Remember Mia Read online

  Suddenly the monitor unleashed violent static and then went silent again. I manually switched over to the second channel. Again, nothing but white noise. I switched back to the initial channel and heard a man’s voice. Before I reached the car, baby monitor in hand, the monitor changed to a gentle buzz, then to a protest, and finally an eruption. Mia’s stuttering gasps interrupted by attempts to fill her lungs with air.

  I dug into my purse for the car key, and when I looked up, the man with the steel-toed boots, whom I’d seen earlier, stared at me. His eyes went from the car—echoing with screams—back to me, to the monitor in my hand. My cell phone rang and the moving company confirmed the address. When I turned back around, he had gone.

  —

  A week later, I stood by the window, parted the curtain with my hands, and looked out into the fall night. It was almost dark and the streets were deserted except for a few people taking their dogs for a last pit stop before they’d curl up on couches or on kitchen floors. Leaves tumbled about like discarded paper, following their destinies into storm drains, iron window grates, and curbside puddles.

  I pulled the curtain, layered it midway where the panels met, and shut out the dark. Night falling on New York City was not my favorite time of day. The outside noises—the traffic, the hurried voices, and the screaming children in the school courtyard across the street—never completely stopped but slowed down like a clock that needed winding.

  Later, I jerked up from a half-sleep state, a buzz echoing in my head. I listened but it was quiet. I shut my eyes again. Three more buzzes sounded and I realized it must be the doorbell. I peeked through the hole but all I could make out was a shadowy outline of a man.

  “Yes?” I said through the closed door.

  “Mrs. Paradise?”

  “Yes?”

  “David Lieberman.”

  At first, the name meant nothing to me, and then I remembered Jack and the property manager mentioning the name of the upstairs tenant who was overseeing the renovations. I had a feeling he wasn’t going to go away unless I talked to him.

  “Just a minute,” I said, ignoring Mia wailing in her crib. I opened the door, chain still engaged, and looked at him through a crack in the door.

  “How’s the pressure?” Lieberman checked his hands and proceeded to clean the fingernails of one hand with the nails of the other.

  “What?” I wanted to tell him to leave me alone but he’d probably tell Jack, and Jack would call and scold me for being rude. After all, according to Jack, Lieberman was here to help.

  “The pressure. The water pressure.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “The water pressure.” He emphasized every syllable, as if I was either incapable of understanding English or partially deaf.

  “What about it?”

  He cocked his head. “Someone’s crying in there,” he said.

  “What can I do for you?” I said, ignoring his comment.

  “If you pick her up, she’ll stop crying. I’ve been listening to her all day.” He gave me a stare. “Not that the walls are particularly thin in this building, but noise travels.”

  “What about the water pressure?” I tried to keep my face expressionless.

  “Have you taken a shower lately?” he asked and looked me up and down through the crack in the door: my greasy hair, my wrinkled shirt, and the pants I’d been wearing for a week. “There’s a problem with the plumbing, they are working on the pipes.”

  “I hadn’t noticed.”

  “She isn’t going to stop crying until you pick her up.” His neck craned to see what was going on behind me.

  I started to think that my expressionless face might be a mistake. “Let me call you after I check, okay?” I closed the door and on my way to the nursery, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I looked emaciated, my cheeks sunken and my eyes black holes surrounded by dark circles. I couldn’t even remember the last time I had taken a shower.

  A couple of hours later the buzzer went off again. This time I opened the door and stood in the doorway. I had all but forgotten about the plumbing and the water pressure.

  “The pressure seems fine,” I lied, “but I can’t tell a difference, to be honest with you.”

  “Would you mind if I checked?”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “I met your husband a couple of times.” He hesitated ever so slightly, then added, “He asked me to check on you.”

  “I don’t need to be checked on.”

  “Maybe that came out wrong. He wants me to help you if you have any issues. Plumbing, electric, whatever you need, just tell me. I’m either next door or upstairs. Except on the weekends, I’m never here on the weekends. I visit my sister upstate. But during the week, Monday morning until Friday afternoon, I’m all yours.” He smiled at me, then cocked his head. “You didn’t call me and I realized you didn’t have my number.” He stepped closer and handed me a piece of paper. I got a whiff of sawdust and oil.

  “I’m not sure what my husband told you, but the moving company gave me a list of plumbers and electricians.”

  Lieberman nodded. “Do you have any idea how long it takes to get a plumber to show up? You have more important things to worry about,” he said and raised his eyebrows.

  Mia was fussing in the background. “Right,” I said and grabbed the door.

  “I’m around nail guns and saws all day. It can get pretty loud and the ringing in the ears sometimes takes hours to go away,” he said and tapped his right ear with his hand. He smiled without showing teeth and took his New York Yankees hat off. “I go home at the end of the day and then I hear the baby cry through the ceiling. That’s all I’m saying. Must be hard, all by yourself.”

  He looked even younger with his hat off.

  “I’ll check the pressure again and I’ll call you. Promise.”

  “Okay then. If I don’t hear from you, I’ll just come back,” he said and laughed.

  I offered him a smile that was friendly without being encouraging. Before I shut the door, I heard the tarp move and for a second the construction noise increased. Then the tarp closed and all was quiet again.

  —

  A couple of blocks from North Dandry, a Child’s Play offered child care services by the hour.

  “Here’s a copy of our policies. The by-the-hour group drop-off times are flexible. The other groups adhere to a curriculum and you have to talk to the individual caregiver regarding the drop-off times.” A middle-aged woman in ice cream cone–littered scrubs handed me a stack of papers from behind the counter.

  We toured the facility. Behind a two-way glass wall two staffers in pink scrubs sat in padded gliders, each one rocking a baby in her arms.

  “Her immunization record must be up to date,” she said and pushed her glasses back to the bridge of her nose. “There’s a list of shot records required by law in your paperwork. Take it to the pediatrician and have them look it over. It’s pretty standard.”

  We passed the window of the toddler room, where about two dozen children, in groups of three or four, were lying on the floor curling their bodies into the shape of each letter of the alphabet.

  A woman in purple scrubs joined us. After she introduced herself as the director, she glanced down at Mia thrashing her arms and legs. “Anything out of the ordinary we need to know?” she asked while Mia was catching her breath between two wails.

  “She’s just a bit fussy today,” I said and struggled to pop the pacifier back in Mia’s mouth.

  “Don’t forget her shot record—we can’t enroll her unless the paperwork is complete,” the lady in purple reminded me. I signed the required paperwork and handed her a check for the application fee.

  After I left the day care, I thought about things that seemed to be out of place lately: a formula bottle I thought I had left on the counter was now in the f
ridge, baby clothes I had left draped over the crib ended up in the hamper, windows left ajar, and dirty diapers I’d left around the house wound up in the trash. It was probably my imagination; it wasn’t as if Jack was catching a flight from Chicago to New York, secretly checking in on me, moving things around. “Mommy brain” they call it, I kept telling myself, assuming that the part of my brain that used to be involved in planning and foresight was taken over by the baby’s schedule. It was probably the unfamiliar surroundings but I didn’t need another worry.

  Mia was asleep in her stroller when I entered a hardware store just a couple of blocks from North Dandry. The sales clerk at Taylor Hardware, Security & Lock wore an apron with the name LARRY stitched in cursive across the pocket, almost illegible in all capital letters, and a slightly more complicated name would have been impossible to decipher. Larry climbed ladders and pulled boxes from the very top shelves while I listened patiently to his explanations, taking mental note of possible lock choices, all the while looking into Larry’s watery eyes stuck behind his enormous glasses.

  “What kind of locks you have now?” he asked and pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose, leaving fingerprints on the lenses.

  “A latch set with a keyhole on the outside and a thumb turn on the inside. There’s also a chain door guard.” Mia started to stir in the stroller and I knew it was only a matter of minutes until she’d break out in a full-blown howl.

  “Are you looking for additional security? Like a dead bolt or something?”

  “There’s no such thing as too much security.” Mia started to fuss and her hands began to flail. I rocked the stroller back and forth, knowing that picking her up wouldn’t do any good. I hoped I’d make it through the lock purchase without Larry giving me any advice on how to console a screaming baby. Mia seemed more content being left in her stroller than in my arms, as if my embrace was the most uncomfortable state of being.

  Larry’s eyes were huge behind the lenses as he rose his voice to top Mia’s crying.

  “How about an old-fashioned alarm system sounding like sirens and hell rolled all into one?” he said. “The security company will dispatch a car within minutes. We’ve got a special going on, twenty percent off and free installation.”

  “I don’t want to alert anyone, I just want to be able to lock my doors and keep them that way.” I kept rolling the stroller back and forth, trying to stop Mia’s crying.

  “An alarm system is—”

  “Just tell me what else you have that I can install myself.” I checked my watch. Larry took the gesture as impatience on my part and started pulling cardboard boxes and metal parts off the shelf behind him.

  “And I need tools,” I added. “Like a screwdriver and a handheld drill.”

  “She’s got a set of lungs on her.” He looked down at Mia, whose face had turned red, her mouth a gaping well of fury.

  “Just give me what I asked for. Don’t forget the tools.”

  He wasn’t offended by my rudeness. “Are you sure you can manage? I’ll talk to the boss and we throw in a free installation. If you live in the neighborhood, that is.”

  “Not too far,” I said and checked my watch again.

  “I’ll install the locks myself if you’re interested.” He stepped closer, and when I reached for the boxes, he didn’t let go immediately. “Seriously, I will. We have a special going on.”

  After he rang me up at the register, I left the store, knowing his eyes were following me as I walked by the glass storefront. I had seen the disappointment on his face when I paid in cash. I knew he wanted to look at my credit card and remember my name, even look me up later. Or ask for my driver’s license to find out my address.

  Back home, I went to work but realized quickly that I was in way over my head. I couldn’t even hold the drill steady nor could I identify the exact spot where the screws were supposed to go.

  Two hours later the metal door to my apartment was scratched and dented. I studied the parts I had bought at the hardware store. I read the back of the boxes until the words no longer made sense. The bolt throw seemed too long and I couldn’t find the steel insert. One of the locks contained a free-turning cylinder but the screws were too short to reach the wood studding beyond the doorframe. I was frustrated, sweaty, and discouraged; my knuckles were bruised.

  The hardware store address and phone number were printed on the top of the receipt, and I hoped Larry’s offer for a free installation was still good. I called the hardware store and asked for him. I heard paperwork being shuffled, and the bell above the door jangling. Eventually Larry came to the phone. I explained who I was and what I’d bought, and asked if the free-installation offer was still valid.

  “Yeah, about that,” Larry said, and I heard the sound of the register open and shut. “I was wondering how those locks worked out for you. I can come by after work and take a look. What’s your address again?”

  “Five-seventeen North Dandry, apartment A1. There’s a lot of construction going on and I was going to ask one of the workers, but . . . anyway . . . I don’t want to disturb them.”

  “Like I said, it’ll be after hours. It’s just something we do out of courtesy for our customers.”

  We agreed on a time and hung up. If Larry got the job done quickly, neither Lieberman nor Jack would ever find out that I had locks installed. After I hung up the phone with Larry, a faint whine crept toward me from Mia’s room. There was no shower in my near future but at least the installation of the locks seemed certain. After I fed and changed Mia, I stood with her in my arms, looking out the window facing the street. The windows still had their original cast-iron bars and unless someone took a metal saw to them, they seemed very sturdy and safe.

  Larry appeared with his tool belt fitting snuggly around his waist, his belly drooping over in the front. He carefully laid out all the locks on the foyer tile.

  “Locks have personality, you know,” he said.

  “Well, they weren’t speaking to me,” I said and passed Mia from one hip to the other.

  She let out a sudden screech that prompted Larry to drop the electric drill. It left a jagged crack in the ceramic tile.

  “Darn it,” Larry said and inspected the damage. “Little one scared me. I’ll replace that for you free of charge.”

  I didn’t care for him to come back. “Don’t worry about the tile. I’ll have that fixed. There’s lots of tiles stacked in the hallway.”

  Whatever I hadn’t managed to do a couple of hours earlier took him all of twenty minutes.

  “Anything else I can do for you?” Larry asked and took his time returning tools into his red Craftsman box. “While I’m here. I’m handy with a lot of stuff.” He winked at me and with the back of his hand wiped the sweat off his forehead. “If you don’t mind, call my boss and tell him about my work. It’s almost Christmas, which means bonus time.”

  I promised I would and that I’d call him if I needed anything else, and shut the door quickly. It was dented, the paint scratched, but I thought that I had all the locks I needed to keep us safe. Now, even if he had a key, Jack wouldn’t be able to just barge in unannounced. And I wouldn’t have to second-guess my mental state every time something seemed out of place.

  Later that night, I walked across the room to the fireplace and poked the logs until the flames grew into a joyous blaze. I sat in front of the fireplace, yoga-style, and raised my palms until the heat of the flames became unbearable. I looked around the sparsely decorated room, which consisted of a couch, a chair, and an old table.

  Jack’s architect had decided to convert the brownstone into four separate units in order to take advantage of the rising real estate values. One unit was occupied by Lieberman and another by me. The two units next door were still under construction. I envisioned how this building must have been a century ago. Opulence lingered just beneath the coat of wear and tear. Single living rooms
replaced double parlors, kitchens became smaller but more efficient, and entry foyers disappeared completely. The parlor doors had lost their shine and the marble mantels had long been replaced. The ceiling plasterwork was still intact but showed patches here and there. All interior doors and wood moldings showed deterioration and fatigue, but the allure was in just that: the beauty of imperfection. I wondered how every little scratch or scrape had gotten there. The rooms were spacious, their ceilings an imposing fourteen feet. The sleek mahogany doors were the most distinctive feature of the apartment.

  The ceiling work of the house was machine-made, rather than handmade, and of papier-mâché or stucco, rather than plaster. The combination of luxury, faded glory, and ornate shabbiness gave the apartment a kind of magical charm. Since the first story’s floor plan was the exact mirror image of the second floor, four identical apartments had been created by using the former grand entrance as the hallway and separating two units by a simple wall.

  While the left side of the house, apartments 2A and 2B, was still under construction, the right side of the house, 1A and 1B, had been completed almost nine months ago.

  Mrs. Drake, in our initial meeting, had explained the legal ramifications. I hadn’t understood most of it, but figured that the completion of the two unfinished apartments was behind schedule due to the lawsuit that Jack had filed against the contractors. The settlement stipulated that the contractors now had to complete the left part of the building within a certain time frame.

  The blaze in the fireplace had eased and the shadows flickering across the walls were subtle, almost comforting. I fell asleep as the rainbow-colored craze of flames turned into a tamed orange glow, exhausting itself.

  —

  The next morning—four empty bottles on the couch proof of the number of night feedings—I took two aspirin for my headache. I waited for the buzzing in my head to ease, for my thoughts to stop spinning.

  The doorbell buzzed, followed by Mia crying. I went to her room, picked her up, and to my surprise she settled down the second the bottle hit her lips.