The cold air brought him back to the present and back from the haunting thoughts of past that brought him here. He stood at the intersection staring across at the flickering neon lights of The Scarlett. The streets were empty. Even cabs were rare at 3 am. The train ran about thirty minutes ago, but it wasn’t going by again until 4. Typically the sound of screeching train brakes as it rounded a corner or came to a halt at the station echoed through the air. There was also usually sirens wailing off in the distance. Now though under the cover of the late November cold, it was almost completely silent. So here he waited, alone in the freezing dark, across from the black windows of the store front. He had been here before. It’s where he saw her the first time. He didn’t go in, but he saw her when she came out.
It was three years ago just before midnight, that she had walked out of that building. He stood there alone, like today, but at that time he was waiting for the bus. She approached him and asked if she could borrow bus fare. She wanted to leave this place. He paid her fair. On the way home they talked, and it was with the swaying of the seats that he saw a woman hardened by a life of pain and abuse. Yet, somewhere he saw a broken and scared girl, afraid of the world, hiding behind those deep set eyes. When he stepped off, he found himself offering her a place to sleep for the night. He didn’t even know it until the words fell out. At the time it was just a small apartment, but it had a couch, and that was better than the streets. Something in him told him that she needed someone to help her. He didn’t think she’d accept such an offer, he could see the distrust in her eyes, but she did. Besides, in her world no one gave favors without debt. She stayed that night but was gone the next morning. It was three months before he saw her again. This time she came and knocked on his door at half passed two in the morning. She needed his couch again. He made her promise to stay for breakfast, which was his only requirement. She stayed.
Three years just wasn’t long enough.
It was the hardest three years of his life, but they were worth it. He had seen this angry woman and terrified little girl both soften and learn to laugh. He saw joy, love, and real happiness. She became a person that loved others deeply and fought to help those that had been where she had been. She was amazing.
Then one day she heard something. Maybe it was a whisper, maybe a lie that crept into her head, or maybe just a vision of darkness that once bound her. Over the course of three months she slowly began to distance herself from everyone. The eyes became more inset, the laughs quieted, and sadness shadowed everything she touched. He once heard her say that she wasn’t this new woman and that this was all a sham. The happiness wasn’t real because how could it be, her past was who she was and there was no use running from it. Within a few weeks she said that there was no use pretending any more. She was gone.
He waited up that first night for her, but the sun rose and there was no knock at the door. Three more months and nothing. Then one day on his ride home from work, he missed his stop. He rode the train all the way to the street and hopped a bus to this corner. That was three hours ago.
In a parking lot half a block away, he heard a pair of heels strike the pavement. From the shadows emerged two women, both in short skirts and boots with lace leggings. Their coats were just as short and he could see, even from this distance, that they were shivering. One of the girls had a fur trimmed hood which was being used in a semi-futile attempt to keep her ears warm. The other had no such luxury at all. Their hands were stuffed into the thin nylon pockets. and their arms tucked tight against their bodies. Each step was taken swiftly in desperate determination to find warmth. Upon reaching the intersection, they crossed diagonally and started heading for the door between the black windows. They undoubtedly worked within. As they grew ever closer and as he paid more acute attention, he recognized how the girl without the hood walked. He quickly pulled his glasses from his coat pocket and with a second glance, he saw her face. It was her.
He hadn’t planned this in advance. He hadn’t even meant to come here. It seemed to have all happened without his consent. As he moved quickly to intercept them on the street, he realized it was happening again. They hadn’t seen him or maybe just chose to ignore him, but he made no attempt to hide his heavy and purposeful steps.
Fifteen feet.
They both stopped and looked at him. For a moment there was nothing but panic and fear in their eyes, but hers suddenly cracked and washed away. Her eyes were those of a small child, lost in a zoo, the moment her father comes into view. Recognition, salvation. Yet twisted with fear of coming discipline for wondering off.
He slid his wool coat from his shoulders and wrapped the startled shivering frame within. He didn’t look back, but guided her away. His arm pulled her tightly as he walked toward the center of the city towards home. He didn’t know what to expect in this moment, but her walk was in step with his and offered no resistance. When he looked down, he saw her hands peek through the opening of the coat and pull it closed tightly around her. It may have been a mile before he looked down again, but this time she was looking up at him with tears streaming down her face. Her lips quivered as if to say something, but no words came out. He pulled her a little tighter. As if in response she lowered her head and rested against his arm. Through the light sweater, he could feel each shake and each sob as the heaviness of her heart was broken and as she pressed her weight against him, “I promised I’d never go back there.”
His eyes were stern and determined, but his heart tore apart with each step. Each painful thump in his chest beat for her. She was broken and hurting, just like him. Through frozen chapped lips and coarse throat, he spoke the only words of encouragement he knew. Entangled with them was unconditional love, unrelenting forgiveness, and unquenchable grace.
“I know.”