Hugo & Rose (11 page)

“I don't believe him either.” Adam was trying to be helpful.

Oh, Lord,
thought Rose.
Again with the bikes.

Isaac was refusing to act as he had in the past. Until now he had never settled for long on what toy he most desired; the constantly shifting landscape of greed made Christmas shopping difficult and birthday shopping a nightmare. At Christmastime Rose combated this proclivity by making the boys write letters to Santa in the first week of December. That way when they (inevitably) changed their minds about what they wanted, she could remind them they had written to Santa about their old heart's desire and that he wasn't likely to be able to read their minds.

That said, this did not keep Rose from going shopping on Christmas Eve, attempting to put whatever newer better cooler thing they craved into Santa's sack. But at least if she failed, she had managed to curb their expectations and avoid a little bit of Christmas-morning disappointment.

Usually this far out from “B-day” Isaac would have changed his mind five or six times already, leaping from the latest gaming system to whatever new piece of masculine crap Nerf was selling and back again.

But, to Rose's chagrin, the bike was sticking.

Rose had left toy catalogs on the kitchen table in hopes of something new catching Zackie's eye. Instead of fast-forwarding through the ads flanking the boys' favorite shows on the DVR as she usually did, she had let them play, steeping the boys in their bright commercial flogging.

But still the bike stuck … though Zackie had a few fresh ideas for what he'd like from his grandparents.

Finally Rose just told him to pick something else.

“But why?” he'd asked.

She had shown him the scar buried in her hair. She had told him the story of that day when Papa had shown her how to ride a bicycle.

“Bicycles are dangerous, sweetie. And I don't know what I would do if anything ever happened to you. I just want you to wait a couple more years.”

“How much longer?”

“Maybe when you're ten.”

Isaac had closed his mouth at this. Looked away. But he was quiet.

Rose knew better than to think it was over.

Instead of accepting his mother's proscription, Zackie began collecting evidence in
his
favor, hence the polling of his friends for the age at which they had gotten their bikes.

And he had, naturally, recruited Adam in this endeavor, which was even worse, as Adam discovered that most of his friends, too, already had bikes and knew how to ride them.

“Dad said the reason you got hurt is because when you were kids people didn't wear helmets … and I would always always always wear my helmet.”

Rose wanted to murder her husband.
When had he said this? He knew how she felt about it. So much for a united front.

“Did Daddy also tell you that I didn't wake up for five days and that Baba and Papa thought I might never wake up?”

Adam's little mouth opened. “Like Sleeping Beauty?”

Rose shook her head. “Not fun like Sleeping Beauty.”

Isaac furrowed his brow. Rose could tell he was already thinking of his next plan of attack.

Josh was repentant.

*   *   *

“Sorry, honey. I didn't think it would be a thing. He just asked after you showed him your scar.”

Rose had had Josh paged. He had called immediately, thinking that something had happened to one of the children, and was relieved to find that it was just this quirk of Rose's. He relaxed. Even though he could hear the edge of frustration in her voice, it was nice to hear it during the day. She sounded clearer than she had in recent weeks, closer.

Rose sighed. “I'm sorry. This is my fault.”

This had happened because she hadn't been paying attention. She had been too busy thinking about that
man
to attend to her kids.

“Oh, before I forget, the preschool called me. They must have our numbers mixed up.”

Rose felt her heart stop. Penny hadn't been to school in weeks.

“They left a message asking if Pen was okay. They said she hasn't been in in a while?”

“That's weird.” Rose felt the lie come easily. “Must be another Penny in one of the other classes. I'll call and let them know they have the wrong one.”

“You're such a good mom, Rose.”

Rose was quiet.
She was a horrible mother. She was the worst mother. She was a negligent liar of a mother.

“I love you so much.”

“You too.”

Rose hung up. She had to fix this. She had to get rid of these thoughts that had pulled her away from her family.

Her stomach seized again.

 

eight

She called the neighborhood woman. Mrs. Delvecchio, the widow with the lovely garden and the house that smelled of stale potpourri.
Could she take Penny for a few hours?

Of course, dear.

Rose had dropped her off with a stuffed diaper bag and a promise to be back soon. The ancient television in the Widow Delvecchio's den was already running network cartoons when she left. Rose shrugged it off.

“No worse than she's gotten in the car with me these past few weeks.”

She was getting started later than she'd like. Talking with Josh and waiting for Mrs. D to call back had eaten away her morning. She'd be rushing to get back on time.

But what she had planned wouldn't take too long.

Just a quick encounter, a brief eye contact, and she'd be healed. She'd be home in time to have ants on a log waiting for the boys when they got back from school. Their mother returned to them, as good as she ever was.

Whatever that was worth.

Rose had decided she couldn't do what Naomi had suggested. She couldn't
introduce
herself.

But there was a simple way to get close to him. To look him in the eye and
see
.

Today was his shift. All she had to be able to do was order lunch.

*   *   *

Traffic was heavier this late in the day. Clogged with trucks from Denver's distribution centers sent out to the exotic reaches of Nebraska, Kansas, and beyond. It took Rose longer than usual to reach the battered exit sign, to turn onto the loop of the ramp and head into town.

Two large touring buses dominated the parking lot of the Orange Tastee, their bifold doors open. Teenagers teemed out of them, filtering from the buses to the restaurant. Rose parked the van and watched them through the windshield.

She could tell they weren't American teenagers. The boys' pants were just a little too high and the girls' shirts were just a little too loose. European, probably, possibly German, their faces characterized by wide, round cheekbones. A few of the boys wore highlights in their spiked hair, shyly touching the hardened tips as they smiled at the girls.

This was good, Rose reasoned. She could just slip in among them.

Still, her heart thumped.
No. No. No. No.

It was two thirty.

If she was going to do it, she had to do it now. The boys got home just after four.

Rose sat for another five minutes before she finally was able to force herself out of the car.

*   *   *

Inside, the restaurant was packed. Every table was filled with exuberant Aryan teenagers, happy to be off the bus, filling the air with the scent of foreign pheromones. These
überkinder
flitted from one table to the next, chattering in their hard language, their cadences a strange music in this place.

Rose stood in line behind a passel of them.
What were they doing here? What lame tour of America had included this stop?

Though she had stared at its interior for weeks, Rose had never been inside the Orange Tastee. She hadn't tasted its food. Even that first time she had ordered only for the kids.

It smelled of oranges and burning meat, the char of the grill carrying over the sickly sweet smell that comes from too much fruit. The scent called to her mind the bees and flies that hover over trash at summer barbecues.

The small staff was clearly overwhelmed with the demands of the customers, ordering hot dogs and Pepsis in careful, Teutonic-accented English.

The teen girl Rose had seen that first night was at a register (“Could you say that again, I don't understand you”), struggling to handle the influx of cash and sending the orders to the cooks in the back.

Rose saw no sign of the boy who had been with her on that first night. The Bullshitter was absent.

For an oddly hopeful moment, Rose thought maybe the Man Who Was Not Hugo would not be there either. Maybe she had gotten the days wrong. Maybe he was sick. Maybe she wouldn't have to do this.

But then he stepped out from the back, shooing the girl away from the register. Sending her into the recesses of the storeroom to fetch more cups.

Rose couldn't breathe.

Everything will be okay.

Rose repeated the mantra that got her through takeoffs and landings.

Everything will be okay. Everything will be okay. This is perfectly safe.

Rose looked at the glass doors of the exit to her right. She could leave.

“Ma'am, may I take your order?”

Rose looked up at
him
. His eyes were on the register. Waiting.

This was as close as she'd ever been. She could see the spot on his cheek where he'd missed with his razor this morning. The frayed edges of his fingernails.

She swallowed. “Uh … a Tastee Dog … and fries.”

His fingers danced over the keys.

“Would you like a drink with—”

He looked up and Rose saw it happen.

His bland smile faltered as his eyes met her searching face. Pupils widening. His breath stopped.

“—that.”

He stared at Rose, the pink draining from his cheeks. Rose heard a sound bubble from her lips.

“You…”

He pulled his eyes back to the register, his head shaking slightly, flicking her away. Shaking her off. Swatting at that impossible thing that just transpired, sending it away.

Recognition.

“You know me.”

Rose heard a voice say it, and he flinched. It took a moment for her to recognize the voice as hers.
Her
voice speaking words from
her
mouth, far away, beneath the rushing sound in her ears.

He turned away from her, his hands shaking as he pulled a tray from beneath the counter. He pulled a dog and a cone of fries from the stainless shelf.

He turned back, head down. Avoiding her eyes.

“Will that be cash or charge?”

Maybe she had imagined it. Rose started to doubt what she had seen just seconds ago. Her brain felt as if it were falling, reaching for a thought to hold on to, something to make sense of the “thisness” of this moment. But the thoughts were coming too quickly to form; there were no words for this sensation, no precedent for this moment.

She handed him her credit card.

He took it without looking up. Again he shook his head. Pinched at the spot where his eyes met his nose.

“I'm sorry, did you say you wanted a drink?”

He waited for her to answer. Rose could barely make sense of the syllables he had said. Finally, reluctant, he looked up at her.

And she
knew
.

“I thought I was … but … you
know me.
”

The Man Who Was Not Hugo … Who Could
Not
Be Hugo … shook his head, a violent jerk. He was trembling. Sweating suddenly and profusely, a small, clear smatter of dew appearing under the lip of his paper cap. He was breathing in sharp sips, gasping, a panic attack setting in.

And in the center of this storm his eyes anchored on her. Locked. Hooked on her. He was lost in seeing her. He was lost in looking at Rose. In the impossibility of
her
.

The stone in Rose's stomach lurched upward into her lungs.
Recognition.

He turned suddenly, almost a spasm, knocking her tray to the floor. The fries and the dog hit the tile, rolling toward the kitchen.

“Hugo, are you all right?”

It came out of her mouth naturally.
His name.
Surely his name. Indisputably his name. She said it as she had said it a thousand thousand times on the island, making sure he was safe, making sure he was there.

Hugo.

His eyes went
wide
at those two small syllables. He stepped back, distancing himself from her, tripping over his feet. Suddenly he was falling backward into the prep station, tumbling to the floor, and everyone was staring at him. The employees, the Germans … and
Rose
.

He gasped, “Air. I need air!”

He stumbled to his feet, his arms forward, flailing. He pushed past the counter, his hands slapping the glass of the door. Pushing. And then he was outside.

And then, as she had done a thousand thousand times before, Rose followed him.

*   *   *

She followed him onto the cold, clear shimmer of the pavement. The stark Colorado light reflected off the parked cars, sharpening the shadows on his back as he ran from her.

“Hugo! Hugo, please stop!”

He stopped and turned to her. His face was angry. Furious.

“Nobody calls me Hugo anymore.”

Rose stopped. Ten feet from him … trying to make sense of what he'd just said.
Anymore. Which meant …

He shifted, his palms curling into themselves. Gone was the gasping man at the counter, and here was a rattlesnake. A coiled threat.

“Look, this isn't funny. I'm sure whoever got you to do this thought maybe you could pass … and you're very close, but…”

“But what?” Rose heard herself speak. Words lost in the wind. She sounded like a child. Tiny.

“No offense, you sort of look like her, but not really. You're like her older, fatter sister.”