by Sonya Chung
Now he was asking her for something. Your opinion. Something important. She was alert and grateful. She was glad he asked.
3.
Charles had been home for a week over the summer—back from a three-month assignment before heading out again—and badly needed a haircut. He hadn’t been to Vernon’s in years. There was a new sign—Fat Mike’s BARBER SHOP—and Charles didn’t know when it had changed. He decided to go in. It was late afternoon on a Friday; the place was buzzing. Charles almost didn’t recognize Mike, who said, “Well look who it is.” Mike wore a big graying Afro and had lost weight. “The great disappearing act, Charles Lee. Now ya see him, now ya don’t. Couple presidents now?”
“Just about,” Charles said. “How ya been, Mike?”
“Can’t complain.” He told Charles about his boys, now in middle school and managing to stay off the corners.
“Vernon?” Charles knew the answer.
Mike nodded. “Almost two years ago. He went easy. We were glad for that.”
An old man lowered his newspaper and cleared his throat. “You’re Essie Lee’s boy,” the man said.
Charles and the old man eyed each other. “Yessir,” Charles said.
The man went back to his paper. It seemed that was all he’d be saying about that.
Charles looked to Mike, who shrugged.
Mike patted his chair, and Charles sat down. Mike worked quickly, all business. There was a line now. Fat Mike’s was a place where the job got done, and the wait wouldn’t be long. Charles was in and out while the old man leaned back for his shave.
He walked home the long way around the block, taking in all the changes in the neighborhood—For Sale signs on nearly every block, a Vietnamese nail salon, a coffee house on the corner. As Charles turned onto Kenyon Street, an old Lincoln pulled up slow beside him. The driver rolled down the window. “I knew Frank,” the old man said. He was wearing a porkpie hat now, but Charles recognized the voice from before. “We ran together in those days.”
This thing happened, and I want to tell you about it.
At the house the Lincoln pulled over, and the man, his face now shiny and smooth-shaven, climbed out with his cane. They stood at the bottom of the stoop. Charles invited him in, but the man begged off. His name was Clarence Crawley. He lived in St. Louis now but was in town burying his aunt.
The old man told me that Frank was alive, living in Senegal last he heard. Followed a woman there. Before that, San Antonio, for a while Chicago. He didn’t know much else. He said, “We ran together. Frank, he was no prince. But he weren’t empty-headed either. Frank wasn’t a punk. He had ideas. It was a long time ago. But I thought you might want to know.”
I could go and find him. It wouldn’t be hard. But why should I? I’ve been thinking about this. Frank and I, we’re not so different. Neither of us wanted what we got stuck with. That’s the truth, and it never changed.
But you knew that. You knew from the beginning.
I’ve been writing to you a long time. I wonder who you’ve become, what you think is important now. If you think any of this is.
The letter went on, it was longer than usual, spilling onto the other side of the page. Charles made sure to write a return address—a PO Box he kept in McLean—on both the outer envelope and on the letter itself.
He left for his next assignment, would be gone through December. He was glad for the distraction, moving the time along. He was still doing Tier 2 work, wherever they needed him, and he was as good as Bart had predicted. His assignments almost always became bigger and more interesting than they were at the start—risk factors and responsibilities inching upward—because of how good he was. He’d be body-guarding an asset’s mistress, mostly to appease paranoia; then they’d move him to the asset himself. Or he’d observe and report on a contact, then they’d put him on the higher-up—there was always someone up the chain, often a government official—that Charles had identified.
If he stopped to think about the danger, he might flinch or falter, but Charles never did. He kept his eye on the ball. He watched and waited and knew that to move too soon or too suddenly was always a mistake. The best guys waited longer, then moved on a dime. Sometimes it was a matter of seconds; sometimes days or weeks.
Neither did Charles ask why, or which one was the good guy, which one the bad. He understood that the answers would not be satisfying, and knowing that, the work made sense to him.
“Now that’s a frightening statement.” The woman from the first training in Vegas sat next to him at an airport bar. They both had layovers and time to kill. He’d recognized her first. Her hair was different, long and flowing and a different color, and she was wearing heels—probably she’d need to use feminine charms to get what she needed, wherever she was going—but he’d known her right away. She went by Anita.
“What’s really frightening,” Charles said, “is when anyone tells you, ‘We’re the good guys.’” He was glad to see her. She was easy to talk to, and it was like no time had passed.
“Yeah, but c’mon. There are some really bad guys out there. Like a hundred and ten percent bad. And anyway, none of it makes sense.”
Charles raised his glass. “Agree to disagree,” he said, smiling.
Anita paid the tab and led him to a staff restroom at the end of a hallway near the lost luggage office. She clicked the lock and began unbuckling his belt.
Charles let her kiss his neck, but then grabbed her hands, and lifted her chin. Her lipstick had smudged to one side of her mouth, and he saw how dark the circles under her eyes were. He whispered, “How about—” and reached into his bag, pulled out a small film canister—“this, instead.” He popped off the top and, from a cluster of Q-tips, pulled out a joint.
She laughed and seemed relieved. He handed her a paper towel for her face and buckled his belt. She said, “You know, this leather skirt is a bitch to get out of anyway.”
They slipped out of the bathroom, the joint tucked into Anita’s bra, and she asked did he have another. He did. “I know a guy in air traffic, with a windowed office.”
“Seriously?”
“Don’t worry; he’s just a charts-and-graphs guy.”
They stood by the open window and watched the planes take off. Dave the data analyst went out for his break, grinning and greedy. Charles let Anita have the joint. “I think you need it more than I do,” he said. He didn’t smoke much anymore. Once in a while for the jet lag.
“Jeez, a Boy Scout type. I could sort of tell, back in Vegas.” Charles didn’t say anything to that. “You religious or something?”
He laughed.
“Or—and I got nothing against it or anything, but back there in the bathroom—you … queer?”
He laughed again, a little louder. He wasn’t offended. But it was a nervous, off-guard laugh. Truth was, he didn’t have a better explanation—for why he’d refuse a good, no-strings fuck with a woman he liked.
Off he went. He worked through the fall. In January Veda would be back from her trip. They would have a few days together. In the new year, he’d have time off coming to him: he’d worked too many days, too many assignments, one after another—according to Bart, who was on him about it. “Take the time,” Bart said. “I’ve seen this before. You get sucked in. Mistakes get made.” Maybe he would take the time; spring in west Africa, why not. He would wait and see. Wait before deciding. Maybe there would be something in the PO Box when he returned.
4.
Veda spent a month in England. She got comfortable and put off her trip to Paris. Toward the end, Nicole took up with a medical student from Wales whom Veda found irritating, so she bought a train pass and set out on her own. In Berlin, she caught the end of Oktoberfest and learned how to roll a cigarette. Amsterdam was cold and rainy, and the best museums were closed for renovation. One night a pimp approached Veda with a wad of cash and a proposition; she got on the morning train and headed south. She took her time making her way to Paris—Bruges, Lille, Amiens. For
two more weeks, she sat in cathedral pews, stood on bridges, ate bread and cheese. It was easier than she’d thought, getting around, traveling alone. To keep men from harassing her, she took to wearing baggy jeans and her father’s old Army sweatshirt, her hair up in a Redskins cap.
Veda was three days in Paris before venturing to find Rue Pascal. She checked in to a hostel in the Latin Quarter and kept busy doing laundry and browsing tourist sites the first two days; on the third day she sat on a bench by the Seine, pensive. What was she doing here. What was this all for. When finally she found her way to the 14th arrondissement, she walked up and down the street for an hour, then sat in a café. She didn’t know which building. It was a small street, but still there were at least twenty buildings. She thought there was a 5 in the address, but she couldn’t recall for sure. She came the following day at sundown and waited for the lights to go on in the windows. One of the buildings had a blue front door—a vibrant blue that was somehow also serene. She’d been drawn to it right away (plus the number was 51), so she focused on the windows there. A woman with twin girls approached, and Veda made like she was walking in the opposite direction; she looked over her shoulder and focused on the fingers punching in the code.
Veda knocked on the door of the ground-floor apartment. A woman answered in bare feet and wrapped in an enormous shawl. Her black hair was tied up in a messy chignon. When she saw Veda, Monique’s expression changed from mildly annoyed to solicitous. “Are you all right, my dear?” Monique said in English. Veda was no longer wearing her protective disguise—she’d put on a purple dress and tall Doc Marten boots—but something still gave her away as an American. She had the look of someone in search of something definite and specific. “Can I help you?”
Veda said who she was looking for, and Monique became animated. Yes, yes, Hannah Lee lived here, upstairs. Was she expecting her? Obviously she knew Hannah well; was more than just a neighbor.
“No,” Veda said. “Not at all. It will be … a surprise.” She tried to sound casual—an old friend passing through. In fact, Veda was not shocked to have found Hannah; somehow she knew that finding her would not be the hard part.
Monique made tea. They sat at one end of the large oval dining table. Hannah would be back soon, she’d gone to the museum library to do research. “We have begun a new project,” Monique said. “A novel, based on the life of Balthus.” Monique went on to describe who Balthus was and why he interested her. Soon, Veda knew more about the painter than she did about the woman speaking. She hadn’t even said her name.
“A man like Balthus, there has to be more than meets the eye, you see,” Monique was saying, when they heard the squeal of the heavy blue door, footsteps in the building foyer. Monique had left her front door cracked open.
The footsteps ascended the stairs, then stopped. Slowly they retreated. It was unusual for Monique’s door to be open. Monique put down her cup, pushed back from the table, and stood. “Ah-nah?” she called. She walked to the front door and opened it wide. “Viens. You have a visitor.”
Veda Lee and Hannah Lee stood at opposite ends of Monique Glissant’s table, staring at each other.
Their postures became taut—as if a force pulled forward from their chests, locking them together.
Monique cleared her throat. “We have been having such a nice chat. You are surprised, Ah-nah? She said you would be.”
Hannah pressed her shoulders back. “I … yes. What a surprise.” Hannah’s voice was flat, and controlled.
Veda remembered that evenness; her babysitter’s persistent calm. She tucked her hair behind her ear and focused on the scuffs on her boots. Then she lifted her eyes and said, “I thought … it wouldn’t be so hard to find you. I guess it wasn’t.” Veda wanted to get this part out of the way—that she’d come looking for Hannah.
Hannah re-gripped the handles of her tote bag. Her face flushed, but her expression was inscrutable, and Veda remembered this, too.
“I’ve been telling your friend about Balthus,” Monique said brightly. “Just when you came.”
A beat of stillness. Darkness clicking down outside.
“You have not seen each other in some time?” Monique looked back and forth between them. Then she leaned over the chair and began gathering the pot and teacups, a few scattered papers. Creating motion, moving the air.
“A pretty long time,” Veda said.
“You’ve … you’re so tall,” Hannah said.
Veda laughed at that. “You look the same,” she said. “But different.”
Hannah continued to hold her tote bag off the ground, her shoulders square despite the weight of thick art books pulling on one side.
“Sit, sit,” Monique said, waving her hands. She left the room. There was rummaging in the kitchen.
Veda slid back into the chair and stacked her hands in her lap. She tucked her chin and lengthened her neck; it was something her dance instructors had drilled into her. Soft and hard, like steel lace. Hannah put her bag by the door. She came forward and pulled out a chair, but did not sit. It was not unlike the first time the two met—Veda sitting, statuesque, and Hannah standing by, stunned by the sight of her. Back then Veda had taken Hannah’s hand, full of trust and confidence. Now, eight years later, neither recalled the memory.
Their eyes pulled toward each other and locked as their beating hearts had moments before. Hannah sat down.
“Your friend is nice,” Veda said. She knew she should say more. She did not want to beat around the bush. Almost two months she’d been working her way to this moment. Longer, really.
Hannah said, “So—how did you …” She did not finish her question. Maybe she would have, if Veda had not started in, all at once.
She told Hannah about the letters—the one in the mailbox that came back; the one in Charles’s briefcase. She took them back four years in an instant. “He didn’t know,” Veda said, “my dad. That I was looking. That I saw.” She twisted a pink stone ring around her index finger. She’d bought it on the street in London and was proud to have bargained with the vendor. “He doesn’t know I’m here.”
Monique returned with a plate of bread and butter and olives, and a bottle of Viognier. Hannah and Veda sat silent with hands in their laps, like children receiving their punishment. “So,” Monique said, “tell me. You were schoolmates?” Hannah explained how they knew each other. Monique was surprised to learn that Veda was so young. “Come all this way toute seule? Quel courage.”
Veda told them about her travels. She didn’t yet mention the money. “I’m starting at Howard in January,” she said.
“Your parents must be proud,” Hannah said.
Veda just nodded. She wondered what Hannah knew. About Alice and her father. She wanted to find out. “So, you live here? Upstairs?”
They stood in Hannah’s tiny kitchen. Veda was armed with her questions, her need to know. She told Hannah about the mysterious money. “It’s sitting in the bank,” Veda said. “I’m supposed to claim it, I guess.” She mentioned the lawyer. It was an even more bizarre story when she said it out loud.
Hannah listened. Then she said, “I don’t know anything. I’m sorry.”
Veda had not anticipated how she would feel, either way. She found herself neither surprised nor disappointed. And she found herself believing that Hannah knew nothing—about the money, about her mother. It seemed ridiculous now that she imagined Hannah would have the missing piece. Her missing piece. “It’s probably Alice,” Veda said. “Though I have no idea where she’d get money.” She said it in a defeated way that did not invite a response. And she said Alice. In her mind, Veda had been calling her mother by name for years; saying it out loud felt both strange and liberating.
Suddenly there seemed to be nothing else to say. Nothing at all. Veda’s hunch had not panned out. All the buildup of the last two months. Now what? Did she have another hunch? Another different idea? What was her next question? What did she really want to know? It was getting late.
&nbs
p; The force that had pulled on their hearts waned. Veda could almost hear the click, the unlocking. Her dance instructors would cringe to see her sagging shoulders, dropped chin. Veda realized she did not want to ask, or know, anything more. About the letters. Her father. He had always had his own mysteries. Still, he was known to her; a certainty. Nothing was as sure, and she wasn’t going to start doubting. Veda felt at once that she knew everything; that there wasn’t anything to know; and that, if there was, it had nothing to do with her.
The spinning again. An image of bright lights by the ocean at night, teacups twirling. Weariness came over Veda all at once: she missed Kenyon Street and Aunt Rhea and her cat.
She said: “Do you know where Josephine Baker performed?”
The grand foyer of the Folies Bergère was all greens and golds, like an underwater palace. Enormous candelabras, red spires illuminated, flanked the staircase.
“Wow. This is … something.” Veda stepped up behind Hannah’s shoulder. It was the following night, and they’d agreed to meet by the stairs. Hannah had picked up the tickets at Will Call, from Monique’s friend. Veda scanned the upper floor. “What’s with all the horses?”
“And this paint job.”
“I guess it’s supposed to be ‘gilded’.”
“Not quite worthy of Josephine?”
“Not really.” But Veda wasn’t actually disappointed. It was exciting, and she felt somehow at home. She wore an ivory sweater, her hair pulled tight in a long ponytail. Both she and Hannah noticed people around them noticing her. Veda stepped to the side, underneath the staircase, as if accustomed to the strategy. She would perfect her strategies in years to come—refusing to be taken for something she was not.
Hannah said, “Do you remember saying once that you wanted to be a beauty queen?”
“I said that? Really?” Veda considered this. “I guess that idea seemed simple enough at the time.”
Hannah took a moment to reply. She said, thoughtfully, “Yeah. I think it was your backup.”
They milled around the lobby. Hannah told Veda that she’d never been inside, only walked by. “Have you been to Josephine’s house, the Chateau?” Veda asked. Hannah had not. “I’ve seen pictures. My aunt told me about it. It’s … I mean, you can’t believe it. Like a fairytale. Did you know she was a spy for the Resistance and adopted twelve children from twelve different countries?”