But then I was moving to Boston at the end of August, starting college, and going in a totally different direction. Would we do that long-distance relationship thing that never works out on TV? Maybe by August we’d be on sounder footing, and our relationship could stand the distance. The truth was that I really had no idea what tomorrow was going to look like. I just knew that tomorrow I would wake up and think about John before I thought about anything else. I knew that I loved him and felt like he loved me too. That would be enough, right?
May You Live in Interesting Times
I was up and fully dressed by seven. I still couldn’t leave the house and had no idea how to get in touch with John. When the phone rang at eight, I sprinted to the kitchen to see my dad already had it. “Sure, John, she’s right here.”
I nearly ripped the phone from his hand, trying to calm my stomach and my voice before I said anything. Did I really think he was just gone? I took a few steps out of the room before speaking. “Hey.”
“Hey. You know this is the first time I’ve ever spoken to you on the phone? Am I calling too early?”
“No, this is great, I’ve been up forever.” I plopped down on the couch, hoping this call would last for hours.
“I didn’t sleep either. I guess I’ve gotten used to you.” He was so normal, he could have been sitting right next to me. This was going to be okay.
“Are you coming over?” I asked, relieved that we weren’t going to be playing it cool.
“Actually, I’m calling to give you guys the official schedule of the day. Can your parents bring you to FBI headquarters at ten? You’ll have to lie down in the back, so as not to be seen. Damage Control wants to go over some things with you, and I think the Bureau chief is going to come in with a team to debrief us. No big deal, but they are going to ask a ton of questions about what happened, for the record, before we totally forget.”
“Sure, we’ll meet you there,” I said.
“Okay, good.”
“Okay.” A few seconds passed.
“And then, I was going to ask you, um, my dad is flying back to New York tonight, and I was wondering if you’d want to . . . I mean, if your parents would let you come hang out here tonight. I’d pick you up and bring you home at whatever time they said. We could just hang out like regular people, order a pizza, and watch a movie.” Was he actually nervous to ask me that?
“It’s a date. I can’t think of anything in the world I’d rather do.” This whole being-straight-with-people thing was getting to be a habit.
“Me either. It was all I could think about last night, just imagining what it would be like to have you here. Farrah, this is all really strange for me. I’ve never felt like this before.”
More with the honesty. “Neither have I, not even close.”
“I wish I knew how to make this day go by faster. Hang on.” John put his hand half over the phone and was talking to his dad. “Yes, I have her on the line. They are going to meet us at headquarters for the debriefing. Yes, I told her she should lie down in the back . . . Okay. Sorry about that Farrah. Let’s just talk more about that at our meeting later.”
I giggled a little. “Okay. See you at ten.” That was only in two hours, I told myself. I could make it.
My parents and I arrived at FBI headquarters a little before ten. I gave a wave to the surveillance cameras, knowing the security guys would recognize me and have a chuckle. In the lobby, we were escorted to an elevator bank that took us to the thirty-ninth floor. John was standing there, waiting in another expensive gray suit, when the doors opened. I tried as hard as I could not to throw my arms around him, managing to stop at a little pat on the arm. “Hi.”
“Hi, Farrah. Mr. and Mrs. Higgins, please come this way. Damage Control is waiting in the conference room.” John was a little stiff, but I overlooked it since he was at work. We’d snuggle up later.
We were greeted by a Damage Control committee of six who informed us, moment by moment, how the next twenty-four hours would go. Thursday morning a police car would arrive at our house, tipping off the neighbors that something was happening. My parents would call friends and family, telling them that I had escaped unharmed and had found my way to the police, who had brought me home. I would resume my normal life and be back at school on Monday, saying, “I’d rather not talk about it,” when asked about my captivity.
John gave me a wink, and my stomach did a flip. My dad asked, “Won’t the press be all over us? When they find out that she’s been released, it’ll be all over the news. How will you protect Farrah until Jonas Furnis is shut down?”
“Homeland Security,” began the head Damage guy in a slow, deep voice, “has contacts in every major television and radio station. They can quiet any story they want for several weeks if it is in the interest of national security. The only discussion of Farrah’s return will be among local gossips until we give the press the go-ahead. And by then no one will care. We do this all the time.”
We nodded, as if we were satisfied by their plan and as if we had a choice. I looked at my watch to see that only thirty minutes had passed. How long till pizza and movies?
Just then the conference room door opened, and I noticed everyone sucked in a little air. A large man in a dark suit filled the door frame with eight people behind him. He looked more like a Wall Street type than an FBI guy and commanded such complete attention over the room that I wondered if he had bacon in his pocket. No one moved until John stood up and walked over.
John spoke with an outstretched hand. “Hello, sir, welcome. We are just finishing up with Damage Control here, and I think that the Higginses are adequately prepared for the next steps. Please come in. Mr. and Mrs. Higgins, I’d like you to meet our FBI Bureau chief, Don Woods. And this is Farrah Higgins . . .”
We all stood up and shook hands. Don looked me up and down and said without humor, “You seem to have survived well. I am glad.”
On cue, all the Damage Control people stood up and backed out of the room, saying goodbyes and freeing chairs for the next group. Don Woods and his people sat down opposite us at the table, hands folded. I took the first seat closest to the door, and John carefully led my parents to the seats next to me, separating me from him and his dad.
The man to the far left spoke first. “We have prepared our preliminary questioning about the events of the last week: the initial contact with Jonas Furnis, Steven Bonning’s duplicity, the financial records you obtained, your whereabouts in New York, your return here, the involvement of Henry Bennett, and finally the intelligence surrounding the events at Disney World. Please give short answers.”
And so it began. They fired questions at us, mostly at John and me, but some at Mr. Bennett. We gave answers like: “On day three, in the Lost and Found,” “PS 142,” “West Side Highway.” And the whole story came out. At one point I was asked to decode MODMIYKIFDBTAPZMDIBIVHY using the Fibonacci sequence and the Caesar shifts. At noon they brought in sandwiches, lemonade, and iced tea, and we kept on answering questions.
Finally at two p.m., there was nothing else to say. The man at the far left of the table said to the tape recorder, “This satisfactorily concludes the questioning of John Bennett, Farrah Higgins, and Henry Bennett in the likely capture of Jonas Furnis.”
Don Woods finally spoke. “This concludes your involvement in this investigation. The CIA will be handling Jonas Furnis and Steven Bonning’s role there for obvious reasons. The last item of business is what to do about you, John. After you have secured the safety of this young woman, unearthed a spy among us, and all but ensured the eradication of one of the world’s fastest-growing terror organizations, I cannot exactly send you back to work receiving tips from the public.”
Laughter all around. John’s dad seemed really proud, and John smiled humbly.
“So I have spoken with the folks in D.C.,” he went on, “who have been seeking to fill an opening in Special Sector, and I have recommended you for the job. Their training schedule is tight, so if you
accept the job, your flight leaves immediately.”
John let out an audible gasp. “Sir, that is an honor. Thank you very much.”
Mr. Bennett, the wisest person in the room, looked over at me. I met his gaze. What about me? my eyes shouted.
“Do you accept?” Don Woods asked.
John looked at his hands for an answer. “Of course—I’m ready to go now.”
“Great. Ribowitz will get you outfitted and shipped out.” He gave Mr. Bennett a little smile. “Whereabouts unknown. You know the drill.”
John turned to his dad and hugged him. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Mr. Bennett asked.
“No. But it’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
“All?” his dad asked.
“Bye, Dad. I’ll call when I can.” Then, as if to end the conversation, he turned to my parents. “Mr. and Mrs. Higgins, it was so nice to meet you both. I’m sorry that you had to suffer through your daughter’s absence. I’m so glad that she is home safely.” Wait. What?!
I was the only person between him and the door, where Don Woods and his new life were waiting. I felt a shadow of my former self starting to speak to save face. “Hey, congratulations. I totally get it—thanks for everything.” But she didn’t speak, because she barely existed anymore. I was done saying things that weren’t true and then hiding behind them. It was too late for that. I wasn’t going to backtrack and pretend this didn’t happen. It occurred to me to start crying, but why? I was slightly, just slightly, above tricking him into staying. All I could get out was, “No pizza?”
He barely looked at me, knowing that if any intimacy passed between us, his credibility with the almighty Don Woods would be gone. “I have to go. I really have to.”
“You don’t have to.”
Our eyes met for a second before he brushed past me and out the door. I’ve heard people say that you can actually hear your heart break. I’m not sure if I did, but I know that I felt it. It was a bit like having an elephant kick you in the chest, knocking all the wind out of your lungs. In fact, my chest felt so heavy that I wondered if I was having a heart attack. My breaths were short and incapable of filling my lungs. I backed into the chair behind me and let my head fall into my hands, wondering how I was going to get out of that building.
Mr. Bennett’s voice faded into a low rumble as he spoke to the lady who was waiting to escort us out. “If you wouldn’t mind, may we please have a few minutes alone? I can show us all out.”
She left without a word—seemed to be going around. My mom spoke first. “Oh, darling. How awful.” She turned to Mr. Bennett. “What was so important about that job? Why would he just leave without giving it a second thought?”
My dad’s face had gone gray. I could tell that he was actually feeling my pain. Is it even worth it to be that close to someone that you have to feel their pain too?
Mr. Bennett answered, “It’s a long story. That job carried with it a bit of folklore in our family—it’s like the one that got away. Farrah, I’m so sorry. I knew he wasn’t listening to me. All I can tell you is that he’s an idiot and a coward. Not all the time, but right now he is. He’ll figure it out, and it will be too late. By then you’ll be over this.”
“I’ll never be over this.” I couldn’t bear to lift my head and see them all watching me fall apart.
Mr. Bennett touched my chin and raised my face to meet his. “Listen, Farrah. I’ve never seen him like that with anyone, bringing you to our home, sharing himself, hanging on your every word. It was real, Farrah. He just blew it. I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you. I need to go home now.” They all nodded and gathered their things and escorted me to the door like I was made of sand and was about to slip through their fingers. How right they were.
I’m One Bad Relationship Away from Owning 30 Cats
It’s an interesting thing, getting dumped. I’d never had a boyfriend before, and I still wasn’t totally sure that I had, but I knew that I loved someone and that he’d walked away. So by anyone’s definition, I guess I’d been dumped. In this particular situation, your only choices are to suck it up and move on or to “go there.” For those first couple of days, I went there. I got home from the FBI that day, put on my pajamas, got a pint of Chunky Monkey, and watched The Notebook. Five times. Everyone left me alone. I suspect they were a little afraid of me. I went up to my room and listened to Taylor Swift’s “White Horse” on replay, knowing she was the only person in the world who could relate. My nerve endings seemed to be on the outermost parts of my body, ready for any stimulus to pass by and hurt them, inviting it, even. I knew what it meant to have your heart broken wide open, because I was roadkill.
Olive took Danny to the Senior Prom on Saturday night. I came down to the living room in my sweats to watch them take pictures. He wore a white tux that she’d picked out; she wore black. I watched them hold hands as they walked out, somehow happy for them and sick to my stomach at the same time. The limo pulled up in front of our house. Kat popped out of the sunroof with her arms in the air, dancing to the beat of music that I couldn’t hear. I tried to imagine myself at the prom, if none of this had happened. Maybe with Drew, dabbing Scotch behind my ears to keep up appearances. I felt sorry for that girl, maybe more sorry than I felt for my new self. I went inside and popped in The Notebook. Again.
My mother woke me up Monday morning with a tray of ice-cold cucumber slices. “You’re putting me on a diet?” I asked, rubbing my swollen eyes.
“Darling, you’ve been crying for five days—you look like a prizefighter. Let’s just put these on your eyes to bring down the swelling before school starts.” I wanted to tell her that I didn’t really care that my eyes were swollen, but I found that I didn’t even care enough to say that. I just lay back and let her tend to me.
An hour later I was seated behind the wheel of my trusty old Volvo wagon, headed to school. Getting dressed and getting into that car felt like moving through Jell-O, but I insisted on driving myself. It’s weird enough appearing back at school, unexpected after a brief kidnapping, but I didn’t need an entourage. My parents followed Danny and me to the car: “What are you going to tell people?”
“It doesn’t matter. They can think what they want.” And I rolled up the window against the cheery spring morning. I pulled out of the driveway and headed out, feeling Danny watching me.
I glanced over at him. “What are you staring at?”
“You’re just so different. It’s cool.”
“Why? Because I got my heart broken? Yeah, cool.”
“Sort of. I mean more because you’re opened up. It’s like my karate teacher says—you are more alive when you are feeling pain than when you are so careful that you feel nothing. Maybe after some time goes by, this will have been really great for you.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” I had the strangest desire to reach over, open his door, and kick him into traffic.
“I know Dad said we can’t talk about him, but I liked the way you were when he was around. You were Digit again, like when we were little. And if you can stay there, then, yeah, I think this was worth it.”
“Danny, I really don’t want to start crying again. Can we just stop talking?”
“Suit yourself.” He turned up the radio and left me alone.
I have to say that depression or grief or shock or whatever can make you a bit of a badass. I parked my car and strolled with my little brother past all the people I’d turned to for approval all those years. Some followed me and asked a thousand questions; others stood back and whispered too loudly: “She looks different—think she was raped?” Danny turned to say something, but I grabbed his arm and led him inside.
In the hall, nothing had changed. My locker still opened with the same 19-9-24. All of my books were still inside with my rotting lunch from exactly nineteen days ago. Danny stood behind me, as if on guard, as I got my things for class. When I turned around, the Fab Four and Drew Bailey were all gathered behind him. The girl
s hugged me tentatively, Olive pretending like she was surprised I was back.
“Oh my God, Farrah, are you okay?” Kat looked legitimately worried.
“I’m fine. It wasn’t that big of a deal.” I know that my face told them otherwise. I imagined that I looked cracked, like a piece of china that had been dropped and had a web of lines running through it, threatening its structure from the inside out.
“Where did they take you?” Tish asked.
“Did you see us on TV?” Veronica was trying to hide her excitement.
“Yeah, you looked great.” I looked for a hole in the circle they’d formed around me, but they were shoulder to shoulder.
Drew looked really concerned. “You guys leave her alone. I mean, I’ve heard that in these kidnappings they take you back to their ship and take out all your organs and do medical experiments.”
I almost smiled, partly because that was so stupid and partly because he’d nailed it—that was exactly how I felt. “I think that’s in alien abductions. I’ll see you guys later. I have to get to class.”
Danny led me by the arm out of their circle, and we made our way through the sea of staring faces in the hall. I didn’t care. I was even shocked that I ever cared. It was all so clear now that this person that they were gossiping about didn’t really even exist. They had no idea who I was. And Danny was right—just because I was completely broken, I didn’t have to go back there. I was probably incapable of it, and that was the only thing in the world that felt close to good.
A Girl Named Digit Page 16