At the end of the meal, he reached across the table and put his hand over mine for two seconds before he got up to clear his plate.
I did the dishes and turned off the kitchen lights. Then I went upstairs.
The bedroom was dim, and Varga was already in bed on top of the duvet. The reading lamp on my side was on. He had his eyes closed and one arm flung over his head on the pillow.
I pulled my shirt over my head and looked at him.
He made a small sound when the bed took my weight. He shifted to make room. I turned off the lamp.
I lay on my back. He turned without opening his eyes and put his hand on my chest.
“My sister asked again,” he said into the pillow.
He said it three-quarters asleep. He had told me about the first time she’d asked it, in February, and then he had not mentioned it since. I didn’t know what the question was.
His breathing slowed. The hand on my chest grew heavy.
Chapter four
Varga
Cross was asleep before we’d cleared the gate.
He sat in row two, aisle seat, with headphones on. His mouth was slightly open with his head tipped to one side.
I leaned over the back of his seat. “Cross.”
No response.
“Cross. Captain, my captain.”
“He’s asleep, Varga,” Heath said from across the aisle, without looking up from his book.
“He’s not asleep; he’s pretending. Within thirty seconds of sitting down on every flight, he starts pretending because if he commits to the bit early, he doesn’t have to talk to me.” I turned my attention back to our venerable captain. “Cross, I’m going to tell you a story.”
He didn’t move.
“He’s playing dead,” I said.
“He’s asleep, Varga.”
“Heath, look at his hand.”
He looked. Cross’s right hand was resting on the openChicagoTribuneon the tray table in front of him. The crossword washalf-done. He held a pen, capped, between his thumb and forefinger.
“He’s holding the pen,” I said. “If he were sleeping, it would have dropped.”
I once asked Cross why he did the crossword in pen. He said,if you can erase it, it didn’t happen.At the time, I thought he was only talking about the crossword. Later, I figured out it meant a lot more than that.
He was a man who married his wife at twenty-three. He signed a contract with the Chicago Ironhawks and never asked for a trade.
“He’s in love with that pen,” I said.
“Probably,” Heath said.
“He’s been in love with that pen since I came up. That pen is the second most committed relationship of his life.”
“Varga,” Cross mumbled without opening his eyes. “You could be quieter.”
