Chapter 4 #2
“I’ll be glad to hold forth on another date.” Sadie put down her half-eaten cookie, then cocked her head, looking at Anne. “As long as you hold forth, now or in the immediate future, on what’s been going on with you since your birthday.”
Someone had once walked in on Anne in a changing room at Neiman Marcus. The sudden spike of fear and anxiety she’d felt then was identical to how she felt now.
She turned away, unable to face Sadie directly. Hadn’t Anne wanted to have a conversation? But not like this. “What do you mean, what’s been going on with me? I’m fine.”
“So you say. But I say you’ve been off for the last couple of weeks. Either too quiet or picking unnecessary little fights or tapping your fingers against your palms like you’re getting paid to do it. Spill. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong!” It came out too loud.
Now Sadie’s tone softened with obvious concern. “I know that sometimes I’m too blunt for your WASPish sensibilities. So I wanted to wait for you to bring it up first. A little like you hand-feed a deer, by staying still until the deer feels safe to come to you. But you didn’t come. So here we are.”
“I’m not a deer,” Anne snapped. She pressed her hands against the denim covering her thighs, hard. “I’m a person. And there’s nothing—nothing—except—”
Silence, full and heavy.
Then she felt the pressure of Sadie’s right hand on top of her left one.
“It’s me, beloved,” Sadie said gently. “It’s your Sadie. You can tell me anything.”
Not anything. Not this. Not when it could be the beginning of the end of everything.
Anne bit her tongue hard enough to sting. After ten seconds, she finally managed to get the words out. “Hal and Talisha told me about Barnard.”
Silence again.
It took every bit of strength for Anne to turn her head toward Sadie. Even in the direct light from the French doors, she could see shadows lengthening Sadie’s face, the stillness of that full mouth as Sadie took this in.
“Well, fuck,” Sadie said, and pulled her hand away.
“And I know you’re going to New York for an interview, even though you let me think you were visiting Sam.
” Now that the dam had burst, Anne couldn’t stop herself.
It felt like a purge. “You weren’t going to tell me?
What were you thinking, Sadie? Were you just going to move out in the middle of the night and send me a postcard?
‘Thanks for the last four years, now onto the next adventure.’ Doesn’t this”—she gestured between herself and Sadie, unable to put words to what she meant—“mean something to you?”
“What kind of question is that? Of course it does! I was going to talk to you—once I figured out—”
“Once you figured it out? Oh, I see. So this was never going to be a conversation. Fine. You go ahead and make your decision.” Anne’s throat felt thick with her anguish. “And while you’re doing that, I can get a head start on planning your farewell party.”
“Good God, will you hush for a second and listen to me before you gallop off on that high horse? I didn’t mean I was going to tell you after I made a decision about the job.” Sadie swallowed visibly. “I did want your input before I decided. I still want it.”
“Oh,” Anne said, a little mollified. “But you haven’t even asked for my input. And you’ve known about this for what—weeks? A month? More?”
“They first reached out to me about six weeks ago.” Sadie had the good grace to flush with obvious embarrassment.
“The campus visit offer came two days before your birthday. I’m so sorry I didn’t say anything.
I was going to tell you this weekend—before I left for New York on Tuesday. I swear I was.”
Anne believed her. “But you always want to talk about everything. Why not this? Especially when it’s so important?”
“Well,” Sadie said, too lightly and too quickly, “you’re right, I do love talking.
To anyone, honestly, not just you. You most of all, of course, and I always corner Rabbi Aviva after services—and then there are the girls in my yoga class, and Hat Dan when he’s having one of his good days, but of course I also talk to Manny, from—”
“—the airport parking lot, yes, I know—”
“—his kid’s got a loose tooth, she’s awfully nervous because she doesn’t want to lose a part of herself, and I deeply empathize, so I’ve been telling him everything I know about gestalt psychology, just in case it helps.”
Anne couldn’t keep up. “A loose—wait a minute, what—?”
Sadie stood abruptly. Her face was pink, her breath coming fast.
“Sadie? I don’t understand anything you’re—”
“I can’t stand the idea of leaving you!”
It was a loud, shrill, frightened cry that echoed throughout the room.
The oddest sensation pulled hard inside Anne. It felt almost exactly like the rush of wet sand sinking beneath her feet as the ocean drew away to build a wave.
Now Sadie was the one who couldn’t make eye contact.
“That’s what I needed to figure out before I talked to you.
Why the thought of not living next door to you feels so—so—” She clasped her neck with one hand.
“It doesn’t feel like I’d miss you. Nothing that normal.
It feels like my throat’s being steeped in wet concrete—”
Anne’s heart tripped over her ribs.
“—like, like salt would just slip right out of my food if you weren’t there with me, like all the parties in the world wouldn’t mean a damn without your perfectly-arched right eyebrow decorating the room—”
“Sadie.” Anne grabbed the edge of the table. She was sitting, which meant she couldn’t fall down.
“—I know, I know, you must think I’ve gone completely off my rocker, and maybe I have, but I just—the thing is, I just don’t know if I can live somewhere, anywhere, without you there.
” Then Sadie looked at Anne, and the feral desperation in her eyes felt like a burst of heat blazing across Anne’s face. “I think—I think—”
“What?” Anne had just enough breath to get out the word.
“I can’t live without you,” Sadie said simply.
A small sound strangled in Anne’s thick throat. Her hands clenched involuntarily.
Sadie laughed, a sound with no humor in it. “Ridiculous. Melodramatic. I know. I swear, I know. But say something, won’t you? Tell me what you’re thinking. Please tell me something. Anything.”
Take me to you, imprison me—enthrall me—
Anne gasped and put her palm over her mouth.
“Anne?”
I can’t be apart from her. I have to be with her.
I can’t live without her.
“Please—”
She jumped to her feet, grabbed the back of the chair with one shaking hand, and burst into tears.
“Anne!”
I’m fine, she tried to say, but the words wouldn’t come. Helpless, all she could do was sob through her open mouth.
Dense pain impaled her chest. Maybe she was having a heart attack. Maybe this was exactly what a heart attack felt like. Her heart, attacked.
“What is it?” Sadie grasped Anne’s upper arms with both hands, her face pinched with worry. “What’s wrong? What do you need? I didn’t mean to—”
Anne pushed Sadie away and bolted from the table.
The sounds coming out of her as she ran toward her bedroom were alien in her own ears, like someone else was sobbing, someone she’d pity. She’d never felt more mortified in her life, and that was a hell of a thing for a woman with an ex-husband who’d abandoned her because he was, he was—
The bedroom door slammed behind Anne. She had just enough self-presence to remember to lock it before she stumbled toward her bed and sat down, hard.
Sadie couldn’t bear the thought of leaving Anne. Because Sadie couldn’t live without her.
And here came the plain and simple truth of it, rising up inside Anne, unmistakable for anything but what it was: Anne couldn’t live without Sadie.
What did that mean?
She couldn’t—she couldn’t look at it—
The pain in Anne’s chest constricted like a hand making a fist. Any minute now, she’d be able to regain control over herself and stop crying. Any minute.
“Anne!” The door handle rattled.
Goddamn it. Sadie didn’t ever know when to give up.
“Anne? Would you please let me in?” A pause. “I can’t leave until I know you’re all right.”
“Go—a—way—Sa—die—!” Humiliatingly, each syllable had its own sobbing breath.
“No dice, sunshine. Not when you’re like this. Just remember, panic attacks are like a rip current. You don’t fight them, you swim parallel to the shore. Listen to my voice. Breathe. In, out. In, out. In, out. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
Anne thought: Why does that terrify me? She thought: It’s a bad idea to go swimming in the ocean because sometimes people can’t find their way back.
“Anne?” A gentle tapping sound on the door. “Are you listening to me?”
Anne pressed a hand to her breastbone and tried, as hard as she could, to breathe normally. Please, God, she said to herself. Oh, please. And again and again. Please, please, please.
She begged as hard as she could for something she couldn’t name. It wasn’t the kind of prayer Anne had been taught as a child, the kind with two hands pressed piously together. Instead, she had one tight fist squeezed against her heaving chest, trying helplessly to stop the wave.
* * *
It took a half hour for Anne’s panic to fade. Curled up on her bed, legs pulled in toward her chest as close as she could get them without an answering twinge in her lower back, she began to breathe more regularly again.
No sound outside her bedroom door. Maybe Sadie had finally given up and gone home, waiting there for when Anne would be ready to talk.
Yes, at some point, she’d obviously have to give Sadie an explanation so Anne could pretend she hadn’t made a complete fool out of herself.
Over nothing, really, at all. But she needed a little more time to wash her face and come up with a good smile that said, What, that?
You’re so sweet to be concerned, but see? Everything’s just fine.
Because everything really was fine. Anne could see that, now that she’d calmed down.
Sadie didn’t want to go anywhere without her best friend, and for Anne, that thought felt like waking up after one of her nightmares: realizing that she wasn’t late for an important event, that no one was chasing her, that her teeth were still in her mouth.
There was nothing to panic about because Sadie didn’t want to leave her. Which meant that nothing would have to change.
I can’t live without you, Sadie had told her.
Anne stared out the big picture window on the right side of the room, at the tall grass in the meadow between her house and Hedge Nettle. It bent gently with the slight breeze.
There was no reason at all to panic, except that—in Anne’s experience of the world—nobody refused to move because they couldn’t bear to leave a friend they’d only known for four years.
That wasn’t in Anne’s carefully indexed list of reasonable actions.
You only did something like that for a—with someone you were—someone you couldn’t live without—
When she opened the bedroom door, hoping for an empty hallway, Anne was met instead with Sadie, who appeared to have fallen asleep. She sat on the floor, her back against the wall next to the bedroom door, velour-covered legs slightly bent to one side.
She hadn’t left.
For a moment, Anne stood in the doorway and watched her best friend in silence, the gentle rise and fall of Sadie’s chest almost hypnotic. She could sleep anywhere, at any time. Often did.
Sadie’s tie was askew, her lapels uneven and a bit wrinkled. That wasn’t like her. Despite Sadie’s jumbled decor, her clothing was always impeccably arranged.
Instinctively, Anne took a step forward, her hand lifting, and then a thought hissed through her mind before she could stop it: Touching her will make it true.
She inhaled sharply, and her hand dropped.
What was it?
“Anne?” Sadie’s eyes opened. “Oh, thank God. Are you all right?”
“I’m okay,” she said calmly and then forced a smile. “Now.”
It would’ve been pretty convincing, if Sadie were anyone else.