TWENTY-EIGHT

We caught up with Sly outside New Ground and gave him the package. I didn’t want to bring it into the coffee shop, in case it was as contagious as we feared. I also didn’t like the idea of leaving it in the truck, or anywhere really, especially in the heat. It wasn’t stinking yet, but it was sure to start soon. I was a little bit worried that if things dragged on any longer, they might not be able to do whatever tests they had in mind.

Sly was more concerned about CLAD’s plan to bring down the Wellplant network. He was unhappy that I wasn’t able to get any more information about it. When I told him Ogden had said he could tell me more if I became a part of CLAD, he looked at me expectantly, like he thought I should go ahead and join up in order to get that info.

“No,” I said. “I’m tired of having the FBI showing up at my front door. The last thing I want is to give them a legitimate reason to think I’m involved with CLAD.”

He was clearly disappointed but said he’d let us know as soon as he heard anything, and that he’d be home for the next few days if we needed to reach him. He had a tiny apartment at the southwest tip of the city, in a flooded-out part of Eastwick.

After Sly left, Rex wiped down the inside of Jerry’s truck with disinfectant, just in case. I went into the bathroom and gave my hands a good scrubbing, then Rex did the same.

I was relieved to be rid of that package, but felt a bit of a letdown, now that all we could do was wait.

As we sat there, Jerry came out from the back and asked Rex to take care of a few things for him at one of his buildings.

“I won’t be long,” Rex said to me. “Want to hang out after I’m done?”

“Nah, I shouldn’t,” I said. Then, I smiled. “I feel like I haven’t been home enough lately.”

Rex understood, and after an extra-long hug and kiss goodbye, he left and Jerry returned to his office.

I looked around the coffee shop and realized I didn’t know anybody else there. It was weird. Over that past nine months I’d been coming so regularly, I almost always knew someone—at least Ruth or Pell.

I used the pay phone in the back to call my mom, just to check in.

“Hey Mom,” I said when she answered. “It’s me.”

“Who?” she said, sounding confused.

“Your daughter,” I said. “Jimi.”

I realized as soon as I said it that she was messing with me. “Jimi…Jimi…” she said, as if searching her memory. “That’s right, I did have a daughter named Jimi.” She laughed—loud, long, and breezy. “You know, I forgot all about her. Thought she’d run away to join the circus or something.” This was not the first time we’d played this game.

“More like ‘run away from the circus,’ I’d say.”

“Ha, ha, ha. Very funny. So, where’ve you been?”

“You know where I’ve been. I spent the night at Claudia’s. I’m at the coffee shop now, but I’m about to head home. I’m just checking in to see what you’re up to and how you’re doing. Like a good daughter.”

“Kind of like a good daughter.”

“Mom!”

“Kidding! I’m just kidding.”

“You better be!”

“So you’re coming home?”

“Yup. What’s for dinner? Need me to pick anything up?”

“Thanks, but I think we’re all set. I was thinking tacos, and maybe going to a movie later. There’s a new holarium in East Falls that’s supposed to be nice. How about it?”

That sounded good to me. On a hot summer day, there was something very special about sitting in a big, dark, over-air-conditioned holarium, and losing yourself in the movie playing out over your head.

“What do you want to see?”

“I don’t know. Let’s see what’s playing and decide when you get home.”

“Perfect.”

On the spectrum of holomovies I’d seen with my mom, this one wasn’t so bad. A romantic action comedy with a couple of actors I liked and one I didn’t (but whom my mom loved), it had something for each of us.

On the way home, we stopped for soft ice cream at a little place on top of a steep hill in Roxborough, on Ridge Avenue, which was the ridge between the Schuylkill River gorge and the Wissahickon gorge. We used to go there when I was little, when my dad was still alive. He would pack the whole family, and half the kids in the neighborhood, into the minivan.

There were only a couple of people in line when we arrived, but by the time we got our ice cream, at least a dozen were waiting behind us.

The evening had cooled off and there was a nice breeze. Mom got a double—perhaps the first time I’d seen her get anything bigger than a single, or her usual kiddie cone—so I did, too. It seemed to be that kind of night.

We sat on the bench, trying to keep up with our cones while looking out at the sky over the Schuylkill River. Lightning flickered in the distance, illuminating a large thunderhead towering over the hills to the south. Early summer had become the dry season. We’d had a fair amount of lightning at night, but no significant rain, not in a while. Tonight, though, I almost didn’t notice the smell of smoke in the air from the brush fires.

We sat there talking, mostly about nothing at first, and it was nice, until she innocently asked me what was new. She’d meant it to be a softball question, but it made me freeze for a second. There was so much going on; a lot of it she knew about, but a lot of it she didn’t. I had a moment of confusion about which was which. But without a doubt, chief among the big things that were new, that she didn’t know about, and that I couldn’t tell her about, was that Dymphna was around, that I had met with her.

I had known for some time that Dymphna was the head of Chimerica. Rex had told me months earlier, and I had been holding that secret ever since. But now—having seen her, having her back in my life—the secret felt bigger, more immediate. More like a lie.

I buried it yet again and instead we discussed Wells running for president and chatted about some of the people we both knew at E4E, especially those who were close to Davey and Myra, who had died in the bombing. She grilled me about Rex but didn’t push any of the questions I sidestepped. I knew she had come to like Rex a lot, which of course made sense, because pretty much everyone did.

Then she asked how I was holding up.

“Fine,” I said, automatically, then, “You mean because of the bombing?”

She suppressed a shudder, and it struck me again how hard a lot of this must have been for her, being a mom and asking your kid how she was faring after an act of terrorism.

“Yes…but not just that,” she said, gently placing a hand on my knee. “Jimi, sweetie, you’ve been through so much this past year. First Pitman and what happened to Del, then Gellersville, now this. You’ve seen some terrible things, had some horrific experiences. That’s all going to take some…processing.”

I took a deep breath and steeled myself. This was a conversation we’d had before, and I knew she was just concerned for my well-being, so I was determined not to be difficult about it.

“Are you sure you don’t want to talk to someone about it?” she said softly. “A professional?”

I was also sure she was probably right to bring it up, but that didn’t make me any less sure that no, I absolutely did not want to see a shrink about any of this. Not yet, anyway.

“Yes. It has been a really intense year,” I said with a reassuring smile. “But I’m okay, Mom. Really. If I wasn’t, I would say so.”

She opened her mouth, like she was going to argue the point, but thankfully she decided not to. A second later she said, “Well, how’s it going with Marcella?”

Whenever she said Marcella, it always took me a moment before I realized she meant DeWitt.

“It’s good,” I said. “I mean, it’s only been a few weeks, and the actual work I’m doing is boring, but I’m learning a lot just being around her.”

“That’s great,” she said, her eyes twinkling with something like pride. “It’s a great opportunity for you, a high-powered internship like that while you’re still in high school.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said. “And she does important work.”

“Your dad would be so proud,” Mom said, her voice suddenly thick. She looked away and dabbed her eye with her napkin. “Of Kevin, too. He’d be so proud of both of you.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. I knew she was right, not because of anything Kevin or I had done, but because of who my dad was. And I knew she was proud of us, too.

“I know, Mom,” I said. I put my arm around her shoulders, and she leaned into me for a moment, a brief moment when, for the first time in my life, I felt like I was giving her strength instead of the other way around. And it wasn’t about any weakness on her part, it was about honesty, about sharing her vulnerability with me, letting me see it. Treating me like an adult. “If Dad was around, he’d be proud of you, too.”

Mom leaned away from me and cleared her throat, as if vaguely embarrassed. She looked at her ice cream and said, “I think I’m done.”

My ice cream was dripping over my fingers, my eating having been slowed by the hug, and the massive lump in my throat. “Yeah,” I said. “Me, too.”

Without a word, we both got up and had one last lick as we walked over to the trash can to dump our cones. As we headed back toward the car, she handed me another napkin, and just like that, we were back in our regular mother/daughter roles. It was nice.