“You’re going to do great,” Mom said, as if being myself wouldn’t be so hard or so terrible. As if I hadn’t spent my entire life wanting to be her.
And then the ground beneath us started to shake.
The walls rose as the floor sank. Bright lights flashed white, burning my eyes. I reached dizzily for my mother’s arm.
“Just a body scan,” she said reassuringly, and the elevator continued its descent farther and farther beneath the city. A wave of hot air blasted my face like the world’s biggest hair dryer. “Biohazard detectors,” Mom explained as we continued our smooth, quick ride.
Time seemed to stand still, but I knew to count the seconds. One minute. Two minutes . . .
“Almost there,” Mom said. We descended through a thin laser beam that read our retinal images. Moments later, a bright orange light pulsed, and I felt the elevator stop. The doors slid open.
And then my mouth went slack.
Tiles made of black granite and white marble stretched across the floor of the cavernous space like a life-size chess-board. Twin staircases twisted from opposite corners of the massive room, spiraling forty feet to the second story, framing a granite wall that bore the silver seal of the CIA and the motto I know by heart:
