Zombie, Illinois by Scott Kenemore Page B

thing that makes it “not that easy.” She has no finances. She has nowhere else to go. She has had children with him.
    If it’s not that, then it will almost certainly be a suspected drug habit or drinking problem—likely compounded by a correlating suspicion that children are being neglected. These s uspicions— when they’re accurate—are some of the most difficult for me to assist with. (If the troubled person cannot be convinced that they have a problem, then it comes down to a series of difficult binaries; choices where it’s either this or that. We either call child protective services, or we don’t. We either call the police, or we don’t. We stage an intervention, or we wait until something happens again.)
    A final possibility—a rare one, but something I still see consistently—will be a request that I use my connections in the community to lobby for some sort of minor municipal change that will benefit the neighbor. Pastor, that bus stop needs to be moved to the other side of the street—all those people right outside the window! Pastor, that traffic light just changes too fast— I can’t haul my old bones across the crosswalk in time. Pastor, our new property assessment can’t be right . . . can it?
    So I have—or at least think I have—some idea of what Ms. Washington will ask about on behalf of her friend, Ms. Khan.
    And I am totally wrong.
    Ms. Washington takes another deep drag and says, “I ain’t seen Ms. Khan for almost two weeks. And normally, I don’t pay it no mind when she don’t come around. We just been missin’ each other. She’s flying all over the world. She gets free tickets, you know, with that job? And the men she carries on with? The trips they take together? Mmm-hmm. And so I haven’t seen Ms. Khan, precious little thing. Then, this evening, I go out to my box to get the mail and she’s standing out in the cold—in the cold, Pastor— wearing nothing but her exercising top and those yoga pants. Can you imagine?”
    I nod as if I can.
    â€œAnd I ask her how she’s been, but she won’t say a word to me,” Ms. Washington continues. “Not a word. She won’t even communicate. She looks lost. And my mind says: Something is not right with this young woman! She is freezing outside in just her exercise clothes. I have got to get her someplace warm.”
    I nod again.
    â€œBut she won’t go back into her building,” Ms. Washington continues, sounding genuinely exasperated. “So I think, maybe she just needs to come inside and have a cup of tea with me. Warm up, you know? And if that doesn’t work, I say to myself, I’m going to call the hospital. So I take her by the hand and bring her into my house. I try to make her to sit in a chair—the same one where you’re sitting now, Pastor—but she won’t. She just wanders through my house. She is bumping around, knocking things over, like she doesn’t even see them! I cannot, for the life of me, understand. Then something happens you won’t believe!”
    As if to punctuate this declamation, a loud scratching sound— like a dog trying to open a door—rises from the back of the house. It falls away after just a few seconds.
    Ms. Washington looks over her shoulder uneasily.
    â€œWhat happened?” I press, following her gaze toward the mysterious noise.
    â€œShe got . . . bitey” Ms. Washington whispers seriously—as if this is something more sinful than sex or drugs or rock and roll.
    â€œShe got . . . ?” I try, hoping for more explanation.
    â€œShe tried to bite me!” Ms. Washington answers, vibrating nervously like a round mound of pudding. “She snapped at me. With her teeth! I asked her what she was doing. I said I was trying to help her. I told her to stop. But she wouldn’t listen. No sir! She got this mean look in her eyes. Her