The Night I Met With Her
by Sarah Downey
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I walk through wise old streets, I see many races of people, all blind and colourful in blissful ignorance and I smell. I smell that New York City air. It has that scent; that scent of love that no other city can hold. Because no body loves a city like the peeps of New York, the peeps, the kids and the dogs that travel through New York’s streets like the inside of their hearts. All clogged and disgusting is the city. It’s my city. Except tonight, I don’t search for inspiration or that sweet scent of contentment. Tonight, I search for my child, the child who wandered away, let go of my fingers and grasped the hand of another person, who then led her away into the dark. I hope for a sign. I wish for another happening, to be told my happening was my keeping tight of that small, defenceless hand, ready to attend her fifth birthday party.
Her mother and I met at the back of a supermarket, bumping trolleys and roaring at each other’s contrary temper from trying to outdo one another. Soon, we were kissing and hiding from the world, in the shed at the bottom of my very small garden. Eagerly kissing and making spectacular plans, making plans to smell the scent of New York City air.
We arrived with naïve hearts and resided in a broken apartment, once the home to another silly dream. I planned and besotted over many adventures for my child, the little girl I knew was coming after only four months of courting. How should I have known in the midst of my fanatic planning and saving with cherries, that my lover would take a tumble down some stairs and crush what barely existed in her ever swollen stomach. We called upon Doctors to do whatever it took, my savings decreasing by each withering word I spoke so eloquently in order to save my creation. Amazingly the child survived the mighty crush, the horrendous fall that later left her dumb and deaf. Although unfortunate and useless, she was a miracle nonetheless and placed gently in my waiting arms.
Those curious blue eyes were looking up at me, begging for knowledge, and unknown to her and me that her brain would refuse to function. Still, we wandered the streets like beatnik writers searching for a story and soon she was as addicted to the story of New York City air as I became to telling it.
I am still searching for her now, my heart aching for an answer as each minute passes, each torturing minute keeping me from my baby longer for time’s sheer amusement. The City is laughing at me, my confidence is dwindling, and we all know she will never be found in this damned too big City. Those tiny hands are slipping, I can’t remember their touch, I want her in my arms again to comfort and tell her I’ll never let go again. But I don’t think I can and I don’t think I ever will. My banging head is telling me, after one week of agonising searches to give up and go home, where my lover scrapes her wrists and curses me for letting her fingers slip.
I am sinking to my knees; I cannot feel my beating heart anymore. It is giving up on me and preparing to turn to stone. My heavy tears are drying up, my nose reduces to sniffling, the aching torment in my mind is unbearably calm and I have now decided that she is gone. My child has been swallowed by the City, the enormous New York City, where people come to find love and dream, to make the dream come true, to live and touch upon the lives of those beatnik writers. My eyes are lost to where I’m lying; for once I do not recognise the tallest buildings alive and the berating traffic’s complaints. I am not religious; I am not a worshiper of any kind, of any sort, to any God that may exist. But I’m asking for help, whether it is from my self or someone much stronger than me, to ease my tired soul, to take away the pain of losing a child. I’m asking for someone to help me find my way, to help me reach my home, to soothe the woes of my childless lover, to fall into a sleep and never wake up. I ask…I pray.
“Papa?” comes a voice I wish would go away. It haunts me during every second I try to sleep, plaguing me with guilt, reminding me to keep looking, but I give up. “Papa?” it cries again, this time more persistent, that weeping asking voice, that baby girlish charm. I keep my head in my hands, wishing for no more disappointment, no more crushed creation, begging me to look, asking me to hope. “Papa?” once more the voice cries, this time a hand rests on my head, I’m guessing a suspicious nobody, telling me to move along, to get on with life just like everybody else.
The hand presses more firmly and instantly my eyes snap open, my hands begin to tremble, for I recognise those fingers and I remember that beautiful touch, those tiny baby fingers, resting now on my forehead, feeling my temperature like her mother used to do.
“You sick?” she asks, that miracle breathing voice.
I sit sorely on my knees and stare, for there she is, still in one piece if not a little bruised. Those curious blue eyes look intently for signs of recognition, that her Papa has found her and wants to take her home.
I sign, “Where were you?” with jittery nervous hands.
“Looking for you,” she slurs back, giving that reminiscent wonderful smile that I was contemplating never seeing again.
I pick my child up and cradle her in my arms, like I always do. Except this time I hold tighter, I study her fragile features and slip my teary fingers into hers. Her head rests in my neck and she sleeps, the whole way home. She is unaware that the city has just spat her back out, thrown her back into my life like a ball of irate fire. I know now never to let go again and I realise the City’s sweet smelling air is just an illusion of what we walk in when things are great. No one will ever love her like I do. Not even New York City.
© Copyright Sarah Downey