“I wouldn’t classify my regular life as an adventure. More a choose-your-own curtain fabric.” Alice lowered her volume.“He says heneedsme, Kimberly. Needs my help, I mean. Whoever needed me for anything but essay writing and funeral preparations? Sorry, not that I mind at all, though I wish it wasn’t necessary.”
“Everyone likes to be needed, especially you. And to be needed by a guy like that.” Kimberly groaned. “Is he as hot when you get to know him as he is on first impression? And second impression?”
“Hotter. I feel like I failed him, in the book. I might have to rewrite it, if I get out of this alive. Sorry—God—shouldn’t say that.”
“I wish everyone would stop apologizing every time life or death is mentioned—I’m not going to take it personally.” Kimberly finally got her water to her mouth, though she seemed to have a hard time working it down her throat. “Have a fling with him at the very least,” she said.
“Shh!” Alice glanced in the direction of the garage, though the muffled voices suggested Carter and Malik were well occupied.
“It’s obvious he likes you.”
“How can you possibly tell that from the two minutes you’ve spent in the same room as us?”
“I have a doctorate in being able to tell when a guy likes you.”
“You have a doctorate in palliative counseling.”
“It’s the way he looks at you. It’s different from how he looked at you yesterday. What if I make it my dying wish that you should have a fling with him? Then you’d have to make it happen.”
Alice raised her eyebrows. “I thought eating a peanut butter and banana sandwich at Graceland was your dying wish? Or was it putting it all on red in Monaco? You’re so milking this.”
Kimberly shrugged. “Dying woman’s prerogative—and nowyou’rechanging the subject. Omigod,” she said, slamming the glass down, sloshing water, “you’ve already slept with him!”
“What? Shh. Jesus.”
“You have!” Kimberly pointed the glass at Alice accusingly, spilling more water.
“How did you…?”
“Sorry,” Kimberly said, planting both palms on the counter, dropping the glass. It rolled away and clanged into the sink. “I think I … I have to sit down.”
Alice was beside her in a second. “Kimmy?”
“I need a minute, that’s all,” Kimberly said, pushing past Alice into the living area. “Sit here with me.” She half-sat, half-fell onto the calico-covered sofa. “Just the shock of my big sister becoming a bona fide Bond girl.”
“So, the chemo?” Alice said, sitting. “Somehow we ended up talking about me.”
“I would much rather talk about you. We never talk about you. It’s always me. And before it was me it was Nika. And before that it was Mom and Poppy. No one ever talks about you.” Kimberly turned and planted her hands on Alice’s cheeks. “I’m so goddamn grateful to have you. But you know what worries me? Whoyou’llhave after I’m gone. I’m not sure how much help Malik’s gonna be, bless him. So forgive me if I’m excited about this development.”
“I don’t know that an ex-spy who’s still heartbroken about his wife’s disappearance is a good choice as a steady life companion, even if that choice were on the table, which it’s not.”
“How was it, sleeping with him?”
“Kimberly!” Alice pulled back, and Kimberly’s hands dropped away.
“Humor a dying woman, please.”
Alice stared straight ahead at the TV, not that it was on. “It’s hard to describe. I mean, yeah, the sex was good—like, holy shit—but it was also more intense than anything in my life. Like, I feel like I have such a strong connection with him, in all sorts of ways. I guess that’s the situation though, right? It’s all so unreal. It’s ridiculous, really—me and a guy like that.”
“It’s not ridiculous at all,” Kimberly said, leaning on Alice’s shoulder and nestling in, as if they were watching TV.If onlythis whole thing was some TV show. “I can see exactly why a guy like that would need someone like you. If he’s anything like his character in the book, he’s adrift and needs an anchor—emotionally, mentally. A job like that, a history like his… He’s gotta have major trust issues, and you’re obviously someone he can trust.”
Alice groaned. “Oh, don’t psychoanalyze him from what we wrote in the book. Besides, you said yourself that anchors can hold you back.”
“Sure, if you’re anchored to the wrong things. But you could be perfect togetherbecauseyou’re so different. Some people need more anchoring and some people need less. Maybe he needs stability and you need freedom, so between the two of you…”
“Wouldn’t that put us at cross-purposes? Literally a push-pull? Anyway, he wants to go back to his old job, in the field. I could never handle having a partner who did a job like that—again, not that it’s an option available to me. Can you imagineme, waiting and worrying? It was bad enough when I dated that guy who used to go rock climbing on weekends. I need to fall in love with an accountant whose only hobby is riding a stationary bike, and whose biggest risk is the commute to his office. Better still, an accountant who works from home and has agoraphobia.” Alice put her arm around Kimberly’s shoulders.Regular girl-talk was so much more comforting than discussions of espionage and cancer.
“And you’ll find an excuse not to take a risk with the accountant, too,” Kimberly said. “But yes, I suppose having an international man of mystery for a boyfriend wouldn’t help with your fear of losing someone you love. It’s just—you have so much love to give, and you’re running out of people to give it to. Love is always a risk, whether he’s an accountant or a spy.”
