The City Sleeps for Me

8 - Emily

Emily

On Friday, the sky is a deep, cloudless blue, and cold wind whips scarves around. Rebecca and I walk home from the library. Her wavy hair is down, and a maroon scarf is curled around her neck.

The city is alive and excited; everyone is on Fridays. People walk home from work a bit happier, wait for the subway a little less impatiently, hail taxis not quite as aggressively. 

I swing my violin case and smile, breathing in the cold, crisp air that cools my throat. Trees shiver in the wind, leaves rattling around and dancing down streets. 

We don't stop in front of Rebecca's apartment like usual, and instead walk right through the front doors. It smells like old carpets and faintly of pine trees, for some reason. 

The lobby is small, old-fashioned red carpets beneath my feet, with a couch and a few chairs in one corner. The mail room is in the other corner.

"Hello, Ms. Bishop," says the doorman. He has dark skin and stubble on his face, and his warm eyes are crinkled with happiness. 

"Hi, John," says Rebecca. Her eyes are gazed off into the direction of the silver elevator. "This is my friend, Emily."

Friend. I like that word. 

"Nice to meet you," I say, smiling at John the doorman, and then Rebecca and I are riding up the elevator to the seventeenth floor. Generic jazz music crackles through the speakers, and I glance at our reflections in the shiny metal of the doors. I tuck a strand of stray hair behind my ear.

"Alright," says Rebecca when we're in front of her apartment. "Let's see how this goes."

"I'm excited!"

"You shouldn't be." But she smiles and unlocks the door. 

The apartment is small, neat, and orderly. A clean kitchen with old appliances, blue towels hanging down from the oven handles, a small wooden table pushed up against the wall with two chairs. A couch and armchair in the living room, a flickering purple candle on the coffee table, and smooth hardwood floors throughout. It smells like vanilla, probably from the candle, and faintly of lemon.

A woman walks out of a bedroom, shaking out her curly hair. "Hello," she says. "You must be Emily."

"Yes, hi!" I say, trying to smile politely without being too creepy, and I shake her hand. She looks really similar to Rebecca, except her mom's skin and hair are a bit darker. But their green eyes and noses look the exact same. 

"You can call me Anne," says Rebecca's mom, and she smiles tiredly. There's a faded silver cross that hangs down her neck, and she's wearing a plain white blouse and blue pants. 

"Okay," I say, feeling my face heat up. I set my violin down by the front door and take off my coat, and Rebecca pulls off her scarf and gloves.

Rebecca's mom - I mean, Anne - made spaghetti, garlic bread, and salad, and we sit around the small table. Anne pulls out a folding chair from the closet for me to sit on.

I take a bite of garlic bread and nearly faint. It's so good. And the spaghetti sauce is so fresh and warm and you can tell it's homemade. Usually, my father and I just order takeout, or stick some frozen meal in the oven. 

"So," says Anne, picking at her salad. Even though it's her food, she doesn't seem that hungry. "You play the violin, Emily?"

"Yes," I say. "I've been playing since I was little."

Rebecca chimes in. "She's really good."

"Wow," says Anne, and she slides the small cross up and down the chain of her necklace. Her eyes meet mine and she tries to smile. Her and her daughter seem so similar, but they're so different, too. "Do you attend high school, Emily?"