So he was already at the airport.
But I wasn’t going to let that stop me. I hung up and ran outside and told Lars to flag down a cab.
Then I called my dad on his emergency number.
“Mia?” he whispered when he picked up. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” I said. “Was it Mom?”
“Nothing’s wrong? Mia, this is my emergency line—I’m in the middle of the General Assembly—the committee for disarmament and international security is speaking right now. I know you’re going through a hard time right now dealing with the loss of your boyfriend, but unless you’re actually bleeding, I’m hanging up.”
“Dad, don’t! I need to know,” I said urgently. “The person you said you loved—the person you let go without a fight. Was it Mom?”
“What are you talking about?”
“WAS IT MOM? Was Mom the person you loved and regret letting go without a fight? It was, wasn’t it? Because she said she never wanted to get married, and you HAD to get married in order to provide an heir to the throne. You didn’t know you’d end up getting cancer and I’d be your only kid. And you didn’t know you’d never meet anyone you loved as much as her. So you let her go without a fight, didn’t you? It was her. It’s always been HER.”
There was silence for a moment on my dad’s end of the phone. Then he said, “Don’t tell her,” very quietly.
“I won’t, Dad,” I said. Because of my tears I could barely see Lars out on the curb with the Four Seasons doorman, both of them frantically waving their arms at cabs that were all currently filled with passengers. “I promise. Just tell me one more thing.”
“Mia, I really have to go—”
“Did you ever used to smell her neck?”
“What?”
“Mom’s neck. Dad, I have to know…. Did you ever used to smell it? Did it smell really good to you?”
“Like freesia,” Dad said faintly. “How did you know that? I never told anyone that.”
Mom’s neck smells nothing like freesia. Mom’s neck smells of Dove soap and turpentine. Oh, and co
ffee, because she drinks so much of it.
Except to Dad. Dad can’t smell any of that. Because for him, Mom was the One.
Just like Michael is my One.
“Dad,” I said. “I gotta go. Bye.”
I hung up just as Lars yelled, “Princess! Here!”
A cab! At last! I’m saved!
Friday, September 10, cab on the way to John F. Kennedy International Airport
I don’t believe this. It doesn’t seem possible. But there’s no mistake: We’re in Ephrain Kleinschmidt’s taxicab.
Yes. The same Ephrain Kleinschmidt in whose taxicab I wept so many bitter tears the other night.
Ephrain took one look at me in the rearview mirror and went, “YOU!”
Then he tried to hand me his Kleenex again.
“No Kleenex!” I yelled. “JFK!!! Take us to JFK, as fast as you can!”
“JFK?” Ephrain balked. “I’m about to go off duty!”