"For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me." Job 3:25
“Hey, how come you have my shoes?” I was imagining this question coming from my best friend Candice. It was not something I wanted to hear.
“Well…” I began as I mentally rehearsed different ways of handling this conversation. “Remember that Friday you came home from work early and Mike acted so surprised? Turns out you surprised me, too. In fact I was so surprised I couldn’t find my shoes, so I took yours. When you went into the bathroom I slipped down to the front door and put these on before I left.”
That was the scene I was trying to avoid when I threw her soft black ballet slippers into the dumpster behind my apartment building. I did not know someone else had seen me do it, though.
Walking home from their house in those thin-soled shoes, each step sent a painful jolt up my spine as my mind raced out of control. I tried to focus on where my own green sandals might be. Under the bed seemed most likely, but I’d looked. Mike and I had started in the living room, but there was no time for searching there as I left. I’d hiked my skirt for him on our way upstairs, but no: if I’d left my shoes on the stairs I’d have seen them on my way out. Everything was starting to blur. How could this happen?
With the sidewalk pounding its dull staccato into my bones, I tried not to think about Candice finding my idiot favorite sandals in some unlikely place around her home. And running in a ragged video loop behind these thoughts was an instant replay of the moment we heard the door click open downstairs and Mike suddenly pulled out of me. His look of horror. The sudden absence that left me gasping. I wondered if that moment would ever really end, ache and emptiness chasing each other from the pit of my stomach to my forehead and back again. I was exhausted by the time I covered the few blocks back to my apartment.
Late that night Mike assured me via text that he’d found my sandals. I relaxed a little, finally falling asleep. However, just after I awoke the next morning I realized that if I hadn’t thrown Candice’s shoes into the dumpster, Mike and I could quietly exchange the footwear sometime, and with any luck put this insanity behind us. My God, what were we thinking?
But when I went out and checked the dumpster a few minutes later, they were gone.
“Sweetie, if you’re looking for your slippers, I have them.”
I stopped short as I was about to re-enter the building and looked up to see my middle-aged neighbor Denise sitting on her second-floor balcony.
“They’re adorable,” she added, easing the awkward pause that followed. “Very pretty, with the beadwork. Did you sew those on yourself?”
“No, a close friend of mine did.”
“Anyhow, they’re too dainty to fit me. I thought of my niece and sent her a picture. She says they look like they’re for dancers. Why’d you throw them out?” Her face was serene, friendly, inquisitive.
“I’m a little impulsive sometimes. If you don’t have any use for them, can I have them back?”
“Sure. Just a sec.” Denise rose and returned a moment later with the shoes. “Catch!”
“Thank you!” But I missed them both, one of them disappearing in a low shrub near the entryway.
As I stood up after taking a moment to retrieve it, Candice was suddenly beside me in her running outfit. Her face pink with exertion and glistening in the sunlight, she looked heartbreakingly fresh and beautiful.
Saturday morning. Of course she was out running. It’s what she does.
“I just thought I’d swing by and say hi,” she said, a little out of breath. “Hey, how come you have my shoes?”