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At this point, Nathan and I keep pace with each other.

“Climb break?” he asks as we approach the eleventh floor, and we hook our shoes onto a ledge to give our arms and legs a rest. “Tell me about how you got into the FBI.”

“You don’t have to do that. I’m good, seriously.” I don’t share that my hands are already getting tender and muscles I didn’t know existed will be hurting tomorrow. If we make it to then.

“You’re humming.”

“It helps me focus.” And relax. And think.

Nathan removes one hand from the cable to grab a flashlight in his jacket pocket, casting a short distance of light into the shadows. We’re still far enough away from the fourteenth floor, so we might as well get through this somehow.

“What if it’s for me?” he asks. “I’ve been in enough darkness lately. I want to know this about you.”

I have so many questions, but I only focus on the one he’s asked me. “We’ve never talked about it?”

“Do you know how I got into the FBI?” he asks, his breath leveling.

I try to recall this topic ever coming up in conversations, in past assignments, or at Quantico, but I can’t. We must’ve been too busy trying to outdo each other.

“The FBI saw you kick through an elevator hatch and thought, ‘He’d do well here’?” I guess.

Nathan chuckles. “Close. I’ll tell you after you tell me.” It comes out sounding like a threat, like always.

Fine. We’re doing this. “My neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Cooper, were retired special agents. They babysat me a lot while my parents worked. My sisters are so much older than I am, so they were always off doing their own thing,” I say, a newfound appreciation for the darkness settling over me. It’s kind of like I’m talking to myself and not to the man I haven’t stopped thinking about for the last year. “I was a really shy kid.”

“You? Shy?”

“The shyest. Got bullied a lot for it. The Coopers taught me how to hold a poker face, which kind of helped. Then they encouraged me to not be afraid to defend myself and to try martial arts. I immediately loved it. Gained a lot of confidence. Should we keep going?”

“Sure, but keep talking,” Nathan says as we set off.

I keep one hand in front of the other as I continue. “I was obsessed with the stories they’d tell me. We’d watch action movies, and they’d point out what was realistic and what wasn’t. During school, I’d spend my days solving schoolyard crimes, like stolen lunches and missing mittens. Afterward, I had an alternating combination of language study, martial arts, and mile runs. It was awesome having these adult figures in my life who just taught me stuff that I never thought I’d be able to do. I got too confident, apparently. Became a little naughty.”

“Naughty-ish?”

“Full-on naughty!” I say, my voice echoing up the shaft. “I always got in trouble the most at Christmas. Kind of soured the holiday for me.” Among other things.

Nathan huffs out a laugh. “Did you peek at the presents early?”

“Please, that’s child’s play. One year, I turned the entire house into a winter wonderland with oil paint. There’s still a candy cane garden in my parents’ living room. I woke up extra early to get ahead of forming snowballs for fights, and I’d make the cookies extra sweet. Like, sickeningly sweet.”

“Diabolical.”

“I’d set up traps for Santa the same way Kevin did in Home Alone,” I share.

“Sounds about right,” Nathan says. “Always taking down the bad guys. Is Santa the original criminal?”

“He’s a home-invading stranger who leaves stuff but takes food? Highly suspicious,” I joke.

Usually when I share my opinions on Christmas, I get dirty looks and intense pushback. With Nathan, though, it feels like cellular-level bonding to understand each other in this way. It’s both a surprise and a relief.

Nathan grunt-laughs. “We can take him. This is what I’ve been saying for years. Those reindeer hooves damaging the roof?”

“Sorry, but no insurance is going to cover that,” I say. “Santa’s totally coming after us one day for all this shit-talk.”

Then we’re laughing at the ridiculousness of the conversation. Of the entire night, possibly.

“Anyway, the Coopers and their purpose-driven life lit a flame inside me,” I say. “Since I was twelve, I knew I wanted to do what they did. Where better to take down bullies than in the FBI?” I stop to adjust my grip. “I majored in psychology with a criminal justice minor and then applied to the FBI after the two years of work experience they require. I had a whole plan. Color-coded, of course.”