Shock

by Francine Pascal

  “I don’t want a nice hot anything,” Gaia told him. “I’ve had enough heat for one day. The Organization destroyed their front before I could finish the job. They set it on fire.”

  That woke Dmitri from his meditative tea making. “What? My child, are you all right?” He looked up, and his face took on an expression of concern. For the first time he noticed what a mess she was, and Gaia saw herself reflected in his reaction. Her hair torn and matted. Her skin caked with dust and muck. Her jeans gray and her sneakers half melted. Ugh. No wonder people had kept their distance on the subway. She either looked like a crazy person or an extra from the newest Christina Aguilera video.

  “Oh, my dear, I had no idea—how could I have let you go?” Dmitri asked, squeezing her upper arms and patting her face with concern. “I would never have sent you if I had known they were planning such an action.”

  “I don’t know who you got your information from, but whoever it is might be trying to set you up,” Gaia told him. “Not only were they planning on destroying the place…there was another problem, too.”

  “What?”

  Gaia forced herself to spit out the bad news. “The dossier on my father wasn’t where it was supposed to be,” she said. “I found the right file cabinet, and there were files in there similar to the one you said I’d find, but none was labeled Moorestown, and none contained information about him. I was in the process of checking out the rest of the file cabinets when the Organization operatives came back to destroy the place.” She paused. “I’m sorry.”

  The old man’s face fell as she relayed the story. He shook his head and sank into a chair, looking even older than he had when they’d found him.

  “Dmitri, are you okay?” He was looking distinctly ashen. Gaia thought he might be having a stroke or something.

  “I feel terrible,” he said. “I put you in danger for an empty reason. Perhaps you are right—I am too feeble-minded to help you find your father.”

  Gaia sat next to him at the table. “Here, drink your tea,” she told him. He gave her a sad stare, and she pushed the tea closer to him. He took a sip, grimaced, then took a sugar cube out of a tin on the table and put it between his front teeth, then sipped again, and then a few more times. His color seemed to return a little bit.

  Frail as he was, he was Gaia’s best hope of finding her father: Even if fifty percent of his information were flawed, it was more than she was going to find anywhere else. Whether or not she trusted this guy, she had to keep the information coming.

  “Don’t worry about it,” she said. “My dad used to tell me that was part of any kind of information gathering. You have to know that a lot of it is going to come up short. You get what you can and don’t give up if it’s not what you expect.” She genuinely felt bad for Dmitri. She hated to see him blame himself, even though she’d been blaming him just a short while earlier. Funny how that happened. She was relieved to see him nod in response.

  “That is true,” he said. “I know it is true, but I wish I had not endangered your life for such a slim chance at finding what we need.”

  “It’s okay. Does this folder have to do with my father?” she asked, tapping the yellow folder.

  “Only indirectly,” Dmitri said. “I need to go through the information and decode what is there. It is possible that there will be locations of other prisons and cells, and from there I can investigate to see if there has been movement recently that might indicate his arrival in one of them. But it is working backward. The other file would have led us directly to him.”

  Gaia felt a pang of regret. Once again, the crappy option had won. But there was nothing she could do about it now.

  “Please, I would like you to clean up,” Dmitri told her. “You must have a shower and let me wash your clothes. This apartment has a small washing machine and dryer.”

  “This place?” Gaia looked around.

  “It was outfitted so that operatives like myself could stay inside for long periods of time.” He shrugged. “I believe the addition of females to our ranks encouraged some creature comforts.”

  “Huh.” Gaia had to admit, a shower sounded good. But she really didn’t want to run into Sam. “No, I’ve got to go,” she said.

  “I insist,” Dmitri said firmly. “Sam will not be back for a long time. I don’t know why you wouldn’t want to see him, but it’s obvious that you don’t. Please, don’t let that stand in the way of your taking care of yourself.”

  Jeez, this guy was such a mother hen. “All right,” Gaia relented. “I’ll take a quick shower. I’d probably attract too much attention on the street looking like this, anyway.”

  “I’ll turn on the hot water now,” Dmitri said. “It takes a long time to warm up.”

  A few minutes later Gaia stood in the steamy bathroom, inspecting the damage to herself. She looked like absolute hell. There was an old brush sitting on the sink, and she tried to yank it through her hair. Giving up, she stepped into the warm stream of water and let the heat sink into her muscles. It burned where the fire had gotten too close. But it felt too good to stop. Forgetting herself, she relaxed and stood with her eyes closed for a long, long time.

  Hidden Masses

  SAM SAT IN THE PUBLIC LIBRARY, reading through the newspapers from the time that he’d been gone and trying to catch up on what he’d missed. He was tired of being a shadow in this world. And though he knew he had to hide—well, that was one of the things about New York that could be either great or horrible, depending on how depressed you were. You could be hidden in plain sight. The city was full of people who might as well be invisible. Old people with no way to fill their empty hours, young people with no direction or desire, displaced people waiting for the next adventure or catastrophe—they filled the public places, the parks and atriums and subways, and even this library.

  And Sam fit right in with the hidden masses.

  He just wanted to know what was going on. Paging through recent papers and magazines and flicking through microfilm was sort of soothing and reassuring. He followed the case of a city scandal about misdirected funds and the dog pound. Totally boring to most, but it was one more thread pulling Sam’s consciousness together. He followed a celebrity divorce from bitter feud to conciliatory appearance on the red carpet. Another thread. He skimmed the top choices of a daytime show’s book club. Whatever he could get his hands on, anything that could tell him what had happened in the world during his confinement, Sam gobbled up with greed. He couldn’t explain why he had such a craving for information. The only reason he could think of was that he just wanted to make up for lost time. To recreate the world as it rolled on without him so he wouldn’t have this massive blank spot in his worldview.

  All that reading made Sam tired. He was still physically drained from his injuries—and the stress on his body wasn’t helping his diabetes, either. He marveled at the fact that his captors had treated him so badly—neglected his every need—but had managed to get him the insulin he needed to survive. As if they wanted him to live, but with a broken spirit. Well, today’s research mission had taken him a long way toward repairing that spirit.

  But damn, his body still needed some mending.

  As he hopped on the subway and headed back down to Chinatown, Sam noticed with a rush that he hadn’t thought about Gaia in hours. Not that she wasn’t there—but she hadn’t been in the forefront of his mind. She was starting to shrink from the massive icon in his mind into regular old Gaia Moore, high school girl who had stolen his heart.

  Funny thing, though. His heart still tightened at the thought of her. His temperature still spiked when he pictured the way her hands brushed across his chest. He still had the most massive feelings for her. Even shrunk down to normal size, Gaia still ruled Sam’s heart.

  And damn it, between misplacing his cell phone, Dmitri’s Internet habit, and the lack of working public phones in this city, he hadn’t been able to get in touch with her all morning. Couldn’t even comfort her—as a friend—after
her fight with Ed. It drove him crazy. But that was the way it was.

  The last thing he expected, as he exited the train and walked up to Dmitri’s apartment, was to see the object of his desire, obsessive or otherwise, wrapped in a terry cloth robe with her hair swathed in a turbaned towel. Even in his fantasies, he hadn’t thought he’d walk into the dingy apartment to find Gaia Moore dripping wet and basically naked. In fact, a postshower Gaia was the last thing Sam Moon had expected to find as he opened the door to Dmitri’s apartment and trudged toward his room.

  End of Story

  “OH! GOD!” GAIA YELPED AS SHE came out of the bathroom to ask Dmitri what he’d done with her clothes. Stupid, stupid, STUPID, she thought. Her heart felt like it had just exploded inside her chest, leaving pulsating bits of arterial matter splattered all over her lungs and stomach. All the warm relaxation of the hot shower drained from her body as she came face-to-face with Sam Moon.

  Sam, the guy she still had lingering feelings for. Sam, the guy who had apparently arranged for her murder the night before. Part of her still bloomed with happiness at the sight of that handsome face; the rest of her wilted with disgust at the guy who’d set her up to be whacked. With all the breaking and entering and arson of the afternoon, she had forgotten her resolution to get out of Dmitri’s apartment before Sam got back.

  Because this was more than she could stand to think about right now.

  “Gaia! Are you all right?” Sam seemed surprised and thrilled to see her—tried to hug her, in fact. Maybe he was checking for the bullet holes that were supposed to be there. Maybe he was surprised just to see her without a body bag and toe tag. Or maybe she was wrong and he hadn’t set her up.

  Click. Her mind turned off and her instincts switched on. Gaia had to get out of this claustrophobic apartment, and pronto.

  “Sam, you are back early,” Dmitri said with dismay, appearing behind him with Gaia’s clothes, cleaned and folded.

  “I thought nobody would be here,” Gaia said to him. “I thought our discussion was top secret.”

  “It is,” Dmitri told her. “He only just walked in. Why are you so upset?”

  “I’m not upset,” Gaia snapped, taking her clothes and vanishing back into the bathroom. “I’m just mad that I hung out this long,” she called out through the door as she frantically shoved her still damp legs into her jeans. Mmm, that’s a pretty feeling: wet denim is just sooo comfortable, she noted distractedly. She did not care. She had to get out of there.

  Of all the idiotic moves, she scolded herself. Getting sidetracked by a shower. Running into Sam when you have to stay focused on your dad. Some reliable daughter you are. She barely noticed how melted her sneakers were as she shoved her feet into them and twisted her hair into a waterlogged knot on top of her head.

  She left the bathroom in a rush, heading straight for the front door as if she were a racehorse with blinders on. “Let me know what you found in that file,” she called out to Dmitri.

  “Gaia,” Sam said uncertainly.

  “Yeah?” She paused at the door, her hand on the knob. She felt her heart take a swan dive into her small intestine, bouncing on her pancreas, liver, and stomach on its way down. Sam’s presence loomed like a planet behind her.

  “Are—are you okay?” he asked. “The last time I saw you, you were fighting with Ed. I just wanted to make sure things worked out.”

  Are you kidding me? Gaia shrieked inside her head. Ed’s not exactly primo in my mind right now, Mister Killing-Me-Not-So-Softly. But she didn’t want to let on that she suspected him. Let him wonder why I’m not dead for a while, she decided. Confront him later, when you’ve got more evidence.

  “Everything’s fine,” she said stonily, glaring at the doorknob. “Can’t you see for yourself? I’m in one piece.”

  With that parting shot, she yanked open the door and left the apartment. Ha, she thought. Let him chew on that for a while. She felt a certain satisfaction that her thinly veiled insult might dig into his double-crossing soul and show him that he couldn’t eliminate her so easily.

  Of course, it was hard to ignore the fact that the look on his face had been more baffled and hurt than insulted and evil.

  But ignore it she did. He’d sent the message that brought her to the church. And in that church she’d been shot at and very nearly killed. End of story.

  Right?

  Right. Right!

  Stark Contrast

  Even in the life of Gaia, this was a weird one.

  Shoop-Shoop

  CROSSING THROUGH THE PARK AGAIN, Gaia felt her head reeling from the potent cocktail of Sam-induced hormones, dad-inspired guilt, and Dmitri-assisted annoyance. She just wanted to wiggle out of her skin like a snake and leave her old self behind. Everything is such a mess, she thought. All I want to do is find my dad, and the harder I try, the more everything in my life gets more screwed up.

  Calling it a park was generous. Let’s get real: To get to the subway, all Gaia had to get through was a half-block-wide strip of grass between two avenues at the base of the Manhattan Bridge. There wasn’t much room for a lanky, athletic girl loping along in a blind fury. Predictably, Gaia collided with one of a group of geriatric Chinese people practicing t’ai chi.

  “I’m sorry,” she blurted out. Expecting to see an elderly Chinese lady glaring up at her, she was both relieved and confused when the victim of her klutziness turned out to be Jake.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” she asked.

  Jake lay on his back, looking just as startled and confused. “Gaia? Did you just try to mug me?”

  Gaia let out an exasperated breath. “Yeah, I was trying to mug you,” she spat. “Times are tough, you know. A girl needs her lunch money.” Then she stepped over his prone frame and stomped up the street. What a day she was having. Even in the life of Gaia, this was a weird one.

  “Gaia!” Jake stood and chased after her, dusting himself off as he went. “I was just kidding. Would you stop?”

  “What do you want?” she snapped.

  “I was just—jeez! Come on, Gaia, don’t you think it’s kind of funny that you literally ran into me in a totally different part of town?”

  Gaia stood for a moment, glaring at him.

  “Ha ha,” she finally said. “Can I leave now?”

  “No!” Jake scratched his head and looked at her curiously. “Are you okay? I mean, you’re not exactly the friendliest person on a normal day, but you’re acting really weird.”

  “Why, because I don’t want to sit and chat with you?”

  “No. Because you literally just knocked me over and you didn’t even say excuse me. You’re such a weirdo!”

  Jake was still laughing, and it was making Gaia feel strange. Besides, the word weirdo was echoing in her head in a way it never had before. Ed’s fault. He’d made that crack about how she couldn’t be part of anything. Okay, so he hadn’t actually made that crack; Gaia had just inferred it from the way he was looking at her. But it still snowballed with Jake’s current crack enough to make Gaia stop herself from storming off.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I was in a hurry.”

  “Well, will you slow down?” he asked. “At least long enough so I can save face with Mrs. Ong and her lady friends?”

  Gaia looked over and saw the small crowd of still gently swaying t’ai chi people. A few of them, though they still had expressions of serene distraction, were peeking over between moves. Jake waved at them, like he was trying to be a little less embarrassed.

  “You’re friends with these old people?” Gaia blurted out.

  “Well, I come down here sometimes just to watch them do their thing,” he said. “Karate isn’t the only stuff I do. The guy who teaches me said I should be familiar with yoga, t’ai chi, and whatever else I can scare up.” He looked back at the swaying figures. “I keep wanting to join in, but I feel funny.”

  “Yeah, so would I,” Gaia told him. “You’d kind of stick out. You’re about two feet taller than any of
them, for one thing.”

  “But they keep saying I should join in. I think if I had a partner, I’d feel a little better.” He peered at her. She glared back.

  “No,” she said.

  “I didn’t ask yet,” he objected.

  “Fine, ask.”

  “Will you come do some t’ai chi with me and the old people so I won’t feel so self-conscious?”

  “No.”

  “Gaia!” Jake shook his head.

  Is this guy just relentlessly amused by every stupid thing that happens on the planet? Gaia wondered. Just what is so goddamn funny?

  “Come on. Have you ever tried it?”

  “When I was a kid,” Gaia admitted. “And I did some yoga, too. But karate’s more my style. I’m not really into deep inner calm.”

  “Trust me, neither is Mrs. Ong,” Jake said. “The first time I met her, she was throwing a fish at someone.”

  Gaia laughed in spite of herself. She had to admit, the willowy movements of the serene oldsters looked very cool. Plus they all seemed to be absolutely free of the kind of anger and frustration that was turning her stomach into a bucket of acid.

  “I suppose it could make me a better fighter,” she admitted.

  “Sure. Focus and whatnot,” Jake agreed. “Help you stay cool in a hot situation, reducing that panic response most people get in the middle of a fight. Fear’s a killer, you know.”

  “I’ve heard that,” Gaia said.

  “Come on,” Jake wheedled, dropping his messenger bag at his feet. “I’ve always wanted to try this. We’re so far from school, nobody will spot us.”

  People from school weren’t the issue. Gaia peered up at Dmitri’s building. His apartment was on the other side; she wasn’t likely to be spotted by him or by Sam. And it wasn’t like she was in a hurry to get back to her Tatiana-infested apartment. This day had her totally frazzled. She hated to admit it, but Jake could be right: Something calming might be just what she needed to grab hold of herself and refocus her attention on the search for her dad.