Page 65 of On Fire Island

“What is taking you so long? Come now, or something bad is going to happen.... We don’t have a house number... ’cause there’s no mail here. Why would we need to know? OK, yes, I see that now but please, ‘A’ street, the door’s wide open, all the lights are on!”

The two women pushed the dresser in front of the door and sat on the floor, their backs pressed up against it with all of their strength. They could hear shouting downstairs and hoped the police had arrived. It got quieter, and they could hear footsteps race up the stairs. The doorknob turned, and they pushed back onto the dresser with all of their might, until they heard a familiar voice.

“Girls! You OK?” Shep Silver called out.

The two women burst out in tears of relief. They pulled the dresser out of the way, opened the door, and threw their arms around their savior.

“There’s a huge man downstairs!”

“He wasn’t that huge. I chased him out with a baseball bat.”

Andie hugged Shep again as Pam declared, “I’ll never yell at you about keeping that bat in the umbrella stand again!”

Pam scooped up Oliver, even though he was asleep, and they covered him in kisses as Matty escorted two police officers upstairs with their too little, too late pronouncement.

“Did someone call nine-one-one?”

thirty-five

The Return of Dignity

It was a long night, and all three men slept in later than usual on account of it. Matty and Shep didn’t even attempt to come in quietly upon their return from their big adventure. They ran right into our bedroom and told Ben the entire story of what may have been the most action-packed night in Bay Harbor history. Despite the more than sixty years between them, I swear they both looked the same age as they relayed what had occurred, like two kids on an adrenaline high. Ben only interrupted to ask them to slow down. When they were through, having heard himself describe chasing a big angry man out into the street with a bat out loud like that, Shep sat down on the bed to catch his breath.

“Oh boy,” he said. “That was intense.”

It was as if he had just realized what had happened.

“Pour him a Scotch,” Ben told Matty.

“Make it a double,” Shep added.

When they finally got to bed, it was after four, so when people congregated outside the house at 9:00 a.m., it was only Sally who heard them.

She barked at the door and then ran to each bedroom, licking their faces and hands till they stirred.

A small crowd had gathered by then, including Pam, Andie, Big Les (who I had never seen this far from the store!), a bunch of the ballplayers, the two policemen from the night before, and the security guys who had confiscated Shep’s bike. Apparently, two other officers had caught the perpetrator as Shep chased him from the house and he was in police custody. And while he wasn’t the Goldilocks Interloper, news of the lockup would surely discourage future break-ins.

Matty, Ben, and Shep came out in whatever they had slept in to investigate the ruckus.

“What’s the big hoopla about?” Shep asked.

“It’s for you,” Andie was the first to volunteer. “You’re a hero, Shep!”

The small crowd clapped and cheered, before parting for one of the security guards to wheel Shep’s old bike through.

“Here you go, Shep. If you can handle what you did last night, we all agree that you can definitely handle a two-wheeler.”

Shep grimaced at him nonetheless. There was no way he was giving the guard the satisfaction of a smile. Though he was indeed happy. He took his bike and walked it up the ramp—grinning from ear to ear for Ben and Matty. They smiled back in kind. It was most definitely a happy ending.

The policemen explained that they had caught the man in question, a day-tripper who had missed the last boat and who, as Andie had thought, was strung out on something. He was, indeed, more menacing than some guy with the munchies a.k.a. a modern-day Goldilocks. Though by the time he dried out in the cell at the police station in town, he couldn’t even remember whathe had done. Soon everyone went on their way, except for Pam, Andie, and baby Oliver, who wanted a few moments alone with Shep.

Matty was holding up the bike while Shep was inspecting it.

“Need a hand with that?” Andie asked.

“No, we got it.”

She choked up. “I wanted to thank you again, Shep. I don’t know what would have happened if you didn’t—”

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