It’s why he’s enlisted Malaika’s help. She can wait inside the building by the turnstiles for Eva while Calan covers the exit. Calan hadn’t been prepared to hear about Malaika’s side hustle on the way over. It’s disturbing, imagining her going out with men for money. It’s messing with his focus.
“But what are we even looking for?” Malaika frowns, squinting under the pale sun. “What’s the point of following her?”
“I don’t know exactly. She says she’s pregnant and it’s my dad’s, right? So maybe I catch her with her actual boyfriend. Or maybe she meets with someone from Souliers.” He shrugs, looks down at his feet.
Calan asks Malaika to be his lookout in the lobby. He can’t do it—his dad could spot him, not to mention the hundreds of employees who live in Alma.
Malaika wanders inside, leaving Calan alone with his thoughts. He tries to think of Eva Stone—to keep his head in the game—but all he can do is picture Malaika as an escort. The idea of it makes his skin crawl.
He waits. Ten minutes, twenty minutes. Thirty minutes. At 5:40, when he is beginning to lose hope, his phone buzzes. A text from Malaika.
She’s leaving the building.
Calan sweeps his eyes over the front of the iconic construction. Dozens of people are leaving 30 Rock. None of them look like Eva Stone. Calan is about to text Malaika when he sees her coming out of the building, her eyes glued to the back of a woman wearing a black coat, a scarf wrapped around her head, and dark sunglasses. At first, he’s confused—the woman looks nothing like Eva. But as she gets closer, he notices that it is her. But it’s almost like she’s disguised.
Eva takes purposeful steps towards the Avenue of the Americas. Malaika is a few feet behind her. Calan trails Malaika.
About fifteen minutes later, Eva walks into a door on Tenth Avenue. A small, nondescript coffee shop. Malaika follows her in. Calan is debating whether he should do the same when he spots Malaika coming back out, her face flushed. She sprints in his direction.
“He’s in there,” she hisses. “Your dad.”
His heart hammers inside his chest. “Are you sure?”
Malaika nods.
But that’s not possible. Calan hadn’t seen his dad leave the building.
“Did he see you?” he asks.
She shakes her head. “I don’t think so.”
Calan feels as though his feet are superglued to the city’s asphalt. He hadn’t expected this.
He reaches for his phone inside his jacket. He curses under his breath when he opens the app and sees that his dad’s phone appears to be offline.
“What do you want to do?” Malaika says.
“I don’t know,” Calan hears himself: weak, lost. He hates how he sounds.
Should he call his mom? No, he couldn’t do that. He’ll have to tell her, of course, but not over the phone.
Calan feels his stomach rumble. Oh, God, he can’t be sick. Not now.
“What are they doing?” he asks.
“Just talking.” She moves closer, clearly worried about him. She can probably see the sweat beads on his forehead. Gross. She probably thinks he is disgusting and pathetic, a silly boy who can’t handle learning the truth about his dad. “They’re sitting at the very back.”
“If I go in, will he see me?”
“If he looks at the door, then yes. I was lucky he didn’t when I walked in.”
“I don’t know what to do,” he says under his breath. The confession is oddly relieving.
“I have an idea,” Malaika says. Before he can blink, she approaches a tall, lanky man on the street. “Excuse me, sir?”
The man looks to be in his twenties. He is almost as tall as Calan, with brown hair and pale skin. He is wearing a varsity red jacket that has seen better days. He is also ogling Malaika, which is disturbing.
Calan watches as Malaika asks the man to go inside the coffeeshop and record two people who are in there. Her voice is like velvet: soft, almost seductive. And her tone is casual, as if hers is a perfectly reasonable request. The man is skeptical at first (“Is this a prank?”) and then skittish (“I don’t want any trouble”), but he’s no match for Malaika’s big yellow eyes.
The wait feels like an eternity. Calan hasn’t felt this tongue-tied around Malaika since before they became friends. The door to the café opens twice and, on both occasions, Calan feels his heart jump out of his chest. Calan pictures his dad walking out. What would he say to him?
Finally, the man exits the coffee shop.
“I made a video. I’m not sure how good it came out,” he says. “The place has real bad lighting and it’s noisy for a small joint.”
“I’m sure it’s great.” Calan wants to pry the man’s phone from his hands, but instead he takes out a twenty-dollar bill and hands it to him. “For your trouble.” It’s what Grandpa Charles says when he gives people money.
The man takes Calan’s money. “I think they were arguing,” he adds. He asks for Malaika’s number and sends her the video. She forwards it to Calan.
“Thank you so much,” Malaika says.
“Hey, do you think I could call you sometime,” he asks Malaika, not bothering to make it sound like a question.
“I’m sorry. I’m leaving the country tomorrow. Going back home.”
She gives him her consolation-prize smile. Calan knows she’s used to this sort of thing: he has witnessed her turn away quite a few guys when they’ve ventured into the city to search for fabrics. The man gives her a resigned nod and walks away.
“You don’t look so good,” Malaika says to Calan.
“Let’s just go,” he manages to say. His nausea is escalating.
“Are you sure?”
He should stay—it would be the logical thing to do. They could find a place to hide and follow his dad and Eva when they walk out together.
