Questions I Want to Ask You

by Michelle Falkoff

  I end up calling Nonna. I’d told her I would fill her in on what I found in Brooklyn and I never did, and I’ve been feeling bad about it ever since. I tell her about showing up and having just missed my mother, and how helpful the visit was despite her absence, between talking to Jen and getting the duffel bag. “How did you know to send me there?” I ask her.

  “I wrote her letters every week while she was in prison,” Nonna says. “I asked her to let me visit, but she didn’t respond until she was out on parole. She didn’t want to meet, but she gave me an address where I could keep writing. I’ve kept writing all these years, though she rarely writes back. She hasn’t yet forgiven me for believing the worst of her. But if she still wants my letters, there’s hope. That’s the most important thing.”

  “What about Aunt Reggie?”

  Nonna tells me Aunt Reggie needs time. “She hasn’t imagined herself in my place yet. When she does, she’ll come around.”

  “I can’t wait that long,” I tell her. “If I promise to get her there on a Sunday, will you make dinner?”

  “I make dinner every week,” she says. “I want to be ready whenever she changes her mind.”

  We agree on the Fourth of July—it’s not like Tom’s going to be having a barbecue this year—and I convince Dad to drive up to New Haven with me. Matt promises he’ll strong-arm Aunt Reggie, and by some miracle, he’s able to pull it off.

  All my family, together in one room.

  It’s super awkward at first, no shock there. I’d had to explain to Dad a million times that no one had helped my mother, that they weren’t upset with him about the restraining order anymore (which was only sort of true, but whatever), that they really did want him to come. By the time we get there I think he believes it all; he definitely hides it well if he doesn’t, and everyone manages to be polite. Even Nonna and Aunt Reggie. They don’t have a big heart-to-heart while we’re there or anything, but they’re civil, and Poppa looks thrilled to see them together.

  The Fourth of July is a holiday, and I have this amazing family now, so I decide to celebrate properly. “Mia, can you pass the meatballs?”

  “Only if you take pasta too,” Matt says.

  “No pressure,” Aunt Reggie says.

  I roll my eyes. “I was planning on it.”

  Dad winks at Mia. “You’ve all had quite an influence on Pack,” he says. “I’ve been trying to get him to ease up on the whole Neanderthal thing for years.”

  I want to remind him that he knows it’s Paleo, but he’s just teasing. And he’s right that easing up is appropriate now. If I’ve learned anything by working with the nutritionist this summer, it’s that my relationship with food has been kind of messed up for a long time. I’ve been using food as a means of control, but I’ve also been using it as a way of avoiding making my own decisions, letting other people tell me what it was okay to eat so I could just go along. I didn’t believe I had the power to make good choices myself, or even to make the occasional bad choice and not have it be a catastrophe. That’s what Matt was trying to tell me that day on the train, I think, and I’m only just starting to get it. “Whatever,” I say. “Nonna, did you make any dolci?”

  One cookie won’t kill me.

  I’m not sharing my cookie revelation with the people at work. If there’s one thing I’ve figured out this summer, it’s that I like working out at my gym a whole lot more than I enjoy actually working there. I don’t love training people all that much—I lack Jeff’s knack for finding the best way to talk people through the difficulties they’re having, not to mention his patience, and I had no idea how much science there is in understanding how different muscle groups work and what that means in terms of planning effective workouts. Not to mention nutrition science. I thought I could learn to become a trainer or a nutritionist on the job, but there’s no way to do it without more education, and I’m not sure that’s the kind of education I want.

  To be honest, I’m starting to think about going in a whole other direction. It’s ironic that the only person who ever suggested I go to the police academy was Tom, but I’m starting to think maybe he was right. Investigating a real crime turned out to be way more fun than just watching someone else doing it on TV, or even playing along. Dad will be shocked, but I might surprise him by enrolling. Classes start in the fall, right around the time Maddie leaves for college. I have just enough time to redesign my workouts to get ready for the physical entrance exam, and I start doing them instead of the regular classes at the gym. I’ll have to do a bunch of obstacle courses, so I need to work on speed and stamina, which means more running. Yuck. There’s a trigger-pull test to show I can fire a gun quickly with either hand, so I add in some special hand exercises and start going to the firing range to learn how to shoot. Then there are sled push and pull exercises, to get me ready for these other drills meant to mimic saving people. Working out with a purpose in mind is way more fun than trying to beat my time or max weight in a regular WOD.

  I’m even contemplating signing up for a program that would take me away from Brooksby. There are lots of police academies in Massachusetts; I don’t have to choose the one closest to home, in Reading. I could go to Boston, or Worcester, or somewhere out on the Cape. Or Springfield, way out in the western part of the state. Two hours away from home, an hour away from New Haven. And only about forty-five minutes away from UMass. Just in case.

  There’s still one last thing.

  One day, near the end of August, Dad takes a rare Sunday off and tells me to get in the car. We drive for over an hour until we get to the federal prison where Tom’s being held pending trial—his wife refused to post bail for him when she learned what he’d done, and most of their money’s been seized by the government anyway.

  “I don’t understand,” I say. “What are we doing here?”

  “I thought you might want to talk to Tom. See if he can give you some answers.” He leads me through security until we reach a room that looks like a smaller version of a high school cafeteria, with tables where a few prisoners are meeting with their families. Tom is sitting at one of them, alone. He looks thinner than I remember; apparently he’s not one of those guys who spends all his time in prison working out. His hands are clenched into fists, and I wonder whether he’s angry. He hasn’t seen us yet, and I’m tempted to turn around and leave before he does.

  “How do you know he’ll talk to me?” I ask.

  “I’ve been here a couple of times already,” Dad replies. “He won’t tell me much, but it’s been a long summer for him, and his kids won’t come visit. He asked for you.”

  We walk over to the table and sit down across from him. I have no idea what to say, but he talks before I have a chance to come up with something.

  “Heard you helped out with all this, kiddo.” Tom motions at the room. “Nice work.”

  How am I supposed to respond to that? Dad looks like he’s about to jump in, but I knee him under the table.

  “Ah, I’m just kidding,” Tom says. “Joe, can you leave us alone for a minute?”

  “Not on your life,” Dad says, but I kick him this time.

  “Come on, Dad.” It’s the first words I’ve managed to get out of my mouth.

  He gives Tom a death glare, but then he turns to me. “I’ll be just a few feet away.” He walks over to an unoccupied table and sits down, watching us.

  “He’s a good guy, your dad,” Tom says.

  “Then why would you do this to him?” I ask.

  “It wasn’t about him. It wasn’t about any of you. And I’m not about to get into it here. I’m working on a deal, and it will all come out then. But Joe’s done a good job making me feel like shit for keeping you away from your mom. So maybe there’s something I can do for you.”

  I stare at him for a long time. “Why would you?” I ask again.

  “He really was my friend, you know. That’s why I kept him away from everything. I had my guy shoot him in the leg just to get him out.”

  Hol
y shit. “Does Dad know that?”

  “He does now.” Tom makes a face that on someone else might have been a smile. “Things would have gotten ugly if he’d figured everything out, and if your mom had come back, he would have. He was a good cop, you know. Better than he ever gave himself credit for.”

  I know that now, that’s for sure.

  “He says the only way I can fix this is to set your mom free. To let her know it’s over. Like she hasn’t already figured it out from the papers.”

  She hasn’t, I’m sure. Otherwise she would have gotten in touch with me. I think. I hope.

  “Anyway,” he continues, “it’s not like it matters anymore. So here.” He unclenches one of his fists and I see a scrunched-up slip of paper. It’s part of a piece of notebook paper, with ten digits written on it. As soon as I see them, I know what they are.

  “I made her carry a burner,” Tom says. “So she’d know I could get hold of her at any time. If she doesn’t know about me getting busted, then she still has it. You might want to call her soon, though—if she hears I’m out of the picture, she might get rid of it.”

  My stomach drops. The thought of losing the one link I have to my mother when I’ve only just gotten it makes me feel a little sick. I snatch the paper out of his hand, stand up, and start to walk away.

  “Aren’t you going to say thanks?” Tom calls out after me.

  After all you’ve done? I want to say, but I don’t bother. I just keep walking, trusting that Dad is right behind me.

  We don’t talk on the drive home, either. It’s not until we get in the house that I manage to ask Dad what I should do. “Are we even sure it’s the right number? Will she answer?”

  “Won’t know unless you try, kid,” he says.

  You’d think after months of agonizing over a decision like this I’d have come up with an answer by now. “Maybe you should call her first.”

  Dad shakes his head. “It’s you she reached out to, not me. You don’t have to use this, you know. But look, I’m wiped. Going to take a quick nap now. Wake me up for dinner, okay?”

  I nod, still staring at the slip of paper. Am I ready? Am I really going to do this?

  I am.

  I get out my phone and punch in the number, then wait for it to ring. It rings several times before I hear the click of someone picking up, and then a voice I don’t recognize. A woman’s voice. “Hello?”

  I’m so surprised she picked up I forget the words I’ve rehearsed in my head.

  “Hello? Are you there?”

  “Hi, Mom, it’s Patrick. Your son.” I pause. I wish I’d written a script; there are a million things I want to say. But in the end, I keep it simple. “I have some questions I want to ask you.”

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Richard Abate and everyone at 3 Arts Entertainment. I can’t believe how many years it’s been since I first submitted stories back in grad school, but I’m so glad we stayed in touch!

  Thanks to Jocelyn Davies (who is as wonderful in person as she has been online and over the phone) and everyone at HarperCollins. Special thanks to Ellen Leach and Bethany Reis—I am embarrassed and grateful to learn about all the writing tics I never realized I had. If we are ever in New England at the same time, the grilled bagels are on me.

  Thanks to the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts for providing time and space to write and a fantastic group of people with whom to share that time. Thanks also to the Writers’ Police Academy (and to Sisters in Crime for funding assistance) for helping me learn about what it means to be a police officer; all inaccuracies are mine and mine alone.

  Thanks to all the organizations that have provided community, both in Chicago and elsewhere, especially SCBWI, the Mystery Writers of America Midwest Chapter, the Chicago salon, and certain unnamed Facebook groups. I’m so grateful to be included in your ranks, even if I’m not always the most vocal (especially online).

  Thanks to Katherine Bell and Rebecca Johns Trissler, the two people who have to read everything I write before I’m willing to let anyone else see it. There is no substitute for friends who can look past the flaws of early drafts to help unlock the potential of what lies within.

  Thanks to my writing group, especially Brandon Trissler, Jessica Chiarella, and Dan Stolar. Your feedback was invaluable.

  Thanks to the people whose life details I borrowed for this book and others (although perhaps I should say “stole” rather than “borrowed”—I felt like a magpie going after shiny objects). In particular, thanks to Cristina Prochilo, whose family has been so dear to me for so long; I thought of all the Prochilos often as I wrote, and I hope I didn’t do a disservice to anything I’ve learned from the family over the years.

  Thanks to all the friends who’ve provided love and support, but especially Nami Mun, Gus Rose, Vu Tran, Elisa Lee, and Justin Kramon.

  Finally, thanks, as always, to my family. During the time I was working on this book some very sad things happened (we miss you terribly, Jeff and Lou), along with some wonderful things (I’m talking to you, Ryan), and I was reminded (as if I needed reminding) how important you all are to me.

  About the Author

  Photo by Oliver Klink

  MICHELLE FALKOFF is the author of Pushing Perfect and Playlist for the Dead. Her fiction and reviews have been published in ZYZZYVA, DoubleTake, and the Harvard Review, among other places. She is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and currently serves as director of communication and legal reasoning at Northwestern University School of Law. Visit her online at www.michellefalkoff.com.

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  Questions I Want to Ask You

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  Copyright

  HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

  QUESTIONS I WANT TO ASK YOU. Copyright © 2018 by Michelle Falkoff. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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  Cover art by Bill Bragg

  Cover design by Jessie Gang

  * * *

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Falkoff, Michelle, author

  Title: Questions I want to ask you / Michelle Falkoff.

  Description: First edition. | New York : HarperTeen, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, [2018] | Summary: Pack receives a letter on his eighteenth birthday from the mother he believed was long dead, and begins a journey to find her even as he struggles to figure out his future.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017034842

  Subjects: | CYAC: Identity—Fiction. | Dating (Social customs)—Fiction. | Fathers and sons—Fiction. | Single-parent families—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.F35 Que 2018 | DDC [Fic]—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017034842

  * * *

  Digital Edition MAY 2018 ISBN: 978-0-06-268025-9

  Print ISBN: 978-0-06-268023-5 (hardback)

  1819202122 PC/LSCH10987654321

  FIRST EDITION

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