The Corner

by Dory Adams

 

They were making dinner, meatloaf and mashed potatoes, her mother's recipe. Supper, as it was called back home.

"I'm starting to think I see familiar faces on the street," Faith said.

"You probably do by now," Jeff said, adjusting the flame under the boiling potatoes. 

"No. I mean faces that belong to people back home. Not people I knew, but people I'd recognize. People I used to smile at, and who'd smile at me.”

“Feeling homesick?" Jeff asked, jabbing at a potato with a fork. “We're almost ready. These are ready to mash.”

“Me? Homesick? I am home. This is my home now.” Faith looked at the date on the milk carton, then sniffed hesitantly at the open spout. “Spoiled,” she said. She slid her hand into Jeff's front jeans pocket and closed her fingers around some change.

“Hey, stop distracting the cook when he's working.”

"I'm only after milk money. Unless you want to eat sour mashed potatoes.”

“Do you want me to run out and get it?” he asked.

“I'll go. It'll only take a minute. You can stay here and slave over the stove.”

She hurried to the Mom & Pop store at the end of the block and across the street. She usually tried to avoid this market at the corner of Baker and Post if there was time to go the four extra blocks to the one on California Street.

The doors were propped open as usual. She paused just inside the threshold of the store, allowing her eyes to adjust to the dim light. A Doberman behind the counter barked and strained at his leash. Pungent smells of over-ripe fruit and rotting vegetables hung in the dark air. She went straight to the dairy case at the back and then joined the small line of people at the register. A woman at the front of the line dug in the bottom of her purse for loose change to pay for a loaf of bread. Faith drummed her fingers against the milk carton, which was already beginning to sweat. She wanted to get back out into the sunlight and fresh air, could see the sunny sidewalk just beyond the cash register at the door. The dank air felt too thick on her face, suffocating. The man ahead of Faith noticed her impatience and let her move ahead of him. Then he wanted to chat.

"I've seen you around," he said. "Live nearby?" He smelled of sweat and stood too close to her.

"No," she said, keeping her back to him, wishing she hadn't accepted the favor of moving up. The Doberman put his ears back and growled. Faith tried to ignore the man, tried to ignore the dog. The way it strained at the leash and showed its teeth made her nervous. Shouldn't he be on a chain? The old Chinese couple behind the counter spoke in loud, sharp sounds to each other. Arguing?

She regretted not taking the time to walk to the other store. It was well lit and the Chinese owners there had graduation photos of their children behind the counter. Clean and prosperous. No rot and decay there.

She finally paid for the milk and walked out into the evening sunlight. On the bright sidewalk, facing the doorway and smoking a cigarette, stood the strange man who'd been in line with her. When had he gone outside?

She tried to step around him.

“Making dinner tonight?” he asked.

Faith was unsure of what to do. She didn't want him to cross the street with her. She couldn't let him see where she lived. Less than a block away were her front steps. She could see the cheerful colors of the Victorian's gingerbread trim. He could watch her from here. Maybe she should walk up the hill to Presidio, then backtrack along Geary. Maybe he'd be gone by the time she came down Baker from the other direction. 

She shifted the quart of milk to her left hand and gripped her keys tight in her right fist.

"Not going home?" he asked, as she tried to turn right and sidestep him.

She stopped and looked straight into his bloodshot eyes. His short wooly hair had begun to gray and he'd lost a front tooth. He was a little shorter than her. Dirty mismatched clothing stuck to his thin body. 

“A girl like you ought to have a man to cook for.”

She tried to think what to do next while he talked on. She took another look at him, to see if there was anything she might need to remember. He looked like any of the other bums who went into that store for a pint of Night Train or Thunderbird.

“I like a girl that looks womanly.”

He was looking at her hips. She wished she hadn't tucked her shirt into her jeans.

“Lots of men only like skinny, bony women. What they really want is another man. Women should have curves.”

She thought about going back inside the store, but didn't think the owners would let her use their phone.

“ . . . back when I was a drummer with Chuck Berry.”

Stay calm, she thought. Don't overreact. He looked pretty harmless. What could really happen to her here in front of the store? In the daylight? She could outrun him if she had to. 

“Really? When?” she asked, stalling. He talked on while her thoughts raced. 

“ . . . at least that's what Camus believed.”

"What?" she asked, noticing he was standing closer to her, realizing she could feel his stale breath on her ear. 

"Ever read Nietzsche?" he repeated.

Nietzche? How did he know about Nietzche? A former lover had given her his copy of On The Genealogy Of Morals when they'd broken up. Inside the cover he'd written, "Faith, to answer some questions." She hadn't read it, of course. He'd been a rogue, a charlatan, and probably hadn't even read it himself.

What could be the harm in listening for another minute? Maybe then he'd go away. Hadn't she just been telling Jeff that she was tired of keeping her guard up all the time? That she was afraid she was getting too hardened by the city.

“Ever read Immanuel Kant?” he asked.

“No,” she said.

"Then I've got just the book for you. It'll only take a few seconds to go get it."

This was her chance. She could wait until he was out of view and then hurry home.

"It's just down the block,” he said, pointing down Post Street.

“I'll just wait here.” 

He looked at her like he didn't believe it.

“Just right there,” he said. “Two houses down. The red one. See it?”

There was something about his voice. It seemed to be inside her head, humming like a lullaby.

“Um-hum,” she said. Maybe she would even wait there and see if he really did bring a book back.

Faith felt a slight pressure on her elbow. Her feet seemed to glide under her, taking her, instead of her brain sending signals to them. She couldn't believe she was going with him, walking right along beside him. Faith could almost see herself being led, as if she were outside her body. 

When they reached the red house, the stranger led her up to the porch and rang the doorbell. It felt cool in the gray shade. Why was he ringing his own doorbell?

Through a window she saw a man rise from a chair and look through the sheer curtains. He shook his head 'no,' then sat down again without coming to the door.

This isn't right, she thought. She had to get back to the sidewalk. She had to make her feet take her down off that porch. 

The stranger rang the bell again.

The carton of milk slipped out of her hands. She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts. The milk. Jeff. The kitchen. She wanted to get home. 

Faith saw herself walking away from the stranger, back out into the sharp evening sunlight on Post Street. Then she saw the stranger follow her and touch her elbow again, but she couldn't feel it. She saw herself look up at the corner store just as Jeff came out.

Jeff called her name and hurried toward her, then gently took her arm from the stranger's grasp. Faith felt Jeff's firm grip on her forearm. Disbelief blazed from his clear blue eyes. She felt like she owned her body again. How could she have done something so stupid?

“We have to be on our way now,” Jeff said to the stranger, in a pleasant voice that Faith knew was forced. She knew he was furious under that calm tone.

“I wasn't gonna do nothing,” the stranger said, backing away with his hands up, palms forward, at chest level.

“You just go on your way and we'll be going on ours,” Jeff said.

The stranger walked down Post. He started to turn around once, but Jeff said, “Keep on going.”

Jeff practically pulled her up the street; Faith couldn't quite match his long strides uphill. She faintly recalled a similar scene played out years earlier when her mother had dragged her home after she'd disobeyed and gone outside the yard to play.

When they were safely inside the door, he said, “You really scared me. Do you have any idea how long you've been gone?”

“There was a book,” Faith said, knowing how foolish it sounded.

Jeff didn't speak to her the rest of the evening. It wasn't that he was giving her the silent treatment. He simply couldn't talk.

“I can't believe you did that,” was all he could manage. 

Faith wandered through their flat the rest of the evening, touching everything. She ran her fingers over the spines of their books. She picked up the thin sand dollar they'd found at Ocean Beach, picked up the delicate teapot they'd bought in Chinatown, holding each up to the light, amazed at their translucence. She needed to touch everything, to reclaim her possessions and know they were real. But now the hardwood floor felt slick and slippery beneath her feet, and her possessions seemed unbearably fragile. 

First published in Slipstream (Issue 22, Spring 2002)

Dory Adams grew up in the mountains of central Pennsylvania and now lives in Pittsburgh, where she is at work on a novel titled “The October Earth.” Her work has appeared in Blue Earth Review, Hobart, Common Ground Magazine, The Oklahoma Review, and Slipstream. New work is forthcoming in The Avery Anthology. In 2002 she won the William Faulkner Award for Short Fiction for her story “As Easy As That.” She is a co-founder of Paper Street Press and the fiction editor at Paper Street (www.paperstreetpress.org). She earned her MFA from Vermont College and has been a contributing editor for Hunger Mountain.