Unknown Caller (after Season 4, 03)
"She's dead. She's probably already dead by now. Or else they're torturing her right now." Luke was sitting in a comfortable armchair, in a warm living room, on a beautiful crisp fall day, completely incapable of doing a single thing to help his wife. She was in some Gilead prison somewhere, and he was sitting in the lap of luxury. He hated himself. And he hated every single goddamned second of this never-ending day. Since Rachel had called him down to the US consulate yesterday to inform him that June had been captured by Gilead agents, Luke had been unable to eat, sleep, take care of Nichole, or work. He just kept picturing the worst possible jail cell he could, and then his mind jumped to an even worse image. On and on. At least yesterday's rain had matched his mood; today's sunniness was grating on his nerves.
"You've gotta have a little faith, Luke," Moira told him quietly, not really believing her own words. He was probably right. Nobody got out of prison in Gilead, not after kidnapping eighty-six children from commanders' households and taking them to Canada. They were going to hang June for sure. Or stone her.
"Faith? In what, God?" Luke shook his head. "You still believe in God, Moira? After three years in Gilead?"
"God's been with her so far," she said hesitatingly, repeating her words from yesterday.
Luke snickered. "Sure, the last five years have been like Christmas morning for her. Like a kid's fucking birthday party." His cell phone buzzed. "Unknown caller. Should I bother?"
"Nah, let it go to voicemail." Moira didn't think Luke could handle any more right now.
The phone rang until the voicemail picked up. Right away, the caller dialed again.
"Really? They're calling back?"
"Well," Moira shrugged, "maybe you could use a distraction. But put them on speaker for me, so if it's a telemarketer, we can mess with them."
"Yeah, okay." Luke leaned forward on the couch, put the phone on the coffee table in front of him, and said hello. A male voice answered.
"Hey, man! Remember me? We met in a bar last June. How are you?" When Luke didn't respond, the man continued. "I know it's been a while since—"
Luke finally cut him off. "Sorry, who are you? What's your name?"
A pregnant pause. "You know my name. Remember that bar downtown, near the hotel?"
Luke frowned at Moira. "No, I don't. Sorry, you have the wrong number." He hung up and shrugged. "Whatever."
Moira looked pensive. "That was weird, though, that he refused to say his name. He didn't say yours, either. Maybe…maybe someone was listening in? Or his phone was being tapped?"
He snorted. "You're paranoid."
"Yeah, probably. But he did say June's name."
Luke knitted his brow. "He said we met last June. Not the name."
"That was months ago. Why would he mention that? I don't know what I was doing last spring. I dunno. I'm just saying, if I were talking to somebody after a long intermission, I'd start with my name and my relationship to you, maybe what I look like, but not the month. Wouldn't you? I mean, maybe the word June was just a strange coincidence, but…if he calls back, maybe you should hear him out."
The phone rang a third time. Unknown caller, the screen reported unhelpfully. Luke and Moira exchanged a dubious look. "Okay then, take two." He pressed the green talk button and put the caller on speaker once more, so Moira could keep listening in. "Hello again."
The man still sounded cordial, as if speaking to a friend, but this time there was a bit more urgency in his tone. He needed to be understood. "Hey, so we met in a bar, and we talked about that beautiful blond we both love so much." Luke's eyes rose in surprise to meet Moira's. The voice continued quietly. "I told you she was pregnant." He waited for a response.
"Oh, that bar! Of course, yeah." Luke suddenly knew exactly whom he was talking to, and his stomach clenched. This was indeed a call about his June. Or…their June. He picked up a pen from the coffee table and hurriedly wrote NICK on his hand for Moira. He switched to an amiable tone of voice. "Hey, man, how's it going over there?"
There was a short, relieved laugh. "I've been better. It's been a rough couple of days; we've had some problems, you know. Maybe you heard a little about that?"
"Yeah, damn right I heard." His voice was strained. Please tell me June's still breathing.
As if reading his mind, Nick continued casually. "Well, so, I saw our friend Blondie this afternoon."
"This aft…today? Is she still al…." Luke began saying alive, then thought better of it and finished with "all right?"
"Yeah, yeah," Nick assured him. "She's okay. I mean, she's not in a real good place, you know. She was really unhappy with where she was. She just decided it'd be a good idea to get away. Try something different. So she, uh, left where she was. She's gonna do a little travelling now."
"She's…away from where she was?" Luke sagged with relief.
"Yeah, footloose and fancy free." He emphasized the word free.
"I heard she might have been, um, banged up a little bit?"
Nick went momentarily silent, thinking of a tactful way to phrase an answer without scaring June's husband. "A little. But she's as strong as they come, man. She'll be fine. She just needed a change of scenery. Maybe she'll even come over and see you—I know it's been a while."
"I'd love to see her," he said, voice quivering. She's free. She's out of prison. "God, I miss her."
"She knows that," Blaine murmured. "You'll never stop, as you told me. She knows that."
He has a good memory, Luke thought. A year and a half ago, he'd sent one message to June: that he loved her and would never stop. Had that been hard for Nick to swallow, knowing that he was having an affair with a married woman whose husband still adored her? It certainly didn't seem to bother Nick now; he wouldn't be calling if he'd harbored resentment. "Glad you remember. Are you with her? Is she around?"
"No, I had to…stay here for work. My boss is kind of an asshole."
"Yeah, you mentioned that the last time we met." Luke paused. "Thank you. Thanks for letting me know. Thanks for taking care of her and helping her out." It seemed like a strange thing to say to the man who had slept with his wife, had a baby with her, and was still apparently still risking his life to break her out of prison or something. Still, Luke now felt a sense of kinship with him, an affinity stemming from—as Nick had put it—that beautiful blond they both loved so much. "I don't know how to repay you," he added honestly.
"Sure you do," Nick countered. "You do it every day. So, speaking of that, how is Shorty?"
"Shorty?" Luke tilted his head, looked up at Moira, who pointed to Nichole. He smiled. "Oh! She's great, man. The light of my life. The only good thing in my life, really. She's right here, organizing her alphabet magnets. She's super smart, knows some of her ABC's."
"Already?" Nick squeaked.
"Yeah, she even knows how to spell a little bit. Just the first letters of animals—her favorites. She'll line up her stuffed animals and put the B magnet in front of the bear, the P in front of the piglet, and so on. She, um, she loves to read books about animals. She's very literary."
Nick exhaled audibly. "Of course she likes books. She's her mother's daughter." Pride and affection were evident in his tone.
"Yes, she is," Luke assured him gently. "And she's got those eyes. Clear blue, you know. But her personality is a lot different—much calmer, more easygoing. She's not a little fireball. She just sits on the playground and watches everyone."
"That's more like…her father."
"I thought as much. Also, she's not nearly as stubborn as her mom."
"Well, praise be to God for that," Nick said drily. Luke laughed despite himself. He didn't want to like this guy, but he was beginning to anyway.
He thought about what else to say about Nichole. "She's taking a swim class with me. It's called Little Ducks. She's pretty terrible at it; the princess does not like getting her face wet. She's not going to be a great swimmer. In fact, she's pretty much a klutz. Like, she's almost seventeen months old but still hasn't learned how to walk. Even her crawling sucks. So if you're expecting an Olympic athlete, I tell you, you can just give up that dream right now."
"Oh well, hopes dashed. But at least she'll be able to read, better than those dopey jock pre-schoolers."
"Oh, for sure. She'll kick their asses in the spelling bee."
Now it was Nick who laughed. "I hope I can see you guys some day soon," he said wistfully.
"Yeah, you should definitely come on over with Blondie. Take a vacation. Tell your bosses to shove it."
"I'd love to," he said honestly. "And I'll try. It's just a little hard to get away from work. But I've gotta go now. I'm using the Company phone—Mark's phone. You know Mark?"
He means Mark Tuello. "Yeah, I know him."
"He'll be pissed that I'm running up his phone bill. So I should go. But please give our little girl a kiss for me."
"Absolutely, I will. Call again soon, okay? And stay safe."
"You too. B'bye."
Little Nichole looked up from her magnets and responded to the disembodied voice on the phone. "Bye bye, dada," she said, waving at Luke.
Silence on the line. Luke bit his lip and glanced at the child. Great timing, kid. "Are you still there?" He hoped so.
"Yeah, I am." Nick's voice wavered. He continued very gently, in a higher pitch. "Bye bye, baby. It's time for bed now, okay? You've got to go to sleep soon, sweetheart. Take your favorite stuffies with you. And have very sweet dreams."
Luke spoke in a similar tone of voice. "That's a good idea. Let's put on our pj's and go to sleep now." To Nick, he added, "See you later, man."
"Later," he sobbed, and hung up.
Luke made sure he was disconnected before collapsing backwards into the couch cushions. He felt his lungs fill with air, seemingly for the first time in two days. "Unbelievable. She's out."
"I guess the green persimmon did the trick, huh? I just hope she can keep it together and not get recaptured." Moira paused. "Well, that conversation blew my theory that Nick was just a sperm donor."
"Yeah, he just lost it there at the end."
She continued in a whisper, although Nichole couldn't understand what they were talking about. "I mean, she called him dada. Can you imagine hearing Hannah's voice on the phone?"
Luke blew out a breath. "Oh no, I'd be gone. I'd be a basket case. Game over."
"Yeah. Maybe he actually loves his little girl. And loves June too, I guess. He risked a lot to call Canada. I'm not being paranoid, Luke—they trace calls in Gilead. You can't just call whoever you want, and cell phones are illegal. How the fuck did he even call you?"
"I have no idea. Oh, yes I do. He mentioned it was Mark's phone. Mark Tuello, maybe? How would he get a phone from the Americans?"
"Well, we should definitely go see Mark in the morning. And ask him if he's in The Company—isn't that what the CIA called itself?"
Luke shrugged. "I don't know about that, but that was the most James Bond-ish conversation I've ever had in my life." He looked down at Nichole. "That was your other daddy on the phone. Your cool spy daddy." He leaned down and picked up his little girl. "And he was right, it really is bedtime for you."