Spy Mom (46 page)

“Absolutely,” I said. My statement was punctuated by a loud noise coming from the Toyota's rusted-out trunk, as if a tiny jackhammer were pounding away on the back of my seat.

“Pull over, Min,” I shouted. “I think someone's in your trunk.” Min slammed on the brakes and I went flying over the seats, landing right in his lap.

“Oh, my, Miss Allison. My apologies.” The loud knocking sound continued. I untangled myself, jumped out of the car, and tried, with limited success, to pop the trunk.

“When was the last time you opened this?” I asked. Min shrugged.

“Never?” he said.

“Great.”

“Try this way,” he suggested. With that, he climbed into the backseat and pushed a fist through one of the gaping holes in the upholstery. A second later, from the hole he produced the slim, tan leg of a child.

“How did you get in here?” he roared, pulling the rest of Ayushi from the hole. “This is dangerous. You could have died.”

Not to mention she would have had to move at the speed of light to get from my hotel room into the trunk of the car without notice.

Ayushi took a second to stand up and straighten out the now torn and filthy skirt of her uniform. She fixed her liquid eyes on us.

“I would rather be dead than stay with Kirin for one more minute,” she said with a conviction I've not often heard since then. Min and I looked at each other. It was hard to argue with her but it didn't explain her apparent power to teleport herself from one place to another undetected. I put my hands on my hips in my best imitation of an irate mother and waited. Under my gaze, Ayushi kicked the ground. A little cloud of dust floated up between us.

“The drain pipe,” she said quietly, “through the other window, in the back.”

“And you didn't mention this to me because of … why?” I asked, thinking I really could have done without jumping out the second-story window. I dreaded the bruise I'd have by nighttime.

“You didn't ask,” she said, jutting her chin out in defiance.

True.

“This is ridiculous,” Min interrupted. “We'll take her to my cousin's wife's brother-in-law. She will be safe there.”

Ayushi pulled on my shirt.

“You owe me one,” she said, as if I needed reminding.

My luck was now officially classified as awful. Where was my sprinkling of fairy dust when I needed it? Hung up in customs? I was not suited to mind a child. In fact, keeping a cactus alive was a stretch for me. But what she said was true. I owed her for saving my life. And in my business, that wasn't something to be taken lightly.

“Listen,” I said, kicking the dirt. “Min's cousin is the safest place for you to be. Being with me isn't always that safe.” What an understatement. I hoped she was old enough to read between the lines.

Ayushi crossed her arms and glared at me.

“I'm coming with you,” she said. “If you leave me, I'll follow you.”

She was beginning to remind me of a baby duck that accidentally imprints on a fox or some other totally inappropriate animal. Min glanced at his watch, tapping his foot in case I missed his point.

“Okay,” I said finally. “She comes with us.”

“This will make things complicated, Miss Allison,” Min said, already looking tired.

“If you haven't noticed,” I said, “things are already complicated.” Simon was going to kill me or, at the very least, send me to count snowflakes in Mongolia for six months.

Back at the airport, we headed toward a plane I think was actually a 1973 VW minibus with wings. The pilot heaved plastic chairs and irrigation tubing out onto the runway to make room for our bodies. When he was done, he shook each of our hands enthusiastically and welcomed us aboard.

“Nice weather for flying,” the pilot said. “No rocks in the clouds today.”

Oh, dear. I recited what I remembered of the Lord's Prayer, which was not a whole lot, and closed my eyes. The plane lurched and sputtered and eventually was airborne. All around us were steep hills covered in dense green foliage. Steel gray rivers cut their way through, pulled by gravity to an unknown sea. In a matter of minutes, we appeared to be crashing right into the side of a mountain.

“You're hurting me,” Ayushi said, as I grabbed her arm in a terrific imitation of panic. “It's just the runway.”

“Sorry,” I whispered.

“You can open your eyes now,” she said. “We're on the ground.”

“Right. I was just resting.”

“Okay,” she said, “if you say so.”

“What?” I said, assuming the nonchalance of a cat that has just fallen flat on her face.

Ayushi laughed and her small round face lit up as if she held the warmth of the sun inside her. I felt my heart constrict just the tiniest bit. She was not a cactus. Maybe I could save her.

“You were scared. You were scared,” she sang, dancing between Min and me. The skirt from her school uniform twirled with a joy that seemed alien to this dark, dreary place.

As far as the eye could see, in every direction, there was nothing but mud. A few yards from the landing strip was a row of rudimentary houses, haphazardly constructed and leaning precariously on one another for support. A foul stench belched from their chimneys.

“Yak dung,” Min said, turning up his nose. “No wood left to burn up here.” I nodded as if it were a perfectly ordinary thing to burn yak shit for fuel and followed Min into the five-inch-deep mud. It was aggressive mud, grabbing onto my boots and requiring a Herculean effort for each step forward. Ayushi clung to my neck, baby koala style, and I said a silent thank you that she was small for her age. During my time with the Agency, I'd have many good ideas. Bringing a child into this environment was not one of them.

Theo dances around the kitchen. His shiny silver shin guards are strapped to his forearms, part of an imaginary superhero outfit that includes a baby-blanket cape and a child-sized San Francisco Giants batting helmet. He speaks Kung Fu, sounding exactly as he might if he were being strangled. I try to pack a bag with enough snacks to cover the morning, which isn't as easy as one might think.

“Cheese sticks?” I ask.

“Blah. Cheese sticks make me sick.” An Academy Award–winning fake barfing scene follows.

“Stop that right now,” I say. “And cheese sticks do not make you sick.”

“Yes, they do. I'm allergic.”

“No, you're not.”

“Well, Zach is, at school. He turns funny colors and has to stick himself with a pen. Allergic to cheese sticks and broccoli.”

“Just because you don't like something doesn't mean you are allergic to it. It's okay not to like every food. But if you don't even give them a try, how will you know?”

“Mom, I hate cheese sticks.”

Okay. No cheese sticks. For some reason, this makes me mad at Will. He shouldn't be spending his weekend negotiating the price of windmills but rather here negotiating about cheese sticks and water bottles. And while he's doing that, I can be … doing something else. Like figuring out who has Gray and coming up with a daring yet responsible plan for getting him back, perhaps? No, no, no! Not that. Again, I tell the nagging voice of my instinct to shut up and go away. I'm just an ordinary person taking her normal kid to the regularly scheduled Saturday morning soccer game. It's all very mundane and routine. But the effort required to make myself believe I don't care is exhausting.

“Let's go, Mom,” Theo says. “We're going to be late and it's all your fault.”

“You didn't just say that to me, did you?”

“What?”

“Oh, never mind. I guess it's time,” I say, rolling up my sleeves. “Assume the position.”

Theo plops down on the floor in front of me and sticks both legs straight up in the air like a cartoon character that just keeled over dead. I take a shin guard and strap it to his leg. It's too big and covers him from ankle to knee. I wrap the extra-long Velcro straps around and around his skinny calf until he resembles a modern-day gladiator, albeit a very small one. I move on to the size XXS soccer socks, which are at least twenty-five feet long. I roll them up as if I am preparing to put a pair of panty hose on the Jolly Green Giant.

“Keep your toes tight,” I say. “Don't bend your foot.” Even after all this time, Theo has no idea what that means and starts waving his foot around in the air, a sail that has broken free in the wind. I grab it and go in for the kill. The sock gets hung up on the first set of shin guard straps.

“That hurts,” Theo wails. “You're pulling too hard.”

“I know,” I say. “I'm sorry. Just another second here and I'll be done.” I put his flat foot against my thigh and give the sock a quick tug. With that, my whole child goes skidding across the kitchen floor.

“Mom, what are you doing?”

“Almost home,” I tell him, breaking out in a sweat.

The sock bunches up at his knee. I pull out all the wrinkles and fold it over and over again on itself to get it to the proper length. Theo's leg now suffers from a bad case of soccer-sock elephantiasis. We repeat the process on the other side and jam both feet into cleats that fit very nicely with normal socks but are almost impossible to get on with the soccer socks. And this is what we do for fun.

“Okay,” I say as cheerfully as I can manage. “We are good to go!”

We climb into the car and I wait while Theo insists on buckling himself in.

“I can do it,” he says, pulling out about fifteen yards of seat belt. “I need slack.”

“Looks like you have some,” I say. The minutes pass.

“I can't do it,” he moans. “I hate this car. Get a better car, Mom.” It's not exactly the car's fault but I agree with the sentiment.

A quick word about the car. I used to have a cool car. It was fast and sleek and shamelessly chugged gasoline like a linebacker chugs Gatorade. But one day I opened my garage and found that my cool car had been replaced by a fuel-efficient tin can. I have many names for the tin can, none of which are polite, but its given name is Prius.

“Don't worry, honey,” I say. “Mommy has her eye on a Tesla, a cherry red one, that even Daddy can love.” Theo has no clue what a Tesla is but the very word makes him smile.

At the soccer field, I wedge my eco-car into a tiny parking spot. It's so tiny, in fact, that Theo has to climb over me in the front seat and squeeze out a very thin sliver of open door. I give him a quick shove with the heel of my hand to make sure he doesn't spend the remainder of his childhood wedged here between the outside world and me.

“Mom! My arm.” He shoots me a wounded look and rubs his elbow.

“Sorry, kiddo,” I say, trying to extract myself, “city parking.” I suck in my stomach and attempt to push my too big body through the narrow space. My jeans catch on the door latch and rip clean across the thigh. I couldn't have cut a straighter line with a pair of scissors. A patch of denim that used to be attached to my pants dangles from the latch.

“Great,” I say, but Theo's out of earshot, dashing toward his team, already assembled on the grass.

Any sun we had was left behind in our neighborhood. This field, closer to the ocean, is shrouded in a cold, damp fog. I zip my fleece jacket up to my chin and think about how quickly I would trade my Prius for a cup of hot coffee.

On the other side of the field, Avery, my best mom friend, waves to me. Her daughter Sophie, wearing pink cleats, pink socks, and a pink bow in her hair, runs toward Theo. I experience a sudden weird wave of love for her unapologetic girliness.

I sit down next to Avery on her blanket. Avery is the kind of woman who remembers things like a blanket and a thermos full of hot coffee and mittens, and she most certainly is not wearing jeans with a huge gaping hole in the thigh. If she weren't so nice, I wouldn't like her at all.

“How many more games are we going to be forced to endure in the name of teaching our children to be team players?” I ask.

“Four,” she replies without even a moment of hesitation. See? She's that kind of mom, the one all the rest of the moms want to be, the one who remembers things. A few minutes later, Sam joins us on the blanket. It's not a big blanket but Sam is a grandfather, so the chances of him remembering a blanket and coffee are slim to none.

“Have you guys made any kindergarten decisions?” he asks as he settles in next to me. “Matt and Emily want to know.” We have never met Carter's parents. They don't come to soccer games or yoga classes or the playground. Apparently they work and meet their son for the occasional late dinner. “Personally, I don't know what the big deal is but Emily's going a little crazy over it. What happened to your pants?”

“I don't want to talk about it,” I say.

“Private,” says Avery, covering the hole in my pants with Sophie's jacket. “I'm afraid of the public school lottery. I've never won anything in my life so I'll probably get a lousy lottery number and there goes Sophie's chance at a top-rated public school. I'd rather take my chances on applications I can actually influence.” She pats the jacket in my lap as if to say, great, now that giant hole in your jeans is all taken care of.

“You aren't going to resort to bribery?” I ask, only half kidding.

“No, of course not,” Avery says, “but if they need an extra wing for their library, I might consider a donation.”

I laugh. True colors are often revealed in times of great stress.

“Who cares?” Sam says, obviously exasperated by the topic. “It's kindergarten, ladies. It doesn't matter that much.”

Avery and I look at him as if he were a tried and convicted traitor.

“It matters,” I say.

“It does,” Avery agrees. “Do you want Carter to be playing catch-up in junior high because he didn't go to a good elementary school?”

Interesting. I was thinking more along the lines of it mattering because I want the school where my son is least likely to be snatched by someone I pissed off in Afghanistan ten years ago. But Avery's point is a good one, too.