He always did have that uncanny ability to sense someone watching him. Her instinct should be to hide her face, but she doesn’t. Instead, she rolls the window down so they can see each other better.
Chaz freezes. Recognition slowly lights his face, and he breaks into the widest grin she’s ever seen on him. They look at each other across the parking lot. He doesn’t approach. She doesn’t get out of the car. Instead, he puts his hand over his heart, and she does the same.
Thank you, Chaz.
Drew jumps into the driver’s seat of the car at the same time Chaz goes back inside. The smells of jerk spice and curry fill the car, and her stomach rumbles in response.
“Heard that.” Drew puts the car in drive. “Where do you want to eat this?”
“Take me home,” she says.
* * *
Twenty-five years later, 42 Willow Avenue does not look exactly as she remembers it.
It’s brighter. The old brown brick has been painted a cream color, and the rusted balcony walls have been replaced with wrought-iron railings. The building lobby has been renovated with new doors, new tile, new everything. It actually looks like a nice place to live now, and the park across from the building is clean, with two new play structures for children that weren’t there before.
She looks up to where apartment 403 is, wondering who lives there now. There have probably been many tenants over the past nineteen years, all with different stories to tell. Hers was just one. Being here brings up vivid memories of Ruby being taken away that night, and while she’s worked hard not to think about it, it isn’t really possible to forget something that changed the entire direction of her life.
But with time, she can remember it less.
A plume of smoke catches her eye, and she spots a man barbecuing on his fourth-floor balcony. Barbecue grills used to be forbidden, but maybe they allow them now. He flips his burgers while chatting on his cell phone, and she realizes it’s Mr. Malinowski, the building superintendent who used to live on the first floor. Is he still the super?
The glass doors to the lobby open, and she watches as a woman wearing colorful nursing scrubs holds the door open for an elderly woman with a walker. She recognizes Mrs. Finch immediately; her old neighbor from down the hall must be in her eighties now. Her housedress is stained and hangs off her bony frame, her white hair so thin that the pink of her scalp shows through. In the end, the woman had done the right thing when she finally called the police, even though the years that followed were hard.
Paris gets back into the car. As she and Drew drive away, she mentally says goodbye to the girl who lived in Willow Park, the one who survived her mother. All the memories here are painful, but they belong to a life that’s no longer hers.
And over time, she will remember it less.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Maple Sound looks so different in the daylight, serene and pretty, a picturesque small town someone might want to settle down in if they wanted to escape the city.
Ruby must loathe it here.
They make the long drive up the hill toward Tita Flora’s place, and Drew cuts the engine when they reach the top. They sit in silence for a moment, staring across the pond at the exterior of the two-story house that she lived in for five long years. It was too dark to see much of anything when she was last here, but now, in the late-afternoon sun, she can see the effort that’s been made to keep it up. The siding has been painted white to match the porch, and the flowers along the front of the house are in full bloom. Tita Flora is retired now, and with Tito Micky gone, she must have a lot of free time to maintain the place. It looks better than it ever did.
There’s a shape moving in the kitchen window. She doesn’t need to see a face to know who it belongs to. She would know that silhouette anywhere.
“How long, do you think?” Drew asks, breaking the silence inside the car.
“An hour,” she says. “Which is fifty-five minutes longer than I’d prefer to be here.”
“Do you have the cashier’s check?”
She pats her pocket.
“I still can’t believe you actually went to the bank.” He shakes his head. “Want me to come in with you?”
“No, I need to do this alone.” She gives his hand a squeeze and opens the passenger door. There’s no way to predict what Ruby will say, and however this meeting goes, there are things she will never want Drew to hear. Ever. “I’ll be okay.”
“I’ll be waiting right here,” Drew calls out before she can shut the door. “Don’t, you know, kill each other.”