But Adam Hawkins isright here, and he’s not a client sitting in my salon chair, or one of the boring, slightly sleazy divorced dads from Tegan’s school who have hit on me before. He’s right here and he is not a convenient person to find handsome given he is part of something that is exploding my life. My sister’s life.
He says, “Have you really never spoken to her in all these years?”
I blink at him, stunned that he’s asked. Sort of . . . intrigued that he’s asked.
No, wait. I’mangrythat he’s asked.
I have to stay angry.
It’s the only way I’ll get through the next three weeks, I’m pretty sure.
“That’s not really your job, is it?”
He furrows his brow. “What isn’t my job?”
I huff. “Asking me that. Aren’t you . . .”
I trail off, wave a hand. I have that strange, looming sense of dread that sometimes happens when small talk goes awry. Maybe I ask a client a banal follow-up question about their son’s recent wedding and all of a sudden it’s fifteen minutes on the new daughter-in-law being “too outspoken” and “obsessed with her career,” and I spend the whole haircut wishing I hadn’t asked.
“Aren’t I what?” Adam says.
“Uh,” I say, and Ihatethe way that dull, uncertain syllable makes me sound, hate it enough that I push past the bad smalltalk feeling and blurt out a bit of my first impression of Adam Hawkins, from back when he seemed—to me at least—to silently stand guard over Salem in my kitchen.
“Aren’t you . . . security, or something?”
As soon as I’ve said it, I realize how ridiculous a thought it was, how ridiculous it sounds now that I’ve said it out loud. Why would Salem Durant havesecurity? For her work on a podcast about a totally nonviolent grifter? For her meeting withme—or, who she thought was me?
It gets worse when I notice how still Adam has gone. His ears are pink, and he blinks down at his lap, unclasping his hands and setting them on his thighs.
When he looks up again, it’s not searching in his eyes. It’s not leaned-in or listening. It should be exactly what I want from him, because I’m allergic to curiosity when it’s directed my way, and obviously what he’s here to negotiate with me about goes well beyond curiosity.
But it strangely does not feel like what I want.
“No. I am not security.”
“Ah,” I manage, swallowing thickly.
He doesn’t offer any additional information, and I guess I can respect that.
Stay angry, I tell myself, but it doesn’t work, because Adam’s ears are still pink and he’s standing from his spot on the couch, one of his knees knocking the edge of the table as he rises. Nothing falls, but the water in our glasses ripples and the abstract pine cones clink together.
I stand, too, because I’m not sure what else to do. I don’t think it’d be a good idea to stay in my hammock-chair and feel like Adam Hawkins is standing guard over me.
He clears his throat. “Any more conditions I can pass along to Salem?”
I cling to those conditions, shoving away the embarrassment I feel. The regret I feel over the embarrassment I’m pretty surehefeels. I don’t owe Adam Hawkins anything.
I run through them in my head:No recordings unless we know. No recording Tegan without me present. Three weeks. If we find Mom, Tegan and I talk to her first.
“I think that’s it,” I tell him, but the truth is, I can’t be sure now that things have gone off course.
Ironically, I should’ve written them down.
He waits a beat, as if to give me time to be certain. I don’t want to think about what a kindness that is, or whether I deserve it at this moment. I smooth the front of my T-shirt—black, again, always—and look anywhere but at him.
“Don’t forget your binder,” I say, gesturing toward the couch.
He turns, bends slightly to pick it up. When he looks back at me, the pink at the tips of his ears has faded, and there’s a beat of silence where neither of us seems to know how to end this. For the next three weeks, I’ll be with Adam Hawkins every single day, and somehow, in this moment, that feels riskier than every other part of this trip. This entire situation.
