He's Alive

I heard the entire story by the time I was already late for bed. It started with some banging. I've heard it before. The college kids next door; I imagined someone locked themselves out or there was a creepy stalker girl who visited. The incessant knocking, like hammering. I turned the water off from the shower and listened to the wall like my family taught me to do when curious about neighbors.
I put on my sweatshirt and towel turban and opened the upstairs window. The noise stopped. I listened to the air outside. Two cars went by.
Was there a bird stuck somewhere?
I closed the window.
The noise started again.

I looked down into my dark yard; and then into Nellie's well-lit yard observing for something and then I saw a familiar short shadow moving with intention and frustration.

It was Nellie in her yard. I closed the window and began to dry my hair; hoping to not have drawn much attention to myself. I went downstairs and the noise began again.

Before long, I heard the sound of the air moving through the pump connected to my front Storm door. It was open and the piston thing made a 'seyuuuw' and the rustling noise of the leg or foot next to the aluminum bottom panel. And then a knock. "Meg!"

"Nellie?"

I opened the door and the next hour of my life was in her hands. I have known her for twenty-one years. Our friendship is old enough to drink.

I realize that her situation was desperate and also that if I hadn't opened the window, she probably wouldn't have asked for help and I was considering opening the door and investigating further, and many things went through my head about my own knowledge of being selfish, my own knowledge of knowing better than to interfere in a domestic disturbance, and my own knowledge that I told her that if she is ever in trouble to always knock.
If I'm busy, I'll let you know. She asked to use the phone.

I asked if she wanted the cell phone or the land line and I'm not sure why.

"Noooo. Not the cellular," she dramatically said this as if the cellular phone was some type of expensive luxury. And it reminded me of my grandfather.
It reminded me of Nellie crying outside in her gardening gloves, tears streaming down her face, as always, telling me that she misses my grandfather because he was her best friend, her fists drawn tight facing the ground in the mixture of sad and angry, staring up at my house where my grandfather used to live.
It reminded me of my throat getting tight and starting to cry myself.

I missed him too. And that reminded me of the people at my father's office who spent every day with him. Strangers who were a different type of family to someone I loved, who saw him more than I did and cried like babies at his funeral.

Generous, kind, respected. He would even give people money if they needed it. My father was generous. My grandfather would drive each and every widowed man to their doctor's office as often as they needed it and shovel snow and buy groceries for them. And he would fix things with wire. Pleyers and bandaids on his fingertips, glue, matching crayons or paint to touch things up. Recipes and lists on index cards in his front pocket.

Nellie dialed the phone, which I have nestled in the kitchen pantry. No one answered.
I was thinking her husband might be dead because at this point she had been knocking for a good forty-five minutes. I told her to sit down. It was thirty degrees outside and she had on just a tee shirt and sweatpants.
I made some tea for both of us as her story began about the Philippines and her schooling, her degree. Her career in the United States, how her husband took her savings and went to visit Thailand four times this past year and how his guts were rotting out as punishment from God.
And how we both know what he's doing on the computer late at night.

I hear the story; the WHOLE story every time she comes over. I hear it every time we talk. Last time, she talked about God having grace and putting it in her heart (as she clenches her fist against her chest and raises it up, again, this makes my throat become tight and I can't help but relate---"God. God KNOWS what kind of woman I am," she says.)

I don't know why this happens. My friend calls on my luxurious cell phone and tells me that he is coming to make a payment for the car he bought from me for five hundred dollars. I ask him if he feels like breaking into a house next door and he says 'Yes,' very few of my friends would say No, and I'm pretty glad about it.

The alternative is that Nellie sleeps over in the spare room, so I really got to helping around 11:00pm. Not that I don't trust her, but, I'm just not wild about having a roommate.

For one thing, I don't know why it is when I write that the tense changes from past to present, but it does and I guess I'll have to go back and fix it one day...

My friend and I finally help her into her house after banging on the doors and windows for another twenty minutes. I consider calling 911, since it was a real possibility that her evil husband was dead inside after this much racket, this many phone calls, and my inability to comprehend how a human being could let his wife stand out in the cold for three hours while he is playing with the computer or napping or whatever.

My friend sits at the kitchen table and I finish my tea, and Nellie pops her head into the front door and says, "He's alive."
And then she did an impression of his face pretending to be asleep. She closed her eyes gently and said, "this is how someone looks when they're sleeping."
Then she squinted her eyes closed, and wrinkles formed all over her face, "This is how he looks pretending the be asleep."