Part 9 (2/2)

”No. My tag.”

”I-mop,” she said it aloud, thinking it sounded like a cleaning product. ”What does it mean?”

He shrugged. ”Just my tag.”

She pointed to the letters Afgh. ”And what does that mean?”

”Afghanistan,” he said.

Even though that had been her first thought, she was shocked to have it confirmed, and in such a matter-of-fact way. And then she wondered: was he telling the truth? People lied more in the dark, as though the shadows gave them permission.

”Why does it say Afghanistan?” she asked.

He paused, taking in her face. ”Just does.”

”I...I have a connection to the country, and so I wondered...”

”Yeah?” he said, his eyes still wary. ”It”s a f.u.c.ked up place.”

A block away, a car alarm sounded. She started, the way she did in the morning when her alarm clock went off. Only then did she realize this might be about when she would be waking up, in her regular, former life. Only then did she begin to feel tired.

”I”m Clarissa,” she said.

”Danil,” he answered after a moment.

”You live around here?”

”Around.” He took a step away from her, preparing to go.

”My husband.” She spoke quickly. ”He works with refugees. He was kidnapped. In Afghanistan, a few days ago. He”s being held there now. We aren”t supposed to talk about it, so my friends don”t even know. But that”s why I-why I was asking. I just wondered...”

She felt him examining her again, maybe wondering whether she could be believed. ”That”s rough,” he said after a minute. He looked off into a dark horizon, and then back at her. ”My brother was in Afghanistan,” he said. ”First Battalion, 32 Infantry, 10 Mountain Division.”

She stared at him, willing him to go on. ”He”s back home now?” she asked after a moment.

He shook his head. ”Didn”t make it.”

”Oh.” She released a breath of air. ”I”m sorry.”

”Yeah.” He gestured with his head to the painting on the wall. ”This is for him. Or, I guess it”s for me, but because of him.”

Unlike the face of the woman he”d painted, his was open. Clarissa hesitated, then spoke without censoring herself. ”You know, my stepdaughter keeps making me food-way too much of it. I live a few blocks away. You want something to eat? An early breakfast? You”d be doing me a favor if...”

He held up one hand, shaking his head, but she kept talking.

”I mean it”s not exactly breakfast food,” she said. ”But then, it”s not quite breakfast time when you”ve been up all night. And she”s a professional chef so I know it”s good and... and it”s kind of driving me crazy. I can”t throw it out, but I absolutely can”t eat it all.”

Still slightly shaking his head, he stared at her, then rubbed the back of his neck. It was an old man”s gesture; it surprised her. What was she doing inviting him to her home? What was she thinking, who had she become?

”I”m sorry, that sounded weird,” she said. ”It is weird. It”s a weird time for me. Never mind.”

”Sure,” he said.

”What?”

He gave an odd half-smile. ”Why not? I haven”t had anything since a pizza slice for yesterday”s lunch, and the paint fumes left me hungry.”

Now that he”d said yes, she suddenly felt awkward. ”So, well, okay...”

”Are you hungry?” he asked.

She paused. ”Yes, actually. I am.”

”So let”s go have the un-breakfast,” he said, as if it had been his proposal all along. ”Let”s go eat your worry food.”

”You mean comfort food?”

”The food nice people make to try to take away your fears. Only that never happens if you eat it alone.”

She smiled. ”Right. So okay, then. Follow me.” And despite the hours she”d spent awake, she felt a rush of energy that surprised her, and a flash of optimism-brief but welcome-that she hadn”t felt since the day Todd was taken.

Mandy, September 12th ”So how”s Jimmy?”

In the computer room in the guesthouse, Mandy started. She”d hung up on Skype with her son five minutes earlier and hadn”t moved since then, thinking over the conversation-or mostly, the silences, the words unspoken.

”Is it just me,” she asked, ”or are you exceptionally talented in sneaking up on someone?”

Hammon laughed and handed her a gla.s.s. ”It”s part of the job description, isn”t it? Here”s some fresh lemonade. Rumi made it. It”s delicious.” He sat down on a worn couch.

”Thanks,” she said. ”And thanks for not telling Jimmy about the kidnapping.”

Hammon shrugged. ”It”s what we do.”

”I get that. And so does he, of course, which is why he has the sense there”s something I”m not telling him.” She laughed. ”I always had that sense too, when he was here.”

”And he probably worries even more than you did, since he”s seen how it can go down here,” Hammon said.

Mandy sipped the lemonade. She”d been thinking a lot about Jimmy. He was always at the edges of her mind at home, too, but it felt different here. She had time, she had distance, and she was often alone. In that s.p.a.ce, she”d made a disturbing discovery.

She was an emergency room nurse, and besides that a mother, and nurturing should come naturally where Jimmy was involved, but the emotion she”d been fighting and barely burying had been anger, pure and strong. In fact, she”d been repressing anger toward Jimmy for months now-for getting hurt in the war, but not exactly that. More precisely, for not getting better, for not finding a way to make things work again so that they could go on-maybe not like before, exactly, but go on. He was the one who”d lost his legs, the left below the knee and the right at the thigh. And still she was fuming: that he”d made the choice to go to war; that he”d gotten badly hurt, and now the rest of everything that followed would be changed. Nothing would ever feel to her wholly safe again. She could never return to the softness of that time when Jimmy had been a baby in her arms and her life had felt full of possibilities. Or even to the promise of the time before the war, when she”d imagined him a father playing football with his kids on the lawn while she and a daughter-in-law she loved put the finis.h.i.+ng touches on a big dinner. She was mad, too, that all around her, the message she heard was that she should just feel grateful that Jimmy was alive.

And so even as she”d been taking care of him-feeding him, helping him bathe, giving him pep talks, meeting with his doctors-surely, on some level, he”d felt the underlying foundation of her suffocated fury. He”d probably recognized it before she did. Worse, it had to contribute to his own anger and bitterness.

So now, on top of newly recognized anger, she felt deeply ashamed.

”It is good lemonade,” Mandy said, breaking the silence that Hammon was so good at keeping.

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