Your Closest Friend

by Karen Perry

  ‘Think of the ratings,’ Derek says.

  It starts to build again, that sense of unease, the moment I sit in front of the mike. There are three of us in the inner sanctum of the studio: Vic peering down at his notes through half-moon lenses, a pugnacious air about him as he smooths down his tie, Angela delivering the news and weather in a briskly elegiac tone, while I draw the hair back off my face, the heat of the room pressing down on me.

  No small talk this morning – once Angela’s done, Vic quickly dispatches her. Arms folded on the desk, he leans forward and launches into my intro. I’ve seen him do this hundreds of times, but always from the safety of distance. My heart thuds against the unfamiliarity of the situation. Everything seems slightly off-kilter, and as he announces my name to his listeners, I feel that drag of nausea again in my stomach and I shift a little in my seat.

  ‘Tell us, Cara,’ he says in a kindly tone, ‘what did you feel when you looked up and saw a terrorist coming towards you wielding a knife and a gun?’

  Unused to talking about myself so publicly, I begin clumsily, my voice sounding strange in my ears.

  ‘It took me a moment to feel anything. It was all so unreal. There had been a buzz in the air, I was out enjoying myself, and then to see a man armed in that way … it seemed incongruous.’

  Vic gives me a slight frown. Keep it simple is his motto.

  ‘At what point did you realize the seriousness of the situation?’

  My answer comes out clearer now, and I find myself relaxing into my account, Vic drawing me out with questions, leading me back up that staircase, placing me in the storeroom once more. I tell it like it’s a story – something that might have happened to someone else. It is only the two of us in the studio now. There is intimacy here, a gathering hush that feels far from the busy industry of the office beyond, further still from the traffic and life percolating through the city below.

  ‘And when you came out on to the street, what did you see?’ Vic asks, the register of his voice dropping a little.

  ‘I saw bodies. On the road, on the pavement. They had been covered with sheets. I don’t know how many there were. It was awful. Shocking.’

  He lets that sit for a couple of seconds, and then asks, ‘And the two other people who had been in the room with you?’

  He knows about Neil. When I gave my account to him on the phone on Sunday, I told him. The image comes again: the sheet covering whatever remains lay there, but those feet sticking out, immediately identifiable. A quiet impression branded on the mind. It advances and recedes, a pulse in my brain.

  ‘I lost them,’ I say. ‘I don’t know what happened to them.’

  His eyes narrow. ‘You don’t?’

  I talk quickly then about the time that followed, the confusion, the Italian café, giving my account to the police, and as my words fill the space between us I see Vic’s eyes flicker to one side and know from this he is receiving a message through his headphones.

  ‘Now, let’s just leave things there for one moment, Cara, because we have a caller on the line,’ he announces, his voice gaining authority, while at the same time indicating to me to put on the headphones in front of me. ‘Someone you may recognize,’ he adds, before booming into the mike, ‘Hello? Is that Amy?’

  I feel a soft-edged confusion as I slip on the headset and half-turn to glance back. Derek is in the producer’s seat, his face unreadable.

  There is a pause, and then I hear it: that same low throaty voice, the casual American inflection. I recognize it straight away. ‘Hey, Vic. Hey, Cara,’ she says.

  I stutter through a response, something startled and awkward that conveys my unpreparedness. How did they find her? I wonder, my mind grasping for an answer.

  ‘Amy, first of all, let me ask you if you are alright?’ Vic asks, all concerned.

  Her name doesn’t suit her. It’s too soft, too homespun for a young woman with her hard edges.

  ‘Yeah, I’m okay. Glad to be alive, I guess. How’re you doing, Cara?’ she asks.

  I try to keep my voice even, saying, ‘Like you say, I’m glad to be alive.’ My antennae are twitching all over the place.

  ‘And we have you to thank for that, Amy,’ Vic says, adding, ‘So tell us what happened? How did you come to rescue Cara?’

  It seems wrong, to put it that way, passing it off as some gallant act. In a way, it lessens the impact of what she did, by turning it into a soundbite. The gratitude I feel for her is immeasurable. Vic’s schmaltzy tone somehow cheapens that. I think she feels it too.

  There’s a pause before she laughs a little – a mirthless breath that sounds closer to a cough – and then says, ‘I don’t know. It wasn’t something thought out. I just saw her and pulled her back out of the street.’

  Her shift had ended and she’d just shut up the shop with her co-worker, she explains, when they saw the terrorists coming.

  ‘We backed into the doorway, towards the stairs. I just saw Cara standing there – this guy coming right towards her – and … I don’t know … instinct kicked in, or something …’ Her voice trails off, embarrassment radiating through the brief silence that follows.

  Vic jumps in to fill it, asking, ‘What happened when you were hiding in the storeroom together? What were your thoughts?’

  ‘I don’t know. We were all kind of panicked. Neil wanted to leave – to try to run – but I just thought we ought to stay there and wait it out.’

  ‘So did one of you take charge?’

  ‘Not really. Neil was kind of spooked, and after a few minutes, he ran back down into the street. Cara went to go after him, but I pulled her back.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I knew if she went down into the street, she’d die.’

  ‘How did you know?’

  ‘I just did. I can feel these things. It’s like an instinct.’ She coughs then, in a way that seems to ground the outlandishness of her statement. ‘It was the same when my mom died. The morning when she left to go to work, I just knew something bad was going to happen to her. I knew I wouldn’t see her again.’

  Unlike so many of her contemporaries whose sentences rise at the end in an irritating up-tick, Amy speaks plainly, making definite statements. Her voice, though low and throaty, hums with quiet conviction.

  ‘And when was this?’

  ‘Sixteen years ago – I had just turned eight.’

  ‘And, if you don’t mind me asking, what happened to her?’

  ‘My mom worked in the Twin Towers. She was killed in the 9/11 attacks.’

  The declaration snaps like an electric current. Vic lets it lie there for a beat, allowing the significance to reverberate across the airwaves. My body has grown very still, but inside my thoughts skitter around madly. I feel the coffee churn in my stomach. But this girl’s words affect me in a way I can’t understand.

  ‘So that’s twice in your life you’ve been directly affected by a terrorist attack,’ Vic states in a tone that lies somewhere between respectful and appalled.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Is this something you talked about when you were hiding in the room together?’

  ‘No,’ I answer firmly.

  ‘I was listening more than talking,’ she adds quickly. Do I imagine it, or is the manner in which she says this pointed?

  ‘How so?’ Vic asks.

  ‘Cara was upset,’ she explains. ‘I felt like she needed to talk. There were things she needed to say.’

  My thoughts slow. All the things I said in that room – the admissions and declarations, regrets, fears, unresolved passions – all of it seems to rise up now and fill the air around me with heat. A deep twang of nerves announces itself in the pit of my stomach.

  ‘How long were you in that room together?’ Vic asks.

  ‘Two hours.’

  ‘Two hours. I imagine in a situation like that, a situation charged with emotion, not knowing if you’re going to come out alive, you must both have felt the need to reach out, to share conf
idences.’

  ‘You make it sound like a Confessional,’ she says in a wry tone, but her voice has gone quiet.

  I don’t trust myself to speak.

  Vic glances at the clock.

  ‘Well, Amy, I’m so glad you called into the show this morning, and that you two were able to make contact with each other after your shared ordeal,’ Vic intones, and I feel the danger begin to recede. He is going to wrap things up now, deliver some pat line before offloading us both. I can almost feel the relief of escaping the studio, the heavy door closing behind me.

  ‘Can I say something to Cara?’ she asks then, and from her tone I know something is coming. Immediately the danger is back.

  ‘Go ahead,’ Vic urges, surprise in his voice.

  Her breath echoes in my headset, as if she’s steadying herself for something.

  ‘He says I saved you … but really, you saved me. It feels like we were meant to meet that night. And what you said … what you told me when we were alone in the room … I just want you to know that I’ll keep it close. I want you to know: you’re safe.’

  Vic’s head is cocked with interest. Behind me I can feel the intensity of the others’ gaze. All the unease I have been pushing away comes over me now in a wave, like sickness. My headset abandoned on the desk, I push through the door, out to the safety of the antechamber.

  The broadcasting coordinator is there, her headset on, looking at me expectantly.

  ‘She’s still on the line,’ she whispers, her hand held over the mouthpiece. ‘Do you want me to patch her through to your desk?’

  I think of all I have told this girl – that crazed spewing out of secrets. A great sea wall of regret rears up in front of me.

  With effort, I keep my voice steady and firm. ‘No, that’s not necessary,’ I say, and I turn and walk away.

  4.

  Amy

  My mom used to say to me, ‘You gotta fly by the seat of your pants, honey. See where your shit lands.’

  Every time she said it, my heart would sink a little, because it meant she was about to uproot us from whatever place we’d settled in. The signal that the school where I’d just started making friends, the bedroom I’d come to think of as mine, all of it was about to be tugged away from me as we’d gather up our stuff in a hurry and get back in her beat-up Subaru, no goodbyes, no onward mailing address, the two of us on the road again.

  Fly by the seat of your pants.

  Not much of a life philosophy, if you ask me.

  I have the phone held to my ear but it’s gone quiet. I don’t know why, but I was half-expecting somebody to come back on the line – the girl who’d first spoken to me, checking my story, verifying the facts before patching me through. Someone, even just to say thanks for phoning in or we’ll get Cara to give you a call once she’s finished up – anything. But instead, there’s silence on the line. My heart is still pounding though, a silly grin over my face. And when I put the phone down and stare out of the window at the morning sky, I feel something soaring within me – an unfamiliar feeling – and realize with surprise that what I feel is hope. It’s happening. It’s really happening. I can’t remember when I last felt like this.

  I dress quickly and straighten out the covers over the bed. Sean has already left for college. He said I could stay here while he was gone. I’d given him some scant details of what had happened, and I think he felt obliged to let me stay. In the hall, the radio is still playing, but I’m done with it now, so I switch it off on my way out. I hitch my bag over my shoulder and plug in my buds, and soon enough I’m on the bus with Kery James in my ears, rapping in a language I don’t understand. Grey buildings flick past and merge into something homogeneous and familiar, and I think about Connie – about how she’ll never get to see all this – and it’s funny how she’s back in my head again, after all this time. Her laughing voice worming through my thoughts, saying: What are you up to, Amy Keener?

  I reach my stop and as soon as I round the corner on to my street, and see the police-cordon tape flickering, the wavering inside me starts. People are still going about their business and shops are open, but it feels different, like a sudden change in season. I stuff my hands in my pockets and keep my eyes fixed on the pavement in front of me, trying to hang on to the buoyant feeling, and when I walk inside the shop and Emerson greets me the same as he always does, with the V for victory sign, I feel better. Still, I don’t go up the stairs to the staffroom, choosing instead to nip behind the counter and dump my stuff behind Lucy’s desk. I wash my hands at the sink, pull on my apron and cap, and take my place alongside Haqim, who is already slapping egg mayonnaise on to granary bread.

  ‘Didn’t expect to see you,’ he says without looking up.

  ‘Ain’t nothin’ gonna keep me down, Haqim,’ I say breezily, and for just a second I imagine that to be true.

  Who am I kidding? Even as I pull bread rolls from their packaging, I can feel Neil’s presence there by the sink, like it’s Friday night again and the shutters are down, and we’ve turned the music up high, me mopping the floor while he scrubs the mats, whistling to the radio, the soles of his shoes squeaking on the wet lino. I’ve been trying hard not to think about him since it happened. For all I know, he could be lying naked in a drawer in a morgue right now, a tag on his toe. Or laid out in his best clothes in the front room of his parents’ house.

  I hold a bread roll in one hand and slice through it, and there’s a shout across the kitchen.

  ‘Amy! If I catch you doing that again, I’ll cut your fucking hand off myself, d’you hear?’

  I look up and see Monica, my kitchen supervisor – a small fat woman of Indian descent and indeterminate age – barrelling towards me and I can’t help but be relieved, knowing that she’s not going to tiptoe around me, subject me to pitying stares, or sympathetic murmurings. Dark eyes and crooked teeth that are crying out for a retainer, with her hair tucked up under her cap, she looks more like a twelve-year-old boy than the adult in charge of this kitchen.

  ‘You alright?’ she barks.

  I can feel everyone else looking – Haqim sneaking a sideways glance, even Emerson taking a peek from the shop – and I say, ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’

  Nonetheless, she tells me to stop what I’m doing, gets Emerson to fix us two coffees, and soon we are perched on stools at a window table, Monica fixing me with a serious look, saying, ‘You want to talk about it?’

  I shrug and look down at my coffee, wonder if any of them heard me this morning on the radio – wonder if anyone I know heard it.

  ‘Not much to talk about, really.’

  Besides, I’ve told her all she needs to know already. I’d called her on Saturday morning to report what had happened – she’s my boss, after all. And in a way, I saw it as a human resources issue, seeing as one of her humans was no longer resourceful, seeing as how he was dead.

  ‘I couldn’t fucking believe it,’ she declares now. ‘I still don’t. D’you know, there was blood on the pavement outside when I came in this morning? I made Emerson go out there with a bucket of soapy water and a brush. This is still a civilized country, for fuck’s sake.’

  She shakes out a package of sugar, spills it on to the foam of her coffee. She’s acting like the terrorist attack was a personal affront to her but I get the twitchy feeling that she’s enjoying the drama of it. Blood on the pavement? Yeah, right.

  She’s like that, Monica – all fire and brimstone and righteous indignation. I like her, though. She’s probably the closest friend I have right now, apart from Sean, and yet I can’t talk to her about this, not really. She wants from me what everyone expects: horror, sadness, the special shiver that comes from looking death in the face. But what happened in the room – how to explain it? It wasn’t like that. It was something else. Something coming to life inside me, like a match struck in the darkness. I’m afraid to even talk about it, in case it takes away the magic.

  ‘You’re to take things easy, you hear me, Amy? I know you think y
ou’re alright, but shock hits people in funny ways.’

  ‘I’m not going to flip out in front of a customer,’ I tell her, but she looks unconvinced.

  ‘You don’t know that. Your coolness isn’t fooling me, you know.’

  It’s like something Connie would say to me when we were kids. She’d look down at me, her eyes crimping into a smile, nodding her head sagely like she was ten years older than she actually was, saying, ‘You don’t fool me, Keener. I see right through you.’ And then we’d both laugh, and it was like whatever hurt or grievance I’d been nursing inside would just burst and fade like a firework disappearing into darkness. I miss Connie. At times like this, that missing feels almost physical.

  ‘Listen, I’ve heard from head office – there’s going to be a service for Neil sometime in the next few weeks. I’ll be doing the rosters so I need to know: do you want to go?’

  A hum starts in my head, right then when she says it. Barely three days have passed since I stood upstairs in that room and smelt the sharp tang of Neil’s sweat too close to me, too dark to make out his eyes but knowing the fear that they held nonetheless.

  Monica’s talking again, saying how a bunch of them will go – Monica herself, of course, not wanting to miss the drama, Emerson and Pamela, both born-again Christians, always eager for a bit of religion – but how she wanted to give me first dibs, on account of my situation, my situation being I was the last one to see Neil alive. Like that gives me some kind of claim on him.

  ‘So what do you think? You on for going? If it’s not your thing, that’s absolutely fine.’

  She’s talking, but it’s like we’re underwater or something, the words all bloated and indistinct, her face blurry and wavering. And swimming up through the water comes Cara’s face, caught in the greenish light of the Emergency Exit sign. The way her eyes had fixed on mine – the need in them.

  ‘Sure, I’ll go,’ I say.