Chapter Seventeen
It takes me four hours to get to Miami. I drive down the interstate along Florida’s Gulf Coast before cutting across Alligator Alley and winding up in South Florida. The air is different here, even compared to that of the Tampa Bay area. It’s heavier, it’s thicker, and it’s far more humid. Take one step outside, and you feel wet.
Having visited Miami on a number of occasions, I’ve found the city to be overrated. It’s a haven for college kids and retirees. It’s not a place in which I would settle down and start a family. Miami’s poverty rate is sky high and the number of violent crimes in Miami is on par with that in Philadelphia, even though Philly has three times as many residents.
I would never say all of this in Elena’s presence. This is her hometown and I make it a point never to openly blast someone’s hometown. No matter how negatively the general, nationwide population may look upon your city, it’s still your home. There’s something to be said for that. It’s not as if Philadelphia’s perfect. Most people see it and its citizens as dirty and undignified. My view, of course, is different. It’s home.
But I digress.
I pick Jimenez and Hamilton up from Miami International, an old, large and confusing airport. We check into a Hampton Inn amongst all the high-rises in downtown Miami and each get our own rooms. We don’t want to be too far from the Julia Tuttle Causeway, a bridge which runs across Biscayne Bay and connects downtown Miami with Miami Beach. The causeway, according to Elena, is also the target of the A of J’s next attack.
The three of us are huddled around the desk in Jimenez’s room. She sits in the desk’s chair. I sit on the edge of her bed while Nick sits on the floor.
“Why there?” I say.
“There used to be a designated colony for sex offenders under the bridge,” she says. “They called it Bookville.”
“You said there used to be?” Hamilton says.
“Right. There’re still some there; enough for the A of J to give the A of I the impression that that’s why they hit it.”
Hamilton rolls his eyes. “That is, if the A of I ever made them explain themselves.”
“That’s not why they’ve targeted it, is it?” I say.
“No, it’s not,” Elena says. “It’s just more chaos.”
“What are they going to use this time?”
“A plane.”
“Are you serious?”
She nods her head. “Commercial airliner.”
“Jesus,” Nick says.
“Pilots flying into MIA often circle out into the ocean before making their descent,” she says. “The A of J wants to throw a plane into the side of the causeway. Between the size of the plane and its fuel …”
Nick makes an explosion noise, using his hands to illustrate.
“How do we know exactly where they’ll hit it?” I say.
“About two-thirds of the causeway is surrounded by small patches of land,” Elena says.
“Kind of like an island.”
“Right. The other third is exposed to the bay.”
“How the hell are we going to control a plane? No way we keep that thing from crashing. It’s too big.”
Elena shrugs. “If the A of J can crash it, we can keep it in the air.”
“Or at least keep it from crashing into the bridge,” Nick says. “We could land it safely in the bay.”
“Like that plane in the Hudson River a few years ago,” I say.
“Exactly,” she says.
“So, what’s our plan?” Nick says.
“At 0800, we’ll pull over near the causeway’s point of the exposure. That’ll give us a few moments before they’re to execute their plan.”
“Right in the middle of rush hour.”
“Yes,” she says. “They didn’t choose that timing by accident.”
Something about this entire campaign bothers me, though. It’s been stuck in my craw since I left Clearwater. “I have a question.”
Elena and Nick stare at me blankly.
“Let’s say we save the bridge. Then what?”
“What do you mean?” Elena says. “We recruit more former A of Is and move on to the next disaster.”
I purse my lips and shake my head slowly. “This is all a little shortsighted, no? I mean, what if we all die tomorrow? It’s not like there’s anyone out there right now who’d pick up where we left off.” I swallow hard and look both of my two comrades in the eye. “I just think there needs to be an endgame here. There’s three of us and God only knows how many of them. And the A of J is on to us. There’s nothing that precludes us from being eliminated.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“The only way to win this thing is to stop the A of J, right? I’m just saying … instead of waiting for them to attack, why don’t we attack them?”
“I’m not following,” Hamilton says.
“The Arrowhead,” I say.
Nick and Elena both groan. “No way. Out of the question.”
“Why? Didn’t Richardson say destroying it would be catastrophic? Let’s at least take it. It’d definitely scare the shit out of them, wouldn’t it?”
“And the A of I. I don’t know about you but I’m okay just pissing off the A of J,” Hamilton says.
“And that’s if we could ever find the thing,” Elena says.
“Let’s ask Richardson. I’m sure he knows.”
Both of them shake their heads.
“I don’t get it. Why are you guys so—”
“Doesn’t the A of I still pay your salary?” Nick says.
“Well, yeah, but—”
“What about your safety?” Jimenez says.
“What about my safety?”
“The agencies aren’t Philly P.D., Calvin. That’s all I’m saying. Look, when we finally get a chance to catch our breath, we’ll recruit more people.”
“Fine.” Their reaction was some kind of strong. I feel like there’s something they’re not telling me.
“Anything else?” Nick says. “I’m hungry.”
“No,” Elena says. “That’s all, gentlemen.”
“I think I’m going to grab something from the sub shop across the street,” he says, standing up. “Anyone want to come with?”
“No, I’m good,” I say, following him to Elena’s door.
“No, thanks, Nick,” she says. “Calvin, wait.”
I turn around to look at Elena.
She waits for Hamilton to leave before standing. “I want to visit my parents, before it gets dark. Can you take me?”
“To the cemetery?”
She nods.
“Sure, let me just grab my wallet.”
With the sunlight waning, we drive to a cemetery just outside Little Havana, not twenty-five minutes from our hotel. Although Elena has been quiet throughout the car ride, she’s been more pensive than unpleasant.
“How did the A of I compare,” I ask her, “with what you did in the military?”
She looks over at me. “I still did some of the same things … intelligence gathering and stuff like that.”
“What’s different, aside from the obvious?”
“For one, I was actually making a difference in people’s lives.”
“So you did like it.”
“Of course.”
“I guess it just seemed too warm and fuzzy for you.”
“No,” she says. “I really did like it.”
“Well, you had a funny way of showing it.”
She shrugs. “It was a shield.”
I glance at her. “Oh, I know all about shields. Do—do you care to share?” I’m not sure if her aforementioned wound has healed fully, but she brought this up. It must not be as painful as it was that night in Repentigny.
“Only if you tell me about yours.”
We trade glances, her brown eyes teasing me behind the veil of the foremost strands of her hair. This is the most relaxed I’ve seen Elena. As such, it’s also the most vibrant I’ve ever seen her.
I tel
l her about my flawed friendship with Ronni, how I held it in such haughty, untouchable regard. I explain to Elena how I could love Ronni so much that I couldn’t admit it until the very end. I even tell her about Ashley Koch and how her patience for my selfishness ran thin well before Ronni’s.
“Do you still miss her?” Elena says. “Ronni?”
“Yes.” I shrug. “But it’s not like she was ever mine to begin with.”
Elena nods her head. She then holds her hands together on her lap and stares down at them. Her lengthy, brown mane hides her face from me.
“What about y—”
“Mine was a boy,” she says, still focused on her hands. “In high school, I dated a boy named David. We took all the same classes and were in JROTC together.”
“So you knew you were going to go into the military for a while.”
“Yeah. David did, too. At least, that’s what he told me.” She moves her hair away from her face. “We both applied to Colorado Springs and said we’d only go if we both got in. If not, we were both going to enlist right out of high school.”
“Wow.”
“Well, we both got in and we both went.”
On my left, I see the cemetery’s entrance approaching.
“Then, one day,” she says with a sneer, “he was gone.”
“He left?”
“Yup,” she says, nodding her head. She throws her hands up only to let them make a loud slap on her thighs. “Didn’t even tell me.”
“Damn, what a punk,” I say. “Was he homesick?”
“Sort of.”
“Well, if were you there. How much more home did he need?”
“That’s the thing,” she says. She points for me to turn into the cemetery.
“Another girl?” She nods. “In Miami?” She nods again. “That’s messed up.”
“I found out when I went home for the holidays that first year.”
I can only shake my head. “That’s why you put up your shield.”
“Kind of. The worst of it was the aftermath. I cried, all the time. And in the military, that means you’re weak.”
“Right.”
“The other girls would all smother me with pity. The guys …” she says, looking out the passenger side window. “Let’s just say they really liked the weak girls at the academy. I put up my shield and got used to it. Back then it was perfect. Nobody wanted a damned thing to do with me. I loved it.”
“It’s not too late, Elena.”
She shakes her head. “I don’t want to live without my shield.”
“Don’t want to or don’t know how?”
She looks back down at her hands. I hope David’s happy. He ruined Elena’s view of all people, not just men. At her core, there is a pleasant Elena Jimenez, one with a sense of humor, one who sees the good in people. It’s a shame. That’s a woman I’d really love to get to know.
“I’m sorry,” I say, driving down the cemetery’s main drag. “You deserve better.”
“Right there,” she says, pointing to a group of gravestones to my left. She’s put up her shield again.
I stop the car, making sure to leave enough space for any other cars that may traverse this narrow road. I think we’re alone, however. I can see no other cars or people for as far as my sight will allow.
We walk side-by-side through two rows of headstones before stopping in front of two tombstones, memorials for Jorge and Andrea Jimenez. The tributes on both tombstones are written in Spanish. Andrea died only three years ago.
Elena takes a step forward. She lowers her head as she toes the imaginary line of committing the impropriety of standing over one’s grave. She begins speaking to her parents, I presume, in Spanish. I imagine her telling them that she misses them and, if she believes in God, she’s asking Him to watch over them. During her tribute, Elena’s voice catches, causing her to speak louder. She wipes tears from both her cheeks as she continues her prayer, stopping every so often to let out a sob or to sniffle. Before long, Elena is overcome, burying her face in her hands.
If Elena were to ever ask me about my parents, I’d be embarrassed. I wouldn’t know how to answer, honestly. I never really knew my father, and my mother and I have a strained relationship, to put it kindly. Money aside, I couldn’t tell you what she’s been up to in recent years. Hell, the fact that I haven’t written her a check yet that hasn’t been cashed is the only reason I know she isn’t dead. Morbid, I know, but I feel better off; Celia Williams is a hard woman to please. To wit, she bemoaned my decision to choose Penn over Tuskegee, despite Penn’s offering more scholarship money. If you know anything about Tuskegee University, or any of the other historically black colleges, you get an idea of my mom’s view of the world and I can tell you it was no doubt formed during the 1950s. Elena is not the first person I’ve known who has loved their parents this fiercely. But I’m embarrassed, without fail, whenever I see the manner in which people like her interact with their parents, even after they’ve passed away. My mom may annoy the shit out of me, but she’s still my mom.
I step forward and, for a brief moment, place my hand on the small of Elena’s back. “Mr. and Mrs. Jimenez, I hope that, wherever you are, you’re proud of your daughter …”
Elena pulls her hands away from her face. I keep my eyes on her parents’ headstones but I can feel her eyes upon me.
“… She has grown very beautiful and very strong. Currently, she—she needs your guidance. She has started down—started on a journey that will require the greatest strength and the sharpest … decisions. She is well-trained and well-prepared for this. But, I also know that she hurts inside. Please give her your guidance and love so that she may possess greater strength to overcome all obstacles.”
Elena takes my right hand in her left and, with tears still rolling down her cheeks, leans her head on my shoulder. The scent of vanilla fills my nose. With the soft skin of her arm against mine, I turn to face her. She averts her eyes, attempting to hide the sadness that lies within them. Then, with the quickness of a cat, she wraps her arms around my ribcage, embracing me with a loving viciousness. With her head firmly pressed against my chest, I feel her core muscles contracting again. Remembering the last time she cried on my chest, I keep my arms at my side.
I look over at Jorge’s and Andrea’s headstones and wonder if they are looking upon this scene.
“Hold me,” Elena says between sobs. “Please.”
I wrap my arms around her as she presses her body firmly against mine. I muffle every cry and absorb every sob. When her cries subside, I pull away, hoping to see Elena’s face. Instead, she lowers her head, hiding from my gaze. With my right hand, I lift her head, her eyes finally meeting mine. Her face is a beautiful disaster: her cheeks flushed, eyes swollen and hair scattered across her moistened visage.
I brush her hair aside as she wipes her tears away. We share a laugh. I think Elena’s embarrassed to have shown me this much. I hold the side of her face with my right hand as we trade smiles and I draw my face closer to hers. She doesn’t back away.
She then covers the rest of the distance, softly overwhelming my lips with hers. I savor the moment. I’ve never felt a kiss this powerful, this meaningful. It’s the kiss I never want to end.
And it stops.
Elena pulls away and averts her gaze again. “I’m sorry,” she says, trying to catch her breath. “We have to go.”
She walks past me, toward the car, leaving me to stand alone in front of her parents’ headstones. Was that a mistake?
I don’t know if our moment was based purely in physical attraction, emotional vulnerability, genuine love, or a combination of the three. The most profound thing I can take away from it is that Elena Jimenez is, in some form or other, capable of love.
And that means something.