Burning Time

52

Emma sat on the edge of the sofa for many minutes, fighting the nausea and dizziness that came from the effort of leaning forward and untying the ropes around her ankles, knot by knot, with shaky fingers. The pain from the blow to her head was intense, and her legs trembled so much they didn’t support her when she finally tried to stand up. She sank down on the hard sofa again.

“Help.” Her voice sounded pitifully weak.

She looked around. Must be a phone. Everyone had a phone. Where was the phone? She saw a window by the sink with the dripping faucet. Maybe she could open the window and call for help. Maybe she could jump out.

She organized herself enough to get on the floor and start crawling toward it. How many feet was it?

“Help …”

She couldn’t seem to make much noise.

The window was just above the counter. She pulled herself up to the counter and grabbed at the shade covering the window, missing the cord on the first two tries.

She sagged against the sink. Don’t fall down, she told herself. She grabbed the cord again and this time succeeded. When she pulled on it, the shade snapped all the way up with a ferocity that startled her. She cried out and looked behind her, certain the door had opened and he was back. Everything was the same.

She turned back to the window, panicked. She had to get out there to the other side. She was on the second floor, pressed against the glass, naked in the artificial light. There were cars but no people on the street below.

She could tell by the sky that she wasn’t in Manhattan. There were no skyscrapers with lights that cut pieces out of the sky here. In fact it was a long way across a maze of roads with walls to the row of low buildings on the other side. Where would the street be so wide she could hardly see the houses on the other side? The skyline was a map for anyone who knew the buildings.

It was dark, but there were a lot of streetlights. It seemed that the window fronted on a number of streets parallel to each other. Emma desperately tried to think. What was she looking at?

She pounded on the window at a man in a passing car. He didn’t turn his head.

The latch on the window was too high for her to reach it without climbing up on the counter. Her muscles ached from having been stretched so long over her head. She shuddered. How long had she been lying there with him looking at her? Had to get away. She struggled to get up on the counter. She could hardly stand, much less pull herself up.

She stopped suddenly, confused by the roar that kept pushing through the haze in her brain. Through the thunder she could see lights and a dim shape in the sky. She frowned, struggling to name what she saw, tilted her throbbing head to one side.

Looking at it this way, she suddenly realized that although the street in front of her was flat, the street beyond that was on an angle. It was going up a hill to a Christmas tree of lights. Strings of lights out there like lace in the sky. That made no sense.

She inched down the counter. There she could see the side of a house. The light was on in the room opposite her, but there was no one in it.

It was then that she saw the phone. It was a white wall phone, a few feet to her right, almost hidden by the refrigerator. If she hadn’t been standing right next to it, she might never have seen it.

“Oh, God.” She reached for the phone and almost collapsed with relief when she heard the dial tone.

She tried her own number first. The receiver shrilled three discordant notes in her ear.

This number is not in service in area code seven-one-eight.

Oh, God, where was she? Emma fought back her panic and tried two-one-two, then her number. Was flooded with relief when it began to ring. Please, Jason, be home.

The phone rang and rang. Had she called the wrong number? She dialed again, more carefully this time. Two-one-two and then their home number. It rang again, a series of hollow echoes in her head. What was wrong? She was sure she had left her answering machine on. Had he come home and turned it off?

“God, Jason, pick up,” she cried.

Maybe he was in his office. She tried two-one-two and then his office number. The machine picked up on the second ring. His cool, reassuring voice said he couldn’t be with her right now, but if she would leave her name, date, and time of the call, he would get back to her as soon as he could.

I can’t be with you right now. I can’t be with you right now. I can’t be with you right now. Those were the most powerful words she knew. Her father couldn’t be with her because he was always in the middle of some ocean. Her husband couldn’t be with her because he was always with someone, with someone, with someone. Always someone in trouble. The words had an echo that resounded all the way to the depths of her soul.

Jason was always telling her he’d be there if she needed him, but he was always “with someone, with someone, with someone” whenever she felt she did. No needs that she’d had were ever sufficient for him to consider it necessary to be with her right now.

She was sobbing uncontrollably by the time the beep sounded.

“Jason. Please come home,” she sobbed into the receiver. “This man—He’s cra—crazy. Please. He took my clothes. He has a gun, and he said he’d shoot me. Oh, please, help me.”

The thunder sounded again. She couldn’t stop crying. “My head hurts. I can’t think. I’m in a house. I don’t know where it is. Low houses, somewhere in Brooklyn, or the Bronx. I see a—lights and a ramp. I think it’s a bridge. Oh, God, Jason, he tied me up,” she cried hysterically. “He’s going to kill me.”

Beep.

“Oh, God.”

She clutched the receiver in her hand, staring at it dumbly. The tape machine clicked. She was cut off. She was alone. She started sobbing again.

Then a shape moved in the window opposite.

Someone was standing there looking at her. Emma’s eyes widened.

“Help!” she cried. She banged on the window. “Help me.”

The person stood there stolidly, all in black, studying her grimly. Maybe it was a ghost.

“Oh, God,” Emma cried.

A nun, or a Russian patriarch.

Without knowing what she was doing, she dialed 911.

“Police Emergency.”

In the window across the way, the mouth began to move.

“Help,” Emma cried. “Help!”

“All right, miss, calm down. Are you injured or is there an injured person with you?”

“Uh,” Emma gulped.

“Try to calm down, miss. Where are you located?”

The mouth was moving across the way. The narrow black figure was making hand motions. It was too confusing. Emma started to cry.

“Help …”

“Okay, take it easy. Let’s take it one step at a time. Can you tell me your name?”

Nausea swept over Emma. She gagged over the sink. She couldn’t talk. She needed something to drink.

“Miss, are you there? I need some information to help you. Give me something—a location, a phone number.”

The words dribbled out of the receiver that Emma had dropped on the counter. “Call back later,” she muttered, hanging up the phone. Moments later her head hit the edge of the counter as her legs gave way under her, and she sank to the floor.