Boston, the same day
Borya pedaled slowly toward the bank, watching the traffic with one eye and the curb with the other. It had been cloudy when she left home, threatening rain, but now the sun was out full blast, warming the air with a promise of spring. Buds were starting to peek out of the dead wood of the trees, and already the morning was warm enough that she didn’t need the sweatshirt she’d bundled herself in. It was so warm, in fact, that she decided to stop and take it off a block from the bank; she rode up onto the sidewalk, hopping off the bike with a quick, practiced motion. The seat and pedals on the Shimano mountain bike were adjusted so her legs were at full extension, and a careless dismount could hurt. She pulled off her sweatshirt and tied it around her waist, smoothing it against her baggy khaki pants.
She’d decided to skip school at the last minute and in fact was still not entirely comfortable with the decision. Her father was away, which made skipping school more problematic, not less. Any call home about her absence would go to voice mail, where she would intercept it and return it, pretending to be her au pair—a college student who was a serious pain before leaving the family employ two years before. The woman who looked in on her in the evenings—never use the term babysitter—was a kindly old dolt who was easy to dodge. But her father had an unfortunate habit of calling the school when he was out of the country, ostensibly checking to see how she was doing; this made skipping more problematic, if not downright dangerous.
Even though he wasn’t Roman Catholic, her father had an unworldly and to Borya’s thinking inexplicable respect for the nuns who ran the school; a cross word from them always brought swift retribution.
Not that he would hit her—she couldn’t remember that he had ever done so, even when she was five or six years old. But his lectures. These were old-school tirades, marathon sessions that varied in volume from hour to hour—and they did last hours. Guilt was a heavy component, as was the sainted memory of her beloved mother, God rest her soul, who would be invoked a minimum of twelve times. Borya hated this mother—not her real mother, whom she had only the vaguest memory of, but the sainted, beloved mother her father presented during these speeches.
It was a joke, really. He’d indulged in a series of ho’s for as long as she could remember—his various attempts at being discreet had grown pathetic over the years—and Borya was fairly certain that such a practice would have originated before her mom’s death. How could you cheat on a person and venerate them at the same time? But he definitely venerated her now. The house was practically a shrine to her, with photos everywhere.
There was a certain resemblance between mother and daughter, as visitors often remarked. Borya focused on the differences—her own raven hair cut short and brushed back, tattoos on both her arms, baggy boy clothes in sharp contrast to the gowns and long skirts her mom wore in most of the photos.
Borya chained her bike against the railing of the Starbucks where she’d stopped, then walked around the side to go into the store. She ordered a venti cappuccino—a two-week-old habit—and gave the clerk a rewards card.
He looked at it suspiciously. Borya’s breath caught. The card was bogus, bought online for a fraction of its supposed value.
Did he know it? Was he going to call the cops?
She could get out of the shop easily enough, but it would mean leaving her bicycle behind.
“Your strip’s peeling off,” said the clerk. “You should get another one.”
“I, um.” Borya’s mouth was dry. “There’s still money on it and, uh, it’s really my dad’s. So—”
“I can transfer it if you want.”
“Uh . . . sure.”
The clerk tapped his fingers across the cash register, whizzing the card and a new one through the reader on the register. Borya felt frozen, worried that it was a trap.
“Fifty-five dollars and twenty-five cents left,” said the clerk, handing her the new card. “Your dad likes his coffee, huh?”
“Lattes,” said Borya weakly. Then she had an inspiration. “Can I have the old card?”
“It’s worthless now.” He had it in his hand, flexing it.
“Yeah, but, my dad—I have to show it to him . . .”
“Control freak, huh?”
“Anal.”
He handed it back to her. “Nothing on it now. It’s voided out.”
“Thanks.”
Borya’s chest didn’t unclench until she was outside the store. Loading cards up with bogus money was a silly game, easily discovered if the chain’s security people put their minds to it. Disposing of the evidence was the best strategy.
Transferring balances from card to card—that was something she’d never considered. Did that make it more or less likely she’d be caught?
Borya hung the bike chain around her neck and walked the bike away, coffee in hand. The possibility of getting caught, the rush of having escaped—it was better than any drug, certainly better than the vodka she snuck from the liquor cabinet.
She passed the bank. There was someone at the ATM just outside the lobby door.
Good, thought Borya, spying a bench a short distance away. I’ll drink the cappuccino while I’m waiting.
It was only after chaining the bike and sitting down that she realized she had forgotten to put any sugar in. She decided she would drink it anyway, as a matter of discipline.
I have to work on keeping my head straight, Borya told herself, taking a bitter sip. Panicking is the easiest way to get caught.