen, if the two of you had tried to pull that game on me, I’d have had you both in seclusion before you could yell Uncle. You wouldn’t fool me for five minutes, and don’t forget it.”

“How could you sign the permission?” Skip asked her as soon as Valente walked away. “They couldn’t make mesign!”

“You’re not twenty‑one. They didn’t need you to sign it.”

“They didn’t need you either. Your brother signed it. Why did you give in?”

Connie shrugged. “I was scared what they’d do to me at Rockover if I didn’t. I figured they had the permission anyhow. I want them to think I’ve given in.”

“Haven’t you?” Skip flounced away, down the wide hallway.