Good Neighbors; I Know Your Ways

Eileen woke to find the house empty, the kitchen a mess of toast crumbs and scattered cereal. She stretched and turned off the television, a real-life judge still braying advice to an audience that wasn't there. She looked in the back yard and then the front before she began to worry.

"Ma," she called. "Dylan." She tightened the belt of her robe and walked all the way around the house, even peering into the garage and shed, calling all the way.

Across the street, Surya stepped out onto her small front porch. "Do you need some help?' she called in her clipped syllables.

Mutely, Eileen nodded. Without speaking, Surya stepped back into her house and called something over her shoulder. She crossed the street to Eileen with car keys and a cell phone in her hand.

"My mother doesn't usually leave the house," said Eileen in a rush. "And Dylan is done with school. Usually he goes with my sister -- you know how she's a teacher at his school -- but she has meetings. So I thought he'd just watch tv with my mother until I woke up." Her words ended in a frantic sob.

"I know," said Surya calmly. "I know your ways."

Eileen looked at Surya as if she had never seen her before. Growing up in a neighborhood, living most of her life in the same house, Eileen had become accustomed to neighbors who moved in, fixed up a house, moved on, and were replaced by new neighbors who repeated the process. She paid attention long enough to learn their names and identify intruders, but she had never considered that the neighbors might pay attention to her.

"I will knock on every door in the neighborhood and look in their yards," said Surya. "And I will ask Joe, who is often home in the mornings, to drive around the next few blocks. I think you should stay here in case they reappear."

Eileen nodded.

"This is my phone number," said Surya, pulling a card from her pocket. "Give me yours."

Eileen dictated the digits of her home and cell phone numbers. "Should I call 911?" she wondered aloud. "Let me call my sister at work first. Maybe she knows something."

Surya patted her on the elbow and left, knocking first on Joe Atkinson's door. Eileen saw him open the door, still wearing running clothes from his earlier exercise. She watched him listen to Surya, then -- just as she had done -- reach behind him for keys and close the door. He, too, tapped digits into a cell phone and drove away. As Eileen watched him drive slowly along the street, clearly scanning the yards, tears filled her eyes. She turned back to the house to find her phone and call Shannon at work, hoping that, even as she walked slowly to her front door, her own phone would ring with news that her son and mother, neither quite of this world or prepared for its challenges, were safe, somewhere, looked after and well.