Behind me, I heard a prolonged sniffle. I paused, then turned to find the same woman I’d encountered at the elevators last Friday. When I caught her eyes, she dabbed them hurriedly with her handkerchief and gave me a brave smile.
“Oh hello,” she said. “How are you today?”
Her smile trembled at the corners. I felt a surge of sympathy for her. Just like me, she seemed to live in the hospital; I’d passed by her sitting in the waiting room of her floor, sometimes accompanied by a gaggle of older women, but usually alone. She was almost always hard at work crocheting something, and sometimes, when I had a few extra minutes, I would watch her from across the room, wondering what masterpiece she was creating and for whom. I examined her features in secret, her stout frame, her straight, thin lips, and now it seemed almost funny that I had automatically linked her to Ricky. They really looked nothing alike.
“I’m okay,” I said cautiously. “Are you?”
She nodded unconvincingly, then took in a halting, shuddering breath. I stood woodenly for a moment, staring at the elevator numbers flashing above our heads while trying to decide what to do. Console her? Hug her? Would she be okay with a complete stranger’s touch? When her sniffles turned to sobs, I settled for a tentative hand on her shoulder. When she seemed to lean into it, I opened my arms wide for an embrace.
Apparently, that was all the invitation she needed, because she dove into them without preamble. I rubbed circles into her back as my elevator came and went, my mouth set in a line. I remembered the boy in the trauma bay, and the way his mother had trembled with anguish even as she pushed against the officers to get to her son. This woman’s grief felt similar.
After one long minute, the woman pulled away, her expression sheepish behind her damp face.
“Sorry, sorry,” she said, adjusting her sweater. She cleared her throat, dabbing her eyes. “Thank you.”
“You don’t have to apologize,” I said. I wanted to ask why she was crying, who those tears were for. But then I remembered that we were in a hospital, surrounded by tragedy, and decided against it. Maybe she would tell me herself, the next time we ran into each other. I pressed the elevator button again, just as the woman made a small peep of surprise.
“Oh! Look what I’ve done!” she said, gesturing to my shoulder. I looked down at my scrub shirt to find a few wet splotches, and I laughed.
“Oh, no problem, I’ve cried on this shirt plenty myself,” I said. The elevator door popped open. “I hope you . . . and whoever you love, get through this.”
As the door closed, the woman gave me a nod.
“Me too,” she said.
*
I should have suspected that treachery was afoot the moment I turned onto my street and found a car that looked suspiciously like my family’s 2009 Honda Pilot parked a block away from my apartment. All of the clues were there—the clumsy, suburbanite parallel-parking job, the dent along the bumper where Tabatha had reversed into a mailbox in her senior year of high school—but I’d ignored them out of willful ignorance. After all, my parents didn’t have keys to my apartment, and though I would not have put it past them to attempt to ambush me at home, they would need a co-conspirator to actually get inside. Specifically, they needed someone with keys. And there was only one other person who fit that description.
Traitor, I texted her when I reached my apartment and smelled the distinct scent of brown stew wafting through the air.
I’m not sorry, Nia texted back instantly. But also, yell at your sis. She’s the mastermind. I just dropped off the loot.
Sighing, I opened the door to my apartment. I should have been angrier with Tabatha for forcing this reunion . . . but I wasn’t. Distance had never been my style with my family. Even though the senior Appiahs exhausted me, I missed having them in my life.
“Angela?” my mother’s voice called from the bathroom. “Is that you?”
“Yes, Momma,” I said. My coffee table had a different kind of spread across it this time: duckbilled clips, combs, a spray bottle, leave-in conditioner, gels, braid sheen spray. Hanging up my keys, I approached it slowly, trying to put together just how many of my friends Tabatha had roped into her plot.
Dorothy Appiah emerged from the bathroom behind me, drying her hands off on her leggings. The last time I’d seen her, she’d been fully decked out for Tabatha’s Knocking: wig in place, makeup done, dress pressed. The woman standing before me now, dressed in a loose T-shirt with her hair braided straight back in cornrows, was much more familiar.