“Why do I have a feeling there’s more to it than that?”
“What do you mean?”
“Let me guess: you haven’t told your dad about me.”
“Wow. That would be a very good guess.”
“But you know what? I don’t mind.”
“Because you shouldn’t have asked me out?”
“Nah. I told you it’s a gray area. I mean, I’m always happier when I don’t have to explain myself. Sometimes a little reticence makes everyone’s life simpler, right? Mostly I just see your point about the driving. I feel a little unchivalrous, but what the hell? You’re making my life a lot easier.”
“So, we’ll meet there at two thirty?”
“Perfect. You know, this is a first for me.”
A couple of possible firsts passed through my mind: Dating a younger woman? Dating the daughter of a woman whose disappearance you are investigating? Dating the daughter of a woman you may—or may not—have been sleeping with? “And that is?” I asked simply, wondering if any trace of wariness had crept into my voice.
“A magic show in a club! Never done that!”
“Well, it should be way more interesting than what you saw at your niece’s birthday party last week.”
“More interesting than your show? Not likely. I kind of doubt the magician will be dressed like Jasmine.”
“You are obsessed.”
“Maybe,” he said. “But only in all the right ways.”
When I hung up, I guessed I was flattered. I know I was smiling and my face felt a little flushed. But I was also relieved: we each had our own reasons for keeping our date a secret. If I met Gavin in Burlington, I really wouldn’t have to tell my father about him. I wouldn’t have to concoct an elaborate excuse for where I would be on Saturday night. Any little lie would do.
The other day, while Paige had been swimming her laps, I hadn’t wanted to risk disturbing our father in his office. Today I decided I would. Marilyn’s remarks about my father and Gavin—the first a man who couldn’t be easy to live with, the second a man my mother had been emotionally tethered to—were no longer dogging me like bad dreams, and I attributed this to my brief conversation with the detective. In a few minutes he had managed to quiet the unease that Marilyn had triggered. But I still wished that I had pressed the woman for details about both men—probed to learn what Marilyn had meant. And yet how could I? I was Warren and Annalee Ahlberg’s daughter; my instinct was to defend them. To believe the best about them both. Nevertheless, that afternoon while Paige was in the college swimming pool, I hiked across the campus to the limestone and marble monolith that housed the English Department. I wasn’t precisely sure what I would ask my father (if anything), but I felt the need to be reassured that he was who I thought he was and my parents’ marriage had been fine. Not perfect. But fine. Moreover, his office on an autumn afternoon might be the right spot to share with him Paige’s fears that she may have had a sleepwalking occurrence—or two—and together we could figure out what to do next.
When I arrived, the door was open and a slender girl my age with lush, auburn hair was sitting beside my father. They didn’t notice me, and so I leaned against the wall outside and listened for a few minutes as they discussed the student’s vision for an honors thesis about Wallace Stevens. I wondered if I sounded that pretentious and that ridiculous when I was talking to my adviser. I hoped not. But there was also something intimate about their conversation. I was struck by the way she had pulled a chair around so she was seated on his side of the desk. When she left, I saw that she was wearing a tight retro T-shirt with a Russian cosmonaut on the front. I ignored her as she passed me and then collapsed into the other chair—the one across from my father. I reached behind me and shut the door.
“Well, this is a lovely surprise,” my father said.
“I got bored at the pool. Do you have another student coming in?”
“Not for a few minutes. How’s your day?”
“Weird.”
“Elaborate.”
“I ran into Marilyn Bryce at the supermarket.”
“Oh?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I used to love grocery shopping with you and your mother when you were little,” he said, his tone pensive.
“Why?”
He sat back in his chair, an antique leather monster that shrunk him a bit, and rested his hands on his stomach. He was wearing a knit tie and a blue oxford shirt. His blazer was hanging from the wooden coat rack beside the door. “I was nurturing you and that always made me happy. The chore is all about feeding and comforting…and, one must admit, consumerism. And, of course, I was with you or with you and your mother. How could I not love it?”
“You know that Mom knew Detective Rikert, right?”
“That was abrupt.”
“Sorry. It just came out.”
“Yes. The detective told me the day I flew back from Iowa.”