Lucy liked to think that she dated Michael for three reasons: sex, security and his spacious apartment. As she unlocked the door to her shrunken little dump, she secretly wished that she had reconsidered his obsessive mannerisms and bizarre habits and been a bit more tolerant.

The place was completely dark spare a single lamp she left illuminated in her room. Moving into the first apartment of her own had given her the jitters, and the light was always a welcome reminder of her safety when she arrived home. She walked to the counter and set a pot of coffee to percolating as she skimmed through her mail and pressed ‘play’ on her answering machine.

It was about six o’clock, and most of her messages had been left around lunchtime. There were five. The first was a message from Lucy herself, calling with a reminder about her doctor’s appointment in the morning. She wrote it down on a Post-It note and stuck it to an apple in the refrigerator, having already forgotten about the appointment since she had called.

The second was from Sean, wanting to set up a dinner date for her upcoming birthday. She swore under her breath, not particularly fond of socializing with her brother. She hated birthdays, nuisances as far as she was concerned. Especially hers, because Sean always tried to get her drunk at some crappy restaurant in Cambridge.

The next message was a telemarketer so she quickly deleted it, but the following one held a bit more intrigue. She listened carefully and tried to breathe steadily.

“Luce, it’s Michael. Listen, I know you told me not to come to your house again but I really couldn’t help it this time. You see, I’m getting ready to move again, mainly because this old place reminds me too much of you, and I was going through my old stuff and I found something you might be interested in. So I just had that nice neighbor of yours, whatsherface, Mrs. Hanover, let me in, and I put it on your bed, okay? Give me a call back. I love you so much, Lucy. Please reconsider everything, okay? Like I said, I love you. And I miss you. Bye.”

Lucy sighed and pushed her fingers through her hair, feeling a headache approaching. She was beginning to find Michael’s antics a bit more childishly annoying than frightening. He was harmless, really, like many of the devoted followers she’d had in high school only this time, he was a bit more extreme and intelligent enough to devise complicated ways to “bump into her.” Like breaking into her house.

She finished listening to the messages, the last two of which were both long silences and then either a cough or elongated breathing. She deleted them and headed for her bedroom, feeling her chest tighten in nervous anticipation.

Just as she had expected, it was harmless. On her bed lay a small stuffed teddy bear, a gift Michael had given to her on their first Valentines Day together. She stepped closer to examine it, having forgotten about its existence until now. Its left arm was just about falling off, hanging on by only a few threads. It was missing an eye where Michael’s terrier, Gigi, had gotten the best of it and its legs were spotted with bleach from where it had been thrown in with the laundry one day. Lucy felt nothing as she lifted it from the bed and rolled her eyes. A teddy bear. He had broken into her apartment into give her a teddy bear. She was angry, sentimental value be damned.

When she found the note attached to the bear, sewn onto its stomach, her blood pressure skyrocketed. It was sewn on too tightly for her to tug off with her nails, and she screamed in rage as she threw the bear into her closet and slammed the door. It read, in thick black handwriting on a strip of fabric, “I love you, Lucy, and I always ALWAYS will.

It seemed more like a romantic effort than a threat, but Lucy was wary and upset. She considered calling Catherine to vent but decided against it, thinking that she might be tempted to dial Michael and tell him off instead. She neglected her coffee and went straight to bed.

Lucy found it difficult to sleep that night, haunted with imageless dreams in which she felt a numbing cold spreading over her body like an icy blanket. Inexplicably, she awoke in a sweat so drenching that she felt compelled to strip herself of her sodden cotton pajamas. She lay, now frozen, between her sheets and sulked.

Michael. Meeting him had been a mistake, their relationship had been a mistake. She liked to blame it on him but she really had no one to blame but herself. She had been desperate, really, longing for a boyfriend after her three-year lull. He had been secure and reliable. She could count on him to turn off both the coffeepot and her curling iron whenever she forgot—which was frequent—and to remind her about her dentist appointment. More than that, he loved her deeply, or at least it seemed that way. She could be wearing the thick, prescription glasses she hated or not shave her legs for a month and he still found her the most beautiful woman in the world.

Other than the woman he cheated on her with. Lucy sighed and rolled over to face the window. Moonlight hit her evenly in the face, and she blinked, rubbing the crust of sleep out of her eyes. She stepped out of bed and wrapped her comforter around her shoulders like a majestic, oversized cloak and walked to the large window that exposed the rear parking lot of the complex. There were few cars because few people at Lucy’s income level in Boston owned vehicles. It was cheaper to take the subway and, dirt and crime-infested as it was, Lucy preferred the quick ride to a monthly car payment.

It was on lonely, insomnia-ridden nights like this that Lucy found herself longing for an entity that she couldn’t quite reach. She was no stranger to loneliness—with two dead parents and a hormonal older brother, her adolescent life had been anything but brimming with interaction. As for college, her love affair with books seemed to isolate her from popularity and the men that did venture her way were quickly turned away. It wasn’t that she was petrified of a relationship, like Sean accused of her. She just hadn’t ever known commitment to someone and wasn’t quite sure of how to break herself of her independence.

Michael had done that, however, and the day she’d moved out of their apartment she’d stood on the doorstep in the pouring rain for half an hour trying to figure out what to do. She considered going to Terrence’s place, a squat African American man who lived down the block, but then remembered that he was Michael’s friend first and would not be compassionate. That was true of all of the friends she’d had—they were all Michael’s first. So when she lost Michael she wasn’t only losing a boyfriend, she was ridding herself of several handfuls of close friends, an apartment, security and probably her sanity as well.

But it had been impossible to continue with him, Lucy realized, coming to the same conclusion that she always ended up at when she considered her past. He had cheated on her (deplorably so—the woman was a stranger to both of them and hardly demure) and, upon her discovery, displayed a frightening possessiveness that she wanted nothing to do with. Marriage had been discussed in earlier stages of their relationship, as had a family (and oh, how Lucy had wanted to bear a child with Michael’s sharp features and even sharper intelligence) but both desires had evaporated. Lucy had virtues, after all.

Lucy had no plans to find another boyfriend any time soon, despite what Catherine or her brother thought was “best” for her. She didn’t like to play the part of a heartbroken little girl, but lately it had been the only one available. Her friends did not seem to accept her single status without a reasonable excuse but had held off while she recovered from the nasty breakup and the subsequent shockwaves that were created every time Michael pulled one of his little stunts.

Lucy still was completely astounded that Michael had had the gall to ask her neighbor for entry. Obviously he had chosen the right woman; Mrs. Hanover was eighty-five and completely oblivious to everything except her goldfish and televised poker games. Michael had stooped low before, but this was about the same as breaking into her apartment as far as etiquette was concerned. Not to mention the creepy note he’d left behind. Lucy tried not to get herself worked up about that. She had known the man for years and he was hardly the type to become some sort of obsessive stalker. He would not become one of those heartsick lunatics who goes on a killing spree, she told herself. The man was strange but he was relatively stable. Hopefully, when she eventually called him back and told him to leave her alone he would oblige. Hopefully.

She managed to crawl back into bed, but the sheets felt clammy beneath her. She quickly grew frustrated with the way her comforter kept sliding from her shivering body so she finally kicked it angrily from the mattress, trembling with cold as she attempted to fall asleep. It was to no avail, and she slept fitfully for about two hours before finally stumbling into a hot shower.

Afterwards, Lucy sipped lukewarm tea as she stared blankly at her cradled telephone. The white plastic was so luminescent beneath the kitchen lights that she could almost see her drawn, haggard reflection. The tea was the only thing allowing her consciousness, for she felt completely numb and exhausted as she debated her options.

She could call Mrs. Hanover and lecture her on the dangers of the city and advise her to never again allow strange men into Lucy’s apartment. Yet she felt this warranted a personal visit, one that would form a more lasting impact in the elderly woman’s mind. Besides, Lucy didn’t want to seem too callous—it was a mistake that could only be made by the old.

No, it was definitely Michael who needed immediate lecturing. Without permitting herself any further procrastination, Lucy punched his number into the phone. It rang twice before a ragged voice answered.

“’Lo?”

“It’s Lucy.”

There was a rustling noise as Michael must have sat up in bed. “Luce? Do you even know what time it is?”

“No, I guess not,” she mocked cruelly. “Considering that I never went to sleep to begin with, no thanks to you.”

“What did I do?” The innocence in his voice repulsed her. He was a good liar.

“You broke into my house,” Lucy snapped curtly, draining the last of her tea. She wiped her mouth before continuing. “Do it again, Michael, and I’m calling the cops for a restraining order.”

“Luce, Luce, Luce,” he grumbled, an air of humility beneath his tone. “You’re not going to call the cops. You love me too much.”

“I don’t love you.”

“You will.”

She seethed. “Stop trying to be cute. I refuse to take you back. Why don’t you save your energy and get a new girlfriend? Any prostitutes living near your new place? Or hey, I hear you like Mrs. Hanover quite a bit. She’s single.”

Michael clicked his tongue in annoyance. “Sweetheart. I only did that so that I would have an excuse to talk to you.”

“You broke the law.”

“I did not,” he promulgated. “I had legal entry to your apartment. Please stop accusing me of crimes I did not commit. If you don’t want the teddy bear, fine. But just so you know, I realize that you’re playing hard to get.”

“Hard to get,” Lucy slowly repeated. This situation was getting ridiculously out of hand. “Really. I wasn’t aware of that.”

“I understand that you have flaws, Lucy goosey. You’re a typical female.”

“Don’t,” she hissed. “Call me that.” The nickname had been one from her father and brother, one that she had mistakenly told Michael about. She felt her stomach roil with distaste.

“Would you please just meet me for coffee or something?” Michael continued, ignoring her fiery request. “We can pretend we’re just starting out again. You know? Our first date.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

Without thinking, Lucy responded, “Because I’m seeing someone new.”
Michael balked, then continued suspiciously. “Oh really. Who?”

“A football player,” Lucy answered, wincing as she spoke. “Who loves poetry.”

Then the dreaded: “What’s his name?”

“Mark Thompson.”

Michael snorted, then laughed. “It’s okay, honey. You don’t have to make up a boyfriend for my benefit.”

Lucy hung up on him then, feeling strangely insulted. How dare Michael assume that her love life would end with him! The audacity of the man! Of course, she had made up a boyfriend, one strangely rooted in reality, but still! It was the theory of the thing.

Fully angered and full of heated energy, she threw a sweatshirt over her shoulders and marched next door to Mrs. Hanover’s apartment. She pounded furiously on the door, and then reduced her knocking to a gentle tapping as guiltiness set in. Calm down, Luce, she told herself, trying to breathe evenly.

Mrs. Hanover opened the door wearing a ratty old tartan nightgown. She blinked behind her bifocals, staring curiously up at her neighbor. “Lucy?” she croaked. “My dear, what is wrong?”

Lucy stared at her, regarding her innocent, bulging brown eyes set back in her sunken, liver spotted skin and then stared at her feet. Her toes stuck out indiscreetly from the bottoms of her pajama pants like two ugly roots. She raised her eyes and shook her head. She was coated in a sheen of sweat formed solely of frustration and anger, but suddenly, like a post-workout calm, she was serene.

“You know what, Mrs. Hanover? Never mind.”

And she walked away, cursing herself for that ever-spiteful monster, anger.