She’s on the moon now. She doesn’t yet know she is dreaming, so it’s all unnerving, the moon is perilously small, she could walk the circumference in minutes, but her body is stuck to the thing, pressed into the rock by an immense gravity. As the moon spins, she has the strange feeling of being pinned down and going head over heels, and she is grateful at least to be hard-pressed into the dusty surface. She seems to know intuitively that if she stood she would fly free.
It won’t be long now, he says.
Who says?
She turns to look. She is holding his gloved hand in her own gloved hand, and she knows when she looks that it is Oscar and he is dead. She knows that she is not dead, that a craft is en route for her, she will go home, but the stars spin above them and she wonders how it will all play out, how long she will have to wait. Because he is going the other way because he is dead.
Oscar sits up. The moon continues rotating backward. The stars rifle overhead. She has an urge to put her foot on the floor, like she would do if she’d had too much to drink. To stop the spins. But the moon is the floor.
Oscar lets go of her hand and stands.
She can’t see his face, just his boot as he leaps and floats away and toward the horizon as the moon turns. He is at the horizon so quickly. No resistance in space. The sun flashes through her visor. The quiet is total. She is alone and afraid.
Wait, she says, sitting up. Standing up now. She crouches and leaps. The moon falls away. She knows how cold it is outside the foil of her suit. She looks up (but what is up?). He’s turned to face down at her (what is down?), and she floats to him. In the cold vacuum, they turn slow. For a while together they tumble.
And tumble.
Where are you going? she asks, knowing already she cannot go with him.
To finish.
To finish dying?
No answer. His breath on his visor. Their suits are vivid silver and flash as they rotate in the darkness, the spotlight of sun, the soundless hum of the heavens. She imagines the vibrations of the rings of Saturn, the rungs of Jacob’s ladder, she remembers his tattoo, the one of the Virgin Mary on his chest, el corazón inmaculado floating in between her perfect palms.
They arrive at an edge of overwhelming blackness.
La Nada.
He extends his hand and it disappears into the black and he turns to look at her and nods gently inside his helmet, his breath frosted all around the visor, nodding as if to say I gotta go, cielito, and she holds his hand yet as he goes in and allows him to pull her hand in too and in the startling shock of La Nada she lets him go. He is gone.
A pane of blackness like still dark water inches from her face.
Oscar. Oscar.
There is no fear. Only wonder. That vast finality.
She puts her head inside.
Big mistake.
A terrific blast of Pure Noise, a malevolent horn, a distortion, a terrible quake to make her eyes shudder, water, and close.
She is out. She looks down through blurry eyes, the plane stretching forever, reflecting nothing, not even starlight, taking everything.
The Pure Noise again. She kicks and swims and spins around. Stars. She wants stars, those lights, however far, however cold those lights.
Silence. Her breathing.
The Noise again. . . .
Her eyes flutter open.
Someone shouting in Spanish. The box. Mexico.
The Noise again. Like a buzz on metal. A filing cabinet.
What cabinet?
Where you put your phone.
Gustavo.
Tampico.
Buzzing again so loud. Fuck.
More Spanish spilling out, so fast she cannot follow. Her eyes are open. She’s in the box.
“My phone. It’s my phone, Gustavo.”
Curses, mumbles, his pillow over his face.
“I’m sorry.”
No reply.
“There, it’s off now.”
Just looking bullets at her.
“I’m gonna go out now. Sorry, I’m sorry. Can you get the door?”
He nods, finally.
The warehouse—midday-hot but fluorescent-lit—was empty. Her steps slapping on the concrete, echoing off the walls and floor. Her heart raced yet, a little rabbity stutter to it. No one around. Good.
But lonesome.
The disorientation of waking up didn’t dissipate. No, not disorientation. Worry.
She read the screen to see who’d called. Of course. Bronwyn.
Not Childs. Not Dufresne. No one from the DEA. No one she needed.
Goddamnit. She stopped walking wherever she was walking. Orient yourself. Work backward.
She’d fallen asleep.
Before that, hour upon hour just sitting with Gustavo, just trying to keep him from Oscaring himself. All night. Waiting for Dufresne to call her back. Before that, waiting for Childs to call her back. She’d pretended this was all normal, to be expected. Told Gustavo her supervisors were following expedited protocols, but protocols nonetheless. Things could only move so fast. He’d fought sleep, tossed and grumbled, but then his breathing grew steady and she sat down. His snores were outrageous. She didn’t think she could nod off. But she did. Deep sleep, deep space—
She shook it away. She didn’t want to go back to that dream.
She fired a WTF?! to Childs and another to Dufresne and went in search of coffee. She found an empty break room in the office area. Just cigarette butts in the small metal ashtray and a few empty Jarritos bottles.
The fluorescent light pinged above, and one of the bulbs went out. She looked in the cabinets for coffee. Nothing. Her head had begun to throb. She rubbed her eyes and swept out of the break room and down the hall, passing offices, trying to clear this foggy head of hers. She stopped at the sight of Travis at his desk, doing something on the computer, figures on a spreadsheet. Tongue out like a kid at algebra. Noticing her, he sat up. The cash still on the desk.
“Agent Harbaugh.”
“Mr. Moman.”
“Where’s El Capataz?”
“Asleep. Or was. My phone rang. Is it really six p.m.?”
He didn’t have a clock or watch, and he peered at the corner of his Dell.
“So it is.”
“Jesus.”
Travis leaned back in his chair. Fixed his hands over his belly.
“Y’all don’t seem to be in much of a rush,” he said, with a grin indicating that she had better be.
“It’s all in hand,” she lied. “Should have an exfil plan soon. Just waiting on the paperwork from Mexico City. Approvals and such. You know.”
“Probably I don’t.” He squinted, took a slow deep breath, and paid out a sigh through his nose.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“For what exactly?”
Sorry she’d come down here half-cocked. Sorry she couldn’t raise anyone on the goddamn phone. She had no plan, that’s what she was sorry about. Embarrassed really. And she was sorry she was lying to him about it.
“The inconvenience?” she suggested.
“I don’t want to know what’s afoot,” he said. “I wanna be as see-no-hear-no as possible. So don’t feel like you actually gotta answer this.” He paused, exhaled ostentatiously. “But can’t y’all just leave?”
Despite Moman’s request otherwise, she had half a mind to explain everything. To tell him that she was doing this all by herself, that she’d come down to get a big win and whisk herself out of trouble. But there was no support, it was just her, alone, having to figure this shit out, and she and Gustavo couldn’t just take a commercial flight or walk across the border, no one was waiting for them. She wanted to tell him that she’d thought it would’ve all been sorted by now, though. That someone would’ve called. She couldn’t really imagine what was in store, what the conclusive event would look like. The CIA guy. Blue Linen. Carver, if that was really his name. What was behind him. The mind reeled. The might of State or the Defense Department or the Mexican police. Would this end in a raid? With Gustavo shooting himself before anyone else could? Him dead? Her dead. Everybody dead. Maybe a boat would do the trick. She wanted to ask Moman if he had one—
He was watching her ponder these things. Perhaps dimly aware of the scope of her problems. Instead of answering, though, she just ended up asking a question back at him.
“What happened to those assholes from State?”
“No idea. I’m just sitting here wondering who’s gonna take this money off my desk,” he said. “You ever heard of a man having so much trouble getting rid of cash?”
“Kind of, yeah,” she said, looking at her phone. “It’s hard to move money.”
“You’re not gonna get anything in here.”
“Anything what?” she asked, sounding more alarmed than she wanted.
“Your phone,” he said. “You’ll wanna be on the loading dock to get any bars.”
The sun was hidden behind cranes and smokestacks. The sky overcast, the air a heavy and wet astonishment in her nostrils. She started sweating as soon as she stepped outside. How the fuck does anybody stay dry here?
She held up her phone, watched two bars and two new text messages appear—Bronwyn again—when she heard someone behind her stepping up, coming out. She whipped around. Carver emerged from the shade of the loading bay. She shoved her phone in her pocket.
“Jesus,” she said. “Nice tradecraft, bro. Cool use of shadows.”
“It’s the shade, hon. You’ve been in an icebox all day, so maybe you didn’t notice that it’s hotter’n balls out here.”
“Where’s your pal?” she asked, running a hand through her hair, composing herself.
“Mexico City. Trying to explain this charlie foxtrot to the ambassador.”
“Charlie foxtrot? Are you twelve? Or—oh fuck—you were a jarhead, weren’t you?”
He ignored this, asked, “Where’s the narco?”
“Why are you so interested in him?”
“You first.”
“You know why. He’s a lieutenant in the CDG. And he only wants to deal with me.”
“Oh, I know.” His eyes softened sadly. “You’re handcuffed to the sumbitch now.”
Sumbitch. He didn’t have a southern accent, but there was a touch of the rural about him. His baggy pants. He was compact, but had rangy movements, eyes that darted and discerned. A hunter. Midwestern probably. Kansas or something. She didn’t have his number, but she had a few of the digits. Farmer, hunter, soldier, spy.
“Why you, though?” he asked.
She told him about the card. The call.
“Now answer my question,” she said.
“It’s classified.”
“Is it now.”
“You figure out how to get out of here yet?” he asked.
“I have irons in the fire.”
“Irons in the fire. Right. Wheels in motion. Forces gathering.”
“Why are you still here?”
“You sleep?” he asked.
“Why are you still here?” she asked again.
“I racked out in the SUV. I can sleep anywhere.” He grinned, openly, warmly. None of that keyed-up threat-assessment hardness to his face.
“What. Are. You. Doing here.”
“Awaiting word. Like you.”
“From?”
“Mom and Dad,” he said.
“Mom and Dad?”
“Condi Rice and whatever dipshit is running the DEA. State and DEA have to hash this one out.”
“Sure. And maybe Langley?” she asked.
His face did a little shrug at her. Like he was trying to shake off some worry or other. No, more like he was telling her this wasn’t a big deal, that she didn’t need to worry. Jesus, his whole affect was different now. This wasn’t the same guy who’d throttled her yesterday. He was too cool now. Calm. Which was annoying, considering what a psychopath he’d been the day before. He shouldn’t be able to stand there all calm. She wanted to bother him.
“This isn’t gonna go your way,” she said.
“Yeah, it’s gonna get real gnarly before it’s all over.”
Her phone buzzed, startling her. Carver didn’t even perk. He just turned sideways in a gesture of giving her the space of privacy. Raw consternation discomposed her face—she could feel it curling up her cheeks and forehead. Who the fuck was this guy today? Stubbornly baffling.
She closed the message she’d started to Childs and opened up the longest single text in history, broken up into a bunch of different messages. It began with Bronwyn telling her to sit down and read the whole thing. That he’d worked out a lot of his thoughts, and she owed it to him to listen—
Closing the phone, she muttered “Jesus” and sighed.
He looked up at that.
“What?” she barked at him.
“It’s that guy? Bronson?”
“You had my phone for thirty seconds, and this is what you read?”
His eyes all furrowed. As if vaguely concerned but personally untroubled.
“Tell him the chemistry was off. Or that you got back with an ex. But give the guy closure.”
“Yeah, this is a ton of your business.”
“Nature abhors a loose end.”
Loose end. Interesting.
“Is that why you’re here?”
“To give you fantastic advice? Hardly.”
“You’re the one created Gustavo’s TILLER file, aren’t you?”
He put his hands on his hips and looked at the ceiling in approximation of someone working out an answer, an answer she knew would be mostly smoke.
“Why didn’t you just call me?” she asked. “Or maybe he pulled my card because he’s running from you?” She wasn’t going to let him off. “You’re here to tie up a loose end.”
He scoffed.
“What’s so funny?”
“That dude’s main ingredient is loose ends,” he said. “A couple hundred at least. Not someone you wanna room with. But you do you.”
He looked hard at her, almost urging her to listen. He meant something specific by “a couple hundred,” but she wasn’t sure what. Murders, she assumed, like that was supposed to shock her. What was Carver’s agenda? He had come at her so explosively off the bat. In fact, a theory had gripped her as soon as he’d grabbed her by the throat: Gustavo was involved in some shady intelligence operation. Like the shit she’d pulled with Dufresne. Different scale, but the same kind of thing. She’d reckoned with this idea so much last night that it had slowly acquired more credence and had actually become a fact in her mind. But now, she wasn’t so sure, looking at Carver shaking his head and rocking on his heels. He seemed worried. Gustavo could be something far worse than she’d imagined. Maybe the man in the box wasn’t just a narco, maybe he was something she didn’t yet understand.
“I have an idea,” she said.
“Can’t wait to hear it.”
“How about some interagency cooperation? Unless you’re just waiting for another chance to choke me out.”
He didn’t say anything back. Not right away. She perceived his regret, maybe it was even shame, but only in a slight and softening way. His eyes, that’s where it came through. As though he were actually thinking of her for the first time. He had clouded things barging in and trying to take control yesterday. She’d thought his purpose was to thwart her, dispose of her. When a man grabs you by the throat, your first thought isn’t that this is a rash act of panic. But maybe Carver had less power than she assumed. Maybe she’d been fooled by the neck grab, by his whole fiery aspect.
“You have an inflated opinion of my control of this situation.” He walked back to where he’d been hiding among the racks, where he picked something up off a shelf. When he reappeared, she saw he was holding a dripping-wet plastic sack and a paper one, stained with grease. He held out one of the bags toward her. An offering.
“What’s this supposed to be?”
“Interagency cooperation. You two gotta be starving.”
He nodded toward the back of the warehouse. His face was soft and open. Handsome, even.
She took the paper sack. A warm aroma of hominy and cumin when she opened it. Tamales, salsa tied up in Saran wrap, napkins. He pulled a beer out of the plastic bag and gave it to her.
“Run this back to him,” he said. “There’s plenty more if you change your mind.”
She stood outside the box right under the vent, the AC blowing straight down on her. Outside, a plane passed overhead, the sound of it echoing in the warehouse. Somewhere deep within, a forklift engine kicked on and beeped, backing up.
She realized then that she was ringing too. She set the beer and tamales on a shelf, dug out her phone.
Dufresne.
“Finally.”
“You need to come back.”
“I can’t.”
“You can, and you have to.”
“You can help me, Brian.”
“Help you?”
She could hear him breathe. She could just see his pained grimace. She had to try a new tack.
Revise the past. Relitigate that shit.
“Okay, listen. I’m sorry I said . . . those things. About everything I did as DA. I did all that on my own. If I gave the impression that I expected a job—”
“Stop.”
Don’t stop. Negotiate. Give him things.
“And the trouble with my CI? You can have my phone. I’ll manage OPR, it’ll be fine—”
“Let me assure you, it will not be fucking fine with OPR.”
Shit. New tack. Just listen to him.
“Cromer and I just got off a conference call with the State Department asking how in the hell we have an agent who goes to a sit in Mexico without following a single fucking protocol.”
She heard him seesaw a pencil on his desk between a thumb and forefinger. A thing he did when he was frustrated. She knew this about him, knew a lot about him.
“Let me tell you what I got,” she said. “I have a lieutenant in the CDG who wants to come to America and spill everything he knows. The reason why anyone knows I’m here is because the CIA wants him too, but he only wants to deal with me. All I need is a plane. None of the brass will give a shit what we’ve done once this dude strolls in and we debrief and proffer him. Please. Brian, it’s me.”
She’d never begged him for anything. He just had to see she was for real. He’d quit tapping the pencil. She could hear the casters on his chair move as he leaned back and turned around to look out the window.
“I’m not going to help you,” he said softly.
She took the phone away from her ear. Hearing that hurt, and there would be more pain if she kept listening. Everything all gone to hell. He was still talking and she didn’t know what the words were but they all meant the same thing. She was done.
“You hate me,” she said.
“I hate that you didn’t tell me you were going,” he said. “I hate that you didn’t come to me when the call came in. I hate that Childs told you to go. I hate . . . I don’t hate you. I hate what’s happened.”
He sounded like someone on the stand. Like someone in a pretrial deposition, in an interview with the DA. Parsing. She could hear him breathing, and that was all. She couldn’t imagine what he was doing. She couldn’t see him.
Then he hung up.