Page 53 of The Immortalists

He figured he’d be up at 6:30 the next morning, despite his suspension—at forty-eight years old, he’s nothing if not predictable—but when his cell phone rings, the sun is high in the sky. He squints at the clock, shakes his head, squints again: it’s eleven. He fumbles around his bedside table with one hand, finds his glasses and flip phone, puts the first on and opens the second. Could Raj be calling already?

“‘Lo?”

He’s greeted by static. “Daniel,” says a voice. “. . . t’s . . . Dee . . .”

“I’m sorry,” says Daniel. “You’re breaking up. What was that?”

“It’s . . . Dee . . . here in the . . . son . . . ley . . . service . . .”

“Dee?”

“. . . Dee,” says the voice, insistently. “Eddie O . . . hue . . .”

“Eddie O’Donoghue?” Even in its garbled form, something about the name jogs Daniel’s memory. He sits up, stuffing a pillow behind him.

“. . . ’es . . . Cop . . . we met . . . cisco . . . your . . . ’ter . . . FBI . . .”

“Oh my God,” Daniel says. “Of course.”

Eddie O’Donoghue was the FBI agent assigned to Klara’s case. He attended her memorial service in San Francisco, and afterward, Daniel ran into him at a pub on Geary. The following day, Daniel woke with a splitting migraine and could not imagine why he’d shared so much with Eddie, but he hoped the agent had been drunk enough to forget it.

“. . . pull over,” says Eddie, and suddenly, his voice becomes clear. “There we go. Mother of God, the service here is shit. I don’t know how you stand it.”

“We have a landline,” says Daniel. “It’s much more reliable.”

“Listen, I can’t talk long—I’m on the side of the highway—but would that work for you? Four, five o’clock? Some place in town? There’s a few things I want to share with you.”

Daniel blinks. The phone call—the entire morning—feels surreal.

“Okay,” he says. “Let’s meet at the Hoffman House. Four thirty.”

Not until he hangs up does he notice the wide shadow in the bedroom doorway: his mother.

“Jesus, Ma,” Daniel says, pulling the covers up. She still has the power to make him feel like a twelve-year-old. “I didn’t see you.”

“Who were you talking to?” Gertie is wearing her quilted pink bathrobe—how many decades she’s owned it, Daniel doesn’t want to calculate—and her thick gray hair looks like Beethoven’s.

“No one,” he says. “Mira.”

“Like hell it was Mira. I’m not an imbecile.”

“No.” Daniel gets out of bed, pulls on a SUNY Binghamton sweatshirt and steps into his sheepskin slippers. Then he walks to the doorway and kisses his mother’s cheek. “But you are a busybody. Have you eaten?”

“Have I eaten? Of course I’ve eaten. It’s almost noon. And here’s you sleeping in like a teenager.”

“I’ve been suspended.”

“I know. Mira told me.”

“So go easy on me.”

“Why do you think I didn’t wake you?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” says Daniel, walking downstairs. “Maybe because I’m no longer a child?”

“Wrong.” Gertie sneaks out from behind him and takes the lead, sweeping magisterially into the kitchen. “Because I go easy on you. No one goes easier on you than me. Now sit down if you want me to make you coffee.”

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