Another Chance at Life

Sally Birmingham shouldn’t be driving; she knows. She drank three big glasses of red wine at dinner earlier and is still feeling a little tipsy. But when Charles mentioned his mother, Bridget, is coming over for brunch tomorrow, she realized she had completely forgotten the eggs for the quiche. Bridget is so Hoity toity that if Sally doesn’t have a quiche with Sunday brunch, she will never hear the end of it. So here she is, drinking and driving on a Saturday at almost midnight. She pulls into the local grocery store, making sure to park her Range Rover away from the other cars, out of habit. She grabs her Louis Vuitton purse from the front seat, clutching it closely to her chest as she walks through the dark parking lot. Although, who would really harm her in her safe Connecticut grocery store parking lot?

Sally walks into the store and grabs a red basket. For being so late, there are surprisingly a good amount of people walking around the store. She wonders if anyone else is tipsy as well. She decides that maybe she will browse a little while she is here; Charles is probably already asleep. She is a little perturbed he didn’t offer to accompany her here, but she understands. He had a hard workday; poor Charles always works so hard, getting home later and later every day. When they first were married 25 years ago, he would get home at 5:15 on the dot. Now that their twin boys, Brenton and Jaxton, are both at Yale, Charles is work, work, working away like a little bumble bee. He says he wants to pay off the boys’ school before they finish so Sally and he can retire and buy a beach house in Nantucket. Wouldn’t that be nice? Sally turns into the bakery section and looks through the desserts. She picks up a box of croissants and eyes them up. Bridget won’t eat these, she knows, but they will look nice on the table as a centerpiece if she puts some powdered sugar over them. She places them in her basket and walks over to the dairy section to get the eggs for the quiche. As she passes the deli, she spies a liver pate that looks absolutely scrumptious. Bridget may applaud her on a liver pate over a nice little water cracker. She grabs a ticket and sees there is a larger lady standing in front of her who looks to be ordering an entire cow. She is wearing a hot pink sweatshirt and cutoff jeans. It looks like something Sally’s niece who is 14 years old would wear, not something a 40 some year-old woman should be wearing, but who is Sally to judge.

“No, I said three pounds of brisket,” the lady says as she points to the slab of beef on the meat cutter.

The larger lady smiles at her and says, “Sorry, it’s my fiancé’s birthday tomorrow and I am making brisket for him and his parents.” Sally smiles and glances inside the lady’s shopping cart. She sees Cheetos, ice cream, chips, filth, filth, and more filth.

Sally tries to hide her distain for the larger lady’s food choices. Charles and she try to keep themselves on a strict diet of healthy foods which is how they keep their great figures at their ages. She does Pilates three days a week, plays tennis two days a week, and only drinks wine and vodka as she hears they have the least number of calories. She never allows herself desserts or chips. How could she keep a successful man like Charles married to her if she didn’t have this figure?

“Next!” the man shouts from behind the counter. Sally takes her eyes off of the Cheetos and onto the man behind the counter.

“Yes, please. I’ll take a half a pound of that lovely liver pate there,” she says pointing towards the pate. She finds that when she uses adjectives like, “lovely” and “delightful” before items, it makes them seem that much more special. The larger lady standing next to her turns and smiles again, looking like she wants to make conversation. Sally wants to avoid this, so she turns back and watches the butcher take the pate out from behind the glass and scoop it into a container.

“Bang! Bang! Bang!”

Suddenly Sally hears a loud banging coming from the front of the store. So loud, in fact, that she feels the need to cover her ears and crouch down. She looks over and sees the larger lady doing the same thing, her face making a contorted, confused twisting shape. Sally looks over at the butcher from behind the counter who is looking across the store, eyes wide open in alarm.

“What was hell was that?” the larger lady shouts.

“Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!”

Sally hears a couple screams from the front of the store following these bangs. She is realizing this must be something serious if people are screaming. Still crouched down, her knees begin to shake, and she falls to her knees. She looks up to the butcher and then over to the larger lady for a solution.

“Come here, come here quick!” the butcher yells to them both from behind the counter. He points to the side of the counter where there is an opening.  Sally watches as the larger lady stands up, leaving her cart, and runs towards the counter.

“Bang, bang, bang, bang!”

Sally freezes at the banging noises which are getting louder. She now realizes they are gunshots. Why in the world are there gunshots in her local grocery store?

“Come on lady!” the larger lady yells as she runs back, grabs Sally’s hand, and tugs her behind the butcher’s counter.

“Bang, Bang, Bang!” More screams. Sally runs behind the larger lady and the butcher. The butcher leads them to the very back where there is a big stainless-steel freezer and he opens it.

“Get in,” he instructs as he gestures his hands towards the freezer.

“In there?” Sally points as she sees slabs of half dead cows and pigs dangling from ropes. The larger lady is already halfway inside. What would Charles think of her getting into a freezer with dead animals?

“Get in!” the butcher yells as he grabs her wrist and pulls her into the freezer.

“Listen, you two. There is no way of locking this from the inside. I am going to lock you both in here and slide the key under here so no one can get you. When it is safe for you to come out, you can slide the key back under, and someone will unlock this and let you out.”

“But, what about you?” Sally asks.

“Listen, lady. I’m trying to save your life here.” He slams the door and Sally hears jiggling from the handle. She sees a key slide under the door, and she quickly bends down to pick it up and grips it tightly. She turns and looks over to the larger lady who is sitting on an egg crate that is flipped upside down.

“Lord Jesus, help us!” the larger lady declares as she puts her head in her hands.

 Sally blows warmth onto her hands and walks over to the corner of the freezer, second guessing her decision to wear her high heels and a dress to the store tonight as she is now getting quite chilly.

“Bang, bang, bang!”

“The gunshots are getting louder!” the larger lady whispers, “They are getting closer to us!” She is beginning to cry and appears to be shaking. Sally looks down and realizes she has wet herself. How embarrassing; this has never happened before. The larger lady looks over at the stream of urine running down Sally’s frigid legs and looks away quickly. “Don’t worry about it. I’d probably piss myself too if I didn’t have a coloscopy bag.” Sally opens her eyes widely at this blunt information, but then feels comforted by this lady’s honesty. “What’s your name anyways?” the larger lady asks as she wipes her runny nose with the sleeve of her pink sweatshirt.

“Sally,” Sally responds as she walks closer towards the lady. She realizes she left her Louis Vuitton purse in front of the deli counter, and she curses silently to herself. It has some Kleenex in it she could use to clean this urine and more importantly, it has her phone in it. She could call Charles. She sees that the larger lady doesn’t have her purse either.

“Bang, bang, bang!”

“Get over here away from the door and get close to the ground!” the lady yells to her. Sally hurries over and crouches down next to the lady.

“What’s your name?” she whispers to the lady.

“Amy,” she whispers back. “Sally, I can’t die. I just can’t. I beat bladder cancer 5 years ago. I have a sick mom at home who I am taking care of. And I just met the love of my life last year finally after 45 years of waiting. Can you believe that? 45 years with no love and I finally have it now. I can’t die right now. I just can’t.”

Sally is surprised at all of this candid information. “We won’t die, Amy,” she whispers. “We have the key, remember? They can’t get in.” She holds up the key and hands it over to Amy.

“My fiancé must be worried sick,” Amy begins to cry. “Do you have a husband…. or wife?” she asks looking over to Sally.

“Bang, Bang!”

Both women move their bodies closer and lay themselves flat on the ground. Sally can hear muffled screams but the motor to the freezer is too loud to make out any words.

“Husband,” Sally replies. “But he probably is asleep. He won’t even notice I’m not home.”

“Oh,” Amy whispers and looks back towards the freezer door. Sally can feel the urine on her legs begin to freeze. She wonders how many people have been killed so far in the store. She tries not to think about it. Can bullets shoot through a metal freezer? She guesses it is best to stay on the ground either way.  Amy reaches over and takes her hand. Sally reluctantly allows her to, and Amy squeezes it tightly between her chubby fingers.

Sally can’t help but think about Amy mentioning meeting the love of her life last year after 45 years. How nice that must be for her. There’s a lid for every pot is what her mother used to always say. Charles most certainly isn’t the love of Sally’s life, but he is a good husband, she supposes. He has provided for her and her twin boys through the years. Sally met Charles in Boston when he was attending Boston College for his MBA. She was actually waitressing at the time. Ha! She can’t believe it now, a waitress!  At the time Sally had been in love with a busboy at the restaurant she worked in. Wesley was his name. Sally hasn’t thought about Wesley in years. Wesley was African American, if only Charles knew about that! He used to write her poetry and tell her she was the most beautiful woman in the world. They had kept their relationship a secret from family and friends, for fear of what people would think of them. But when they were alone after the restaurant closed, they would take a walk along the Charles River, or make a midnight picnic in the Public Garden, or sometimes when Sally’s roommate wasn’t home, go back to Sally’s place and make love. They used to say they would run away to an island where people didn’t judge that she was white, and he was black.

One day, when Wesley was off work, Charles had come into the restaurant to eat, and Sally had served him. He had flirted with her the whole time, and she had guiltily flirted back. He had told her she was the prettiest waitress he had ever seen and tipped her 50%. He dressed in such nice clothes and smelled like wealth. Sally couldn’t help but imagine the ease of being with someone with money. Wesley was barely making ends meet, being a busboy in the evenings and going to technical school during the day. Before Charles left, he asked Sally if she wanted to go to his family beach house in Nantucket that weekend. She imagined what it would be like to date someone where people didn’t stare at you walking down the street. So, without giving it too much thought, she ended up leaving the restaurant that day and never seeing Wesley again.

Gripping tightly at Amy’s hand, Sally wonders where Wesley is now.  

“I don’t hear anymore gunshots,” whispers Amy, loosening her grip on Sally’s hand.

“Then someone should be here soon. Then we will slide them the key to let us out,” Sally tells her. It is starting to get really cold. Quite freezing actually. The two women sit up and lean against the wall.

“We need to keep close, keep our body heat together,” Amy says. She puts her arm around Sally protectively. Sally hasn’t had anyone put their arm around her like this besides Charles since Wesley. And come to think of it, Charles hasn’t touched her in years. Ever since Sally found out about his indiscretions, she hasn’t wanted to be close to him.  A few years ago, a woman had called Sally and told her she was sleeping with Charles. Sally had hung up the phone slowly and never said anything to Charles or anyone else. She just decided then and there to never touch him sexually again. And now here she is. In a freezer, maybe about to die of hypothermia, with no love of her life. She wonders again where Wesley is right now. She wonders what kind of life she would have had if she had married Wesley. Would they have been broke? Probably. Would they have had to deal with people judging them for being mixed races? Probably. Would their kids have had a tough time being raised as interracial? Maybe. Although now and days, it seems to her everyone is interracial. Would she have been happy? Probably. Definitely. Wesley treated her well. Wesley was passionate. She loved Wesley. All of the sudden, Sally realizes she is crying.

“Shh, it’s ok. We are safe now. It sounds like they are done. They are going to save us soon,” Amy whispers to her. Sally nods to her, not wanting to tell her that she is crying because she is just now realizing that she chose the wrong path in her life. She is not a country club woman. She hates country clubs. She hates Bridget. She hates quiches and croissants. She chose this life because she thought it would be the easier life. But just because it was the easier path, doesn’t mean it made her happy. Amy begins to rub Sally’s arms vigorously as it seems that Sally is now shaking. How much time has gone by? Hours? Sally isn’t sure. The two sit like this as time passes by. Slowly. Slowly. Amy stops and puts her head on Sally’s shoulder to rest. The two women are now gripping one another’s hands tightly. Shivering. Waiting.

Suddenly, there is loud banging on the door. The two women jolt upright, their arms and legs so stiff and cold, they can barely move.

“Who is it?” Amy yells.

“It’s the police!” a voice yells, “Are you okay in there? It’s safe to come out!” Sally and Amy look at one another and tear up. Amy takes the key and slides it under the door. They see the handle jiggle and then the door flies open. The women see three police officers in front of them, holding silver looking blankets.

“Are you ok?” a female police officer asks Sally as she wraps her in the silver looking blanket. Sally shakes vigorously as she tries to nod her head yes.

“You ladies are lucky, whoever put you in here saved your life,” the male police officer says to them as he leads them out of the back of the grocery store.

The officer opens the door, and the women have to shield their eyes from the blue and red lights flashing in front of them. Sally is surprised to see the sun creeping up from behind the police cars. How can it be morning already?

Sally looks for Charles in the crowd but does not see him. He must not have noticed she never came to bed last night. She sees a man rush up and envelope Amy in a huge hug. They are both crying. Before Sally gets into the ambulance to get checked out, Amy walks over to her and embraces her in a bear hug.

“I can’t believe we are alive! I can’t believe it! This is God telling us we have another chance at life!” Amy says as she wipes a tear streaming down her face.

“Yes, you’re right,” she says. “Enjoy your time with the love of your life,” she says.

“You too!” Amy says.

Sally thinks about this for a second. Yes, maybe I will. Maybe I will go look for him. She wonders if he is still living in Boston. She remembers his family was from Plymouth. She will look him up later today as soon as she tells Charles she is filing for a divorce.