Jane and Sarah

Jane and Sarah are so much alike, even though they've never met. They might even be sisters, I'm not sure. They have the same eyes, and when you look it's hard to look away. Sometimes you might see stars and comets, sometimes just a mirror showing your own reflection. Sometimes you see the world the way you always wished it could be. Each one's a magician in her own way, but you don't want to lift the curtain to see how the trick was done. It's enough to just feel the wonder.

Jane's my muse, my sometimes co-conspirator, my favorite acting student and the first person I think of when I hear some incredible new music, or find a singer who totally moves me. She's my friend. I'm not sure what I ever did to deserve her, but I hope I keep on doing it forever.

I've never met Sarah, but whenever I look at my life so much of the soundtrack is her music, her words.

Jane and I have walked in the sun, and sat in darkened theaters. We've shared meals and secrets, laughed like fools and taken away each others' tears. A long time ago when the bottom fell out of everything I almost crossed a line that would have turned us into a train wreck, but she stopped me short with the gentlest smile I've ever seen, and she laughed and told me, "Screw romance, our friendship will last forever!" I had a hard time believing it back then; now it's something I never think about because it's so true you don't even notice it.

I got to share the evening with both of them last night, and what a gift it was. All those people we didn't know, sitting in the dark with us and watching Sarah sing, watching her sway in the moonlight under those haunted trees while the lightning flashed and the summer rain fell as gently as a cloud of ghosts. Did we lose it, watching all those memories rise like fog? What do you think? Laughing together is so good, but crying together....that's a whole other level. If you've never been there I feel sorry for you.

Later when it was all over and the lights had come up and the rain had come down and we were back in the world as it is, we walked in a slow trance down Seventh Avenue. It was one of those nights when you actually notice the stars, reflected in the wet pavement. Thank you, Jane!

Mothers' Day

She wished she'd never seen him, not once in her sweet short life. That was her mantra, walking through the puddles on the side of the highway. The rain was so soft that it wasn't rain at all, it was some gentle creature lighter than mist and stronger than fog. The wind blowing off the bay smelled like a wet towel. The water ran off the edge of her poncho and down her bare shins, she wished she hadn't worn shorts. At least her backpack was dry under the poncho. If the rain stopped she might even be able to make a hot meal for dinner. The foghorn was blowing sad on Liberty Island, or was it Cape Sable? In this wet curtain she couldn't tell anymore. The road goes on forever, but she felt like she'd been on it at least a week longer than that. Her name is Rachelle and she's sixteen years old. She might or might not be pregnant, but that's not important here.

What's important is the rain, and the chill. It's like breathing through a mask of snow, and every time a breeze from the ocean slaps her face she squints her eyes against the salt spray.She's thinking hard about hot coffee, hot soup, but the next town is still so far ahead, so many rainy steps away.

The road's rising now under her feet as she passes a deserted beach, a bath house boarded up since Labor Day. It's steep enough that she's breathing a little harder as it climbs the headland. From here it rolls for miles along the tops of the cliffs, winding in and out of the low clouds. The crash of the surf so far below is like the soundtrack of a daydream. That was when she saw them.

Right there on the double white line down the middle of the highway, right there in the wind and water. Just an old pair of shoes splattered with the rain. They're worn and dusty and not much to look at. Were they his? Of course they were his, would you have it any other way? Right there where he'd walked out of them and into the rest of his life. She could almost see the wet fooprints, going down the highway for a little way before starting to climb into the rainy sky. She lined her own shoes up so carefully with his footprints, and wondered why it always had to end like this. She wished she'd never seen him, not once in her sweet short life.