You could tell a lot about a man from his backyard.
For thirty years, Cal's backyard had been tucked behind a three-bedroom house in Heartland, Florida, just an hour outside Orlando. It had started as an empty green rectangle when Cal and Molly first moved in, childless except for Molly's little Yorkshire she'd had since college. Then Molly brought some color with a garden, just as her watercolors brightened the halls of their home and would eventually adorn the walls of dentist and law offices around town.
The yard evolved as their family grew. Cal had wanted a pool but settled for building a playground instead. Molly had planted a rhododendron next to the hydrangeas and then buried her Yorkshire under it a few years later, which was appropriate considering how much that dog loved to dig at its roots. Years went by and a permanent BBQ pit grew out of the ground, brick by brick, and the garden only continued to grow, bed by bed.
Their last dog was a mutt from the local shelter—Siouxsie, they named her, like the singer from that band because she'd howled with excitement like a banshee when they brought her home. Siouxsie had immediately claimed the backyard as her own, defending it from squirrels and cardinals both. She loved to explore the outdoors, and she was Cal's buddy on every fishing trip.
For years.
Siouxsie was an old dog when Molly passed from cancer, and for a while Cal had rushed home from school on his free period to walk her and, during baseball season, he'd run home again before practice while his assistant coaches drilled the players. He didn't have to wonder if Siouxsie missed Molly, too; he could tell by the way she always sat on a pair of old slippers that Cal couldn't throw away. Life went on that way, he and Siouxsie together, for two years before Cal came home one afternoon to silence instead of playful barking.
He stood alone in the yard under a baking summer sun and dug the hole where he placed her remains, somewhere between Molly's garden now choked with weeds and MJ's childhood swings, the chains gone to rust.
He'd buried Molly's slippers alongside her.
That was Cal's backyard.
That was home.
That was then.
Now, Cal followed Frank through the front entrance of an old French apartment building with a sign that said La Maison de Vignes—the House of Vines. And the vines looked as old as the building; thick and knotted like gnarled fingers creeping up the sides. Taller than it was wide, four floors wedged between two larger buildings just as old.
The sidewalk in front never emptied of people.
"We ain't in Florida anymore," Cal said, looking up.
Frank smiled. "Thank God."
The lobby was unremarkable except for an old-fashioned elevator, the kind that looked like a steel birdcage with an accordion-lattice door that opened and closed by hand. The cables and pulleys stretched up through three floors before disappearing into the high ceiling.
"Cool elevator," Cal said as he followed Frank into the caged interior.
"I usually take the stairs," Frank said and then shrugged at the suitcases crowding the floor at their feet.
"What floor are we on?"
"Top floor," Frank said, almost bragging. "I got a hell of a deal on the lease, considering this neighborhood is top market and popular with ex-pats. A friend of a friend recommended it and put in a word for us."
Frank hit the button for the fourth floor, which was marked with a three, and the elevator lurched to life and pulled them through the middle of the winding staircase.
"In Europe, they don't count the ground floor," Frank said before Cal could ask.
Cal shook his head and worried at the million small differences of living in France that he'd yet to even encounter.
The building was called the House of Vines, but Frank called their apartment the House of Wine because Cal imagined he thought it was clever and there was a glass of it in his hand barely a moment after they entered. Just like the old-fashioned elevator was the centerpiece of the lobby, a towering wine rack of latticed wood dominated their small kitchen.
"You've been shopping," Cal said admiring the tower of wood and glass in all shades of green, amber, and red. He was sipping from a glass of red before he even realized Frank had passed it to him.
"The place was fully furnished, and I've been here a week already," Frank said. "I got thirsty."
"I'd have been here sooner, but it turns out it's a pain in the ass to uproot your whole life and move to another continent. Who knew?"
"I knew," Frank quipped, "and I warned you to get started earlier—"
"—And you were right," Cal held up his hands, wine glass and all, in surrender. "I was a little distracted trying to stay out of the Heartland County jail. Art says hi, by the way."
They'd all graduated high school together.
"I can't believe you settled on Art for your lawyer," Frank said.
"I've known him my entire life and, hey, he saved me from jail!" Cal said.
Almost—but that wasn't Art's fault. Cal had fled to France all on his own and what Frank didn't know wouldn't hurt him or give him ammunition in a fight Cal wanted to put off as long as possible. Right then he just needed sleep.
And a beer instead of Frank's wine.
Mercifully, it had only been a short walk from the cafe where they'd parted ways with Eeva. Frank had met them and confirmed that the "bad actors" had abandoned their pursuit—joking that Cal's presence must have scared them off. Cal didn't know about that, but Eeva thanked him anyway and hugged him goodbye. It had been a long twenty-four hours, crossing an ocean and suffering through three international airports—including Heathrow in London—but the most memorable twenty minutes had come and gone with Eeva.
He didn't get her number, but then again, he hadn't thought to ask. Instead, he thought about it all the way home. And the hug.
Back in the kitchen, Frank interrupted the memory with a punch to Cal's arm.
"Dude, I can't believe you're here!" Frank said, "And we're finally roomies!"
"Too bad my Atari broke thirty years ago," Cal said and laughed at an old memory of Pit Fall.
"Do you want to try Dungeons & Dragons? I hear it's cool now."
Cal confirmed. "High school kids sure are different from our time. You'd probably be popular now."
"Oh, fuck off," Frank said but he smiled behind the curse and waved it away. "Come on, it's time for a tour, and then I'll whip up some food."
"Show me the bathroom, first," Cal begged. "Damn, I've got to piss. I can't hold my coffee like I used to."
"You got old," Frank teased.
"You try holding it until classes finish, every day for thirty years. I'd claim disability if they paid any."
Frank showed him to the apartment's only bathroom, a small rectangle of white tiles and walls painted the color of sunflowers. The entire apartment was half the size of Cal's home in Florida and consisted of the kitchen with an attached dining room, two small bedrooms, and a salon—which Frank said was the French way of saying living room. Cal retorted that he knew that.
He didn't.
The apartment was modern and renovated, which was a relief considering the antique appearance of the building. A short hallway connected everything, and Frank led him in a circular route back to the kitchen.
The windows were what made the apartment. They were in abundance and Cal peered through a double set over the kitchen sink, down at a greenspace behind the building, filled with trees and shrubs. Other buildings crowded the greenspace on all sides, forming a sort of garden courtyard in the middle of the block.
"You'll love the garden," Frank said, and the wine glass in his hand was mysteriously full again. "We'll go down tomorrow and meet our downstairs neighbors: the friends of a friend who got us in this place."
"I'll have to tell them merci," Cal said.
"A simple thank you will work," Frank said. "They're Brits."
"If I don't have to speak French, then I'll thank them twice."
Frank put an encouraging hand on his shoulder. "You'll get better at it with practice. Still, not a bad first day, huh? You're already dodging bad actors and meeting beautiful women."
"You mean we," Cal had said.
"Yes, but this wasn't my first day doing either."
Cal barked a laugh. "You keep calling them bad actors. What's up with that?"
"That's just what we call them: people up to no good. It's more professional than calling them bad guys."
"Bad actors," Cal repeated to himself. After thirty-odd years of daydreaming about life as an intelligence officer, he was finally in Frank's world.
If such a thing were possible. All he'd really done was help shoo away two local thugs looking to snatch a purse. Big deal.
It wasn't like they were hired assassins.
But Frank seemed eager to humor him. "I snapped some surveillance photos before they took off. I'll show you a big clue that will help us track them down."
"Track them down?"
"Cal, my buddy! Sundance! We're retired now."
"So?"
"So, what the fuck else do we have to do? Here, look."
On Frank's phone were several pictures of their bad actors walking with the pedestrian traffic around the garden where Cal and Eeva had lost their trail. The last phone showed the two men getting into a white delivery van with a red logo that read Livraisons de Mercure. The phone number attached to the logo was partially obscured by the reflected glare of the sun.
Frank wanted to track these guys down? What a ridiculous thought and Cal let him know with a doubtful look. Frank only grinned as he danced around the kitchen making dinner. Frank knew his way around a kitchen and was a damned-good pasta chef, according to stories Lilith always shared when they'd visited Florida. Molly had always said that Frank the husband was more mysterious than Frank the spook.
"So, you're going to make me ask about her?" Frank asked as he gently laid a bundle of pasta into a boiling pot.
"Who?" Cal asked absently. Mercury Deliveries. That's what the red logo on the van translated to or close enough.
"Who else?"
"Eeva," Cal said and put Frank's phone back on the counter. "Yeah, she was something."
"Something good or something bad?"
"Beautiful, I mean, but also surprising. She didn't panic about those guys following her and—once we volunteered to help—she kind of took charge, didn't she? I was impressed."
Frank nodded along, agreeing as he salted the pot.
"Have you met a lot of women since Moll'?"
Cal had to think about it. "No, just the same old coworkers, I guess."
"Date any of them?"
Cal winced. "Don't you think I would have told you if I had?"
Frank smiled behind his mustache and said, "We all have our secrets."
Cal retreated into his wine. Maybe Frank did know that he'd been dodging calls from Art; that there was probably a bench warrant out in his name just waiting for him to step back on Florida soil. Frank shouldn't know, but maybe he did.
The pot began to boil over, and Cal suddenly empathized with the pasta.
"Where's she from?" Frank asked as he adjusted the heat on the stove.
"Estonia. It's in northern Europe, right next to Russia, but you probably already know that."
Frank nodded. "I thought I detected some Russian in her accent."
"Do Estonians speak Russian?" Cal could point at maps all day long, but he wasn't an expert on culture. Frank was a language guy, though.
"Some do," Frank said. "And I bet she does."
Cal continued. "Anyway, we had a few minutes to talk before you showed back up. She's recently retired—like us—and moved here because she loves the sunshine."
"That's why everyone moves here," Frank said and then turned back to prepping dinner. "She looks younger than us."
"You mean she looks younger than me," Cal said and when Frank turned back to protest, Cal waved him away. "I know I've put on a few pounds. I'll work on it. But Butch—you look great! Straight off the silver screen. Everyone here looks great, actually."
"It's the Mediterranean diet," Frank assured him, "and all the walking. Buddy, give it a few weeks and you're going to feel your life changing."
Cal raised his glass and toasted the air.
"To life changing," he said.
It already had.
And her perfume still lingered on his sweater.