by Kira Peikoff
Sam’s eyelids drooped. Even though he would never admit it, part of him longed for the days when Patrick and Ian were here, and the three of them switched twelve-hour shifts to monitor the cells. And then, after Ian had quit, he and Patrick had each taken on eighteen hours—exhausting, though not unthinkable. But to handle thirty-six hours alone was close to disorienting. He did not know if he was hungry for breakfast or dinner, or which was even appropriate. And his circadian rhythm was disrupted. Was he dreaming that he was opening the incubator, cradling the warm circular dish in his palm, walking to the inverted microscope on the counter? Had he even fallen asleep at all? He squeezed his eyes shut and opened them wide. They felt dry and scratchy. Yes, he was awake.
He consulted the label on the dish in his palm: number one. The first of eight chances, he thought as he slid the dish under the microscope’s indifferent lens.
* * *
The flat-panel screen on Arianna’s office wall let out a screeching whistle, followed by bursts of red light. Unfazed, she barely glanced up as she hit the OFF button on her remote. Inspector Banks’s prompt morning arrival was as consistent as the numbness in her legs. She no longer bothered to wheel herself to the waiting room to greet him. Oppressive though his presence was, together they had slipped into a tense routine—first, he would walk unescorted down the hall to her office, and then they would silently proceed to the laboratory at the rear of the clinic. After his inspection, she would sign the same bureaucratic form and then he would follow her back to her office, where he would plant himself in a chair across from her. Arianna hardly ever initiated conversation, and neither did he. As she updated patients’ files and accounts, she tried to avoid his gaze, but she could always feel his empty-looking eyes feasting on her, like a vulture waiting to swoop upon a dying animal.
While she found him nearly unbearable, she sensed that he somewhat enjoyed the hours. He never sighed or made a point of checking his watch, but rather leaned back in the chair, the epitome of patience. The other day, she had deigned to ask him if he was bored.
“No true Christian is ever bored,” he had replied. “There’s always a passage from the Scriptures to think about.”
Great, she thought, all I need in my office is a Sunday school.
Now she heard his shoes slapping down the hallway.
At least—at the very least—it was Friday.
* * *
Trent nodded at the towering presence in his doorway. Dopp’s voice filled the tiny office with a suffocating fullness.
“Make sure,” Dopp said, “that you are in the park at four forty-five today to watch her leave. Banks will be with her until then. And then if she goes straight home, call and tell her you want to come over. Spend as much time with her as possible tonight and this weekend, and try to talk about her fears.”
“I will.” Trent hesitated, thinking about the Manhattan judge who had recently turned down Dopp’s application for permission to bug Arianna’s cell phone. Given a judge’s order, a phone company could remotely install a piece of software on a person’s cell, which activated its microphone even when the phone was not in use. To a listener nearby with a radio interceptor, it was the perfect bugging device, especially since it was undetectable. To Dopp’s frustration, liberal sentiment was so strong in New York that he had to obey the letter of the law, following established channels of legality to obtain a judge’s permission. But the judge assigned to review Dopp’s application had decided there was “no clear-cut indication of criminality” in Arianna’s case. Although it was a setback for Dopp, Trent feared it was insignificant. He knew Dopp was not about to back down.
Bracing for the answer, Trent pressed on. “By the way, are you going to file an appeal?”
Dopp smirked. “Are you kidding? That judge was some kind of feminist nut. I’m already working on getting some friends in Albany to help me speed things along this time.”
The words assaulted his ears. “Good,” he replied.
“But as of right now,” Dopp went on, “until we can intercept all of her conversations, our only hope is a confession to you directly—unless, of course, she goes back to the East Village and leads you somewhere important, or mishandles embryos under Banks’s nose. But I don’t see either of those things happening at this point.”
“Me either.”
“So you have to sympathize with her as much as possible.”
“I am, boss. I am.”
* * *
With a great sigh, Sam pulled the fifth dish out from under the microscope and set it next to the other four failures on the counter. His spine ached from hunching over the lens, attempting to identify the pure cells he longed to see. Yet improperly differentiated cells had popped up in every petri dish, mixing dangerously with oligodendrocytes. That was unacceptable; the cells had to be pure oligos in order to form myelin sheaths and repair Arianna’s spinal cord.
Sam consulted the chart to remind himself which growth factors he had injected into dish number six: the nuclear thyroid hormone receptor, T4 (L-thyroxine) at 40 nanograms per milliliter; the antioxidants selenium and vitamin E; thioredoxin reductase; bone morphogenic protein; and retinoic acid—along with the other standard culture ingredients of nutrient supplements, insulin, and antibiotics.
He went to the incubator and removed dish six, holding it with both hands as he brought it back to that mercilessly objective judge, the microscope. He slid the dish under the lens and peered down into it.
He squinted.
The landscape of the petri dish transcended that of a cell culture. It was a field of flawless diamonds, sparkling and scintillating under a master jeweler’s knife. It was the bottom of the hourglass, where the golden droplets of time had accumulated, pure and precious and waiting to be found.
It was one oligodendrocyte next to another, and another, dozens of like cells jostling for space in the modest dish.
Conformity had never looked so beautiful.
* * *
In the tense silence, Arianna’s cell phone vibrated loudly on her desk. Inspector Banks eyed it as if it were an annoying fly that needed a good swat. Arianna pressed a button to turn off the vibration and then glanced at the caller ID. It was Sam—the one person whose rare calls she hated to postpone. In a flash, she thought about wheeling herself out into the hallway, to the bathroom—but then Banks would wonder why she had never made such an effort for privacy for any other call. To downplay his suspicion was key.
She looked down at her phone, at Sam’s name insistently lighting up the screen.
What if there was another emergency and he needed her right away?
Temptation tipped her decision, even as Banks watched her.
“Excuse me,” she said to him, lifting the phone to her ear. She willed herself to remain expressionless, no matter what. Calm and cool.
“Hello?”
“Arianna.” The word sounded strained, as if Sam were struggling against a barrage of emotions. She hardly recognized his voice.
Her heart leapt into her throat; she could almost taste its frenzied pumping. Calm and cool.
“What’s going on?”
And then his voice broke.
“I did it.”
SEVENTEEN
Arianna gasped. “You did?”
“It’s flawless,” Sam choked out.
Tears slipped down her cheeks, draining from a pool of desperation deep within her. Even as she fought to contain them, the droplets escaped from the corners of her eyes in a free fall of euphoria, gaining momentum as they coursed down her face.
Through her blurry eyes, she saw that Inspector Banks was watching her intently, his eyebrows arched in surprise.
She shielded her face with her hand, unable to speak or think.
“Arianna?” Sam asked.
“I always knew you could,” she whispered.
Finding her voice again launched an ecstatic swell within her, this time in her vocal cords, and she had to repress the urge to scream.
> “I want to see you,” he said.
“I’ll come over right now!”
“Don’t you dare.”
“But I want to see you, too!”
“We should meet at the clinic to extract your skin cells. I want to start the process right away.”
She paused, wondering how to communicate the impossible.
“The bastard is right there, isn’t he?” Sam said.
“Yes.”
“How can you stand him right now?”
She laughed freely, thinking that Banks did not matter anymore, nor did her fear. She laughed still at the fact that such things had mattered minutes ago, and now they did not. Oh, the energy she had wasted—all along, a farce, a cruel one, but that was all.
“Let’s meet somewhere,” Sam suggested. “We need to talk and plan. Your place?”
“I’m leaving right now.”
“Good. I’ll see you there.”
She tore the phone from her ear. Wetness from her cheek had dribbled onto the mouthpiece, so she wiped it onto her pant leg, slipped the phone into her pocket, and then looked up. Involuntarily, she felt herself beaming.
“Some good news, I take it?” Banks asked.
“Yes.”
“You look stunned.”
She shook her head slowly and took a sidelong glance at her office. “I am.” The left wall looked like a checkerboard of pink and blue, adorned with contiguous pictures of her patients’ babies.
“My sister just had a baby. A girl. It was an unexpected early delivery.”
Banks’s face relaxed. “Well, isn’t that nice.”
“She’s seven pounds four ounces. Sophia Roxanne.”
It was the name she had always wanted for a daughter.
Banks nodded. “What a blessing.”
She smiled, turning her wheelchair toward the door behind her. “I’m off to go meet her now. See you next time.”
Leaning forward, she propelled her wheelchair to the door and pushed it open without waiting for Banks’s reply. The hallway gleamed white, no longer sterile and monochrome, but dazzling. For a moment, she thought about going to tell the Ericsons, but they were busy with patients. As soon as the workday ended, she would call them. Instead, she dashed to the waiting room, waved to a few regulars there, and then flew out the door onto the sidewalk. The air was chilly and nipped at her face as she rode jubilantly through the park, savoring the scent of cool freshness after rain. When she flew over a puddle and it splashed up to her blouse, she laughed and went faster, speeding past the fountain, under the glorious arch, and veering left, straight into her building’s lobby.
In the elevator, she took her cell phone out of her pocket and called Trent, drumming her fingers excitedly on her armrest. If only she could see his face. She wondered if he would scream or stay silent, or even cry.
One, two, three, four rings passed before his voice mail picked up. Undeterred, she tried again. One, two, three four, voice mail. Growing frustrated, she tried once more. But his phone continued to ring, unanswered.
* * *
Dopp worked quickly, rewriting the department’s application to bug Arianna’s cell phone. This time, he thought, they’d better be assigned a good old-fashioned judge who could smell something foul when it stank up the room. Senator Windra ought to help land them the right judge, if he was sincere about wanting to support the department. But Dopp was putting off making the call to Albany. Part of him worried that the senator would lose respect for him for asking a favor, that it undermined his own leadership skills to rely on political connections. But then again, that feminist judge had not given their application a fair review. It was up to Dopp to set it right. He knew he needed to shun that worst of human sins—his own pride—and just make the call.
At that moment, his phone rang. No way, he thought, it would be too lucky. He waved his hand over the desk phone’s speaker to answer.
“Gideon Dopp,” he intoned.
“Boss. I have an update.”
Dopp recognized Banks’s throaty voice immediately. “Yeah, what’s up?”
“She left. Said her sister just gave birth, and took off. She was happier than I ever saw.”
Dopp’s skin prickled. “How did she find out?”
“She got a call on her cell.”
“If only that idiot judge had approved our application already!”
“I know.”
“So you don’t know where she went?”
“No.” Banks’s voice wavered. “I guess to a hospital. I just thought you should know.”
“Obviously. Thank you.” Dopp said good-bye and waved his hand over his desk phone’s speaker to turn it off.
For a few moments, he sat completely still, wondering why the hair on his arms was taut and his skin cold. His intuition was a precise instrument, as reliable as a compass, and he knew never to ignore it. On a hunch, he reached into his filing cabinet for a manila folder labeled, ARIANNA DRAKE/WASHINGTON SQUARE CENTER FOR REPRODUCTIVE MEDICINE.
The thick folder held all the information Trent had compiled about her over the past several months, complete with transcripts of their conversations, notes about her moods, and sly observations of her comings and goings.
Dopp turned back to the records of their earliest conversations, when she and Trent had talked during breaks in their bike rides. He skimmed the mostly boring pages, flipping through them quickly. And then he gasped.
Her words were right there on the page, woven into a stock conversation about their family histories, an incidental revelation that held no meaning until this moment:
DRAKE: You’re an only child? So am I.
* * *
Trent’s cell phone began to vibrate as soon as Dopp rushed into his office. But a more pressing matter than the call confronted him: Dopp’s eyes were wide enough to reveal the whites all around his dark brown irises. His lopsided lips were parted and moist, and a glint in his eyes signaled an alarming level of intensity.
“What is Arianna’s sister’s name?” Dopp demanded, clutching the side of the doorframe as if to steady himself.
“What’s what?”
“You heard me.”
“I—I don’t understand. What are you talking about?”
In Trent’s pocket, his cell phone began to vibrate against his thigh for a second time.
“What I am talking about,” Dopp said, “is Arianna’s sister. Do you know her name?”
“I thought she was an only child like me.”
Dopp’s face flushed, taking on a feverish tint. “You’re right.”
Trent felt his heart smack against his ribs. “What’s going on?”
“Banks just called from her clinic. She had some sort of ecstatic outburst and then took off, telling him that her sister just had a baby. But isn’t it funny—” Dopp paused, handing Trent a single sheet of paper that he remembered typing two months before. “She told you she’s an only child.”
Trent took the paper and skimmed it as his cell phone vibrated a third time. He realized then who might be calling … an ecstatic outburst … Could Sam have—?
“I don’t understand,” he said. “Where did she run off to?”
“That’s the whole point! That woman is a liar, and now we’ve caught her in the act! If she doesn’t have a sister, where in the world did she go? And why?”
Trent shook his head. “I wish I could tell you. I’m as confused as you are.”
“Call her right now,” Dopp instructed. “Ask her what she’s up to.”
Oh my God, Trent thought.
Nodding, he pulled out his cell phone and ignored the three missed calls on the display. Then he called his father’s cell phone. He knew his dad hardly used the slim device, which stayed in his car’s glove compartment. The elder Mr. Rowe preferred the old-fashioned bulkiness of land phones, which were easier for him to hold on his shoulder.
The cell rang five times, predictably, before voice mail picked up, and his father’s voice instructed him to
leave a message. Trent shrugged apologetically at Dopp as he spoke:
“Hey, it’s me. Just wondering how your day’s going. Hope you’re doing okay. Give me a call when you get this. Bye.”
He looked up at Dopp. “No answer. Hopefully she’ll call soon.”
“I didn’t think she would pick up,” Dopp muttered. “Are you seeing her tonight?”
“I was supposed to.”
“Well, find out the truth. And if you don’t, there will be consequences. We have the upper hand now, and I intend to use it before it’s too late.”
“How?”
“I have an idea of my own. But I may not have to go that far if you can make things easy for us. I’ll be in touch tonight. If you don’t have her voice on record saying where she was going and why, then you can expect consequences.”
“But what if she won’t tell me?”
“Then I guess you’re pretty useless on this case.”
Trent tightened his lips and did not answer.
“We have to do whatever it takes,” Dopp said, reaching up to hold the back of his flushed neck. “This isn’t about you, and it’s not even just about her.”
Trent nodded, ironically sympathizing with his boss’s strength of convictions. Their motivation was the same: to stop something each saw as evil, because it was a threat to life. On one level, Trent wished that his onetime mentor could see him for who he really was—not an inept agent, but an equally fervent adversary. He hoped they were well matched.
* * *
Sam rushed to Arianna’s apartment giddily. When his taxi pulled up to her building, he tossed the driver two twenties for a ten-dollar ride, and then bounded inside. He waved to the doorman as he ran across the tiled floor into the elevator. The mirrored panels inside showed him the dopey grin on his lips, and he chuckled, hardly noticing his five-day growth of silvery stubble. The anticipation of seeing Arianna’s face carried him on light feet to her door.
When she opened it, he was thrilled to see her sunken cheeks flushed, her smile wide. In her rosy skin and bright eyes, it was as if the life left in her was already proclaiming its comeback.