“Can I come with you?”
“You want to go to the bank with me?”
“Yes! Please! Anywhere that gets me out of the house!”
Alice smiled from hearing the high desperation sound in Pamela’s voice. She pinned the phone against her shoulder and used both hands to rip out a memo sheet of paper left on the small table in the hallway next to the houseplant. Writing a note where she would be, she had agreed to let her new friend come along.
“All right. I’ll see you real soon.”
Alice hung the phone back in its cradle and started to get ready. She threw on her windbreaker jacket and carried her purse and keys towards the door. The chilly, bright afternoon met with her without warning.
She beeped the horn once outside of the Whalen house and sat there watching Pamela throwing hugs and kisses to her children on the doorstep with Pamela’s oldest as babysitter. Alice looked through her sunglasses with the car engine running. Pamela sprinted over wearing a hockey beanie hat, buttonless coat, long turtleneck with stockings and faux fur ankle boots. She grabbed the metal car door handle and yanked it open.
“You sound like you’re losing air from your lungs,” Alice observed once the young woman slipped herself into the car slamming the door shut.
“I’m free,” Pamela said. Through the dashboard she waved goodbye to her children.
Alice pulled out from the driveway and drove off with Pamela sighing in full relief.
“Where’s Kevin?”
“At the shooting range with a friend.”
“You just left the kids unsupervised?”
“No, Kimmy’s watching the younger two. I told her if she needs anything, ask Miss Stapleton across the street,” Pamela explained.
“Ah,” Alice said. “I like your hat.”
“Thanks. It’s Kevin’s.” Pamela readjusts the university hockey team hat on her bushy, brown head before looking out the window.
“This could be a boring trip,” Alice warned Pamela once they parked next to a newsletter box on the curb outside the front of the city bank.
“It’s not boring to me. I’ll go anywhere with you, Alice,” Pamela beamed, hooking her arm through the older housewife’s, steering themselves to walk with each of them shivering from the cold windchill.
Inside the building, Alice recommended for Pamela to sit and wait while she got in line to cash her check. Pamela sat comfortably in one of the comfy sofa chairs, leaning over to pick up a magazine. She flipped to the end to read all the horoscopes with Alice looking after her, admiringly.
When Alice was done her turn at the desk, she found Pamela at the far end of the marble counter holding a checkbook.
“You were suppose to sit and wait,” Alice accused, regretting how motherly she sounded just now.
“I know. I just wanted to look around.”
“Here. Have a lollipop.” Alice presented a lemon flavored flat-round candy on a paper stick that brought a smile on Pamela’s face. She took it and removed the plastic wrapper.
“You never had your own bank account, have you?” Alice questioned. “Kevin handles all the money.”
“Yeah. He doesn’t believe in credit cards.”
They left the bank and drove to the market to pick up a few things before heading back to Pamela’s house, which she dreaded more than anything. The lollipop hung from one corner of her mouth. She looked at Alice with her hat on her head, askew.
“Call me if you go on anymore adventures,” she said.
“The bank and the supermarket are adventures?” Alice snickered.
Pamela nodded and took the lollipop out from her mouth and gave it back. Surprisingly, Alice took it and held it, unsure what to do next. She watched Pamela climb out and felt her absence, couldn’t help but missing her already.