Love Thy Neighbor
We all remember Anna.
Twelve years ago this summer, she walked out the door, her slouchy green bag slung across her chest, her ears plugged with music. It was a Wednesday, an afternoon so laden with heat few people stirred far from their oscillating fans and their gasping air conditioners.
Anna was on her way to Debbie’s house. Debbie’s family had a pool, and so Anna wore a blue two-piece bathing suit beneath her T-shirt and shorts. The straps were tied around her neck in a swooping bow that made Anna feel Old Hollywood glamorous. She went to Debbie’s every day that summer. I kept an eye on her from the front room. You can’t ever be too careful.
But Anna was a good girl. She kept to the sidewalk, and she kept away from the other side of the road where the trees crowded together, keeping their own counsel. She didn’t even glance in that direction, where the woods hunkered down, nestling parents’ fears and urban legends in their shadows.
It was only three blocks to Debbie’s house. Anna shifted her bag as she walked. It held suntan lotion and sunglasses and two magazines: one was her own, a teen movie idol rag where the boys were prettier than the girls; the other was her mother’s, slipped from the mail before it was noticed. It reeked of slutty perfume samples, gave tips for sexy hair and kissable lips, advised the best way to please yourself and your man.
Anna stopped to dig in her bag. She sighed, glancing over her shoulder, trying to decide if what she’d forgotten was worth the trip back home. It wasn’t. She kept walking, swinging her hips a little to the music only she could hear. She stopped again, this time at the Grangers’ yard where their new puppy begged for her attention. She laughed and petted that puppy’s head until it peed itself. That puppy’s a dog now, grown up and old. Not like my Anna.
So, it wasn’t even three blocks. More like two and a half. How could a person have disappeared in two and a half blocks? How could no one have seen anything? Heard anything? Astonishing.
It was marvelous, really. I watched. I waited. I had fewer than three blocks to do what I had to do. I managed quite well.
The woods were ransacked. Police and volunteers plundered and pillaged, so sure that was where the danger lay, so sure that was where Anna lay. Questions laced with grief wove their way through the neighborhood. How did this happen? Why? I asked them, too. The difference was I knew the answers. I didn’t share them then. I won’t share them now.
Three blocks. Fewer than three blocks.
Keep away from the woods, children. Keep away from the darkness lurking beneath the treetops, from the stretching branches ready to snag, from the rumors of bad acts among the sticks and stones, the only witnesses small, skittering creatures.
Stay on the sidewalk, where the edges of trimmed lawns mark the way, where potted flowers spill over in greeting, and where neighbors keep an eye on each other through windows wiped clean with vinegar and yesterday’s newspaper.
Which is the more dangerous side? You tell me.
I already know.
