“And didn’t visit?”
“I’m cutting things close this week. What’s going on?”
Linda says something to someone. She’s at work, which means her news must be important. She takes work seriously. She considers guarding the Compass Club big stuff.
“It’s me again. Don’t be angry, just listen, okay? I’ve been in the computer trying to find you, so I know that you’re not in Seattle. Don’t explain. Before I tell you why I checked your flights, though, you should know about something I saw in your account.”
“Wait,” I say. I ask Julie to pull over. I don’t want to drive out of range of the connection. And I want to be still when I hear this. “Talk. I’m here.”
“You know how you’ve been gunning for a million? You talk about it pretty much nonstop, so I know how important it is. It’s like a symbol.”
I’m disappointed to hear her put it this way. It’s insensitive and inaccurate. She demeans me. The Nike “swoosh” is a symbol. This isn’t that. This is life, this thing, and this is me, and this woman who claims to care for me should understand.
“I knew this. They’re screwing around with me,” I say. I’ve found my bug. I’m angry, exalted, justified. “Linda, hang on. Stay there.” I turn to Julie, who’s facing out her window, still holding the wheel despite having turned the key off. She’s wherever it is that she goes inside herself when some man is calling the shots and not consulting her, or even bothering to make much sense. I suspect it’s her soul I’m seeing.
“Julie? Jules? Something’s happening. Turn the car around. We need to go back to the airport.”
She shakes her head.
“Today’s been exhausting, I know. Just turn the car around.”
“No.”
I give up for now. Back to Linda. To the bug. “What are they doing to me? Lay it out.”
“Redemptions. It could just be clerical, some mix-up, but someone’s been redeeming miles for tickets. I know how you are, so I knew it wasn’t you.”
“Hell no, it’s not me.”
“Hawaii. Alaska. Orlando. All first class. Three in three days, all last week.”
“For future dates? I hope you’re not saying someone
“Relax.”
“I find this sick. I find this worse than sick. This is diseased, what they’re doing. This is
Julie opens her door a crack. For air?
“They haven’t been used. You can cancel them. Calm down. You’ll just have to change your ID numbers or something. Maybe someone hacked them. Those hacker people.”
“This comes from the top. This is dogshit from the top. Make no mistake, Linda. These are sad, sick people. These people are losing a proud, established, major American transportation company to their own short-term lusts and half-baked theories, and in consequence they are sick and sad and desperate. You work there. I know. You can’t afford to hear this. I pity your dilemma. But this is truth. Rock-hard cold impregnable truth.”
“There, I’m in the system now. I’m canceling.”
“You’re canceling the mischievous effects, not the intentions behind them. Those persist.”
“What was strange were the dates. The trips were for a year—a year to the day, almost—from the reservations. Someone expected to go to all those places on three consecutive days? It just looked wacky. Or maybe they were keeping their options open.”
“Don’t second-guess the pathological mind. That’s a trap. It’s bottomless. Don’t start.”
The driver’s-side door slams and Julie is out and walking, straight on up the highway, heel to toe, treating the shoulder stripe like a balance beam. Trucks blast past and lift her pretty hair.
“Should I tell you why I was poking through your bookings?”
“Does Morse ever do that walk-among-the-peasants bit, strolling through the airport, shaking hands, patting workers’ backs? Is that a thing of his? The Pope-in-disguise-among-his-children stunt?”
“You mean have I met Soren Morse? I’ve met him. Why?”
“The touchy-touchy type, or more reserved? This is called casing the joint for unlocked windows. Does he ever eat lunch in the food court? The humble act? My guess is he’d go for that California pizza place, the one where they don’t use red sauce, just so-called pesto. That’s more his trip. The pine nuts. The thin, charred crust. Not pizza as you and I know it. Power pizza. Or does he just hang loose at Burger King?”
“You sound bad, Ryan. Are you on stay-awake pills? I used to take those when I worked the red-eyes. They made me like you’re being now.”
My sister is dwindling. It’s flat and vast here and it takes time to dwindle, but she’s managing to and soon I’ll have to catch her. There are rules for when women desert your car and walk. The man should allow them to dwindle, as is their right, but not beyond the point where if they turn the car is just a speck to them. That angers them.
“Listen, I’m at my desk here,” Linda says. “Guests are flashing passes and I’m not seeing them. They might be expired. What I wanted to tell you was that you mentioned Las Vegas the other day and it happens the airline is sending me there tomorrow. I wanted to check if we’d cross. Looks like we will. Which place are you staying? I’m at Treasure Island. I guess it’s a suite.”
