*
Sawyer calls again when I’m on the way home, Mick Jagger twanging out from the depths of my shoulder bag. I fish for the phone and glance over my shoulder at Hannah in her baby seat, but she’s dead to the world. My car smells like Cheerios and hand sanitizer. “We don’t want any,” I tell him, instead of hello.
“You haven’t even heard what I’m selling.” Sawyer’s laughing; I can hear it in his voice.
I frown at the road in front of me, all grim neon strip malls and fast-food restaurants. I am so, so tired of driving this route. “I don’t need to.”
“Sure you do.”
“Knives?” I ask, merging onto the highway. “Vinyl siding? Flood insurance?”
“Better,” he tells me, full of promises. “Let me cook you dinner.”
Oh God. “What?”
“Dinner,” he repeats more slowly, like maybe the problem was in his enunciation. “Tonight.”
“It’s nine thirty.”
“It’s European.”
“At your house?”
“Well, that’s where my kitchen is,” he says logically.
I roll my eyes. The highway is pretty empty at this hour, the darkened silhouettes of palm trees studding the median and the red glow of scattered taillights up ahead. The windshield fogs up a bit from the humidity, and I swipe at it with the flat of my palm. “Where are your parents?”
“At the restaurant.”
There’s no way. “I already ate.”
“Eat again,” he suggests, undeterred.
“I don’t think so.”
He’s quiet for a minute like he’s regrouping, changing tactics. “Where are you?” is what he tries next.
I check on Hannah in the mirror one more time. “In the car.”
“Where were you?”
I sigh. “At Aaron’s.”
“Ah.” Sawyer sounds satisfied. “That’s why you didn’t pick up.”
“Maybe I didn’t pick up because I didn’t want to talk to you.”
“That’s not what it was,” he says confidently. “You just picked up now, didn’t you?”
God, he is so annoying. And, I guess, right. “We were watching a movie.”
“What movie?”
“Who are you, my father?” I dig around in the console for some gum, shove a piece between my teeth and bite down hard. “A scary one, I don’t know.”
“You hate scary movies.”
“Maybe I like them now.”
“Come over.”
“Sawyer.” I should hang up, really. I don’t know why I’m still on the phone. “No.”
“Why not? Come on, Reena,” he says. “I want to see you.”
“You saw me the other day.”
“I want to see you again.”
That’s a bad idea, is what that is. That is a truly terrible idea. “I have to go,” I manage finally. There is no reason in the world for me to want to say yes as much as I do. I’m passing by the airport at this point: the planes low-flying and larger-than-life, all of that coming and going and me just exactly where I’ve always been. “I’m driving, remember? It’s not safe.”
For a second Sawyer doesn’t answer. I’m expecting him to come back with some new and creative sales pitch, but in the end all he says is, “No.” He sighs a bit like I’ve defeated him, and all at once I’m surprised by how it doesn’t feel like a victory at all. “No, I guess it’s not.”
*
At home I get the baby into her crib without event and wander around the house for a while, restless. I drink some water standing next to the sink. I go up to my bedroom and stare at Sawyer’s number in my phone’s contact list—dial six numbers, then hedge and hang up (my whole life a holding pattern, some variation on wait and see). I pace.
Finally I come downstairs.
Soledad and my father are sitting in the living room, watching Law & Order on the couch. “Can you guys do me a favor?” I say, hovering on the bottom stair like a ghost and willing myself not to sound so timid.
They both look up expectantly. It’s not often that I ask. “What do you need, sweetheart?” Soledad answers, and the endearment makes me feel about one inch tall.
“Can you keep an ear out for Hannah?” I ask her. “I’ve got something I need to do.”