Waterman

The revolving door went around and suddenly there he was: Waterman. The one man who might know the answers; the one man who might clear my name. He stepped out of the black office tower. He stood for a moment in the gray light of the late autumn afternoon, buttoning his overcoat and eyeing the flurries of snow falling from the slate-colored sky. Then he moved off along the sidewalk, joining the crowds of city commuters and Christmas shoppers.

I followed him.

I had been sitting at the window counter in the Starbucks across the street. Nursing a strawberry-banana smoothie, watching Waterman’s building, waiting. Now, I drained my cup with a rattling pull at the straw and stood up. Quickly, I zipped up my black fleece against the cold and hurried outside. As Waterman moved away, I crossed the street and joined the crowd moving along behind him.

For the first time since this nightmare began, I felt a small, dizzying thrill of hope, real hope that I might find my life again, find my way home again. Waterman was the only person I knew of who might be able to explain how a year of that life had vanished from my memory, how I’d gone to sleep one night in my own bed and woken up entangled with the terrorist Homelanders and wanted by the police for the murder of my best friend.

I shouldered my way through the dense crowds, hanging back about half a block behind my man. Waterman was a tall guy, bald except for a fringe of silver hair. His bare head rose above the other people on the sidewalk. It was easy to keep him in sight as he hurried along.

But even as my heart lifted in hope, it was racing in fear.

New York City was like some kind of paranoid nightmare. Okay, probably not for everyone-but definitely for me. The skyscrapers and office buildings rocketing up out of the ground hemmed me in on all sides.