In a movie, this would be a long beat. Music swelling. The held look.
Here, in real life, it’s a flick of green eyes over the rim of a water glass, half a second long, and a small, polite tilt of her chin.
“Oh, no apology needed, Mr. Satyrin. Work always wins. Drive safe.”
“Thank you.”
That’s the full extent of it. But she holds the glass at her mouth a bit too long after I turn away, and I see it in her reflection in the mirror behind the bar as I cross the room. She watches me go, the rim still resting against her lower lip, her throat working once.
I tear my gaze away and I don’t look back.
Coat check. Tip the girl. The valet comes fast. I tip him, too, then slide in, and pull away from the Pierre at a clean, lawful pace, hands at ten and two like a guy who has not, in the last ninety minutes, had his entire reality dismantled by a pencil-eraser-sized blot on a piece of thermal paper.
I find a stretch of curb on a side street where the brownstones are dark and the street lamps are weak, and I pull over and kill the engine. Quiet rushes in. I sit with both hands on the wheel and stare through the windshield at nothing.
The Glock at my back is digging into my spine. I shift, pull it out, and lay the weapon down on the passenger seat. The black grip gleams, dark and ominous.
Then I take the sonogram out of my breast pocket. I unfold it on my thigh and smooth it flat with the heel of my hand against the wool of my trousers. Funny how a little black speck can change so much at once.
It’s a dot. A nothing.
And yet a whole fucking world.
My father has been dead fifteen years. Most days, I don’t think about him at all. He’s a smell, mostly—Belomor smoke and cheap aftershave from a green bottle he bought in bulk at some Brighton Beach pharmacy. A rough-edged laugh I can’t quite reproduce in my head anymore.
I wonder, sitting here in the dark with the engine cooling down, if he ever had a moment like this. Did my mother presssomething similar into his hand and give him the good news? Was he happy or sad when she did? Did he wonder, like I’m doing, what kind of man he’d have to become now, and whether the man he already was could be salvaged or if he’d have to throw the whole thing out and start from scratch?
I’ll never know. He’s dead now, and so is she. Any help they might’ve had to offer died with them.
I refold the paper along its creases, slow and careful, and tuck it back over my heart.
Then I take out my phone.
“Da.” Uncle Afon answers right away. I’m not surprised; he’d be awake at this hour even if he weren’t waiting for this call.
“It’s me.”
“Tell me good news, nephew.”
I look at the gun on the passenger seat. “It wasn’t the right night.”
The silence on the other end is prickly.
“I’ll take the next one,” I say. “The firm retreat upstate in two weeks will be a better chance anyway.”
A car drives past. Its headlights wash over my face and move on.
“Mm.” That’s all he gives me at first. A single syllable. A grunt that could mean anything. “You don’t usually disappoint like this.”
My grip on the wheel tightens. “It is what it is. I’m not stupid enough to rush something like this.” I can hear him breathingthrough his nose, slow and even. “It’ll get done,” I promise. “Tell Lukas he has my word.”
The line clicks dead in my ear.
I expected no less. My uncle loves me, in his own way, but he’s never been one to waste words or gush over with feelings. I lower the phone to my lap.
I feel guilty, in ways I didn’t know I could feel. That’s mostly because I understand, with a flat and terrible clarity, that I have just done a thing that cannot be undone.
I have lied to my uncle.
