The Changeling

by Victor Lavalle

  “You are about to pay us seventy thousand dollars for this thing,” Apollo said. “I want you to be able to say you saw it first.” He set the book down and worked the tape up with the tip of his mailbox key.

  “You said it was a gift,” Patrice slurred.

  “It’s for my wife,” William said. He watched Apollo work.

  “It’s her birthday or something?” Patrice asked. He held on to that fourth beer, squeezed it tight.

  William dropped his head. “We’re estranged.” He stopped and sighed. “My wife moved back to her parents in Bay Shore. I’ve been on my own for eleven months.”

  Apollo lifted the book. “Here it is.”

  William took the book and held it close to his face. He opened the covers. He read the inscription on the first page.

  “This is perfect,” he whispered.

  A look of relief passed across William’s ruddy face. A few tears gathered in the corners of his eyes. From just the littlest bit of information—an estranged wife, the family moved out—Apollo saw the outlines of a moving story forming.

  “Gretta’s father used to read this book with her when she was little,” William said. “That’s my wife. Gretta Strickland. Her father was Forrest Strickland. They were from Alabama, just like in the book. A city called Opelika.” He spoke so softly that the waters slapping against the hull nearly drowned him out. Apollo had to lean closer so he could hear.

  William closed the book and looked at the cover. “It’s just a story about a good father, right?” he continued. “Nobody could live up to it, not in real life, but I think her dad used to read it to her just to give her a model, something to strive for, you know? She never forgot it. And then she married me, but I wasn’t Atticus Finch.”

  “Neither was he!” Patrice said, much too loudly. William looked to him quickly, but then back to Apollo. “You know,” Patrice muttered. “Because of the other book.”

  William spoke to Apollo directly. “I’m about ten years older than you, I think. I was one of the last waves of men who thought all you had to do was work, work, work and that made you a great dad. Provide. Provide. Provide.

  “But you know what happens when you do it like that? You look up after twenty or twenty-five years, and your wife doesn’t know you. Your kids might respect you—might—but that other thing, the happiness, you aren’t close enough with them to share it. You understand? Your wife doesn’t know you, and neither do your kids.

  “Then guys your age get a whole new data set. It’s not enough to make the money, and besides you can’t make enough to cover everything, not on your own. Your wife might want to work or she might not, but it doesn’t matter—she has to work. When I was starting out, you got by on one income, and that was enough, but these days you’ve got to be poor or rich to survive on one income. You want to stay afloat in the middle, and you both are hitting that nine to five.”

  William returned the book to Apollo, who rewrapped it with a new reverence. It was not simply an expensive sale anymore—it was soon to play a part in one family’s history.

  “ ‘New Dads,’ ” William said. “I know people make fun. But I see those guys pushing babies in a stroller on the way to work, or the ones with their kids at the park at six in the morning, and I feel like I missed the good part. I know it’s a lot of work, but it’s the good stuff. And I didn’t even know I was missing it. No one ever told me it was the stuff to covet. My dad certainly didn’t make it a priority. Anyway, it’s not like doing things the old way left me rich. I worked my ass off to barely stay afloat. It’s costing me most of what I have saved to try and win Gretta back. With this.”

  William pointed at the book, then gulped the last of his beer. Apollo finished the wrapping and lightly ran his pointer finger along the edges one more time.

  “If I could just get my wife back into the house, I could do better. Now I know what matters. I love my daughters so much, but I never said it. I thought it was obvious, or should have been obvious, because of the things I did for them. But people need to hear the words, you know? I didn’t realize that for twenty-five years.”

  William accepted the book from Apollo. He clutched it to his stomach as if to protect it.

  “When I saw your listing for the book, I figured maybe it could convince Gretta I was serious. She read this to the girls just like her father did with her. I used to call my wife Mockingbird when we were young. Like a pet name. I don’t remember when I stopped. It was after the kids came, I know that much. Couple of years ago I finally figured out what I was doing wrong. I tried to go back to the old days. Go back to the way things used to be. But maybe it was too late. Or she didn’t want to go back in time. Not with me. She left me because we were absolute strangers. I never hit her or cheated on her. We barely even argued.

  “I mean, I’ve been a programmer for nineteen years. Nights and weekends are when you catch up on the work you didn’t get done from nine to five! I bet I spent more time on code than I did on my marriage. I know I did. I turned into a ghost to her, and maybe she was a ghost to me. You think this could work, though? What’s your feeling, guys?”

  Patrice lifted one of the empty bottles and placed it back into the case. He did the same with the others, his and theirs. He stopped looking tipsy. It was as if William’s earnestness, his honesty, had sobered the big man.

  “You tell her all that stuff you just told us,” Patrice said. “I bet she’d at least consider it.”

  William nodded faintly. He reached into his pocket for his phone again.

  “I can write you both a check if you want,” he said. “But it would be even quicker if I just sent the funds to an account electronically. Do you want to do that?”

  Apollo gave William his routing number and the account number. He and Patrice would split the profits after the money cleared.

  William refreshed his phone’s browser and stared at the number in his savings account, all zeros. “That’s it then,” he said softly. “If this doesn’t get them back, I’m all tapped out.” He set down the phone and held the wrapped book. “This paper is a nice touch.”

  Then, right there on the boat, William took one hiccupping breath and cried. After the surprise of it passed, both Apollo and Patrice brought a hand to William’s back and patted him as he let his tears out.

  FIRST THING YOU do when you get some money is pay off old debts. Don’t buy anything new until your ledger is clear. Apollo learned that early in his career as a book man, and it remained a bit of gospel for him.

  Which is how he ended up making plans to see Kim Valentine again.

  The Mahayana Buddhist Temple is one of the most famous sights for tourists to visit in all of Chinatown. Two golden lions guard the red front doors, and inside sits the largest Buddha statue in all of New York City. Before it became the Mahayana Buddhist Temple, it had been the Rosemary Theater, a place that showed a steady rotation of kung fu movies and porn films.

  In 2011 Kim asked Apollo and Emma to meet her at this temple when they’d agreed to take her on as their midwife. None of them were Buddhists, and when they arrived they were treated—appropriately—like any of the other million tourists who wandered through to gawk at the red and gold designs inside. They stood under the great golden Buddha, sixteen feet tall and perched on a lotus flower, his head ringed by a blue halo fashioned from neon tubing. They hadn’t known if they were supposed to get on their knees, bow their heads, or what. Apollo, out of a very old habit, even made the sign of the cross.

  Kim finally had to admit that meeting clients at a Buddhist temple just seemed kind of “holy” in a way that promised to offend none of her clients, all of them Westerners. Emma and Apollo had been the first ones to even question the meeting place. Feeling silly, they all went out to eat at a spot nearby called Tasty Dumpling, on Mulberry Street, the best dumpling spot in Chinatown. A good meal together felt even holier than the temple visit.

  It was in this spirit—the warmth of those old times—that Apollo greeted Ki
m out in front of the temple. He stood next to one of the golden lions, making room for the tourists and actual practicing Buddhists moving in and out of the space. When Kim arrived, she seemed burned through, bone tired.

  “I was up for two days,” she admitted after they hugged. When she stepped back, she watched his face warily for a moment. “It’s good to see you. Did you bring me here to yell at me?”

  “I thought about it,” Apollo said, trying to seem light but not sure if he quite pulled it off. “But I picked this place because it’s a happy memory.”

  Kim leaned into him again, and the hug lasted longer this time.

  “Do you want to go inside, or do you want to walk?” Apollo asked.

  “It’s kind of dark in there,” Kim said. “I’m so tired I might fall asleep.”

  Apollo pointed over her shoulder toward the Manhattan Bridge. “Let’s walk then,” he said.

  They crossed the street and stopped on the traffic island as five hundred cars took the on-ramp to the bridge. The grand arch and colonnade of the Manhattan Bridge appeared majestic even under decades of soot.

  Kim looked pained for a moment before she spoke. “Triplets,” she said, then caught herself and scanned Apollo. “Do you mind me talking about this?”

  “It’s okay.”

  “Triplets,” she repeated. “Never had that many before. The couple used fertility treatments. It’s kind of amazing how commonplace that kind of thing is now. I’m still amazed by it, and I see it all the time.”

  “Do you think it’s a bad idea? Would you go back to the way it was?”

  Kim opened her hands as if she held a baby in them now. “It means more life in the world,” she said. “I’m a sucker for life.”

  “I wanted to pay you what we owed you.” Apollo took out his wallet and found the check he’d written. “I’m sorry, it’s postdated until Friday. That’s when the money clears.”

  He held the check between two fingers, and it flapped there in the strong winds rolling off the East River. Kim couldn’t have looked more confused. She shook her head, and her tired eyes turned even redder.

  “In the end you didn’t even need me. Emma did it herself. You did it together.”

  “Between you and that class, we were well trained,” Apollo said. “And this is yours.”

  “Apollo,” she said, but then seemed lost for anything more.

  “I never found out her third wish,” Apollo said, not really speaking to Kim.

  Kim stepped toward him and put her arms around him. “I think you should know,” she started. Her face stayed pressed close to his neck, and the traffic moved on and off the Manhattan Bridge. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” she said, crying openly now.

  “But this is how it is.”

  They let go of each other. Apollo still held the check between his fingers, and finally Kim nodded and slipped it into her hand. She kissed his cheek once, and he watched her go.

  “Goodbye, Valentines,” Apollo whispered.

  Apollo stayed there until long after Kim disappeared in the throngs of Canal Street. He turned back to the bridge. He liked the idea of walking it, crossing over water into Brooklyn. He jogged across the road and made it to the pedestrian footpath. He wasn’t on it for two moments before his phone rattled in his pocket. After two more steps, the phone vibrated again. He stopped and looked down at the East River below him. For one moment he considered tossing the phone away, but then he succumbed to a much older technology, hardwired into the human brain: curiosity. He swiped his phone and found one new text message.

  Emma Valentine is alive.

  I can help you find her.

  APOLLO STAYED THERE on the bridge for how long—twenty minutes, maybe more? He stared at the phone as if it would speak. Whose voice would he hear? He stayed there clutching at the phone and waiting while passersby skirted around him, huffing with aggravation because of the space he occupied. People on bikes rang their bells or shouted to let them pass, but Apollo only stared at his phone like a caveman who had just discovered fire. Then another text appeared.

  Follow the map.

  Just like that, a map opened on Apollo’s screen. A grid appeared, and in a moment the contours of Chinatown were drawn in. A rendering of the Manhattan Bridge that mimicked an architectural plan, and on it a small blue dot that was Apollo’s phone. Now a red blip appeared at the far edge of his screen.

  Come to me.

  At first Apollo thought the red dot marked a spot in Chinatown, but as his blue dot came closer to the red dot, the map on the phone rearranged the city, nudging the red dot farther north. Not Chinatown but Little Italy, not Little Italy but NoLita. Apollo held on to his phone, a hook reeling him toward the fisherman. He stepped into traffic four different times and received a chorus of horns. He slammed into countless people as he moved on the sidewalks, but if they cursed him, he never noticed. He left NoLita and entered the East Village. He walked west until he reached Washington Square Park. The blue dot and red dot nearly overlapped now.

  The Washington Square Arch mirrored the arch at the Manhattan Bridge. But where the first had felt like the gateway to his escape—a chance to cross the waters—the Washington Square Arch only led him farther inland. As soon as he passed through the archway, the map on Apollo’s phone closed. The application shut down, and he hadn’t been the one to close it. Another text message.

  I see you.

  Apollo wondered if this would turn into torture. A scavenger hunt across all of Manhattan, led by some mastermind who’d reveal himself—or herself—only at the end of the long game. Apollo didn’t have the patience for any bullshit like that.

  Just tell me where the fuck you are or I’m leaving, he texted back.

  The phone vibrated.

  Sorry! I’m by the fountains.

  An apologetic mastermind. That was a nice surprise.

  WILLIAM WHEELER STOOD by the large old fountain waving his cellphone like a ramp service agent guiding a plane on the runway.

  “William?” Apollo said once they were close enough to talk. He’d honestly been expecting it to be Kim, or maybe Patrice. Even Lillian, but not this near-stranger who’d recently paid an enormous sum of money for a book. What if this turned out to be some intricate, perverse way to request a refund? Another flash of showmanship on William’s part.

  “Mr. Kagwa,” William said. “Apollo. I’m sorry to see you again like this.”

  It was too loud here, and too many people passed through. The mass of bodies bumping Apollo built a kinetic charge inside his body. Strange to be drawn all the way to the West Village by a cryptic message; even stranger to find William fucking Wheeler standing here, and now all these people kept bumping and tussling, and it made Apollo feel like he needed to do something epic and thoughtless. If they didn’t move from this crowded park, Apollo realized he was going to hit William. He grabbed William at the elbow and shoved him through the crowd. He pushed him forward as if the man were a plow.

  “Sorry,” William muttered to people. “So sorry. My apologies!”

  They crossed Washington Square North and stood by a block of beautifully maintained redbrick row houses that existed in almost direct opposition to the reality of Washington Square Park. Where the park practically seethed with vitality and chaos, the row houses were as ordered as rare books in a private library. Foot traffic fell off, too. Apollo’s temper came under control.

  He let go of William’s arm, lifted his phone, and shook it at him. “What the fuck is this?” he asked.

  William, for his part, seemed to be out of breath, or maybe just scared. He touched his elbow gingerly.

  Apollo stepped closer. “What is with those texts,” he asked, his tone stony.

  “I know this has got to be pretty mysterious,” William said. “I didn’t mean to get cloak and dagger about it.”

  “Do you really know that Emma is alive?”

  William leaned back against the low wrought-iron railing that protected the row houses f
rom the sidewalk. “I do. I swear.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me when we talked at the Dunkin’ Donuts? Or on the boat?”

  William shook his head. “I didn’t know then. I only just found out. I only just wanted to find out.”

  “Why?”

  “After meeting you,” he said. “Talking with you. I mean, you go to those group meetings to deal with…what happened to you. That’s hard enough, but then some woman jumps up and starts saying all sorts of crazy stuff to you? It’s not right.”

  William spread his arms, hands extended, as if to show he carried no weapons, no malice. “I guess I thought I’d do what I could to help you.”

  “The FBI and NYPD couldn’t find her,” Apollo said. The phone in his hand felt as heavy as a brick.

  William rose from the fence. He looked up and down the block as if scanning for eavesdroppers. “There was a time when the police were your only resource. If they couldn’t find your wife, then no one could. But that’s not true anymore, Apollo. A hundred people with a hundred computers across the country can cover as much ground. And if those hundred people really care about what happens? They’ll work on it day and night. They won’t stop. And that’s what they did when I told them I wanted to help you.”

  “You told other people about all this?”

  “Only my friends,” William said. “People I could trust. People who cared.”

  Apollo felt slightly dizzy. “So where is she then?” Had he asked the question out loud? Apollo couldn’t be sure.

  “She’s on an island in the East River.”

  Suddenly, magically, Apollo was sitting on the sidewalk. He hadn’t actually expected William to say anything so specific. Or for her to be so close. William put out his hand and helped Apollo up. A handful of people passed by but paid them no attention.

  “How do I get there?” Apollo said.

  “You need a boat,” William said.

  “I don’t have a fucking boat.”

  William pulled out his phone. He swiped a screen, and another. He tapped the little icon of a dinghy. “There’s an app for that.”