In the Walled City

by Stewart O'Nan

  When Sheila came around the dairy aisle and into the checkout area, John’s mother was nowhere in sight. The child aimlessly waved his can at a cardboard cutout of a TV chef. Sheila joined the shorter line, behind a white-haired man in a VFW wind-breaker with American flags on its sleeves. She lifted the basket onto the end of the belt and waited for the old man to push his dog food forward.

  The cashier, a thick-jowled woman with crooked teeth and an ill-fitting red wig, rang up Sheila’s purchases. Sheila had the twenty dollars out, ready for the total. The woman punched the register with the heel of her hand, popped open the cash drawer, and said, “Twenny thirty-three.”

  Sheila gave her the two tens and began to bag the vegetables.

  “Scuse me,” the cashier said, chewing gum. “Need thirty-three more cents.”

  Sheila went through her pockets. “I’ll bring it tomorrow.”

  “Can’t do it,” the woman said, the two tens flat on her palm. “Been happening too much lately. If it was up to me, honey, I’d say sure, but my manager says cash in full.”

  “I don’t have it.”

  “Then just take something back.” She tore the receipt from the register and began running the next customer’s purchases through the electronic scanner.

  Sheila grabbed one of the steaks —her steak, a steak she didn’t even want —and shook it at the cashier. “Thirty-three fucking cents!” she screamed, and pushed through the line. The other customers stepped aside. Steaming for the bread aisle, she heard a dry female voice say, “Man must be out of work.”

  She stopped, turned and faced the line. “You see what this is?” she yelled. “Steak. Understand? Steak.”

  She threw the steak into the bin, then, furious, snatched it back out and jammed it into the waist of her jeans and pulled her sweatshirt over it. It was cold against her stomach. Someone laughed, and her gaze shot to the mirrors above the meat. The handicapped child stood behind her, rattling his can, grimacing vacantly. She laughed back at his reflection. She smoothed her front, motioning the child to follow her, and walked up the bread aisle.

  Before turning into the checkout area, she scrunched up her face and practiced a snarl. The cellophane pinched her skin. As Sheila rounded the corner, face set, the cashier spotted her and waved. The line parted and Sheila drove through to the register. “Satisfied?” she asked.

  The cashier handed her the reciept, counted out the bills one by one onto her palm and placed the change on top of them. “Sorry,” she said, “I don’t make the rules around here.”

  “I know, you just follow them blindly.” She dropped the receipt and the money into the bag. “Thanks a lot,” Sheila called so the line could hear her. “Have a nice day!” She headed for the door, holding the bag tightly against her stomach.

  The handicapped child was cutting through an empty lane in front of her. She stopped and fished through the bag for some change, balancing it on one raised knee. The steak rode up and poked her in the stomach, but she was far enough from the cashier to feel safe. She found a quarter and a nickel, hefted the bag and wrapped both arms around it.

  The child’s hand tossed from side to side, and with her arms around the bag, Sheila could not hit the slot in the top of the can. A styrofoam corner of the package stuck out from her sweatshirt. “Let’s go,” she said, walking away from him. “Come on, I’ll give it to you outside.”

  The automatic door swept open when she stepped on the mat. Outside, against the storefront, John’s mother sat on a bench, still talking with the other woman. Sheila hugged the bag to her stomach. Behind her, the child mumbled loudly, garbled nonsense. The second door swept open, and Sheila stepped out into the cold.

  As she stepped off the mat, the child plowed into her from behind, knocking her forward. Her shoes slipped on the salt and she began to fall. She threw her arms out for balance, and the bag flew. On her way down, twisting, she reached for the child, her hand hitting the can, swatting it away from him, and as her head met the pavement, coins showered around her.

  The vegetables lay in the salt, ruined. Her hands burned, and she felt snow melting on her skin. She brought her hand to her stomach to hide the steak, a quarter peeling away from the scraped flesh of her palm, but by that time John’s mother was standing above her, looking down at her as if peering over the edge of a cliff. At her feet sat the steak, its wrapper torn.

  After helping Sheila and the child up, John’s mother gathered the groceries and fit them back in the bag. The steak rested on top. Dazed, Sheila sat on the bench and held her head. The other woman patted her arm, soothing her with gibberish.

  Mrs. Wystrzemski knelt and scooped the coins and salt in a pile and filled the crushed can. The child stood motionless beside her, as if lost. She found the lid, closed it and handed the can to the boy. She made sure his contraption was on straight, then asked the girl, “You are all right?”

  She nodded. Her hands were bleeding. There were traces of red in her hair.

  “I’ll carry,” Mrs. Wystrzemski said, and picked up the bag. The boy dragged himself back to his station by the doors.

  They crossed from the bare patch onto the snow, arm-in-arm. Sheila’s hands stung, and she did not want to bloody John’s mother’s coat. They turned up McClure and slowly climbed the hill, silent. The men at the barrel were gone, the fire burnt out. Cars swerved and braked, their front tires sliding. The For Sale signs swung in the wind.

  At the top of the hill they turned right onto 22nd. As they approached the stairs of John’s house, Sheila said, “You saw.”

  John’s mother did not answer.

  “You saw it.”

  “What do I see?” John’s mother said. “It is nothing.”

  Sheila stopped. “Don’t pretend,” she said angrily. “Say what you want to say.”

  Mrs. Wystrzemski turned to her. Over the top of the bag she could see only her face. The girl was breathing hard, and under her left eye there was a smear of blood, as if she had been in a fight. “Sheila, you are a good person, you know that. Everything will be fine.”

  “No, everything will not be fine,” the girl shouted. “Everything is fucked-up. Why can’t you admit it?” Her mouth stayed open, her breath coming in quick clouds. Mrs. Wystrzemski looked into the bag. The meat was leaking. “It’s not my fault,” said the girl. “It’s not John’s either. It’s nobody’s fault.” She waited for confirmation, and when Mrs. Wystrzemski said nothing, the girl ran up the stairs and onto the porch.

  Alone, Mrs. Wystrzemski repeated softly, “Everything will be fine.”

  Mrs. Zapala was watching TV in the living room, picking at a box of chocolates. She told Sheila, “The baby’s asleep the whole time.”

  “Thank you,” Sheila mumbled through the hand covering her face, and hurried upstairs, still wearing her coat. Carrying a bag of groceries, Mrs. Wystrzemski came into the room, glanced at Mrs. Zapala and left.

  Mrs. Wystrzemski drew three dollar bills out of the wet bag. She put the money on the kitchen table and began tearing the wrapper off the steak. She turned on the cold tap.

  Behind her, Mrs. Zapala asked, “So, can she shop?”

  “She has a hard time,” Mrs. Wystrzemski answered.

  “Like everyone.”

  “No, it is not,” Mrs. Wystrzemski said, washing the salt off the meat. Water tinged with blood ran over her hands. “It is not.”

  The Big Wheel

  Crandell never noticed the house before it was on fire. It was in Central Islip in a ratty neighborhood —kids hanging out by salt-rotted cars, cruddy lumps of snow. Crandell was on his way home after holding the O’Neill kid for detention. A smart mouth, asked him if a wood screw felt anything like a real one. Crandell called Millie from the teacher’s lounge to say he’d be late.

  He wasn’t used to such heavy traffic going home, and he was letting it get to him. He shouldn’t have let O’Neill get to him. He wasn’t a bad kid, just a joker, the kind of kid who’d only started to go the wrong way. Crandell had
seen it before and knew the best thing was to let it pass. He had to watch his blood pressure. No point wasting all of that broccoflower, all that turkey pastrami. He was first in line at the light —poised to beat the next —when he noticed in an upstairs window a curtain waving in flames. He made to open his door and the Century stalled; someone behind him honked. He ran across the intersection, pointing at the window. He figured someone would follow.

  The house was a duplex, there were two buzzers. A woman in a scorched housecoat stumbled through the door, screaming “My baby! My baby!”

  “Where?” he asked, grabbing her wrists as if she might lie.

  There wasn’t even smoke in the downstairs, but above him the fire was loud. A cloud floated in the second floor, opaque and slow as fog, smelling sharply of plastic. At the top of the stairs his lungs turned to chalk. He dropped to his hands and knees and held his tie over his nose and mouth. Flames poured up the walls.

  The baby was not a baby but a girl at least four years old. She was in the first bedroom he looked in, under the bed. She crawled out, and he held her to him and sidestroked the way to the stairs. Bits of burning lath rained through the smoke. He wanted to straighten up to carry her down, but the fire seemed to have moved downstairs, and when he did risk a full step he missed and fell —out of the smoke and onto the girl. She was shrieking; he had hurt her. He lay at the foot of the stairs, stunned. In the foggy room across the hall, curtains were burning. A piano was going up silently, a lamp. He picked the girl up and bulled out the front door.

  The woman took her from him and caressed her, shushed her. She thanked and thanked him, all the time soothing the child, who was crying steadily. People had stopped on the sidewalk; one young woman came into the yard and suggested they stand back from the house. The mother bent down to salvage a Big Wheel but couldn’t manage it with the child. Crandell picked it up and looked around the yard for anything else worth saving. There was a chain with no dog on it, that was about it.

  Sirens were closing on them. The child was whimpering; it was her wrist, already ballooning. He had left the front door of the house open, and skeins of fabric drifted out, glowing, floated across the porch and fell to the dirt. A window cracked and pieces dropped to the tin porch roof. “Check it out,” a boy behind him cheered.

  The EMT’s took the girl first. They were both women, crisp and confident in their uniforms. He took a dizzying drink of oxygen. The mother —Mrs. DeLuca —was telling them how he had saved her little girl.

  “We got a hero here,” the one EMT told the other.

  “Anyone else?” the other said, offering the rubber mask around. Crandell wanted more but thought it might not be good for him; his heart was tripping as it was. He sat on the back bumper with his head between his knees, spitting black, until the EMT’s said they were sorry but they had another call. They clunked shut the rear doors and got in and shot away.

  The firemen were inside. A different engine was hosing down the house next door; the gutters streamed. The police had put up orange horses. His car sat in the middle of the fire engines, trapped by hoses. Someone had put a ticket on it. The Big Wheel sat by the curb; he picked it up.

  “Hey,” someone called. It was the woman who’d told them to stand back. She had a news team with her. “This is him. He went in the house and got her when it was on fire.”

  “Is that right, sir?” the reporter asked. He had neat hair, and eyeliner. His coat had the NBC peacock sewn over the heart.

  “I have to go,” Crandell said.

  The reporter made him spell his name and told him what questions he would ask when they were on camera. “Don’t practice,” he said, “just let it come out.”

  “Can I put this down?” Crandell said about the Big Wheel.

  “Can you get it?” the reporter asked the cameraman.

  “I’ll shoot him long and zoom him.”

  “Sure,” the reporter said, “put it down if you want.”

  “Beautiful,” the cameraman said. Other crews were stacked up waiting for him, shooting the roof, the trucks, the crowd.

  The house was a wet wreck when Crandell finished answering, the siding warped and bubbled. The DeLucas wouldn’t be coming back here. He hauled the Big Wheel along by one handlebar. The spotlights had given him a headache; the afternoon seemed dim. A pumper sat half on the sidewalk, its crew in the front yard, mopping up. The real rush hour had begun, and people slowed to see what was happening. A reporter had moved his car for him, pledging to take care of the ticket, and he had to search for it. He put the Big Wheel in the back.

  He would be late getting home. Millie would have their trays up and Peter Jennings on. His dinner would be in the oven, getting hard —and he was ravenous now, he wanted to take her out for a steak. The car stank of smoke. He sniffed his cuff, his tie. The whole thing hadn’t sunk in yet; it would take a while, he supposed.

  “I can’t believe it,” Millie said. “You were on all three newses.” She put a little extra into his kiss and took his things, wincing at the smell of his coat. The phone rang. “I’m going to have to send this out,” she said. It rang again. “These people have been calling nonstop, you have no idea.”

  “Do you want me to get it?”

  “They don’t want to talk to me.”

  “It might be George.”

  “I just talked to Eleanor on Tuesday.”

  It was the Post. He told them to call back tomorrow.

  “I had chicken going,” she said, “but I figured you’d want to celebrate.”

  “Let me change,” he said, going up.

  “Or are you too tired?”

  “Just McCluskey’s.”

  “I already called,” she said.

  He had the New York strip, black and pink with garlic salt and butter gobbed on, a steaming potato with a blob of sour cream and fresh chives, and two Strohs. Couples came by the booth to shake his hand when his mouth was full. The cook came out of the kitchen.

  “Now you know how Jackie Kennedy feels,” Millie said.

  Their waitress told him there was no check.

  “I could get used to this,” Crandell said, and left her a ten.

  “Del,” Millie scolded.

  “Del nothing,” he said.

  They stayed up for the news. Millie made popcorn. His face looked fat, and no one had told him about the soot above his lip. His hair seemed thin. He looked awful; he looked dead.

  “She came out and said her girl was in there so I went in and got her.”

  “Were you thinking that your life might be in danger at that point?” the reporter asked.

  “I just went in. I knew she was in there and I went in after her. I wasn’t really thinking at that point.”

  It sounded average, and at first he was ashamed, then angry with the reporter for putting him on the spot.

  “Look at you,” Millie said. “You look like a hero, all that gunk all over your face. I wish we had a video thing to show George and the kids, they’d love this.”

  “I sound like an idiot.”

  “You sound fine. You sound like everyone sounds.”

  A plane crashed in Chile, and he got up and turned.

  Onscreen, parts of the DeLuca’s roof fell in. “There were no serious injuries,” the anchorwoman said, and they segued into the weather.

  “That’s all folks,” he said.

  “I’ll have to go out and buy some Newsdays tomorrow,” Millie said. She cuffed some stray popcorn off the cushions and gave him his good-night kiss. “You’ll lock up?”

  Mornings Crandell kept the radio off in the car. He liked to drive and think. About the Sunday poker game at Reece’s or, now that it was December, the next Rangers telecast. Nothing ever happened in his daydreams. They were all quiet and soft light, warmth, sometimes a sandwich. And then he would drop back into the car, like those old Hertz commercials, and see he had missed Bohemia entirely. Where Sunrise opened to four lanes and traffic sped up, he jockeyed off onto the access road an
d made his morning stop at Martone’s Deli.

  Today he bought a paper with his coffee. Martone asked him how was tricks.

  “You didn’t see the paper?” Martone’s daughter-in-law said. She was mixing antipasto and had on transparent gloves.

  Martone turned a Newsday around on the counter. “I don’t see anything.”

  “It’s in a little,” she said. She couldn’t touch the pages and he couldn’t find it. “I don’t know, but it’s him —Mr. Crandell.” She told the story.

  “Well,” Martone said. “Congratulations.”

  Crandell shrugged as if it wasn’t his fault. “Can’t be late,” he said.

  In the lot, getting in, he saw the Big Wheel in the backseat. The interior smelled sour, like wet ash.

  He slowed to miss the light by the house but the green was long in the morning. Someone had nailed plywood over the windows and put up notices he couldn’t read. He wondered where the De-Lucas were, what kind of insurance they had. Renters probably.

  He figured Ward would stroll over from metal shop and give him a hard time about it, and he was right. A few minutes into the paper, he heard a fake squeaky voice go, “Help, help” and turned to the door. A hand with a lit cigarette lighter danced in the frame.

  “I’ll save you,” said a gruff voice, and a second hand snatched the lighter away.

  “My hero,” the squeaky hand said, and the two hands meshed.

  Ward stepped forth. “Del, fifty-nine? Is that right, next stop the big six-oh?”

  “Don’t believe everything you read,” Crandell said, though it was true.

  “And what exactly are these misdemeanor charges pending on this DeLuca woman?”

  “I haven’t gotten that far.”

  “You picked a winner, Del. It says she’s been in and out of jail since she was sixteen. She’s one of those people the system gets ahold of and doesn’t let go. She just got the kid back.”