Not a Sparrow Falls (11 page)

Bridie hadn’t said anything then, and she didn’t say anything when she scanned a six-pack, either. She supposed, considering her history, she was straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel. Still, she had her reasons. She’d seen firsthand the damage alcohol could do, and for a second her ribs felt sore just from remembering.

“Yes, these groceries are for Thanksgiving dinner.” Winifred—Mrs. Graham—nodded with a slight air of offense, as if Bridie had indeed broken some rule of polite society.

Bridie flushed, scanned the celery and carrots, and vowed to keep her mouth shut from now on. She looked past the first two sisters back to her favorite. Lorna was obviously younger than the other two, a little shy, with a sweetness that was genuine, not the phony kind that set your teeth on edge. She was pretty and plump with a heart-shaped face and soft
brown hair framing it. And it was funny. Even though their whole relationship had taken place across a check-out stand at the Bag and Save, Bridie had the feeling Lorna could have been a friend if their lives had been different. “How are you doing today, Lorna?” she asked.

“I’m just fine, Bridie.” Lorna was unloading her purse onto the check-out stand. A wadded-up tissue joined a set of keys and a checkbook.

“What are you looking for, Lorna?” the other sister, Fiona, asked, with an overly patient tone that said volumes.

“I had a coupon for that onion soup. I just know it.”

Winifred rolled her eyes and exchanged a glance with Fiona.

Bridie felt a little surge of anger on Lorna’s behalf, reached into her drawer, and found an extra. “I’ve got it here.” She scanned it quickly and watched the computer take off the discount.

“What are your holiday plans, Bridie?” the middle sister asked. She was pretty, with hair a darker shade of red than Winifred’s and fine, delicate features. She’d told Bridie she was a professor at George Mason—ancient history or something. Her husband was a doctor. No kids. But she was nice and had a slightly shorter poker up her back than Winifred. When Bridie had called her Mrs. Larkin, she’d insisted on Fiona instead.

“Oh, I’ll probably spend it here,” she answered.

“Surely they’ll give you time off to go to services?” Winifred asked.

Bridie murmured, noncommittal. Winslow would really get hot under the collar if he found out she was discussing religion with a customer, even if they’d been the one to bring it up. “Is that all for you today?” she asked the sisters, her finger poised over the Total key. Fiona nodded. Winifred nodded. Lorna looked disturbed, as though she was trying to get something out, but it seemed as if her mouth automatically closed when either of her sisters’ opened.

“That will be all, thank you,” Winifred said.

Bridie pushed Total with a flourish and read the sum. “That’s one hundred twenty-two dollars and nineteen cents.”

“How shall we divide this?” Winifred asked her sisters.

“Pay out of household, and we’ll make it right later,” Fiona suggested.

“That sounds fine,” Winifred agreed, then both sisters looked at Lorna expectantly. She nodded and went fishing in her purse again. Fiona and Winifred exchanged another glance.

Bridie helped Jeremy finish the bagging, and seeing the makings for the holiday dinner gave her another feeling of emptiness. When she looked up, Lorna had apparently found her checkbook and was gazing square at her, an expression of compassion and concern on her kind face. Bridie flushed. She’d been wearing her heart on her sleeve again and had gotten caught. She flashed Lorna a bright smile, then repeated the total. Lorna nodded and filled in the amount.

The sisters always paid for the groceries with a presigned check from the account of Alasdair MacPherson. It was a constant entertainment to Bridie to concoct stories about who this Alasdair MacPherson was. Perhaps an old, crippled father. Maybe a young man, their cousin or brother, struck down in his prime. In a wheelchair. A veteran. She never asked, though. It was more fun to wonder. Another of her silly little games.

Lorna handed over the check; then with her hand poised over her wallet, she asked Bridie the same question she always did. “Do you want to see Alasdair’s identification?”

Bridie didn’t know what possessed her, but this time, instead of waving her away and shaking her head as always, she had a sudden yen to see what this Alasdair MacPherson looked like. “Let me take a glance at it. If you don’t mind,” she added to placate their surprised expressions.

“Certainly.” Lorna recovered and produced the identification, an expired Virginia driver’s license. The picture was sort
of dark, but Bridie brought it up to the light on her check stand and took a good look. He was a young man. That was the first surprise. And handsome, but fierce and stern looking, as though he’d just heard somebody whispering in church. He had brown hair that was combed back from a high forehead, dark blue eyes, a hawklike nose, a square chin, and a nice mouth, but serious and lying in a flat line, as if it never had curved up at the corners. Bridie made the little crossed lines on the top of the check and scribbled some numbers and letters on them, but it was just for show. She’d just had a curious spell, but now it was over.

“Thank you,” she said. “Manager’s having a hissy fit this week. He’ll be over it by next time.” She handed the card back and loaded the last sack into the cart, embarrassed at her nosiness. “There you go,” she said. “I’ll see you next week.” The two older sisters said good-bye and steered the cart toward the exit, but Lorna stood as if planted. She leaned forward, took a breath, then closed her mouth. Bridie could see the next customer in line fidgeting from the corner of her eye. Lorna didn’t budge.

“Will there be anything else, then?” she asked.

“What are you doing for Thanksgiving?” Lorna blurted out. “I was wondering . . . I mean, would you like to join us for dinner?”

Bridie’s face burned, and she felt as humiliated as if she’d been caught with her hand in the till. Now she understood. Lorna was feeling sorry for her. She answered, hearing her own voice over the wet slush of the pulse in her ears. “Thank you, but no,” she said. “I’m sorry. I can’t do that.”

Lorna’s sweet face looked as though Bridie had dashed a glass of cold water into it, and suddenly it was she who was feeling sorry for Lorna.

“Oh, I see,” Lorna said. “Of course. You probably have other plans.”

Bridie didn’t say one way or the other. “Good-bye,” she said, feeling miserable.

The other two sisters looked back. They had gotten as far as Carmen’s check stand and were waiting, obviously impatient.

“Lorna,” Winifred called to her sister, annoyed. “Let’s go.”

“I’ll tell you what,” Lorna said brightly, compounding Bridie’s misery by giving her hand a little pat, as if to show there were no hard feelings. “I’ll leave you the telephone number just in case you change your mind. You can leave a message here.” She tore off part of the grocery receipt, scribbled something on the back, and pressed the scrap of paper into Birdie’s hand. Bridie was just opening her mouth to say she was sorry, that she hadn’t meant to be rude, but Lorna turned and was gone. Bridie stared after her for a minute and was tempted to go chasing after the sisters.

“I’d love to come to your house for supper,” she wanted to say, but she knew inside with a hollow finality that that would never happen. She fingered the paper. She would never go inside the houses of decent people and eat at their tables. She would stay right here at the Bag and Save and tend to her business. That was all she could expect. That was the best life had to offer, she thought, shoving the receipt into the pocket of her smock. She turned to the next customer, gave him a greeting, and began to scan his groceries. That was the best life had to offer, she repeated again. For the likes of her.

****

Carmen Figueroa glanced across the check stand toward Bridie working in the next lane. It was hard to believe it had been a year, and she still remembered how different Bridie had looked the first time she’d seen her. Skinny as a rail, in a dress that had to have come from the thrift shop, a bad dye job, nails chewed down to a bloody quick, and if that had been all there was to her, Carmen probably never would have made the offer. But something about the new checker’s eyes had snagged the quick once-over. They were big, china-doll blue, and not exactly pleading. That would be saying too much. But when she’d come up to Carmen and spoken
in that soft voice of hers with the accent that stretched out all the middles of her words and rounded off the ends, her eyes had lit up with hope like somebody striking a match in a dark room.

“Are you the one who posted the notice in the lunchroom about needing a roommate?” she’d asked.

Carmen had sighed. “Yeah, that’s me all right.” And that was how it had happened. A year ago. Huh. Now the pretty hair, which Carmen could tell from the roots would be a very light blond, was still covered with brown, but a light golden brown, and Carmen had talked her into a rinse instead of permanent dye. And Bridie had finally put on enough weight so that it didn’t hurt to look at her anymore. Last month she’d told Carmen she was going to quit biting her nails, and she did, just like that. They’d had manicures to celebrate, even though Carmen had had to talk her into it. Bridie never spent anything on frills. Carmen even had to convince her it was okay to buy a new outfit every now and then.

Carmen still itched to give her a makeover. She had such a pretty smile, and with her pink cheeks and creamy skin she’d be gorgeous if she let her hair go back to blond. An easy job with a little help from Clairol number 87. But no matter how much Carmen argued, she couldn’t convince her. Bridie’s mouth would clamp shut, and her eyes sort of hooded over like Carmen’s cat’s.

“No,” she’d say, and the way she said it, you’d think Carmen had suggested being launched into space instead of just coloring her hair. Weird. Anyway, that was just one more piece of evidence. Something was hinky somewhere. She couldn’t say exactly what or even why she thought so. Just that somehow Bridie’s insides and outside didn’t seem to match.

Bridie must have felt Carmen’s eyes on her back. As soon as she finished bagging up the church ladies’ order, she turned around and flashed Carmen a smile.

“Are you going out with Newlee tonight?” she asked, her voice casual.

Carmen gave her a sharp look. Bridie smiled back, all innocence.

“Dinner in,” she said. “But you don’t need to be gone. Stay and eat with us.” She tossed out the invitation, half meaning it and half just wanting to see what Bridie would say.

“Oh, that’s all right,” she answered quickly. “There’s a movie I’ve been wanting to see.” She turned away, and Carmen couldn’t see her face.

“Suit yourself,” she said to Bridie’s back, but she wasn’t fooled. It was just as she figured. This had nothing to do with any movie. Bridie made herself scarce whenever Newlee came around. Something about him gave Bridie the bejeebers, and Carmen was pretty sure it was the fact that he was a cop. In fact, she thought, grinning just at the idea, if she didn’t know better, she’d swear that Bridie was on the lam.

She frowned and stared into space. She’d been joking, but what if? Huh. Bridie had all the marks. Showed up out of nowhere. Talked all the time about the old home place but clammed up whenever you asked for specifics. There was the way she’d looked at first, as if she’d been chained in a closet for the last year. Put that together with her freakiness around Newlee, and it fit. Who knows, maybe she’d robbed a bank or something.

A forty-pound bag of dog food crashed onto her conveyor and snapped her to attention. It was the big biker dude. “Hey, Larry,” she greeted him.

“Hi, Carmen,” he nodded. “I’ll take a carton of Camel hard-packs, too.”

“Coming up,” she said, locked her till, and went to the cigarette case, glancing at Bridie on the way.

Nah. No way she’d robbed a bank. She was just weird. After all, Winslow, a store manager without a kindhearted bone in his body, would have checked her references. A big-eyed look wouldn’t have cut it with him. He said Bridie’d been a checker at some grocery store in the sticks—one of those places where they have to bring in the mail on horseback. But,
then again, maybe Winslow
hadn’t
checked her references. Bridie had shown up the week two other checkers had quit, and they’d been pretty desperate for help. Winslow probably would have hired anybody who could work a cash register and had a pulse.

Carmen got Larry’s Camels, totaled his order, then closed her lane behind him. It was time for her break, and she headed out the door for a smoke, giving her roommate a wink and a smile on her way out. Whatever.

There was something wrong with this picture, but it wasn’t her job to figure it out. She pulled out her cigarettes, checked her watch, and calculated how long until she got off, putting the matter of Bridie’s past out of her mind. If something about her roommate was out of whack, the truth would come out eventually. It always did. She lit up and started thinking about what to fix Newlee for dinner.

****

Bridie hung her smock in her locker and, for no reason she could think of, transferred the paper with Lorna’s telephone number to her coat pocket. Somehow just feeling her fingers around it reminded her of who she had been once upon a time. She punched out and went down the narrow stairs from the lunchroom. She was glad, for once, that Carmen had a date with Newlee. She didn’t feel like talking to anyone. She would have to find somewhere else to hang out for a few hours, but that was all right. She supposed she could go to the movie like she’d said. She headed out of the Bag and Save, then just stood there for a minute. The brick sidewalks were slick with rain, and a few of the cars splashing past her on the narrow streets had turned on their lights.

She liked Alexandria. It wasn’t home, but it was nice. Old and pretty. Everything was orderly and square. Gardens were neatly contained behind the wrought-iron fences, shops tidy, and everything built of solid, red Virginia brick. The old-fashioned streetlights made glowing circles on the street.

She started walking. She looked at the shop windows as she passed them, glanced into Le Gaulois, the snooty French restaurant, passed its garden where tables were set under a grape arbor that would be leafy and romantic come summertime. She went by the bar and grill, the stationery shop, the fancy boutiques. The trees, neatly boxed into squares of brick-lined earth, were bare but would be covered with pretty twinkling lights in just a few weeks. There were dogwood, redbud, flowering magnolia, and cherry, all asleep now.