Laura Lippman: In Big Trouble

As she crossed Charles Street, the open door of the Washington Monument caught her eye. Like many things in Baltimore, it needed a compound modifier to achieve true distinction: first permanent monument to the first President to be built by a city or government jurisidiction. A tiny George was plopped on top, his profile as familiar to Tess as her own. More so, really, for how often do you see your own profile? She saw George almost every day, staring moodily down Charles Street. Soon enough, he'd be dressed up with strings of lights for the Christmas season. Spring would come, and the parks around him would fill with daffodils and tulips. Summer, and he would seem to droop a bit, like all of Baltimore did in the July humidity. Fall, the current season, was Baltimore's best, its one unqualified success. George must have a fine view from where he stood. Yet here Tess was at his feet, a Baltimore native, and she couldn't remember ever climbing his tower and seeing the world as he saw it.

Suddenly, it seemed urgent to do so. She walked inside, stuffed a dollar into the wooden donations box, and skipping the historical plaques and displays at the base, began to make the climb, counting each step as she went.

The circular staircase was cooler than the world outside, its air thick with some recently applied disinfectant or cleanser. As Tess began sucking wind about a third of the way up-even someone who exercised as much as she did was ill-prepared to climb so many steps so quickly-she felt a little woozy from the fumes. Still, she climbed, her knapsack and long braid bouncing on her back. Up, up and up-220, 221, 222, 223-until she saw the ceiling flattening out above her head, a sign that she had come to the end, step 228.

Plexiglass shields and metal gates kept one from venturing out on the tiny parapet that circled Washington's feet, but the view was still extraordinary. Funny, she had never realized what a squat city Baltimore was, how it hugged the ground. The effect was of a low, paranoid place, peering anxiously over one shoulder. She looked east, to where she lived and worked. Then to the north, a scarlet and gold haze of trees at this time of year. Closer in, she could pick out the roof of the Brass Elephant, her home away from home. She turned to the west, to that ruined part of the city between downtown and Ten Hills, the neighborhood where she had grown up, where her parents still lived.

She saved Washington's view, the south, for last, then swiveled her head a hair to the right so she was actually facing southwest. Was there really some place called Texas past the Inner Harbor and its slick, shiny buildings? It seemed unfathomable. She felt like one of Columbus's contemporaries, trying to grasp the idea the world was round, like an orange. Assuming such a comparison had ever been made. If history had taught her anything, it was to distrust the history lessons of her childhood, with their neat little aphorisms that all seemed to be about stick-to-itiveness and moral fiber.

Still, the world looked pretty flat from here. It was all too easy to imagine falling over the edge if you strayed too far.

Crow's photo from the newspaper stayed hidden in Tess's datebook for several days, slipped between two weeks in March. There was no significance to those dates, they just happened to be the place where his likeness remained, almost forgotten. Almost, but not quite. And because everywhere that Tess went, her datebook was sure to follow, Crow was always tucked into the crook of her arm, or riding papoose-style in her knapsack.

He was there when she found a man wanted for a paternity test in Baltimore. (She found him in paternity court in another county, giving a blood sample there. Everyone had his ruts and routines, it seemed, habits he just couldn't break.) He rested in her knapsack as she took photos of an intersection that figured in a complicated insurance claim. Crow went to her office, bounced on the backseat of her car, spent the nights on the old mission table where they had once eaten dinner together. Tess would wake in the mornings with a vague sense of anxiety and go to bed the same way, trying to isolate the thing that was bothering her. Then she would remember, and become angry all over again. It was unfair of him to try and manipulate her, to trick her into calling when he had left her. In Big Trouble . And so it went, around and around in her head, until Friday came and it was Girls Night Out.

The only "out" in Girls' Night Out was take-out. After all, Laylah was far from restaurant-ready and Kitty proved so distracting to waiters and bus boys. They hovered close, their service so constant that it was impossible to maintain a conversation. This, in turn, infuriated Laylah's mother, Jackie-not because her own drop-dead gorgeous looks were slighted, but because she liked to speak without others eavesdropping. So the girls stayed in, with Tess bringing pizza from Al Pacino's and Kitty relying on Chinese or Japanese carryout. Jackie was the experimental one, arriving with Styrofoam boxes from whatever Baltimore restaurant struck her fancy. Tonight it was Charleston's, which had meant cornbread, she-crab soup, oysters fried in cornmeal, a rare steak for fish-averse Tess, and pureed vegetables for Laylah. At least everyone could share the dessert, a pecan pie that Kitty was now slicing.

Tess watched the knife sinking into the sweet pie and suddenly thought of Crow. The connection was probably worth analyzing-was it the nuts that reminded her of Crow, or was she still on that pie-sex jag? She could think about that later. Or, better yet, not think about it ever again.

"I forgot to show you this," she said to Kitty, pulling the clip from her datebook.

"Crow! One of the best employees I've ever had here at Women and Children First," Kitty said, focusing on Crow and ignoring the headline. "For one thing, he actually liked to read, which seems to be less valued among bookstore clerks than the ability to make espresso. The haircut works. Don't you think he looks handsome, Tesser, now that he's gotten his face?"

"I suppose so," she said, leaning over her aunt's shoulder, which smelled of apricots. Kitty's scent was always changing, and her fragrances were often sweet, overbearing things that would have been cloying on another woman, yet they always worked on her. Tess wondered if that was the secret to her eternal appeal. Although in her forties Kitty had her pick of men barely half her age. With her red hair and perfect skin, she reminded Tess of a line from John Irving. Something about a woman who not only had taken care of herself, but looked as if she had good reason to do so.

"‘In Big Trouble.' Aren't you the least bit curious?"

"Not really. It's some cut-and-paste job. He probably did it with a computer."

"Then how did he get it on newsprint with a muffler ad on the back?" Kitty asked, holding it to the light, just as Tyner had.

"I don't know. I don't care."

"She's lying. I can always tell when she's lying," Jackie said from the kitchen floor, where she was crawling after Laylah, who was in dogged pursuit of Esskay around the big oak table. The baby squealed and grabbed her mid-section, as if to mount her for a quick race. Esskay galloped away, rolling her brown eyes at Tess. What have I done to deserve this ?

"What does the dog say?" Jackie prompted. "What does the doggie say?"

"Mooooooo," Laylah replied, all dimples and eyes as she grabbed for Esskay's collar. Tess was sure that Laylah knew what the doggie said, but she was already carving out her own identity, preparing her perfect mother for life with someone determined not to be so careful and circumscribed.

"I get confused about your recent romantic history," Jackie drawled. It was as if she had caught Tess taking Laylah's side in her mind. "Is Crow the one who came after the one who was hit by the car but before the one who's now in prison?"