Theo squeezed his eyes shut.
“Never mind,” she said. “I just thought I’d offer. In case you were a believer.”
He was a believer of sorts. He had no choice but to believe. “Okay,” Theo said. “Ask Her if Antoinette is alive.”
Sabrina lit more candles. The apartment glowed with soft light. Outside on the street, Theo heard car horns. On his way home from school that afternoon, he’d smelled autumn for the first time, the smokiness of falling leaves.
“I never make promises,” Sabrina said. “The Madame doesn’t always feel like communicating. She’s an old, old woman.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I don’t expect much.”
Sabrina sat down on one of the turquoise pillows and waved him over. “Come,” she said. She readjusted her head scarf. “Come and relax.”
Theo plopped onto a pillow next to her while she rubbed her small, manicured hands together. “Okay, now close your eyes and take my hands. What I need you to do is drink about Antoinette. Really think about her. Picture her in your mind’s eye and hold her there. Hold her steady.”
Theo framed Antoinette with her arms crossed over her chest, leaning against his Jeep as she waited for him to emerge from the boys’ locker room after his baseball game. This was a good picture, a “before” picture: before the sex, before the baby, before Theo fell in love. A moment in time with Antoinette when Theo was still safe. He was just a kid giving his mother’s friend a ride home.
“Okay, got it.”
Sabrina hummed-not a spooky, mantra hum, but a show tune of some kind. Try to remember the kind of September… the one that went like that. She massaged his hands and Theo pictured the Madame wearing a red kerchief, carrying her basket of brown eggs. She’s an old, old woman. Sabrina had been trying to convince Theo and his brother and sisters that God was a woman all their lives. Think of her infinite compassion, Sabrina said. Her nurturing. Now Theo felt like laughing-his classmates were at home listening to All Things Considered-but part of him was anxious. Was the Madame saying anything?
Abruptly, Sabrina stopped humming. “Riley,” she said. “A black woman?” Her voice sounded surprised.
“Yes,” Theo said. “Yes, yes, she’s black.” Calm down, he thought. His grandmother probably already knew that. She was teasing him. But maybe not; Sabrina wasn’t cruel. “Do you see her? What does the Madame say?” Theo held the picture of Antoinette in his mind and added other pictures of her: Antoinette standing nude in the bathroom after the first time they made love, Antoinette lounging on her back deck with a glass of wine balanced on the flat spot between her breasts, Antoinette slapping him across the face. She had feelings for him, yes, she did.
Sabrina was quiet for a long while. Theo heard her slow, rhythmic breathing and he feared she’d fallen asleep. He was close to sleep himself, so when her words came, she startled him.
“The Madame says the woman is alive. And the baby, too. The baby is alive.”
Theo opened his eyes. Sabrina was looking at him with the kindest possible expression.
“She’s alive, Theo,” Sabrina whispered.
Was she telling him the truth or simply saying this to make him feel better? Sun of my son. Come into my life. I can help you. She was his grandmother, and if Theo wanted Antoinette to be alive, she would make it so. This was her way.
That night, Theo wrote in his journal. Because his journal was supposed to have something to do with his reading, he wrote about Antoinette living in India, disappearing into one of the Marabar Caves. So many dark openings, one indistinguishable from the next. Which one was she in? Where was she hiding?
He wrote, Am I transforming?
The week before Thanksgiving, Theo saw Antoinette on Clarendon Street, getting out of a cab. It was Sunday and Theo had taken to sitting at the bar of T.G.I. Friday’s where he drank Coke, ate chicken fingers, and watched the Patriots game. Sabrina didn’t have a TV and Theo liked to sit at the bar with his food and his drink and his anonymity. He liked listening to John Madden and Pat Summer all, he liked the roar of the crowd. His whole family were Patriots fans, and because his father didn’t work on Sundays, he used to sit with the rest of them in the living room watching the game, eating potato chips. “These are the good times,” his father used to say. “Don’t you ever forget it.”
At dusk, Theo was riding Antoinette’s bike home when a cab stopped a few yards ahead of him, and Antoinette stepped out.
Theo squeezed the brakes. Antoinette in black pants and a black leather jacket. He saw her profile as she rummaged through a backpack for money.
“Antoinette!” Theo called. He ran toward her with the bike before she could hop back in the cab and escape from him. He grabbed her arm. “Antoinette!”
Antoinette yanked her arm free. “Hey!” she said.
“Antoinette,” Theo said. He started to cry. A line of cars formed behind the stopped cab. Antoinette leaned in to pay the driver and Theo took in a huge gulp of autumn air. A sense of peace settled over him. He’d found her.
The cars honked. He moved the bike to the sidewalk and she came to him.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
Theo wiped his eyes. He couldn’t answer. Sabrina had been right, and the Madame-Antoinette was alive. But then confusion rattled his brain. This wasn’t Antoinette. Or rather, it was Antoinette, but younger, prettier even. It was Lindsey. Her daughter Lindsey.
“Oh, shit,” Theo said. His whole body was shaking. “Shit, I thought you were Antoinette.”
“You thought wrong,” she said. “I’m Lindsey. You’re Theo.”
“Yes.”
“Yes, well, I’d think you’d have better things to do with your time than wander the streets of Boston looking for a dead woman.”
“Antoinette’s not dead,” Theo said.
“Oh, really? She’s turned up?” Lindsey said. “News to me.”
“She didn’t turn up yet,” Theo said. “But that doesn’t mean she’s dead.”
Lindsey snickered. “You should see the look on your face. You are such a sorry sight.” She hitched her backpack over her shoulder. “You were in way over your head, baby. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to meet someone.”
“Wait,” Theo said. He followed her. “Wait, I want to talk to you.”
“I don’t want to talk to you,” Lindsey said. “You and your mother are responsible for what happened, and I can’t tell you how it bums me up. Your mother should be thrown in jail. She should be on death row. I’d like to see a white person get it just once for killing a black person.”
“No,” Theo said. “Because. Well, you don’t know the whole story.”
“I don’t care anymore,” she said. “I’ve been in therapy for almost three months over this, and I don’t need you appearing like some ghost bringing all the bad shit back. Now quit following me, or I’ll call a policeman.”
“I loved your mother,” Theo said. “She was pregnant with my baby.”
“I know,” Lindsey said. “And the thought of it makes me want to vomit. Now please!” She crossed the street against the light, running in front of two cars. Theo had to wait for a stream of traffic to pass; he watched Lindsey hurry down the next block. He should just let her go-she hated him, she probably would get a policeman after him, and he didn’t need that kind of trouble. But, God, what were the chances? She wasn’t Antoinette, but she was close, a whole hell of a lot closer than he’d gotten in months. So he mounted the bike and chased after her, weaving among other pedestrians, and an old man with a dog. When Theo was within feet of her, she whipped around and screamed at him.