She kept tossing the salad, bringing up the tart scent of the apple-cider vinegar, which she’d never used before. She’d finally had the time to make an Ina Garten recipe, a corn salad made from real corn, not canned, with red pepper, red onion, and fresh basil. She’d never used kosher salt either, so she’d gone to Whole Foods to buy some, celebrating the fact that she had a job interview on Wednesday, as an administrative assistant in the corporate headquarters at ValleyCo.
Heather smiled to herself. She felt confident about her prospects, considering that her boss would be Susan, who had all but told her that she’d get the job. Almost overnight her life had changed, and she had the possibility of a new job with a desk, a nameplate, and a tuition-matching program. Not only that, she could wear whatever she wanted as long as it came from a ValleyCo outlet, which was where she shopped anyway. She was even baking a poached salmon filet, filling the small apartment with an expensive, culinary aroma known only to home cooks, like her.
“… stand by for a briefing from the Director of Homeland Security, who will be outlining the details of today’s breaking news, the thwarting of the bombing of the James A. Byrne U.S. Courthouse and the William J. Green Federal Building in Philadelphia, which would’ve caused thousands upon thousands of deaths in and around the building. The loss of life and property would’ve been catastrophic, but for Operation Varsity Letter. You will hear from Special Agent Curt Abbott of the Bureau of…”
Heather screened out the name, which was much less appealing than Chris Brennan. She wondered how he had chosen his alias, and if he had actually looked up online for friendly-sounding names that would fool single mothers who were desperate enough to believe anything.
She tossed the corn salad and tried not to think about it. Jordan had come home from school early and had spoken with her only briefly before he went to his room and closed the door. He’d been shaken by the fact that Evan had almost been killed, as well as being involved in a lethal terrorist plot. In fact, he had come out of his room only ten minutes ago, to watch the press conference on TV.
“Mom, it’s about to start,” Jordan called from the living room.
“I’m making dinner. I can hear it from here.”
“Mom, are you serious?”
Heather didn’t answer, and in the next moment, Jordan appeared at the entrance to the kitchen in his baseball sweats.
“Mom, you’re not going to watch?”
“I’ve heard it all day, the coverage has been nonstop. You’ve been at school, you don’t know.”
“We had it on there, too. That’s all anybody’s talking about. It’s major, Mom. You have to watch.”
“They’re not going to say anything new. It’s all the same thing. We know it all. We lived it all. It’s about us.”
“Don’t you care about Evan? They arrested him. He wasn’t in school today. I think he might be going to jail.”
“Of course I care about Evan.” Heather felt terrible for Mindy, for what she must have been going through. Heather never would’ve thought it could happen to a family like the Kostises.
“Everybody says he was in with those guys, but I don’t think he was.”
“I’m sure he wasn’t,” Heather said, though she wasn’t sure. She didn’t know Evan, but her father always said, If you go through life with your path greased, you could end up on your ass.
“I mean, it’s so random that it was Madame Wheeler in the picture, but Evan is not a terrorist. He wouldn’t kill anybody, he wouldn’t blow up a courthouse.” Jordan glanced at the TV, where CNN was teasing the press conference. “Mom, come on. I want to see what happens.”
“Jordan, I’m cooking—”
“Why are you being so weird?”
“I’m not being weird.” Heather kept tossing the salad like a madwoman. Maybe she was being weird. A weird version of Ina Garten.
“You’re acting like you’re mad.”
“Well, I am mad.” Heather turned to him. “Aren’t you? How do you feel? You went in your room and vanished after school. Do you want to talk about it?”
“Okay,” Jordan answered, less certainly. “It’s a big deal, and I think you should watch the press conference. Don’t you want to hear what the coach has to say?”
“He’s not the coach.”
“Okay, I know that. Whatever.”
“Curt. It sounds like Chris, but it’s not Chris.”
Jordan cocked his head. “Are you mad at him?”
“Aren’t you?” Heather told herself to calm down. She let go of the serving fork and spoon. “How do you feel about it, Jordan? You believed he was a coach, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“And you believed he liked you, that he was showing interest in you as a friend. As a coach. Isn’t that right?”
“Okay, yes.” Jordan shrugged uncomfortably. “Why are you acting like a lawyer? You sound like a lawyer.”
“I’m trying to understand how you feel. Don’t you feel angry that you were lied to? That he lied to us both? Did he ever ask you questions about Evan or the other boys on the team?”
“Yeah, I guess. Once.”
“So he was using you for information. He was pumping you for information. He was only pretending to be your friend, and mine. Doesn’t that make you angry?”
“Um, it’s not great, I admit.”
“It’s more than not great, Jordan. It’s a lie. I teach you not to lie. I don’t like people who lie. But he lied to us, and I’m mad at him, so you’ll understand if I don’t want to watch the stupid press—”
“That’s not what I think,” Jordan interrupted her, which he rarely did, especially to offer his thoughts.
“What do you think?”
“I know he lied and all, and that’s not right, but I still think he liked us.” Jordan blinked sadly, and Heather felt a wave of guilt for her son, let down not only by his father, but by his father figure.
“Maybe he did, I’m sure he did. But I don’t like being lied to.”
“Mom, he had to lie, don’t you see?” Jordan gestured at the TV, where Wolf Blitzer was counting down. “He saved Evan’s life and he saved the lives of all those people. Like they just said, thousands of people would have been killed.”
“But he deceived us. He pretended to be somebody he wasn’t.”
“He had to, for the greater good. He did what he had to do to save people’s lives. It’s like he really was a coach, and we’re all the team. Mom, he did the right thing for the team.”
“But he’s not a coach,” Heather said, softening, thinking back to that night in this very kitchen, when Chris had coached her to think about her skill set.
“It doesn’t matter if he really was. He did what a coach would do, a really great coach. He went to the standard, Mom. The standard did not go to him. It’s seventeen inches, Mom.”
“What?” Heather had no idea what he meant.
Jordan shook it off. “It doesn’t matter. All I’m saying is, he flew upside down through the air holding on to Evan. He rescued him. He achieved excellence.”
Heather felt a glimmer of new pride in Jordan. “You know, you should express yourself more often. You make sense.”
“So you agree?”
“No.”