The Night Letter

Chapter 36

Chapter 36

After breathing the familiar air of South Asia, Soni found her trailer especially cold and ugly. She put away the things she had bought, resisting the urge to look at them again, lest she regret them. She checked the time, then her appearance in the mirror. The traveling and the dust were rough on her complexion but after a quick wash with her favorite soap her mother had sent her she felt presentable. She went to the gym where she had been earlier in the day and waited there awhile. She feared she might be committing consistency bias but then thought that if it was a persuasive enough bias, it would probably align with the same logical fallacy someone else was making. She walked around the building and when she was on the far side she heard the door slam. When she went around to the front she saw Latimer waiting outside. A large case hung by a strap from his shoulder. He looked like a workman carrying a lunch cooler but she didn't ask about it.

"Owen! I thought you would be more, I don't know, stealthy."

"I didn't want to startle you."

"Why did you come back to the gym if you said you would never use it?"

"I thought you would be here since it was the last place we met. Consistency bias, I know."

"You know the cognitive biases?"

"Not all of them. There are too many. We're more than just gym rats, you know. Come on, I found something earlier I wanted to show you," he said as he led her down the path to the little hut with the iron railing on the side that led to the platform on the roof. "I don't even know why it's here, either a lookout or a defensive position. Pretty cool though."

Standing close to him, he towered over her.

"I was going to look for you at the call center next because I thought you would probably be there."

"I already had my check in for the day. Thank you for asking. But I don't call home every day."

"Isn't that a little cruel?" She asked. His rule for talking to women was don't ask too many questions. A common mistake he thought most men mage. It puts them on the defensive. He didn't have to worry with this one. She asked all the questions but she was relentless. Behind it he sensed not only her female interest in matters of sentiment but the immigrant's curiosity of how this culture, in which she was already well adept, although it was still not truly her own, arranged domestic affairs amid all its plenty and prosperity.

"It simply wouldn't be possible for me to call every day. If I got in the habit of doing it and then something prevented me from calling she would be even more concerned," he said but he could see that she was not satisfied with the answer.

Behind her line of questioning was a reserve of propriety that sought not to pry or offend and, rather than provoke her doubts or frustration by appearing too evasive, he simply volunteered what he thought she wanted to know but was too polite to ask. It was hanging over them and he thought he would never get anywhere unless he addressed it. he hoped to win at least her trust. If that was all he won, he could not have hoped to do better. "We tend to be in a big hurry in my profession. We can't afford to put anything on hold. If you put it on hold, you miss it. Marriage and family would be a pretty big thing to miss out on. Yes, my wife worries about me and I worry about her when she drives my kids on the highway. She can handle the stress. Not every woman can, which is another reason the men in this line of work get married quickly. By the way, why hasn't your family arranged a nice Hindu husband for you? You must be at the ripe old age of what? Thirty?

"Thirty-two. My family has given up on me but we weren't talking about me."

"When you find someone who fits the role you have to stick with her because you won't find many others who can do it. The stress comes from other things. You know I have political ambitions but my wife is a little shy. She's not comfortable with politics."