What Changes Everything by Masha Hamilton Read Free Book Online Page B

a glass of water.
           "Those bastards," Ruby said in a voice raw as a skinned knee, a voice that seemed to carry its own echo.
           "Let‟s stay optimistic," Bill Snyder said. "Let‟s hear what the FBI has to say when they get here."
           So Bill was still here, Clarissa thought.
           "That‟s right. Let‟s wait," Angie said as the doorbell rang over her voice. "Want me to get it?"
           Clarissa shook her head. "I‟ll get it." But she waited, arm still around Todd‟s daughter, until she felt Ruby gather herself. Then she rose and opened the door to a couple at her threshold. They didn‟t look like FBI agents. The woman wore dress pants and a suit jacket and carried a large leather purse, but the man was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt. They looked about 30, only a couple of years older than Ruby. Weren‟t FBI agents supposed to be large and pale and middle-aged? Wasn‟t it a job requisite?
    "Clarissa Montague?" the man asked.
    "Yes."
    "I‟m Jack. This is Sandy."
           And now the informality of first names. Something else she didn‟t expect from the FBI, not that she‟d ever had any expectations about FBI agents in her home. "Okay," she said, but her legs responded silently: not okay. They were rooted in place. The presence of these two at her doorstep made everything too real.
           Jack extracted his ID from his back pocket. "You were expecting us, yes?"
            No, I wasn‟t expecting you. Not you, nor any of this.
           She nodded and turned. They followed her into her kitchen.
           "This is my brother, Mikey," she said. "And my stepdaughter Ruby and her partner, Angie. And my husband‟s colleague Bill." She paused. "And these are the agents. Jack and Sandy." The barest and most incomplete of introductions had already worn her out. "Do you want something?" she asked. "A cup of tea or…"
           "No, we‟re good," Jack said.
            Good? They each t ook a chair. Fortunately, the kitchen table was large enough to seat eight, Clarissa thought. Todd had considered it overkill, but Clarissa loved a big kitchen table as much as she loved the city, though they seemed like opposing impulses. The city was layer after endless layer of life, an impossible promise of infinity, while the kitchen table was more personal, inclusive and nurturing.
           This was supposed to be the nurturing stage of her life.
           A thick silence waiting to be born into something darker swallowed the room. At last, Jack spoke. "I‟m sorry about the circumstances that bring us here."
           That stilted sentence seemed to prompt Sandy into action; she opened her purse and pulled out a notebook. "When is the last time you had contact with your husband?" she asked.
           "Contact? I—" Clarissa cleared her throat. "I already answered a lot of questions on the phone."
           "I‟m sorry. We need this in person."
           Clarissa inhaled. "We spoke on the phone last night. It was about 10 p.m. my time. It was morning of the next day in Kabul. I guess it must have been a few hours before…" She broke off, unable to put it into words.
           "What did you talk about?"
            It was not about, it was around. We talked around an argument about safety, and our future.
           "Just small talk," Clarissa said.
           "Can you remember anything specific? Anything at all might be helpful. For example, did he mention anything unusual, or any planned outings or meetings?"
           God, what had he said that she‟d be willing to share with these strangers sitting in her home wanting to sift through her underwear drawer? She struggled to remember precisely. "An Afghan woman was coming to see him in the office. He wasn‟t sure what she wanted. He also was to meet some woman from Texas who wanted to visit a refugee camp. And he mentioned his