Despite an array of empty seats on the subway car, a man sat down in the seat next to her, trapping Avery between him and the window. He wore Bose headphones that barely muffled the music that blistered from them. She tucked her purse closer to her side. The man stared straight ahead and ignored her. The train made a stop and the sliding doors opened. A few passengers exited and were replaced by others who boarded. Avery thought for a moment of telling the man that she needed to exit the train, despite her stop in Brooklyn being thirty minutes away. Before she could muster the nerve, the doors closed and the train rocked back into motion. Music continued to blare from the man’s headphones. A few minutes later the train slowed for another stop. The man reached into his backpack, which rested on his lap, and pulled out an envelope. He dropped it casually onto Avery’s lap, never looking at her.

“Change of plans,” the man said, staring straight ahead.

When the train stopped this time, the man stood abruptly. Before she could ask a question, he was up and through the sliding doors as soon as they opened. She watched through the window as the man pulled the backpack over his shoulders, walked through the turnstiles, and jogged up the stairs. Avery waited for the train to start moving before she picked up the envelope. It was not sealed. She slid the index card from within and read it.

9/11 memorial. North reflecting pool. Wait for me there.

—André

Avery looked around the train wondering what was happening. The image of her making a fast exchange with André on the front porch of his brownstone was replaced now with images of her being arrested and placed in the back of a police cruiser, hands cuffed behind her. She looked up at the map to see where she was. The financial district was two stops away. She thought of calling the whole thing off and ending this nonsense. Of exiting the subway on the next stop and hailing a cab back to the Lowell. But that would mean ending the plan before it had a chance to work.

The train slowed and stopped. She stayed seated and watched the faces of the passengers exiting and entering the car. The doors closed and the train took off. Her right foot tapped away to expel her anxiety. When the doors opened at Fulton Street, she was up and out of her seat and hurrying out of the subway. She walked up the steps of the platform. The empty sidewalks she had known over the weekend were, indeed, gone, replaced now by hundreds of commuters and tourists.