The Last Flight (17 page)

She placed it on top of the towel dispenser and exited, letting Dex slip in after her. When he came out, he patted his coat and said, “Hope you don't mind, but I'd rather not stick around for the second half.”

“I get it,” she said. They made their way out of the club and back down the stairs, exiting the stadium.

They paused outside. “Look,” he said. “We're both a little wound up, and you're right to want to be cautious.” He gestured toward the stadium behind them, where the game had resumed. “We'll do this your way until we're both comfortable again.”

She looked at him, his expression softer now that he'd gotten what he wanted from her. He was both comrade and captor. Protector and prison guard. Regardless of how he behaved, Dex was not her friend. She had to remind herself he wasn't worried about her comfort; he was worried about himself.

She gave him a grateful smile and said, “Thanks, Dex.” As long as he believed he was handling her, he wouldn't notice how she was handling him.

* * *

Later that night, instead of working, Eva sat in front of her computer, staring at a blank search field. Being at the stadium today, remembering how it felt to sit there alone, with no one to fight for her, to say
Eva is a good person. She deserves a second chance
made her wonder if a second chance would have even been possible. Liz's words floated back to her.
Information is power.
Liz had poked through the boundaries she'd constructed for herself, and she wasn't sure if this would help resurrect them or destroy them completely.

Eva tried to prepare herself for the most painful outcome—her mother, recovered, living a happy life with a family and friends—and entered her mother's full name into the search field, the only light in the room the glowing of the screen, illuminating her face. Outside a car glided by, quiet tires humming on the pavement, then silence filled with the relentless chirp of crickets.

She pressed return.

A long list of hits popped up. Rachel Ann James on Facebook. Images. Twitter. A Rachel Ann James at a college in Nebraska. She scrolled down and clicked on a free people-finder link, which brought up eighteen potential matches. But none of the ages matched. Her mother would be in her early fifties, and these people were either too young or too old.

Her body vibrated with anxiety, more than her most stressful drug deals, and she was tempted to stop. To close her computer, get back to work, and forget about all of it. But she navigated back to a new search and entered
Rachel Ann James obituary, California
.

This time, it was the first link in her results. It was a short paragraph from a local paper in Richmond just a few miles north of Berkeley. No details were given about how she'd died, just the year and her age, twenty-seven.
Rachel is survived by her parents, Nancy and Ervin James of Richmond, California, and brother, Maxwell (35)
. No mention of her, the granddaughter they didn't want.

Eva stared at the screen, listening to the blood pump in her ears. Eva had been eight. She tried to match up the childhood she remembered with this new information. Her time with Carmen and Mark. The return to the convent, when the nuns had reached out to her family again. Somewhere in there, her mother had died. And yet, her grandparents, Nancy and Ervin, finally freed from the nightmare of having an addict daughter, had still said no.

She thought about printing the obituary, taking it downstairs and knocking on Liz's door. Asking her how any of this gave her power. As far as she was concerned, it felt like a thousand tiny cuts piercing her skin, a pain with no center, just a radiating fire that consumed her.

But instead, she cleared her search and closed her computer, settling herself into the darkness, and got to work fitting this new rejection, this new heartbreak alongside all the rest.

Saturday, February 26

That Rory lied about his last weekend with Maggie is interesting, but not incriminating in a legal sense. Of course, he would make himself look sympathetic when recounting the story to me, his new girlfriend, and I can't begin to guess why Maggie might have changed her mind and gone anyways. But Maggie's reference to a scary argument chills me, because I know what Rory's temper looks like, how easily she could have ended up at the bottom of that staircase.

But the note doesn't prove anything other than they fought. Which was widely reported at the time. What nags at me is how Charlie Flanagan is connected to that weekend in 1992. That's the key to figuring out everything. Perhaps he was the one to organize the payoffs Aunt Mary mentioned, illegally skimming them from the foundation's account.

A quick check of the time tells me I have just a half hour until I'm supposed to meet Kelly, so I go into the kitchen and grab a Diet Coke from the fridge and take a sip, staring out the back window. As I wait for the caffeine to hit my bloodstream, I imagine Charlie releasing whatever he has to the media. Huge exposés in the
New Yorker
,
Vanity Fair
, the
New York Times
, stripping Rory of all his power. I know it's a leap, but the fantasy still energizes me.

I set the can on the counter and head upstairs in search of a pair of black pants and a white top.

* * *

When I arrive at the coffee shop, Kelly is already there, waiting in her car, and I open the door and slide in.

“Ready?” Kelly asks.

“Let's do it.”

Kelly's phone rings as we hit the end of the block. “Jacinta,” she says into the phone. “I'm on my way to work.” She listens for a moment, and then curses. “Okay, I'll be there in five minutes.”

She hangs up and turns the car around. “Sorry,” she says. “My daughter, Jacinta, has been working on this project for her art history class and she left the poster supplies in my trunk.”

“I don't mind,” I tell her.

“Normally, I'd leave her to sweat it out, but she's working with a partner and I don't want to punish her for Jacinta's carelessness.” She sighs. “This project has been a pain in the ass from day one.”

“What is it?”

“Compare and contrast two twentieth-century artists. Deliver an oral presentation with visuals.” She rolls her eyes. “Berkeley takes its arts education very seriously.”

“How old is your daughter?” Kelly can't be much older than her late twenties.

“Twelve.”

She glances at me, catching my surprised expression. “I had her when I was only seventeen.”

“That must have been hard.”

Kelly shrugs. “My mother nearly killed me when she found out I was pregnant. But then it was buckle down to business.” We stop at a red light, and she glances at me. “My mom is my rock. I couldn't work or go to school without her. And she and Jacinta are tight. Where I get attitude and eye rolling, my mother gets giggles and secrets.”

“You must be busy, working two jobs and going to school,” I say.

Kelly smiles as the light turns green. “I suppose. But I've always worked, so I'm used to it. I have the early morning shift at the coffee shop, take classes during the day, and do catering events for Tom at nights and on the weekends. I'm saving money so Jacinta and I can get our own place. Right now, we live with my mother and it's crowded
.”

I bite my lip, wishing I could tell her not to be in such a hurry to leave.

* * *

Kelly's house is in a neighborhood of small, one-story houses so similar to my mother's in Pennsylvania, I could squint my eyes and believe I was back home again. When we pull into the driveway, she turns to me and says, “Come in and meet my family.”

I hesitate, knowing I should stay in the car. There's a difference between being one of many black-and-white-clad servers at an event and shimmying up to Kelly's family with a name and a handshake. But it would be strange if I refused.

And I'm overwhelmed by how much I want to go inside. After so many days of being alone, I want to sit in someone's kitchen and talk about art. “I know a bit about art history,” I finally say. “Maybe I could help.”

“We can use all the help we can get,” Kelly says.

It's exactly as I imagined it would be. The living room is spare, just a couch, a reclining chair, and a television. Through an open doorway is a small kitchen and eating area where two girls sit, hunched over the table. Beyond the living room is a short hallway that probably leads to a couple small bedrooms and a bathroom. My mother's house had the same feel to it, frayed and scarred around the edges, but polished to a high shine. I can imagine the three of them here in the evenings, each of them in her favorite spot. Kelly's mother in the armchair, Kelly and Jacinta on either end of the couch, their legs in a tangle the way Violet and I used to watch TV.

An older woman stands at the counter, chopping vegetables, while on the stove, pots simmer, the air thick with the smell of rosemary and sage.

One of the girls looks up as we enter. “Sorry, Mom,” she says.

Kelly leads me into the kitchen and says, “Let's practice some manners, Jacinta. This is Eva.”

“Nice to meet you,” I say.

Jacinta smiles, and I can see Kelly in the set of her brown eyes and the sharp structure of her cheekbones. “Nice to meet you too.”

“And her friend, Mel.”

The other girl raises her hand in a half wave, then turns to Kelly and says, “Thanks for coming back, Kelly.”

Kelly squeezes her shoulder and says, “Only for you, Mel.”

The older woman chimes in from the counter. “I'm sorry I didn't check in with her before you left.” She shoots a look at Jacinta. “She told me she had everything she needed.”

Kelly turns to me and says, “Eva, this is my mother, Marilyn.”

I brace myself, waiting for a flash of something in her eyes, a flicker of a question, knowing this is how it will always be when I meet someone new. But she smiles and wipes her hands on a towel before shaking my hand. “Nice to meet you.”

I'm struck by the power of belief. How easily it transfers from one person to another. Kelly believes I'm Eva, and now her mother does too, without question. I look between them, their bond as familiar as an old, favorite coat. It wraps around me, making me want to sit down at the table and never leave. “Tell me what you've chosen for your project,” I say to the girls.

Jacinta slides her laptop so I can see two paintings side by side on the screen. Jasper Johns's
False Start
and Jean-Michel Basquiat's
Boy and Dog in a Johnnypump
.

“Great choices,” I say. “Basquiat started on the streets of New York as a graffiti artist, commenting on the social injustices he saw and experienced. He's responsible for graffiti being the legitimate art form we know it to be today.”

“I think we read something about that. But it's all kind of blending together,” Jacinta says. “This is the project from hell.”

“Jacinta,” Marilyn warns.

“Sorry, Grandma. It's just…look how different they are. It's easy to contrast them. But how are they similar? They're not. At all.”

I sit down in the chair next to them and lean my elbows on the table, which wobbles in the same way my mother's used to. “Here's a tip. Don't get tied up in the images. Art is all about emotion. Teachers want to know what you take away from the piece and how you apply that to your own life. It's totally subjective, so have fun with it.” With the light streaming in from the windows, the rich smell of a cooking meal filling the room, and the reassuring sounds of Marilyn behind us, opening the refrigerator, moving between the sink and the stove, I feel as if I've traveled back in time. All my edges matching up with the space around me.

I spend five more minutes filling the holes in their research. Background about each artist, their childhoods and early influences, before Kelly tells me we have to leave.

“I like your family,” I say as we pull out of the driveway.

Kelly smiles. “Thank you. It's not always easy, trying to raise a child under my mother's thumb. Because I had Jacinta so young, my mother sometimes forgets that I'm Jacinta's mother, not her. I appreciate her help, but that house is too small for the three of us.”

I want to tell her that the tangle of their crowded life should be a comfort, not a burden. I'd been in such a hurry to redefine myself, not knowing that I'd be carving away a piece of my heart. I assumed my family would always be there, waiting for me. Sometimes I can trick myself into believing my mother and Violet are still in our house, moving around each other, waiting for me to finally come home.

* * *

“How'd you know all of that?” Kelly asks as we turn onto the on-ramp of the freeway.

I've been silent for most of the ride, my mind still back at Kelly's house, sitting at that table, feeling as if the farther we drive from it, the farther I'm traveling away from myself. Who I'm supposed to be.

“I was an art history major in college.” I don't feel I'm risking too much to tell her that, and it feels good to say something true.

Kelly looks at me, impressed. “You should be looking for jobs at museums or auction houses.”

“It's complicated,” I say, suddenly afraid if I keep talking, I'll tell her everything.

Kelly laughs. “Show me someone whose life isn't complicated.” When I don't respond, she says, “No pressure. I get it.”

“I'm leaving a bad marriage,” I finally admit, before tacking on a lie. “Hiding out at a childhood friend's house while she travels. It's temporary, until I can figure out what's next. But my husband will be looking for me, so I can't work in my field anymore.”

The car feels like a protective layer, safe and warm as we speed down the freeway toward Oakland. I look out the window, at the people in the cars around us. So many secrets playing out in their minds. No one is going to look too closely at mine. And as far as Kelly is concerned, my story has been lived a hundred times already.

“It takes a lot of courage to start over,” she says.

I don't respond. Nothing about what I've done feels brave or courageous. Kelly reaches across the center console and squeezes my hand. “I'm glad you're here.”

* * *

Kelly wasn't kidding when she said tonight's party was a big one. There are twelve of us hired to set up and work the event, which is being held in a giant warehouse in downtown Oakland. Nearly forty tables fill the enormous room, each one seating eight. When she introduces me to her boss, Tom, I only hold his attention for a split second before someone calls for him from the kitchen. “Thanks for giving me the job,” I say as he begins to hurry away.

“Thanks for helping out in a pinch,” he calls, just before disappearing back into the kitchen. “Kelly will show you what to do.”

Soon we're busy with linens, table settings, and flowers. “I've been waiting for this event for months,” Kelly says.

“Why?”

Her eyes sparkle. “It's a banquet for the Oakland A's.” She looks around the room. “In a few hours, this place is going to be crawling with professional athletes. I'm hoping to at least get an autograph.” Then she winks at me. “Maybe a phone number.”

She slides away again, leaving me to my napkin-folding, but I'm suddenly unable to make my fingers work. My gaze leaps to the exit and then back to my pile of linens. I've run events like this before, with big names in a big location. And one of my first calls was always to the media. The more photographers, the better.

I finish the napkins with trembling hands and begin the table settings, trying to remind myself that I look different now. And in my black pants and white shirt, I'll be just one of many faceless workers sliding between the crowd, paid to remain invisible.

* * *

An hour into the party, I feel more relaxed. The photographers were clustered near the entrance, taking people's pictures as they arrived. There are only two inside, and they're easy enough to avoid. I feel my chest loosen again, and I navigate the large space, offering appetizers and napkins. Some people smile and thank me, while others take what I'm offering without even making eye contact or stopping their conversations at all.

I'm surprised by how physical the work is.

“You're a natural,” Kelly says as she passes me, carrying a tray of dirty glasses toward the kitchen.

I massage a knot in my shoulder. “It seems pretty simple. Keep the food moving, stay in the background.” I think of Marcy, the caterer I always used in New York. A tiny woman who had the grace of Jackie Kennedy but the countenance of a bulldog. She commanded the respect of all who worked for her and had a gift for making any event sparkle. Her staff was always impeccable, though until tonight, I had no idea how hard they worked. I wonder what Marcy thinks of my passing. Whether she will cater my funeral.

* * *

As I circulate among the guests, offering bacon-wrapped scallops, I pass a beautiful woman in a tight blue dress, holding a whispered argument with a well-built man who must be one of the players.

“Just stop, Donny,” the woman hisses.

“Don't fucking tell me what to do.”

My nerves tighten reflexively, even though I know he's not speaking to me. But the way he spits the words at her, his voice laced with venom, makes me hurry past them, eyes cast downward, fear zapping all my nerve endings and making my skin buzz. I know what it's like to be on the receiving end of that kind of anger. And I wish I could turn back, help that woman in some way. I wonder how many people here know this is how he treats her. The other players. Their wives and girlfriends. Do they see it and look away, as so many people did with me? Do they whisper about it to each other, but do nothing to help? I feel impotent with rage, at the careless way people discard other people's problems, and how I'm no better. Watching it happen and doing nothing.