Page 111 of If Looks Could Kill
Tabitha—Reggie’s Bakery(Monday, December 3, 1888)
There was no one at my old apartment. Clearly, Pearl had not been by.
I had mailed Freyda and Cora’s article and Cora’s letter, then come here. It was the last place I hadn’t looked for Pearl. I knew it would be futile, yet I had to try.
I wandered around the corner and found myself in front of Reggie’s Bakery, with its fogged-up windows and its warm aromas beckoning. It was mid-afternoon, and Aunt Mag’s breakfast was a distant memory now. I needed something to eat.
The scent of buttery bread and spun sugar assailed me as I entered. I ordered a bun and a cup of coffee and sat down at a table facing outward toward Rivington.
The streets were clogged with horses, wagons, and carriages. Children done with school darted in and out around adults plodding along. None of them knew or cared that Pearl was out there, somewhere, a Medusa bomb about to go off.
It was time for me to face the obvious: Pearl did not intend for me tofind her. She neither needed nor wanted me. I was wasting time, trying to find someone who didn’t want to be found.
Was I doing this for Pearl? Or was this like every other time I’d tried to “do good” for her—more about my own need to feel wanted? To feel like I belonged?
Pearl would never be my best friend, Jane. Jane was not my Jane anymore either.
Nor did Freyda nor Cora need me. They now shared a bond I never could enter.
There was nothing more for me in this city.
Except Mike.
But I’d only really known him for a day. And one does not reach out to one’s dad to ask him for money to establish oneself into a new apartment in Gotham, after bailing on one’s “save the world” project, without any job or purpose, on the basis of enjoying one day, kiss or no, with a certain boy, be his Irish accent ever so divine.
And his kindness. Be his kindness ever so divine.
I jumped when Reggie’s mother, Marianne, placed my coffee cup on my table.
“Just me, darlin’,” she said. “Want any cream?”
I shook my head. “Not today, thanks, Marianne.”
The look on her face said that everyone was allowed to be a fool now and then. “Where’s our Pearl today?” she asked kindly. “Haven’t seen either of you in a while.”
“Oh,” I said, “she’s… not feeling well.”
Her round face dimpled with concern. “Tell her hello from me, and I hope she feels better.” Marianne returned to the counter and busied herself frosting the X’s on hot cross buns.
I sipped my coffee and burned my tongue.
Aunt Lorraine would crow over the fact that I’d quit the Salvation Army. It stung to leave it just when it had begun to feel rewarding. Much more soup. Quite a bit less salvation.
It was time to go home and cry on Dad’s shoulder and sleep in my comfortable bed. Celebrate Christmas. Move forward with a life closer to what Aunt Lorraine intended for me.
But what if Pearl was in danger? What if she was trapped somewhere?
What if it was me in harm’s way, praying that my friends wouldn’t give up on me?
I wrapped my cold hands around my coffee cup and breathed in its warmth.
God in heaven, tell me what to do, because I can’t even think at all.
I stared into the darkness beyond my eyelids until colored pinpoints of light burst over my vision like fireworks in the night sky.
You ask and you ask, I thought bitterly, and what you get is nothing.
Tell me what to do, I implored, giving the thing one more try. I’m lost. And so is Pearl.
