Sparrow's Story - A Girl Defiant

Chapter 13

Sparrow wakes up in total darkness, her brain buzzing with static. She thought that with the three hour time change LA to NYC she’d oversleep for sure, but when she pulls open the blackout curtains, and New York is aglow at 4 AM. 

She fishes her phone out of her purse and checks the messages. Nothing.

She missed her usual afternoon call with Imran, and she thought he’d contact her hours ago, but it’s been complete radio silence.

Maybe he chickened out, she thinks. Maybe he never intended to come.

She grasps the window frame and thunks her head on the glass. You should have talked to Father Gabriel about extracting you. No backup plan? What kind of idiot are you?

She feels the ocean swell ready to knock her down.

Imran is following protocol. Cut him a break. You both agreed he wouldn’t contact you on this trip except late at night or early in the morning when you’re alone. 

Like now.

Sleep is impossible and she can’t bear waiting, so she digs her running gear out of her suitcase.  

I have to stay focused and keep it together, no matter what happens.

The Chatwal is a bodyguard’s dream, small and exclusive, with no long hallways or grand lobbies. Sparrow’s room is on a keyed wing for women travelers, and she actually likes that the fitness room is a few doors away, and Damon can’t shadow her. 

She settles in for seven miles on the treadmill and visualizes her body as a perpetual motion machine. Copper and brass arms and legs pumping, gears turning. The image calibrates her rhythm, but her brain keeps coming back to where is Imran and why hasn’t she heard from him. 

Then, she tries an old trick and goes block by block through the periodic table. Hydrogen, helium, lithium...all the way to ununoctium. Next, she hops around the table, reciting the elements by group. Alkali, alkaline, noble gases, transition metals.  

By mile five, her lungs hurt and her legs want to quit. She hates running, and the laws of physics prove perpetual motion’s impossible. She can’t run forever. 

She slaps her towel over the treadmill controls.

If I have to run forever, I will.  

Imran said he’d buy her Contract, but he didn’t show up. 

Her feet pound the treadmill. He’s a liar. A big fat liar, like Dad.  

She runs flat out until the blood pounding in her ears silences her thoughts and she has to focus on the next breath and then the next. 

And when her head clears, she dials down the speed and starts her cool down. 

I don’t believe Imran lied.  

Life’s unpredictable. Like Dad says, shit happens. I have to suck it up and deal with the next two days alone.   

Seven miles done, and it’s only five am. Her legs are wasted, but she hasn’t worked her arms. She reaches for the free weights. 

The windows mirror her bicep curls. She pumps twenty pounds on each side, gloating at how Damon doesn’t know. She made him teach her free weights, but then she told him they bored her. 

She crawls back to her room and throws herself on the bed. When she checks her phone, she sees a message waiting.

 An asterisk. 

Imran’s here!

She shoots back a hatch mark and throws herself into the shower. Somewhere, a few floors away or even closer Imran is awake, thinking of her. 

The hot water melts the soreness from her body. When she pours shampoo into her hand, the fragrance makes her pause. She breathes in, experiencing the notes of mandarin, white ginger and musk.   

To live only in the mind is to be half alive. Today I will be fully alive.

She’s grateful she doesn’t have to waste effort planning what to wear. Elancio packed and labeled her outfits. She zips open the garment bag marked “Sotheby’s,” and pulls out a plum-colored sweater dress.

 The wool is soft and sensuous, and so unlike anything she’d ever buy, that she checks the tag. Cashmere. No wonder people spend the big bucks.

When she slides it on, the dress feel comforting, the opposite of what she expected. And as Elancio promised, the purple makes her eyes even greener. 

She reaches for the belt with its thin, gold links and laughs. You’re kidding me. Elancio must have thought she was serious when he asked what she imagined wearing in NY, and she said, “Chains.”

She checks Elancio’s makeup instructions and brushes on mascara and lip gloss. Then she gathers her hair into a loose ponytail on her shoulder. 

The mirror confirms that she epitomizes the stylist’s goals for her meeting with Sotheby’s: sexy, but fresh. Cultured, tasteful, but not bookish. Athletic, but feminine.

But now she wonders if Imran will find her beautiful, and suddenly, she’s conscious of how he’s changed her. 

She’s lost her armor. The kevlar vest she wears over her feelings is gone. 

There’s still a half hour to go before the time they agreed they’d both appear in the dining room. Long enough for her nerves to disable her.

She steps away from the mirror and turns on the television, but the news is prettified with Paternal Controls, so she checks her phone. 

The memorial planned today for Henry Forester, has been moved from the National Cathedral, because of bomb threats. The Supreme Court judges are in protective custody. Samantha Rowley’s gone into hiding. 

The FBI claims it’s tracking the bombers, but she doesn’t believe it for a second. 

The country is hanging on a suspension bridge of lies. I can’t wait to get out of here. 

At 7:15, she stands up. Adrenaline rushes through her body. I’m going to see Imran.