Page 50 of Stay Awake
The last thing I remember before waking on the train was the sudden ring of my desk phone in the office. It was so loud and insistent that it startled me. “This is Liv,” I said into the receiver.
Everything after that is a blank until I opened my eyes, my body swaying with the movements of the train as it shot through a subway tunnel.
My hands were covered with ballpoint writing. Amid the scribble was an underlined message with the name and address of a place called Nocturnal. Something about the name struck a chord. It drew me here like a magnet.
I cross the street to the bodega. My body’s working on autopilot and my mind is a blank as I enter the store. A man with a wide friendly face beams at me from behind the counter; his smile is filled with warm recognition. I smile back stiffly. I’ve never seen this shopkeeper before in my life.
I stop at a wall of refrigerators to check out the assortment of drinks arranged neatly on shelves. Stifling an exhausted yawn, I remove a can of iced coffee espresso from the fridge. It contains enough caffeine to keep an elephant awake for the next twelve hours.
“How much do I owe?” I ask the man at the counter as I put the coffee can down with a thump.
He stares at me tight-lipped, his jaw protruding slightly. Hurt shines in his thickly lashed brown eyes. I get the impression that I’ve offended him in some way. Perhaps by not saying hello.
“I’ll put it on your tab,” he says.
I’m about to tell him I don’t have a tab when he continues. “Every day it’s the same, Liv. You never sleep. You’re up all night. You walk around like a zombie during the day. Two, three caffeine drinks a day. It’s good for business. My business. Not good for you,” he says, shaking his head sadly.
He puts my purchase into a plastic bag and hands it to me by the handles. “You should take better care of yourself. You’ve lost more weight. Soon there won’t be anything left of you.”
I’m stunned into silence at the familiar way this stranger talks to me, like we know each other. I look down at myself. He’s right. I’ve never been so thin, nor felt so fragile.
“Go home and rest,” he tells me. “You look as if you haven’t slept for days.”
Standing on the sidewalk outside the bodega, I wonder if he’s right. I’m utterly exhausted. I look up at the sky. It’s overcast and steely gray. Even that confuses me. It’s supposed to be the middle of summer. Yet it looks and feels like a blustery fall day. The buildings whirl around me with dizzying speed. I close my eyes and wait for everything to stop spinning.
“Are you all right, Liv?”
A man holding a box of groceries stands in front of me, his wide, pleasant face creased with concern. He looks like a younger version of the shopkeeper. He has the same strong, slightly protruding jaw and he speaks with the same Middle Eastern accent.
“Are you having another migraine attack? Do you want me to get you some water so you can take your medicine?”
“I’m fine,” I insist, even though it’s far from the truth.
“I’m delivering this order to a customer on your street. Come with me. I’ll see you home.”
I follow behind him like he’s a pied piper. I’m too dazed and exhausted to explain that I don’t actually live anywhere near here. Two streets later, he stops by a flight of stairs leading to the entrance ofa light brick apartment building. He rests the box of groceries on a ledge.
“We’re here,” he announces.
I look around, blinking in confusion. He’s brought me to someone else’s street, and he’s waiting outside someone else’s apartment building for me to go inside.
I take a tentative step up the stairs. I figure I’ll take a cab out of here once he’s gone. It seems less awkward than explaining that he’s mixed me up with someone else.
“That’s not your building!” he tells me, as I take another step up the stairs. “You live across the street, Liv.” He points to a dark brick building on the other side of the street. I stare at it, bewildered.
“You don’t remember. Do you?”
“Remember what?”
“Your address.”
“Of course, I know my address. I live in Brooklyn,” I say.
“That’s where you used to live.” His voice oozes compassion. “You’ve moved, Liv. You live in the building across the street now.”
His certainty leaves me baffled. “I know where I live and it’s not here.”
“Come with me. The doorman will explain.”
