Immediately, his mother shooed him back into the den from where he’d come. Then she looked toward me, “Yes?” she asked, her painted eyebrows arched high on her forehead. “How can I help you?”

I swallowed, unable to enunciate the tragic news.

“Have you word of our Sébastien?” She bent from the waist to hear me better. “Is that why you’re here?”

At the sound of her pet’s name, Marilyn came out of hiding and flapped her arms with glee. This had the worst possible effect on me. Between Alex and Marilyn, my silence deepened. I tried to open my mouth, but my jaw was paralyzed. I felt tears springing to life behind my eyes. Over the years, I’ve had ample time to reflect on the cause of my unwanted and clearly embarrassing tears. Maybe I was sad about being the one to disappoint Marilyn. But I wonder if it was more likely a premonition that the reality of Mrs. Falkowitz’s life would, in time, become my own.

Mortified at the muteness that held me captive, I took off, sprinting across the icy, patchy, end-of-winter lawn, shame shadowing my every stride. From the corner of my eye, I took in the block kids, watching me tear across the road and straight up my garden path, in through my front door, slamming it behind me. From my dining room window, I watched as the children broke up and went to their own homes, and I saw the Falkowitzes’ door closing, ending the debacle with its solitary click.

That night, Kalman Ostreicher and his acolytes exhumed poor old Sébastien and laid him carefully on the Falkowitzes’ porch. When I awoke the next morning, it was impossible to ignore the strident wails of Marilyn Falkowitz; they filled the frosty block, interrupting everyone’s breakfast. My mother, looking through the window, wondered out loud what could possibly have upset the Falkowitz girl so badly. I stared at my cereal and held my breath.

The last image I recollect from that frightful morning was seeing Mrs. Falkowitz’s arms around the shaking shoulders of her grown daughter, holding her tightly as she rubbed her back, seemingly trying to absorb the loudness of the sobs.

I hardly thought about that episode during my growing years. Truth be told, until five years ago, I had absolutely no idea what happened to Marilyn Falkowitz, her brother Alex, or any of her family. I never went near their front door again, and by the time I married and moved across town, they, too, had sold and left the area.

Yet every winter, when I drive along Allen Road, I turn and stare at the empty lot near Downsview Park. There’s an enormous snow mountain there — far larger and dirtier than the one under which Sébastien perished — and I am reminded. My mind tends to wax nostalgic. Did I know then what I know now — that Marilyn Falkowitz’s destiny would eventually be intimately woven with mine? Was it the heat of a foreshadow that seared itself into me? An omen I tried to wrestle out of me as I tossed around on my bed that night?

Today, when Sari lets out a certain cry, I am pulled back to that moment when something inexplicable lodged itself within me, an apprehension of which I was never able to rid myself. Though close to 40 years have passed, when my daughter behaves too young for my patience to bear, I conjure up the image of kind Mrs. Falkowitz and how gently she held her Marilyn while the adult-child cried and cried as they went about the business of burying their frozen cat, Sébastien.

She has no idea how much that image has guided me over the years.

Around five years ago, it should come as no surprise, Marilyn and I met again. I had booked tickets for myself and Sari, then aged 20, to go to the indoor circus. The trip was discounted for members of the Department of Special Adults Seeking Social Support, and I’d even offered our younger daughter Risa a chance to attend, but she rolled her 16-year-old eyes at me, and I dropped the pitch.

Sitting in the stands, I kept getting a strange sensation on the back of my head, like someone was staring at me. Finally I turned, and there she was, three rows behind me. Aged, rounder, looking remarkably similar to the image I still retained of her mother, but with thinner hair. And the weirdest thing was this: I was thrilled to see her. I watched her mouth, “Queenie Lewis?” while holding up a plump finger, pointing it at me. I couldn’t believe she still remembered my name. Immediately I mouthed back to her, “Marilyn? Marilyn Falkowitz?” She nodded, and I rose from my chair, climbed over all the people between us, not caring for their warranted but foul-mouthed abuse. I needed to make peace with a neighbor who had never deserved my fear. Marilyn stood up to greet me, and there we embraced, to the stunned astonishment of the spectators around us. I cried into her rotund shoulders, and she laughed, her body shaking at the enormity of the feeling running through the two of us. All the while, trapeze artists were risking their lives for our entertainment.

In my sentimental upheaval, I had completely forgotten about Sari, who was standing alone, with her back to the performances, watching us with alarm and mistrust. I turned to face her and, defusing the puzzlement of the crowd, I called out, “It’s okay, Sari, sweet girl. We were neighbors many years ago. I haven’t seen Marilyn Falkowitz for decades.”

We looked again at each other, and I let Marilyn wipe the tears off my cheek. “Look,” I said, pointing to my daughter, who was still standing, watching us. “Look, Marilyn, that’s my eldest child. Sari. She has special needs. Like you.”

Marilyn laughed and squeezed my hand. Suddenly I realized that I’d been gifted with a singular opportunity: the chance to apologize. The opportunity, perhaps, to purge myself of the weight that had lingered on the outskirts of my memories from that day. I had behaved badly. I’d withheld the dignified closure that the Falkowitz family deserved.

“You know, Marilyn, I have always wanted to apologize to you, for that day,” I began, but Marilyn looked bewildered. “The day we found your cat.”

She looked at me, her countenance registering movement from within. Then, quick as it came, it left. She smiled and emptied her face of any recognition of the subject of Sébastien.

“How can we stay in touch?” I asked, looking around for a caregiver.

Since that day at the circus, I have made it my business to visit Marilyn at least once a month. She lives in a home in Brampton, Ontario. I am known among her people as “Marilyn Falkowitz’s Friend,” a title I exult in. We sit together and she shows me pictures of her family and tells me about her day.

Once, when I was getting ready to leave, Alex showed up. I was buttoning my coat and straightening my sheitel when a strong male presence took over the room, and I swung round to see who had entered. I think we were both shocked when we recognized one another. Of course I understood that Marilyn would never have managed to inform Alex of my entrance — or rather reentrance — into her life, so I volunteered an explanation, since I felt he was owed one.

“You’re Alex, right? Do you remember me?” I asked.

He nodded. “Are you Queenie Lewis?”

“Now Queenie Applebaum, but yes. Marilyn and I met at the circus, a few months back.” I waited for him to understand why I was pursuing a relationship with his sister after all those years had passed. He showed no grasp of the situation, at least nothing I could read on his face.

“I wanted to make up for something that passed between us many years ago, when I was a child and did not understand what it meant to have special needs, nor what it meant to have someone close to you who had special needs.”

Still nothing.

“I need to apologize for that day—”

“What day?”

“The day we found Sébastien under the snow bank at the end of the cul-de-sac.”

“Why apologize? You didn’t kill it.”

“No. But I ran away when I should have been more understanding.”

Alex shrugged. “You were only a kid. Kids don’t understand.”

“But still. Nothing is for nothing, and I want to make it up to her.”

He nodded again, but then went silent.

“I behaved badly that day. It’s haunted me all these years. I was afraid of your sister back then, afraid of your family.” His expression remained blank. I continued, “I have a special-needs daughter.” For that disclosure, I was rewarded with a subtle nod. “When she was born, it took me forever to acknowledge that… I just wanted to—” I stopped talking. What did I want? Why was I unburdening myself to this stranger from my youth?

“You wanted to what?” Alex was staring at me without malice.

“To go back and redo that day. I wanted to take Marilyn’s hand and lead her, with dignity, to where Sébastien lay. I wanted to do this without fear; to give her the respect she deserved, and the respect I would want shown to my own child.”

He gave me another tiny but comfortable nod, and broke eye contact. Finally I felt him accept my presence.

I picked up my purse and walked toward Marilyn, who was sitting on her large comfy chair, a blanket around her legs. I hugged her, patted her broad back and told her I would return in about a month’s time.

She took my hand and said, “Bring-your-daughter-next-time. Yes?” Her eyes smiled with otherworldly warmth. “I-want-to-learn-her,” she said, the sides of her mouth gathering wetness.

“Sure.” I smiled back, thinking about the words she had chosen: “to learn her.” How odd a phrase, and yet how accurate!

On my next visit, I brought Sari. She walked stiffly into the living area that Marilyn occupied, not knowing what to expect. I had purposely not spoken too much about Marilyn to Sari, wanting her to experience whatever it was that the Eibeshter had in mind, without trying to manipulate outcomes.

I sat down and patted the cushion next to me on the couch, indicating that Sari was welcome to sit there, opposite Marilyn. I was surprised to see that Marilyn was watching Sari with a quizzical expression, as though she had perhaps forgotten that she’d wanted me to bring her.

“Marilyn, this is my eldest daughter, Sari. Sari, this is my old neighbor, Marilyn.” It was an awkward, perfunctory introduction, but I felt the need to formally acquaint them.

I looked up and noticed that Marilyn’s eyes softened as she absorbed Sari. I turned to see the same emollient, soothed expression take over Sari’s countenance. Ease replaced suspicion in my daughter, and, without much being spoken at first, it seemed as though Marilyn and Sari connected, almost telepathically. I saw it in their faces, then I heard it in their laughter.

After their giggling tapered off, Marilyn asked Sari, “Do you like doing Dot-to-Dots?”

Sari looked toward me, as per her custom, to find out whether she likes doing Dot-to-Dots. I smiled, but did not commit one way or the other. She turned back and nodded, and Marilyn took an oversized book of primitive Dot-to-Dot pictures out of a large canvas tote, which I had never previously observed. Sari got up and, without asking or being directed, sat on the arm of Marilyn’s armchair. She reached out and took hold of the colored marker Marilyn tendered. Sari made the lines while Marilyn directed and peppered her with questions, which Sari answered without any hesitancy. Don’t ask me how, but Sari seemed to know, intrinsically, that she could trust this pleasantly plump, older woman to value her every response. It took no time for Sari to fill the room with her words. Words she hardly used with us, her family. Words I had never heard coming from her mouth before. She spoke to her new friend as though they had been together all their lives.

I was forgotten.

And I rejoiced in my irrelevance.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 892)