Exiles in America(131)

He turned to Daniel, expecting to see a face full of sorrow and pity. But

Daniel was frowning, as if annoyed with Elena for sharing her experience, as

if angry with her for confusing them with her story, her suffering. Zack was surprised and disappointed.

Then Daniel reached across the table, grabbed Zack’s cell phone, opened

it, entered a few numbers, and turned away.

“Agent Parker? This is Daniel Wexler again. We still haven’t heard from

you.” He was so coolly indignant that it took a moment to realize he was talk-

ing to a machine. “There are people here who are terribly worried, a man’s

wife and children. Can you please do us the decency of letting us know what

is going on?” He beeped off and snapped shut the clamshell of phone.

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“You didn’t leave our number,” said Zack.

“They know our number,” said Daniel. “You can be damn sure they know

all our numbers.”

There were footsteps on the porch, and Zack’s heart jumped into his

throat. There were happy squeals outside, and the door flew open. Osh and

Mina spilled in, two children drunk on falling snow. Osh covered his face with

his mittens while Mina tried to stuff whiteness down the back of his snowsuit.

She saw the two men and snapped to attention, instantly sobered by their

presence.

“We have company, darlings,” Elena sang out and switched to French, the

family language. Zack wondered if she were telling them things he and Daniel

shouldn’t know, but she pointed at their red galoshes and he caught an En-

glish word, cupcakes.

Osh immediately became obedient, doing everything asked of him. He

and Mina set their galoshes by the door, hung up their coats, and tromped up

the stairs in their thick wool socks.

“You are free to go,” declared Elena. “Now that they are home, I will be

fine. I will not worry. I will be too occupied. Their noise will drive out worry.

Oh shit.”

“What?”

She made a face. “I was going to go to the store this afternoon. There’s no

food for dinner. I remembered while I was baking but then forgot.”

“Write out a list,” said Zack. “We’ll pick up whatever you need.”

“Or you can go with Zack and I’ll stay with the kids,” said Daniel. “In case

somebody calls.”

Zack exchanged a look with Daniel. Neither wanted to leave, both of them

wanted to help. And Elena was happy to accept. They were all in this together,

weren’t they?

39

The snow continued to fall, but the roads were still clear when Zack

drove Elena up to Food Lion. He was glad to get out of the Rohani house,

which had begun to feel like a hospital waiting room, a limbo zone where time

stood still—Zack was usually on the other side of the door in hospitals. The af-

ternoon was cold and crisp, the snowfall lovely. Not until they were in the aisles

of the supermarket did the strangeness of the day catch up with him again. Here

we are, he thought, buying milk and eggs and toilet paper while a woman’s hus-

band is being questioned by the FBI, or locked into a jail cell, or even loaded

onto a plane to Cuba. And not just her husband but other husbands, fathers,

and sons. The banality of everyday life carried him from hour to hour while his

own government performed its cruelties in secret.

He could not share his fears with Elena, and his hopes would only sound

pathetic to a woman who’d been through so much. Zack didn’t know what to

say to her.

“Here, let me pay for this,” he said at the checkout counter.

She waved away his money and paid with a credit card.

Out in the parking lot, they loaded the groceries into the Toyota and got

in. “You do not have to feel guilty,” said Elena. “It is not your fault these

things are happening.”

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“I’m not doing this out of guilt. I just want to help.”

“And Daniel? Why is he doing so much?”

Zack was silent while he backed the car out. “You’re our friends. He’d do

the same for anyone.”

“Whether he had been to bed with them or not?”

He hesitated again. “I think he would. Yes. Although I don’t see how it

changes anything. I know you’ve had a harder life than ours, Elena. It’s natu-

ral for you to think everybody’s out for number one. But sometimes people do

things just to do them. Not because there’s something in it for them.”

“That is not what I meant. I do not know what I meant.”

They were on the road now, and he couldn’t look at her while he drove. He

was a very careful driver, especially in bad weather.