“Fine. I promise. What the hell, Gwendolyn, what’s wrong?”
What there is to my plan, I tell him, adding that someone may or may not be arranging for some kind of help for me on the other side, in Paris. As I finish, I see Terrance’s eyebrows rise in an expression of such silly surprise that I’d laugh out loud if today were any other day. I hand him the copy of 1984, along with the original coded sheet. “Keep this for me. Hide it.”
“Gwendolyn—don’t” is all he can think to say as he takes the book and folded paper in his hands. Then he finds words and tries to talk me out of it. For a long time, we go back and forth. He uses as his tools reason and facts, a whole orchestra of them. But in the end, they bounce off the armor of my stubbornness.
“Nothing I can say will stop you, will it?” he says.
“No,” I say. “And there’s something else. I need money, Terrance. Cash.”
He’s quiet for a second, then pulls out a silver money clip stuffed with what he has. It’s a small wad, maybe a hundred dollars total, and he tucks it in the pocket of my jacket.
“No. I need more.” I hate myself for saying it, and I see his face pucker a little as if he’s just bit into something sour. An embarrassed laugh from me as I turn to leave. “Look, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have…”
Terrance’s hand darts to my arm. “No. Wait.” He retreats into the apartment and is gone for more than a minute. He returns with a coffee can in his hand. “It’s around two grand, I think. It’s all I have. My dad has more, but it’s in a safe.”
I peek under the plastic lid. It’s filled with loose bills: twenties, fifties, hundreds.
“My secret stash.”
I close my eyes, and my breath trembles with gratitude. “You’re saving my life. You know that?”
“Or helping you lose it,” he says, taking my shoulders in his hands. He’s looking at me deeply, his face tight, eyes begging, the most serious boy I’ve ever seen. “I can go with you,” he says.
For a moment, I believe he actually means it, but it’s a ridiculous idea. He’s a soft American rich kid who’d last about five seconds on the run. Which, come to think of it, is what I am, minus the rich part. “You’re sweet.”
“I mean it. I can help.”
I place my hands lightly on his chest. A shrink would say I was subconsciously pushing him away, but the truth is I just wanted to touch him. “No, I need you here,” I say. “If I need a computer nerd, or, you know, something normal and good to think about.”
I laugh a little. I have to or I’ll cry. Why can’t the world just go on its merry, foul way and leave me here alone with him? I lower my head to his chest and hold it there. It’s the closest we’ve been since hiding in that tenement entryway to escape the rain.
“I have to go now, Terrance.”
“I know,” he says.
But neither of us moves. When I do finally peel myself away, his shirt is wet where my face was. He leans down and kisses me on the cheek, but I turn my head and meet his lips. It’s a dry kiss, silent and soft, mouths closed. But it counts, I suppose.
*
When I hit the street again, the wind has picked up, pushing me down Fifth Avenue. I stuff the pockets of my jacket with the contents of Terrance’s coffee can and drop the can itself in the trash. Two thousand six hundred and fifty-seven dollars is what it comes to.
I hail a cab and tell the driver to take me to JFK Airport. As I sink low in the seat, I pull out my civilian passport. The diplomatic one I’d been issued as the child of a political officer is still back in the apartment—too dangerous to use now and probably flagged, just like my dad’s. But what are the chances they would do the same to my civilian passport? Carlisle thinks I’m headed to Texas. Wouldn’t want to stop me from going to Cabo with my new family, would he?
When I arrive at JFK, the flight is still an hour and a half away. I buy a cap from a store, the kind old-fashioned cabbies and newspaper boys used to wear, and push my red hair up inside it.
At the gate, a strange quiet seems to have fallen over everything. I barely hear the chatter of the passengers, the din of the announcements over the PA as they call business class, group one, group two, group three.
The crowd surges around me like floodwaters, heading toward the plane. But I hang back. This journey has close to zero chance of success, and the only hope I have is the unknown, unlikely assistance Bela may or may not be able to arrange. But he’s just a crazy old man. Said so himself. And I’m just a crazy little girl. This, the insane shit I’m doing now, proves it.
The gate agent calls all classes, all rows, and ten minutes later, the boarding area is empty except for me and her.
She looks at me expectantly, eyebrow raised, on or off?
PARIS
Eight
The airport is sterile and too cold and smells of air cleaned with chemicals. The other coach passengers and I march like a column of refugees through the corridor toward the immigration booths. I’m shivering because the air feels almost arctic, or maybe it’s because I’m exhausted, or maybe I’m just terrified. The line creeps slowly forward, and I try to guess which immigration agent I’ll get. The young thorough one, the old friendly one, the one who hates her job and the rest of the world because of it? It all depends on this. Who will smile at the American girl with red hair and wave her through and who will decide she hates American girls and hates red hair and so let’s dig a little deeper into her story, shall we?
I’m directed toward a sour and drawn agent who stares at me with the boredom of someone who’s done this for fifty years. I push my blue civilian passport across the counter and greet him in French. He replies in English, telling me to take off my cap so he can see me better.
“Why are you visiting France, miss?” the agent asks with tortured French vowels unsuccessfully transplanted onto English soil.
“Tourism.”
“For how long?”
“One week.”
“And where will you be staying?”
“A hostel called Hotel Colette.” I remember seeing the name when my dad and I lived here. It looked like a dump.
“What are you planning to see?”
“The Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, the Centre Pompidou.”
But there’s something here he doesn’t like, something suspiciously tidy about my answer that makes him stare at me for a few seconds. I try not to swallow too hard or smile too nervously.
He flips through the pages of my passport, examining each stamp. “I see you have been to France already three times,” he says.
“Yes,” I say.
“And you have not seen the Louvre or Eiffel Tower yet?”
I smile but feel the corners of my mouth twitch uncomfortably. “They’re worth visiting again, no?”
His hand lashes out, and the stamp falls on my passport like a hammer.