“Who?” you ask again.
“Natasha,” says the voice.
You briefly wonder if you misheard, but the building’s intercom system is fairly clear, and it’s not as if you’d been in a deep sleep. You’d gotten home from Advantage Electric an hour ago and had been flipping through channels waiting for the doe-eyed lawyer from your parking garage to get home so you could take her for a drink. There’s really no reason for your profound confusion.
“I’m sorry, who did you say this was?”
“Your sister, Natasha Ryan.”
Another second passes before you ring her in.
Sliding loafers on without socks, you step into the hallway, waiting to see who will show up when the elevator doors part.
It’s probably been six years since you’ve seen Natasha. You’ve been back in Chicago nine months, but since Maura and your father divorced (sometime after you left, the details of which are not quite clear), he has custody only on odd vacation weeks and never remembers to call you about Natasha’s visits until they’re almost over. By then it’s usually too late to alter your plans (and when you’re being completely honest, spending time with Natasha hasn’t been high on your list of priorities). You’ve seen the stray picture at your father’s house, but you’re not sure of her actual age and find yourself doing quick math and settling on something preteen, between ten and twelve. Always, to you, Natasha will be a little girl of four or five whom you’d get down on hands and knees to play with because her life was as lonely as yours and Maura’s.
While you’re expecting the unexpected, it’s downright dumbfounding when the young woman steps out of the elevator with a fat ponytail of red ringlets and slight swells of breasts and butt evident under her jeans and hoodie. She looks a little like Karen—the sister you do think of as your sister—but her skin is every bit as milky as Maura’s, though less eerie and translucent. To pronounce her beautiful is probably not right, but there is something captivating and otherworldly about her.
“Good evening, Oliver,” she says, strange and formal.
Nodding, you say something along the lines of “Hey.”
Maybe it’s the shock of her transformation, but you let Natasha in and offer her a soda before you remember that you weren’t expecting her, and while she does look decades older than you remembered, she’s still not nearly old enough to be alone in your up-and-coming-but-still-a-little-dangerous neighborhood this time of night.
Probably not wanting to hinder her good fortune at your utter lack of questioning, Natasha volunteers nothing resembling an explanation but accepts a Dr Pepper and the invitation to sit on the tan sofa you bought from the previous tenant.
“Your apartment is lovely,” she continues in her diplomatic and oddly adult way. “And this is in Printer’s Row?”
“Yep.”
“Is it close to Wrigleyville?”
“No, that’s north. Down here it’s mainly old warehouses.”
Her slightly disappointed nod breaks the trance, and you ask what brings her by.
“I was visiting a friend from art camp who lives in the area, so I figured I would see if you were home.” Even if the story were believable, Natasha’s shifty-eyed delivery tells an entirely different tale. “Obviously, I’m in town seeing Dad.”
Flare of frustration that this is now your problem. That this girl you haven’t known for more than half a decade is putting you in the position of calling her out on a lie, of having to find your father (if he’s even available and not somewhere over India or holed up with a stewardess in Australia) or track down Maura, whom you’ve shared fewer than a handful of words with since you stopped sleeping with her and ran away from home at twenty-six.
“What grade are you in now?” you ask in lieu of more challenging questions such as why she’s running away from home.
“Sixth,” Natasha says. “Or I will be when school starts in the fall.”
And you remember being short and hefty before growing six inches freshman year of high school. Remember spending the night at Braden’s, reading his comic books and fantasizing about his mother while your own mother was lying around waiting to die. You were nothing like this precocious girl with whom you share half of your genes.
“Do you like school?” You’re not sure what else to ask someone this age.
“It’s fine; I earn good grades. And you? Dad says you design airplane engines. That sounds fascinating.”
“Mostly it’s a bunch of guys sitting around a table talking.”
A sip of soda. A wish for something stronger, but you don’t have any alcohol in the house.
“Does Dad know you’re here?”
“Of course,” she says without making eye contact. “As I said before, I was calling on a girl I met at art camp last summer, and I told him I might stop by.”
Your father’s parenting was definitely subpar, but it seems extremely suspect that he would let his kid wander around the South Loop after dark.
“Is that really the story you’re going to stick with?” you ask.
Natasha seems very interested in her tennis shoes.
“We need to call whoever you’re supposed to be with so they’re not worried,” you continue, with a pleasantly surprising authority.
You’ve dialed the first three numbers of your father’s house before Natasha is on her feet telling you to wait.
“Please, I have questions to ask you without Dad around.”
Flashback to your own childhood: Old Orchard Mall down the street from your mother’s hospital, Karen telling you to ask her anything. Natasha is probably owed this much, an opportunity to voice her questions about sex or drugs or other grown-up things. Because you haven’t been a great brother to either of your sisters, but you’ve at least talked to Karen since the start of the Bush administration.
“Ask me whatever you want, but we need to call Dad first and let him know you’re safe.”
“Fine.” She takes the phone but doesn’t dial. With the same watercolor eyes as her mother, Natasha looks up at you, more challenging than Maura ever dared. “Are you my father?”
Exactly the same feeling you used to get on takeoff all those years ago—testicles left on the ground ten thousand feet below.
“Excuse me?” you finally manage.
“I want to know if you’re my father.”
“What are you talk—”
“I remember stuff from when I was a kid,” she says, and sounds like a child for the first time. “Mom was always touching you, and you slept in the same bed when Dad was gone. You’d leave before I got up, but I knew.”
What you always warned Maura, that she needed to be careful. That Natasha would catch on. To be fair, not sleeping with your stepmother in the first place would have been the easiest way to avoid this line of questioning.
“I’m not your father.”
“Would you tell me if you were?”
“No. I mean, I don’t know. What does your mother say?”
“I’ve never asked her.” Natasha sighs. “She’s my mother. She lies to me about things all the time. I figured you don’t have a reason to lie because you don’t really even know me.”
The logic is laughably flawed, that lies are reserved for loved ones while strangers don’t warrant the effort of covering the truth. But there’s a beauty to it that makes sense, makes you wonder if Natasha was perhaps the one member of your family you could have connected with had circumstances been different.
“Look, Maura and I were close, maybe too close, because Dad was away so much, but I promise, I’m not your father.”
Natasha shrugs. “It’s just…”
In many ways it’s a technicality, a wiggle of fate. You did bed Natasha’s mother, but not until Natasha was five, and it might classify as a sin of omission to answer only the specific question she’s asking about paternity. But you wonder if this is really even about that or if it’s actually something more universal for alienated (a girl who talks like Natasha is most d
efinitely alienated) children everywhere.
“When I was a kid, I used to pretend I was brothers with my best friend—that Dad wasn’t my dad,” you tell her. “And Braden’s parents called me their other son, and I always stayed there when Dad was away. I think it’s pretty common to hope you’ve got a secret identity.”
After a brief hesitation, you reach out, place your palm on her shoulder, and ask if she’s okay.
Head still down, she nods, and you pray to a God you’ve never really believed in that she won’t cry, because that would fall completely outside your skill set. When she finally looks up, her eyes thankfully are dry.
“We should call Dad now and let him know you’re all right.”
With a sigh beyond her years, Natasha explains that your father had to go to Singapore that afternoon and she was supposed to fly home to Cincinnati a few hours later.
“I got your address from Dad’s phone and convinced him I was old enough that I shouldn’t have to fly as an unaccompanied minor anymore. So after he left, I called the airline and pretended to be my mom and rebooked my flight for tomorrow morning. Then I took the ‘L’ here.”
“What about Maura?”
“I left her a message saying I was staying with Dad one more night.”
“So no one has any idea that you’re here?”
So quiet it’s almost imperceptible: “No.”
There’s a moment where you contemplate letting it slide. Natasha’s already informed her mother she’ll be coming home tomorrow; what difference does it really make if there were half truths involved? But with a sigh that rivals your sister’s, you realize you’re the ranking adult in the situation.
“We need to call your mom.”
“She’ll want to speak with you to verify.”
So you have her dial her mother and stepfather’s house in Ohio, and she hands you the phone.
“Hartlin residence,” Maura says, and you remember all those times you heard her pick up the phone in your father’s house and say, “Ryan residence.”
“Maura?” you ask, though it’s obviously her.
“Speaking.”
“It’s Oliver Ryan.”
A pause, an intake of breath. “Oliver?” Another pause. “I’ve been calling Dan’s about Nat’s message. Did something happen?”
“Nothing bad. I just wanted to make sure you knew her flight got changed.”
Another pause, and Maura asks to talk to your father.
“He had to work, but Natasha and I wanted to see each other, and there was a bit of confusion about when her flight was.”
“So she’s staying with you?”
For an inexplicable reason, it didn’t occur to you that you were agreeing to harbor your sister when you picked up the phone and made this call. Though conceivably Natasha can hear only your end of the conversation, she looks at you with pleading eyes.
“Yes, she’ll stay here, if that’s all right, and I’ll take her to the airport in the morning.”
“I guess that’s okay,” she says with a bit of reserve.
“I’m so sorry for the inconvenience.”
After that there’s really no reason to stay on the phone. But since you haven’t spoken to her in years, it’s hard to hang up.
Of all the incredibly wrong things about what happened between you and Maura, the wrongest may have been that you took off without talking to her. Because the situation was inherently horrible on so many levels, it was at first an easy leap to tell yourself leaving was the best choice for everyone involved. That was likely the case for you, but when you did think about it—on those endless Alaskan winter nights, when there was time to contemplate so many alternate worlds and outcomes—you’d realized it might not have been the best thing for Maura. The whole affair had always really been about your father for both of you, but she was the one who had to stay behind and deal with the fallout. At the time you fled, you didn’t think you cared if she told your dad (it seemed unlikely she would, anyway), but you suppose you owe her a thank-you. Her silence is probably the only reason your relationship with your father wasn’t completely decimated, the reason that Dad is open to whatever it is you’re building now with almost monthly dinners and discussions about airplane parts and the Bears.
“How have you been?” you ask, because it’s been so long and because her daughter, who could so easily have been your daughter, is watching you as if you were an exotic bird.
“I’m good,” Maura says, and it seems like forgiveness. “You?”
Certainly it’s meant as forgiveness when you tell her, “Yeah, I’m doing all right, too.”
And then you’re handing the phone off to your sister, who is covering the mouthpiece and speaking quietly. Politely you busy yourself in the kitchen, suspecting they’re having the kind of conversation reserved for mothers and their preteen daughters who have done something rash and dangerous. Even after the click of the phone, you give Natasha a minute to compose herself before coming back into the living room.
“Thanks for talking to my mom,” she says. “And for letting me stay here.”
You nod and sit in the chair that matches the sofa (also bought from the previous tenant). She sits on the couch and looks at the can of soda.
The digital clock on the DVD player marks the passage of another minute.
“I hope I didn’t spoil any plans you had for the evening,” she says, back to the formal adult, and you remember you should call the doe-eyed lawyer from the garage.
“I didn’t really have anything going on.”
Another minute marked on the DVD clock.
“If this was a movie, we’d bond now,” Natasha says flatly, and you chuckle.
“Did you eat dinner?” you ask.
She shakes her head, so you pull a stack of menus from the kitchen drawer, tell her you’re hungry, too, even though the dishes from the sandwich you made an hour ago are still in the sink. You tell her to choose whatever she wants, but Natasha is a polite girl, so she looks to you.
“How about pizza?” you say. “Tedino’s is on the corner, and they deliver until midnight.”
“Is it Chicago style?” she asks, and when you nod, she smiles. “Dad and I usually get it at least once when I’m here, but we didn’t this time.”
Giving her the TV remote, you instruct Natasha to find something good while you’re ordering. Then you duck into the bedroom to call Jill and explain tonight won’t work for a drink after all. She sounds skeptical when you say you’re with your sister.
“I thought you said she was married and lived in Utah?”
“This is my half sister from Cincinnati. Sometimes I forget about her, too.”
You suspect you and Jill will not have another date and are perfectly fine with that.
Back in the living room, Natasha is watching a show where a bald guy with a mark on the back of his head is talking to the redhead from the jeans ads. There’s something familiar about the look of it, and you realize it must be that Eons & Empires series that started a few years ago on the cable expansion network. Natasha looks up, says you can change the channel.
“No,” you say. “I used to read the comic books. Is the show any good?”
“The Ed Munn books are better, but it’s reasonably well done. It looks like they’re running a marathon tonight.”
The episode is about the Neutrocon, which you remember from the comics, even though you probably haven’t thought about them since you tried to see the movie with Phoebe Fisher fourteen years ago. Parts of the dialogue are clunky, and it’s a little hard to believe that the Jericho Jeans girl is a world-renowned scientist, but the show itself is entertaining.
The pizza arrives gooey and hot, and you and Natasha sit on the couch watching back-to-back E&E episodes while trying not to burn your mouths on molten cheese.
Natasha points to the screen during the closing credits. “I sat next to the actor who plays Captain Rowen on a plane once.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. The show wasn’t even on yet, but I recognized him right away when it started. It was sad; he was trying to get to a funeral from Salt Lake City, but there was a snowstorm.”
You ask if Natasha was in Utah visiting your older sister, feel an unexpected prick of sadness that she was. That she apparently sees Karen and her family at least once a year and is only a few years younger than your nieces (nieces you haven’t seen in nearly as long as you haven’t seen Natasha). And you think you should give Karen a call in the next week or so, just to say hi.
Natasha asks about the comic books you used to like and explains that she’s pretty big into anime. And you discuss Dad a little, now that you’ve established he is, in fact, father to you both.
“He talks about you quite a bit,” she says. “He thought it was really impressive the way you got to see the world.”
You wonder if that’s true, and you ask a question that’s been in the back of your mind for as long as you can remember.
“Did he ever take you up in a little plane?”
“No. I asked once, but he said he took you when you were too young, and he didn’t want to make that mistake again.”
“He said that?”
“Yeah.”
QT runs three more E&E: Rising episodes, and the two of you watch them all.
There’s probably a time when you’re supposed to tell Natasha that she should go to bed, but you’re her brother, not her father. And while you don’t know her well, you know enough to sense that she’ll be more than prepared when you have to take her to the airport the next morning.
10 in some other world, he probably did
In the days and months that followed, Adam wondered if everything would have been different if craft services had had NyQuil instead of Sudafed and Robitussin. Despite his four-year tenure on a show all about parallel worlds, where things were a hair-fracture different one or fifty universes away, he wasn’t accustomed to obsessing over small details that had the potential to change everything. But during the ten days the show had to shut filming down—and all the emptiness afterward—Adam had a lot of time to think about things in those terms.
In Some Other World, Maybe: A Novel Page 22
