The Survivor

Chapter 16

Flores Esposita’s funeral at Forest Lawn Cemetery was a crowded, animated affair. Countless uncles and weeping second cousins and families from church. Among others, Nate was singled out by the stoic widower in the eulogy and had his hand shaken by numerous relatives after the casket was lowered from view. The outpouring of warmth only added to his silent regret at the fraudulent role he was playing here. He’d gone into that bank to take a coward’s leap and had walked out a hero.

Head down, he moved between the plots back to his Jeep.

“You seem uncomfortable.”

He turned to find Agent Abara, impeccably neat in a black suit.

“It’s a funeral,” Nate said.

“Right. I just thought that given your job, you know, you’d be used to…” A wave of his hand. “Events like this.”

Nate thought about finding Flores Esposita’s clip-on earring on the bank floor. How he’d squeezed and the clasp had pushed into the tender skin of his palm. “If I’d gone through the window earlier, maybe I could’ve kept her from being shot.” It was a regret he hadn’t made conscious until he heard himself saying it.

“But you said you climbed out the bathroom window right after you heard the shots.”

“… Yes.”

“So how could you have gotten there earlier?”

Nate wet his lips. Shook his head.

Abara had fallen into step beside him. The lush grass, soft underfoot. “You know what happens when I see my kids?” Abara asked.

“You’re reminded of the simple power of human love?”

Abara squinted over at him but didn’t smile. “I wonder what they’re not telling me. Maybe that’s from being an agent, sure. But you know how teenagers are. Girls. I have two. And everything’s a lie right now. Not ’cuz they’re malicious. It’s because their white matter’s not grown in yet, you know?” He shook his head. “They’re hard to get through to. It’s like they’re talking one language and I’m-”

“We’re preverbal.”

Abara laughed, a dimple indenting either cheek. “Right? So last night my oldest came in past curfew. And I asked where she was, and of course-she was at her friend’s. And I know she’s lying, and she knows I know she’s lying, but we’re doing this dance still, right?” He stopped walking, his perfect teeth shining in the morning brightness. “Ever have that? Where you’re talking to someone and you know they’re lying and they know you know? But there you are? Still talking?” The easy smile remained, but his gaze was suddenly intense.

The suit felt hot and tight across Nate’s shoulders. He chose his words carefully. “With my daughter, sure.”

“Yeah, kids. Sometimes they don’t know what’s good for them.” Abara touched Nate’s arm. “See you around.”

Nate watched him pick his way through the headstones. When he turned around, he noticed someone among the graves just a few yards off. A worker with a bag lunch and neatly combed hair showing gray at the part, his mouth a line of forbearance. He’d paused for his break sitting respectfully at the edge of a little fountain beside a newly turned plot. A wet shovel rested against one thigh. When Nate approached, the man set down a remaining crescent of sandwich.

Nate stared at the fresh dirt, and the man looked at him with his sun-beaten face. “You family?”

“No,” Nate said.

“Oh.” The man set his cap on his knee. “Sometimes there’s a big turnout”-a gesture to Flores Esposita’s grave, around which a dozen folks and grandkids remained, consoling one another-“and sometimes…” He flared his half-chewed sandwich at the rectangle of soil.

Nate read the grave marker again, the name registering this time as belonging to the security guard from the bank robbery-the older black man with the striped socks who’d wound up twisted on his back in the lobby. “Wait. This is…?”

The worker nodded. “The bank paid for his resting place.”

“Jesus,” Nate said. “Someone should be here. Someone should…” He felt suddenly weak, and he eased himself down to the fountain ledge beside the man.

“Bad way to die,” the worker said. “When you won’t be missed.”

Nate tried to picture what his own funeral would look like. A few colleagues recycling the same stories. A hired shovel. A designated funeral coordinator, bowing his head mournfully and checking his watch.

Shirt untucked, tie loose, he sat, the sun heating his face. The man chewed quietly beside him for a while, then rose to get back to work, one callused hand rasping up the shaft of the shovel.