Transcendent (5 page)

But this overly desperate stranger—he seemed like more than enough cause.

“Mom?” I said softly, opening the door a crack and poking my head inside. “There's a man who keeps buzzing from downstairs, and he said he's looking for a Mina Dietrich. I told him that he must have gotten the wrong address, but he's being pretty persistent.”

My mom's cloudy writing eyes snapped into focus, the content rosiness of her cheeks fading to stark white in just seconds.

“Mom?” Caleb asked, leaning in from behind me. “Are you okay? Do you know who Mina is?”

She pressed her shaking hands against the desk and pushed herself up to stand. “Did he tell you his name?” she asked, her whispery voice trembling as she turned to face me straight on.

I shook my head slowly, numbed by the shock of what I saw inside her cool blue eyes. Fear, anxiety, regret. Guilt. All of this from a random man asking about Mina Dietrich?

The buzzer was still going off in the kitchen, my mom flinching with each frantic jab from the stoop below. She balled her fists at her sides as she pushed past me and Caleb and onto the landing. But then she turned back toward us, her fear replaced by a stony resoluteness that was at odds with her usually soft, contemplative face. “Please let me go handle this. I need the two of you to stay right here. Okay?”

“But, Mom,” I said, reaching out and protectively grabbing her elbow, “you don't even know who it is. I don't want you going outside all by yourself. Let me come, too. Please.”

“No, Iris,” she snapped, pulling away. Her eyes widened and she puckered her lips, glancing down the steps
and toward the front door. “I'm sorry, I'm just a little shook up. But I need to do this by myself.” She squeezed my shoulder and started down the stairs, giving us one last glance as she reached the foyer. “I love you two more than anything. And I'll be fine.”

She lingered in front of the first door before the vestibule, one palm resting on the ornate carved wood. I turned toward my little brother. “Caleb, go to your room.”

He shook his head and frowned. “No, I'm staying out here with you. I'm not a little kid anymore, Iris. I want to help.”

I wanted to remind him that he had only just turned ten, still technically “little” in my book, but I stopped myself. “I'm going to try to see what's happening from Mom and Dad's window, okay? I want you to stay here for now. I'm sure everything will be fine, though,” I added hastily, realizing how red rimmed and misty his eyes looked. “Mom wouldn't have gone down like that if she didn't think she could handle it. But still, I'm just going to quick check to make sure the talk is going okay.” I gave him a fast hug and headed toward my parents' bedroom, with windows overlooking the street, and closed and locked the door behind me.

Caleb could run up to my room, I realized, or downstairs to the living room, though that view was more obstructed by bushes—but if I knew him, he'd wait outside
my parents' door. He'd wait for me. I opened the window and leaned in close to the screen, which gave me a clear view of at least a small sliver of the stoop. A large, muscular-looking man in a faded leather jacket, dark jeans, and black work boots was pacing by the buzzer. I was certain that I'd never seen him before, and it was hard for me to fathom who in my mom's life I wouldn't already know. Could he be a fan? Most of my mom's readers were middle-aged women, though, so it seemed unlikely, unless he was there on business for his wife.

I heard the front door pull open, and the man halted, spinning around to face the entrance.

“Mina Dietrich,” he said, his deep, booming voice carrying so well to our second-story window that I might as well have been on the steps alongside him. “I can't believe I've actually finally found you.”

Who was this Mina? And why did he still think that he'd found her?

My mom slammed the door and stepped out next to him, pulling her light cardigan tighter against the late September chill. “Kyle?” she asked, her pale face drawn in disbelief. I cupped my ear closer to the screen, straining to hear her much quieter voice. “Kyle Bennett? What the hell are you doing here?”

Why had she answered to
Mina
? Why didn't she say that she was
Noel
, that he somehow had the wrong person?

“It's not like that,” he said, raising his hands up in surrender. “I'm not here to start trouble. Trust me, if there's one thing I regret in my life, it's the trouble I've already caused you. That's the last thing I want right now.”

“So what
do
you want? I haven't been back to Green Hill or seen your face in nearly eighteen years, and now you've somehow found me and are pounding the buzzer at my front door. Why? What could you possibly want from me now?”

Green Hill
. He was from Green Hill? It was where my mom and dad had both grown up, a small town somewhere on the Philadelphia side of Pennsylvania. I didn't know much about it; my parents didn't talk about Green Hill often, and we'd never visited. My mom's parents lived in Jersey now, my dad's in Florida, so there wasn't much cause. Mom's sister, my aunt Gracie, was in Texas for grad school, and her only two friends from the Green Hill days—her only friends at all, really, other than the characters who filled her head—my “aunts” Izzy and Hannah, had moved away, too, after college. Green Hill had always sounded like a quaint, rustic old country village to me, like something from a folktale. Not a place that still existed for my parents, or for me.

But it did still exist, clearly. This man was proof.

“Oh, Mina,” he said, his voice breaking as he clawed his hands through his hair. “Mina . . . My babies. We were
at Disney. When it happened. Parker, though, he . . .” Kyle sobbed, sagging forward until he fell down onto his knees. “We lost Parker right away. But Ella is still hanging on. Just barely at times, it seems, but my little angel isn't giving up easy. My wife had some burns, too, but nothing life threatening. And I—I came out of it without a scratch. Not a single goddamn scratch. It's not fair. Why couldn't it have been me at least?” He lost it completely then, slamming his fists against the cement steps, a broken strand of
why, why, why
spilling out with his tears.

My mom ducked her head down, concealing her face from me. There was a long pause before she spoke again. “I'm so sorry, Kyle. I can't imagine what you must be going through right now.” She took a few tentative steps forward, slowly reaching one arm out to rest on his hunched shoulder. “I will keep Ella in my prayers.” She paused, waiting as his sobs slowed. “I don't mean to be insensitive, but . . . I still don't understand why you came to New York. I don't understand why you came to
me
.”

“Because I know, Mina,” he said calmly, wiping at his tears as he raised his eyes to face her. “I know that you never lost the baby. I know that you came here to protect her.”

My mom said nothing to this, made no movement. He lifted her hand from his shoulder and clasped it between his palms, shifting himself until he was bowed down before her. “God is punishing me, Mina. He's punishing all
of us, using the Judges to do the work. And I feel like these horrible things have happened to me because . . . because of how I treated you. Because I refused to believe in you. But I'm sorry now, Mina, I'm so sorry. I need you and your child. Don't you see? You're my only chance at the miracle I need to save my little Ella.”

“I don't . . .” my mom started, backing away. He clung to her hand, dragging his knees along the cement to follow her. “Kyle, this is insane. I don't know what you're talking about. I lost my child that day. Everybody knows that.”

My mom had lost a child? A
baby
? My heart was pounding in my chest. Nothing either of them was saying made any sense.

“No, Mina. You didn't.”

“I did!” My mom successfully ripped her hand away this time, disappearing from my view as she pushed herself up against the door. Her voice was too insistent, though. Too forceful.

“That was
her
, wasn't it?” Kyle asked, his face lighting up as he jumped to his feet. “She's the one who answered when I first buzzed?”

“Kyle, no, it's all a mistake. We—I can't help you. You need to leave.” My mom sounded terrified by his question, which only seemed to excite him more.

“It was! I can feel it.” He squinted up to the second story and I jumped back, gasping. Had he seen me?

“I swear, Mina, all I want is for her to meet Ella. And for your forgiveness. No matter what happens after that, I'll leave you both alone for good. I promise.”

“I'm not listening to any of this,” my mom screeched, opening and closing the door before Kyle could stop her. I leaned forward again to see him standing there frozen, staring at the empty stoop in front of him with a dazed look on his face. Just as I was about to run out of the bedroom, he glanced back up at me. My entire spine erupted in a frenzy of cool, tingling goose bumps as our eyes met. I shuddered, folding my arms across my chest to warm myself.

He smiled—and that smile, it looked so hopeful. So
desperate
.

Achingly, frighteningly desperate.

•   •   •

I didn't say a word to my mother when she came back inside. Partly because I didn't know where to start, and partly because she waved Caleb and me off and shut the door to her writing room before we could ask a single question.

Caleb was—reasonably so—upset with me for locking him out of the bedroom, but his curiosity was stronger. He followed me in circles as I paced around the kitchen, clinging to my waist as he tried to get the story out of me.

“Tell me what you saw, Iris,” he said for the fifth time. “Please? Why won't either of you talk about it?”

“It was nothing, Caleb. Just an old friend who was in the neighborhood. I could barely hear the conversation, anyway,” I lied. He gave me a pouty look that made it clear he didn't believe me and sat back down to do more homework. After a few minutes he seemed completely absorbed by his spelling list again, as if the whole bizarre encounter had never happened. Life was so much easier when you were ten.

I couldn't think about homework. I couldn't think about anything but the conversation I'd just overheard. I replayed every detail, every word, but I couldn't make the fragments fit. Only my mom could give me any answers. I sat at the kitchen table staring off toward the staircase, trying to will myself to walk up the steps and confront her.
Stand up, Iris
. Move your right leg, your left leg, repeat fifty times, twist the knob. Easy enough. But then what? How would I start?

Mom, why did that man call you Mina? Why did he say that you lied about losing a baby? And why did he think that you—that
we
—would be able to help his daughter? How could anyone besides doctors help his daughter now?

Before I could make myself follow through on the necessary motions, though, the front door flew open. My dad exploded into the living room, tossing his bag and
coat on the sofa. Just as he started to turn back toward the staircase, my mom's office, he seemed to remember us, looking over his shoulder to the kitchen for the first time. His eyes fixed directly on mine, and my heart skipped. He looked scared and anxious and guilty. He looked exactly like my mom had just an hour earlier. Whatever she knew, he knew, too. Whatever she was hiding . . . they were hiding it together. And they were hiding it from
me
.

He started to say something, his mouth open in a silent O. But then he shook his head and turned away from us.

“I wanted to check in with your mom about . . . something. Didn't mean to scare you guys, banging in here so early. I'll, uh . . . be back down. Soon. Stay here, though? Okay.” With that he started back for the foyer, not giving us a backward glance.

“Now this is getting really weird,” Caleb said. He looked over at me, his face scrunched up with worry as my dad's footsteps pounded up the stairs. I reached across the table and tousled his already messy black curls. He looked painfully adorable whenever he was upset, an exact smaller duplicate of our dad—with identical big brown eyes and dark lashes that seemed to frame a mind much wiser than its ten years.

“I'm sure it's all going to be okay,” I almost said. But I stopped myself. Because I didn't really know that, and
Caleb didn't deserve to be lied to. He had every right to be as scared and confused as I was. I grabbed his hand and squeezed, catching his eye before we both turned back to watch the staircase together.

After what felt like an hour but had probably been less than ten minutes, my dad came slowly down the stairs, his footsteps much less urgent this time, more subdued.

“Iris,” he started, not able to look up at either of us as he walked into the kitchen. “Iris, your mom and I need to talk to you about something.”

“I want to know, too,” Caleb said, still holding tight to my hand. “I'm old enough.”

My dad sighed. “You're right, bud. And we'll tell you. I promise. Just not right now. Not yet. We need to talk to your sister first.”

I could tell that Caleb wanted to protest, but my dad looked so weary—so upset and so unlike himself—that both of us numbly obeyed. Caleb dropped my hand and stayed in his seat as I stood and moved toward my dad.

When I got to him, he leaned down, resting his head briefly on top of mine. “I love you, Iris,” he whispered. “Please just remember that through everything we're about to tell you. I love you so much.”

We made our way to my mom's office, my dad closing the door behind us. He moved toward my mom, hunched in her desk chair, and gripped his hands around her
trembling shoulders. I sat just a few steps away, on the edge of the small love seat crammed along the wall next to her desk.