THE PHANTOM BAKERPeople still talk about the Summer of ’66. It was the year temperatures barreled into the upper-nineties in early May and mostly just stayed there, setting meteorological records that still stand. It was also the summer the Mathersons moved in. My parents and I lived in a bedroom community. The men worked in the city during the day and in their yards in the evening. Most of the women were homemakers. They managed the household and the kids and joined the Ladies Club. Our house sat at the edge of a development of modest ramblers built on small lots. There was little variety in the floorplans, but the homeowners had individualized their exteriors and their landscaping, and the houses were well-maintained. It was an attractive area…except for a dilapidated farmhouse and ramshackle garage that sat directly across the road, behind us. My dad complained about them constantly. When the houses in our neighborhood were being built, the owner over there hung onto his land and continued farming for several more years. When he retired, he sold most of his ground to a developer, but he and his wife kept the family home to live in. The developer divided his acquisition into large lots and built fancy houses with driveways that led to interior streets. From our vantage point, we only saw the backs of the big houses and their sprawling lawns. The farmhouse and garage had been eyesores even when they were nestled into a backdrop of row crops. Now they stuck out even more. Needless to say, when word got around that the old folks’ daughter had convinced them to move closer to her, my dad was ecstatic. Whoever bought the property, he said, was sure to bulldoze the place and build something akin to everything else over there. But that wasn’t what happened. Immediately after the SOLD sign went up, work-vans bearing the logos of plumbers and electricians and cabinetry installers started coming and going. At the same time, painters and roofers worked on the exteriors, and landscapers trimmed shrubbery and took down dead trees. My dad groused that they would have been better off starting from scratch, but he conceded that a remodel and spiff-up were better than nothing. My mother was pleased to see what was happening. She had been saying for a long time that the Ladies Club needed some fresh blood, but she never thought the women living in the fancy houses would be interested. When she saw that the new owners of the farmhouse were simply going to fix it up (as opposed to building some outlandish, new one), she figured the woman might be the type who would fit nicely into their group. I hoped the new family might include an interesting teenage son because most of the boys my age in our town were dopes. *** A moving van arrived the first week of June and a few days later my mother made a batch of bran muffins to welcome the newcomers. That, in itself, was a big gesture because the heat-wave of 1966 was well underway and running the oven made the house even hotter. But Mother said the time was right – the wife should be ready, at that point, to sit and chat for a bit. And, if it felt appropriate, she would go ahead and bring up the Ladies Club, even though they wouldn’t be meeting again until fall. Plus, she was dying to see what had been done to the house. (I should mention here that my mother has always been a keen observer, and even though she recalls the Summer of ’66 through a scrim of hazy heat and humidity, she remembers everything that happened, starting with the details of her hospitality-visit.) She scurried across the road that morning and up the lane, her basket of warm muffins in hand. Before knocking, she took a deep breath, patted her hair and smoothed her skirt – she certainly didn’t want to look like she’d been running a race. A moment later, hard-soled shoes could be heard clipping down an uncarpeted hallway, then a door slammed, and everything went quiet. As Mother dithered about whether to knock again or come back later, the front door opened a crack – enough to reveal an older, ample-hipped woman wearing a non-descript housedress. Her grey hair was cut unfashionably short – indicating, perhaps, that ease of maintenance was more important to her than style. Furrows between her eyebrows gave her a wary expression, but when she saw that Mother had come bearing gifts, she smiled, tentatively, and opened the door a little wider. Mother quickly introduced herself and explained where we lived, extending the basket of muffins and a welcome to the neighborhood. The woman thanked her and said they were the Mathersons – Dorothy and her daughter, Lucille – and asked Mother to step inside. Seeing that her new neighbor was another older woman, Mother says she might have been disappointed, had she not been overwhelmed by the heavenly smell of cinnamon rolls, and by the fact that the house had been air-conditioned. Not many homes were at that time. The women chatted a few minutes about the heat and the novelty of climate control. Then, as Mother had hoped, Mrs. Matherson asked if she could take time for a cup of coffee and led the way down the afore-mentioned uncarpeted hallway to the living room. Only a few pieces of furniture occupied the good-sized space. A nondescript sofa with flimsy cushions, and upholstered in fabric that looked stiff and scratchy, sat along the far wall. In front of it was a small coffee table with a scuffed top. An old-fashioned, wooden rocker was positioned at the end of the table and a console television with a tiny screen sat across the room, facing the sofa. The walls were bare and there were no knick-knacks sitting around, but no half-empty boxes indicated they were still unpacking. A sheet, blanket and bed-pillow were strewn across the sofa. Mrs. Matherson apologized for the mess, saying they were still short a bed. She set Mother’s muffins on top of the television and began folding up the bedding. Mother wondered about that later – why, exactly, they would have been a bed short – but at the time, she was caught up in the whirlwind of Mrs. Matherson’s nervous chatter. Her husband had died recently, she said, and she and her daughter wanted to settle someplace quiet. Our little berg seemed perfect. Mother expressed her condolences and asked where they’d moved from, but Mrs. Matherson had a blanket anchored under her chin and didn’t respond. After she finished straightening up, Mrs. Matherson said she had just taken some cinnamon rolls out of the oven and asked if Mother would like one with her coffee. (As my mother’s muffins always tended to be a bit dry and crumbly, she didn’t mind that they had been forgotten.) She said a cinnamon roll sounded lovely and complimented the newcomer on having already organized her kitchen to the point of being able to bake. Mrs. Matherson paused and looked out the window. “Lucille made them,” she said, “before she went out to work on her garden.” Mother followed Mrs. Matherson’s gaze and saw the daughter digging up sod along the fence line. She had protected herself from the sun with a large-brimmed hat, a long-sleeved shirt and long pants. Mother thought she would have been unbearably hot and hoped Mrs. Matherson would call Lucille to come inside and join them, but instead she told Mother to have a seat while she got their refreshments. Mother started to sit, then thought it only polite that she offer to help. Mrs. Matherson jumped when Mother came through the kitchen door. Mother would have apologized, except that she was dumb-struck by her surroundings. It was, she said, like she’d walked into a completely different house. Whereas, the floors and woodwork in the living room were badly in need of refinishing, and the buff-colored walls were dotted with dark rectangles where pictures had been removed after having hung in the same spot for years, the kitchen was gleaming and modern. Sleek metal cabinets and counters had replaced the originals; the walls were painted a stark white; and new, powerful lighting had been installed. The effect was...well, startling. “Oh my, isn’t this…” Mother didn’t know how to finish. Mrs. Matherson was clearly flustered and mumbled something like, “We like a nice kitchen.” She kept her eyes averted as she forked the rolls onto individual serving plates and looked in several drawers before finding napkins. Mother saw that the older woman’s hands trembled slightly as she poured the coffee and Mother offered to carry it so her hostess could take the rolls. Once they were back in the living room, Mrs. Matherson visibly relaxed. Mother recalls that first, awkward visit quite clearly, but it’s the cinnamon rolls she remembers most vividly. Yeasty, pillowy, pinwheeled dough, she said when she described them to me after she got home, filled with butter and cinnamon and sugar, and topped with a melty vanilla icing that made the whole thing feel like it was dissolving in your mouth before you even started chewing. (I accused her of torturing me because I refused to go on her welcome-wagon call that morning. Later, of course, I came to realize they would have been just as delicious as she made them sound, and not going with her was my loss.) For someone who was always watching her figure or trying to reduce, Mother was powerless to resist when Mrs. Matherson offered her a second roll, and she asked her to tell Lucille they were delicious. Mrs. Matherson smiled – a little sadly, mother thought – and said cooking was all her daughter really cared about. Mother grew thoughtful when she told me that part. Given Mrs. Matherson’s (probable) age, she said, Lucille wouldn’t have been terribly young. How odd that she was sleeping on the couch and cooking for her mother. *** Despite the fact that Mrs. Matherson wasn’t interested in joining Mother’s club, the two women became friends and settled into the habit of getting together a couple times a week. At first, they alternated houses, then Mrs. Matherson started insisting Mother come there. Mother was happy to be relieved of the burden of hosting. Not only was our house miserably hot, but Mother is not (nor ever was, as she is the first to admit) an adventuresome cook or skilled baker and she became anxious every time she had to come up with something to serve. And everything Mrs. Matherson served – made by the elusive Lucille (Mother still hadn’t met her) – was as delicious as the cinnamon rolls. Mother worried about all the extra calories the new friendship was adding to her diet, but she adjusted by skipping lunch on her visiting days, and I don’t think she actually gained more than a pound or two during the time she knew Mrs. Matherson. On the face of things, you wouldn’t have thought the two women had much in common, but they both enjoyed doing fancywork. Mother put her needlepoint away after the weather turned hot, saying the embroidery floss stuck to her hands and turned what should have been a relaxing pastime into an exercise in frustration. The air-conditioning at the Mathersons’ made it fun again. While they sewed, the ladies chatted. I asked Mother, once, what exactly they talked about while they worked on their pieces; or, I teased, did she just go for the food? She said they liked a lot of the same things – The Edge of Night and The Ed Sullivan Show were mutual favorites. But Mother may also have felt a bit sorry for the older woman. She said Dorothy never talked about having any other friends, and apparently didn’t go out – except for frequent trips to the grocery store for Lucille. Once Mrs. Matherson told Mother she’d driven all over creation the pervious afternoon looking for strawberries that would suit her daughter. The refreshment that day was fresh strawberry pie. It was about six inches tall and slathered in sweet, whipped cream. When Mother was ready to leave, Mrs. Matherson insisted she take what was left of it for Daddy and me, saying, “It won’t last long enough for us to finish.” She made it seem like Mother was doing her a favor. The same thing happened the next time Mother was there. Mrs. Matherson handed her a bag containing several of the chocolate croissants they’d just had. “You take these to your family,” she said. This time, Mother started to protest, but Mrs. Matherson cut her off. “I kept one,” she said, “but Lucille hardly eats anything.” She gave an exasperated little shake of her head, as though Lucille were a precocious child, “All that girl wants to do is cook.” When Mother told me about the exchange, I could only mumble my astonishment, in response, as I devoured one of the pastries. *** Back at the beginning of their acquaintanceship, Mother asked Mrs. Matherson if Lucille would like to come with her to our house. Mrs. Matherson thanked her but said her daughter didn’t really go out. Then, perhaps sensing that her new friend was owed a bit more of an explanation, she said, “Lucille gets nervous meeting new people.” Mother assured Dorothy that she understood, and it was quite alright. I, on the other hand, was dying to get out, so when Mrs. Matherson said to my mother, “See if Gail wants to come with you on Friday,” I jumped at the chance. I had been at loose ends since school let out. The only job an almost-fifteen-year-old could get was an occasional babysitting gig; and my best pal, Cheryl, was spending time with her grandparents in Iowa. Sitting in air-conditioning and eating fabulous refreshments sounded like heaven. Plus, I had become obsessed with the Mystery of Lucille. Mother still hadn’t caught more than that first glimpse of her, and a vague picture had formed in my head of a sort-of-faceless, big-boned gal. That was Mother’s impression of her size, but it might have been unfair since Lucille had been wearing sun-protective clothing that day. I thought there must be some way I could get a peek at her. But, just as Mother said, the door to the kitchen was always closed. One day, I came right out and asked Dorothy if Lucille would teach me to make the imaginative shortbread cookies we’d just had (full of tart, dried apricots and rimmed with chopped, toasted pistachios). She didn’t skip a beat. “Oh no, dear,” she responded, “Lucille doesn’t share her secrets.” Mother and I speculated, later, as to what kind of secrets she was talking about. Magical ingredients…or something more sinister? But given the end products, we wouldn’t have cared if she was experimenting with a new form of mind control. Who could have resisted the fancy chocolate layer cake with a creamy filling that was flavored with what Mother later decided was rum? (She claimed I acted goofy all afternoon.) Or the silky, homemade ice cream with tangy raspberry sauce? (We ran all the way home to get Daddy’s into the freezer before it melted, then ended up eating it ourselves, vowing to never admit our gluttony.) Even though the kitchen door stayed closed and Lucille remained out of sight, there was always the muted clatter of pans and bowls and utensils, and sometimes we smelled meat roasting, or bread baking, or more exotic aromas we couldn’t identify. Mrs. Matherson never made any mention of why Lucille was doing so much cooking. At first, Mother and I wondered if they were preparing for a party (to which we hadn’t been invited), but there was never any indication the women entertained. Gradually, I realized I was thinking less about Lucille and more about the food she produced. The idea that food could be so enticing was new to me. Mother found cooking and baking a chore in any weather and seldom attempted anything remotely fancy. Now, the heat wave had her alternating between tuna salad and baloney sandwiches, rounding out our cold suppers with potato chips and cottage cheese, and opening a tin of peaches or fruit cocktail for dessert. Usually, I was fine with our picnic meals, but sometimes I found myself wondering what the Matherson women were having. I even started reading the food sections of my mother’s Better Homes and Gardens and Redbook magazines. The photos and descriptions of casseroles and desserts had my mouth watering, but the ingredient lists went on forever and the instructions were complicated. Besides, anything that looked like it might fit my skill set required using the oven, and Mother said it was just too hot to turn it on. A couple weeks before my birthday in mid-July, I came across a recipe for Black Forest Gateau. Layers of chocolate sponge cake sandwiched with whipped cream and cherries, then decorated with additional whipped cream, maraschino cherries, and chocolate shavings. Oh, my lord! That cake sounded so delicious I dreamed about it. I begged Mother to hire Lucille to bake it for my birthday, but she poo-poo’ed the idea. She always made her One Bowl Chocolate Cake for special occasions and delighted in telling people the secret ingredient was vinegar. *** A few days before my birthday, our heat wave broke with an unexpected thunderstorm. The simple pleasure of breathing fresh air again was, itself, a gift. The rain and the reprieve from the heat made Mother so giddy she asked Grandma and Grandpa, and Uncle Bob and Aunt Janice, to come – not only for cake and presents – but, also for supper. Then she agonized about what to cook. That gave Daddy an excuse to buy the barbeque grill he’d been eyeing. Mother had argued against it – saying he’d use it a few times, then it would just sit on the patio and get rusty – but when he offered to cook hamburgers and hotdogs for the party, and said we’d use paper plates and eat outside at the picnic table, and all she’d have to make was potato salad and birthday cake, she changed her tune. The hamburgers were crispy, and the hot dogs were shriveled, but as they say, everything tastes better outdoors. Everyone said the charcoal flavor was delicious, and even Mother’s potato salad garnered compliments – no matter that the dressing was watery. When we finished eating, Mother had us move inside to the dining room table for cake and presents. Once we were settled, she disappeared into the kitchen, closing the door between the two rooms. That door was rarely closed, and I gave Daddy a quizzical look, but he only grinned and winked at me. Mother was gone so long, conversation started to lag, and my curiosity was beginning to get the better of me. When the door finally opened again, Mother inched her way through, backside first, before turning to face us. The cake she revealed was even prettier than the picture – sky-high, with whipped cream swirled into perfect flourishes on the sides; and on the top, piped into little nests that held red, glossy cherries. And just like in the photograph, tissue-thin chocolate shavings had been showered over the whole thing. Wisely, Mother hadn’t adulterated its beauty with tacky birthday candles. Uncle Bob gasped, as she set the masterpiece in the center of the table. “You did not make that, Lorraine!” Mother acted offended and pretended for a minute that she had; but in the end, she gave her brother a swat and admitted the truth – a baker lived across the road, in the farmhouse. She had slipped out the back door and over to the Mathersons’ to get the cake. Everyone said it was too pretty to cut, but Mother did, and when she carefully extricated the first slender wedge (which, of course, went to the Birthday Girl), we could see four perfectly even layers of chocolate sponge separated by equally perfect layers of whipped cream, dotted with chunks of juicy cherries. I’m not exaggerating when I say that cake was so beautiful to look at, and so luscious tasting, it might have made someone considering suicide think life was worth living again. After everyone left, I threw my arms around my mother and thanked her for getting Lucille to bake my cake. She said Dorothy hadn’t hesitated at all in accepting on her daughter’s behalf – in fact, she seemed thrilled with idea. Mother paid for the ingredients and threw in a little something for Lucille. I spent a long time that night writing in my diary, trying to capture the magic of the evening – and, especially, the cake. Even then, I knew I’d never be a skilled enough baker (nor have the patience) to create something like that, but it was the first time I was conscious of the effect food could have on a group of people, and I liked the idea that, with words, I could capture all the sensations and emotions it evoked. And I knew that, if I described it well enough, years later I would re-read what I’d written and experience it all over again. *** Mother, of course, couldn’t help sharing the story of the cake with her friends, and some of the women wondered if this Lucille would be interested in doing any baking for them. One woman was looking for someone to make her daughter’s wedding cake. Another had to throw a baby shower and couldn’t stand the thought of making dozens of cookies in the summer heat. Given Dorothy’s introverted personality, Mother didn’t want to hand out her phone number without permission, but she agreed to talk to her about it. Mother’s friends peevishly accused her of trying to keep her find all to herself, but she held her ground. As it turned out, though, Mrs. Matherson found the idea intriguing and called the very next morning to say Lucille would do it. Mother was back in her friends’ good graces, and – as word spread – Lucille became quite busy. And so did Dorothy, because in addition to doing all the shopping, she was the one who took the orders and scheduled pickups and deliveries. She also set the prices, insisting that everything be paid for in cash. (The ladies laughed and said that was a given. Cancelled checks would have brought the fact that they were paying for baking – something they should have had plenty of time to do themselves – to the attention of their husbands.) Lucille, as always, stayed behind the scenes and her customers took to calling her the Phantom Baker. The treats Mrs. Matherson now served on our visiting days were no longer as lavish as they had been in the beginning – often, just a few cookies, delicious as always, just not over-the-top fancy. She apologized for the plain fare. Lucille’s little baking business, she said, was keeping them hopping. Mother took some pride in the fact that she had helped start the whole thing – having no idea, of course, how much she would later come to regret it. At the time, though, we only regretted that Lucille was no longer our secret. *** Not long after my birthday the weather turned foul again. Temperatures shot back up, even higher this time. Lawns went dormant once more and tempers grew short. Our brief reprieve made the new round of heat even more difficult to bare. Everyone stayed inside as much as possible, but as I mentioned before, few homes had air-conditioning at that time and our oscillating fans did little more than move the hot air around. Our visits to the Mathersons’ got Mother and I out of the house, but I’m not sure whether that kept us from going stir-crazy or made matters worse. Once the novelty of their air-conditioning wore off, we admitted that their house was a little too cold and it felt clammy. We would sort-of-adjust to it, then it would be time to go back to our hot house. We always seemed to be snippy with each other in the afternoons after we’d been there. I continued reading the Food sections of Mother’s magazines. The enticingly worded descriptions – in addition to the alluring smells we were subjected to at the Mathersons’ – had me carping at Mother about our cold meals. But even on the nights we had hamburgers or hotdogs on the grill, the heat had extinguished any real appetite we might have had. Still, I sometimes wondered what Dorothy and Lucille were having for supper. *** The rest of July and the first couple weeks of August seemed interminable; but finally, my friend Cheryl returned from her grandparents. After that, she and I spent nearly every day together. We’d work on organizing our wardrobes for the start of the school year or stretch out on our stomachs in front of the fan and pour over Seventeen Magazine, making lists of all the wonderful things we’d never be able to afford. My mother, by then, was walking across the road less often. Mrs. Matherson, she said, was so busy helping Lucille with her baking business, she felt like she was intruding. And even though she missed their chats, Mother said it was good for Dorothy – having something to do. Traditionally, school started in our district the last week of August. It always felt like the beginning of fall, even though there was a month of summer left, according to the calendar. We usually had a few hot days that made it hard to sit still in class, but everyone expected them, and they soon passed. This year, though, the Summer of ’66, we couldn’t imagine heading back to our classrooms while temperatures continued to settle in between ninety-five and a hundred nearly every day. Not only were our schools not air-conditioned, we had dress-codes back then: skirts and blouses, or dresses, for the girls; trousers with belts and button-shirts for the boys. Sitting in a classroom would have been torture for everyone and there would certainly have been no learning going on. Finally, three days before school was scheduled to start, the Board of Education called it. No classes until the weather cooled off. We didn’t have sophisticated, long-range forecasting at that time – like we (supposedly) have now – and it felt like there was no end in sight. Sometimes it clouded up just before sunset. We would hear faint rumbles of thunder and see distant flashes of lightning, but they never produced any rain. Stories about dying farm animals appeared on the front page of the newspaper and the governor implored everyone to curtail their water usage. Each morning when we dragged ourselves out of bed, the air seemed more laden than it had been the day before. Any hint of a breeze was stifled by humidity; but paradoxically, the haze that dimmed the horizon did nothing to blunt the scorch of the sun. Everyone was exhausted, unable to remember their last decent night’s sleep. Of course, a few people clucked their tongues and whispered that something Biblical was happening. Far-fetched, perhaps, but even on a less epic level, our lives were grim. Mother was suffering from what she called heat-headaches and had stopped going across the road to the Mathersons’ altogether; the Ladies Club had decided to continue their summer hiatus; and Daddy arrived home every evening, after his forty-five-minute commute, rumpled and uncommunicative. Even Cheryl and I had argued over something silly and weren’t speaking to each other. Underlying it all, there was a growing sense of dread – a feeling that if something didn’t change soon, we’d never recover. Whether it would be our minds or our bodies that gave in first, no one knew. We only knew we couldn’t take much more. *** In the end, most of our minds and bodies managed to hang on. The weather surrendered. But not without a parting shot. Around noon – three weeks, to the day, after school was supposed to have started – we heard faint rumbles in the distance. We assumed it was the same mocking kind of thunder we’d heard so many times that summer, which was never the precursor of anything in the way of relief. This time, though, the rumbles gradually grew a bit louder, and we detected a stirring in the air. These changes were so subtle, so slow in developing, we hardly dared hope anything would come of them. If a heat-breaking storm was brewing, its development was nothing like that of the storm before my birthday. That morning, two months ago, clouds rolled in early; the wind started to blow; thunder boomed, and lightning slashed the sky. Once the rain began, temperatures dropped twenty-five degrees in a matter of minutes. Even after the flash and crash of the storm passed, the rain continued all day, gently replenishing streams and rivers, revitalizing lawns and fields, and restoring our sanity. The next morning, it was like we awakened to a new world. We naively hoped the heat would break in the same way this time. *** Now, clouds continued building in the west all afternoon. The thunder grew louder, and lightning pierced the sky – occasionally, then with more regularity. As the breeze picked up, we started allowing ourselves to think this might actually amount to something. Even though it was hot, just the movement of the air felt so good Mother threw open the curtains and windows she’d kept tightly closed for weeks in a vain attempt to keep the heat and humidity out. Daddy didn’t get home until almost suppertime that day. People were watching the sky, he said, when they should have been watching the road, and several accidents had snarled traffic. Mother kept saying she should go make sandwiches; but it seemed to me, a collective excitement was building, and nobody was hungry. By a little past seven, it looked like night was falling. Daddy went out to move the grill under the carport and, when he came back inside, he told Mother to call Dorothy and tell her to put her car in the garage. “And get the box of important papers.” he said. It was time to go to the basement. Suddenly, as if on cue, the cafe curtains in the kitchen blew straight out from the rods and the thunder rumbles became sharp cracks, separated by only seconds. (Mother forgot all about calling Dorothy, but it didn’t matter – Dorothy had once told her the garage door was too heavy to deal with.) Most people who have never been through a bad storm will admit to a certain thrill when one rolls in, and I felt more alive than I had in weeks. While Mother pushed coats and boots aside in the hall closet to get to the metal file that contained the bank book, the title to the car and documents pertaining to the house, I rummaged in the junk drawer in the kitchen to find a candle and matches, in case the electricity went out. Daddy was closing windows in the bedroom and yelled for us to go on downstairs. He’d run and get the Kellys – the elderly couple, next door, who didn’t have a basement. I also grabbed a box of saltines off the counter – there was no telling how long we’d be holed up and I was starting to feel peckish – even though my heart was thumping from excitement. Mother and I were about half-way down the steep, narrow stairway when I began to understand this wasn’t a lark. A monumental crash of thunder coincided with the lights going out. I gasped and instinctively tried to cover my ears. As shocking as the sound and the sudden darkness were, though, it was my mother – who never swore – loudly taking the Lord’s name in vain that started a cold lump of dread coalescing in my stomach. The cracker box had gotten away from me and bumped down the pitch-black stairwell. I tried to regain my bearings, but Mother dropped the important-papers box on the step behind her and I started again. She told me to hand her the box of matches so she could light the candle (which I had, luckily, managed to hang on to), but she broke several of the matches, and I said let me try. As we awkwardly traded, I felt how badly her hands were shaking – Daddy had just gone outside. Once I got the candle lit, Mother passed it back to me so she could reclaim her file and we made our way down the steps in the dim, flickering light. At the bottom, my foot grazed the box of crackers and I carefully bent to pick it up so Mother wouldn’t trip. We rounded the corner into the rec-room and saw – through the narrow windows at the top of the end wall – that lightning now flashed and sizzled in a near-constant display. And, even being in the basement, we could hear the ominous, accompanying sound effects – staccato cracks of thunder and the bellow of the wind. Mother found a Mason jar to hold the candle and placed it on our makeshift ping-pong table. We sat down on the worn-out sofa along the wall. Our backs were stiff and straight, and our feet were braced, as though we thought that would keep us in place if the house above us blew away. Even though I finally understood how childish it was to have thought we might want a nosh while we waited out the storm, I clasped the box of saltines in my lap as if it was as valuable as Mother’s box of important papers. Both of us needed something to hang onto. We were nearly hypnotized by the melting wax that dripped onto the plywood tabletop when a clap of thunder – louder than any that had come before – brought us abruptly back to consciousness. It was followed by a creaking noise and a deafening crash that drowned out even the roar of the wind. Mother and I gasped in unison and she grabbed my hand. From our subterranean safe-space we had no way of knowing what had happened, and neither of us had the courage to ask aloud why Daddy still hadn’t come back with the Kellys. As the storm raged on, my imagination conjured up unbearable explanations, but they were left unspoken. We had no context with which to judge how much time passed, but gradually we became aware that it was growing calmer outside. Still, it was endless minutes longer before we heard the back door open. The candle had slumped into the jar but was still burning. I grabbed it and we stumbled up the stairs. Even though the wind had died down, and the thunder and lightning had mostly played out, rain still poured down. In the dim light we saw that Daddy and the Kellys were drenched – but they were all in one piece. My mother, uncharacteristically, threw herself into my father’s arms and our neighbors enveloped me in a hug that almost doused the candle. Once we’d calmed ourselves, Daddy told us lightning had split the big cottonwood in the yard next door right down the middle. He couldn’t tell how much damage had been done, but it wasn’t safe to go wandering around in the dark to find out. Even though we had no electricity, Mother tried the phone in the faint hope she could reach Grandpa and Grandma and Uncle Bob, but of course, it was dead. She replaced the receiver but kept her hand on it for a second, as if gathering her stamina, then she took a deep breath and told me to get some bath towels. After Daddy dried off, he took the candle to do a room-by-room inspection of the house – to be sure water wasn’t leaking in in some corner. It was a relief to know that everything looked okay, but there was no sense of jubilation as we sopped up the puddles on the floor, then spread peanut butter on saltines and called that supper. We still didn’t know how our family and friends had fared. *** My parents convinced the Kellys to stay overnight. They took my bed and I curled up on the couch. When I awakened the next morning, to sunshine streaming in through the picture window, it was as though I was coming out of a coma. Before I had time to work out why I was sleeping in the living room, I realized I was not hot. For the first time in weeks, I hadn’t woken up in a puddle of sweat. Then I remembered the storm. I got up quietly and tiptoed to the window. The downed cottonwood from next door lay like an overturned boxcar, taking up half our yard and part of the street in front of our house. Leaves and branches, shingles and pieces of siding, as well as odd bits of lawn furniture and flower pots, were strewn everywhere. Incongruously, the sky was pristine – brilliant blue and clear, without a trace of haze. Mother and Daddy emerged from their bedroom, looking as groggy and disoriented as I felt. When they saw the scene outside, Mother inhaled sharply and pressed her fingers to her lips; Daddy shook his head and racked his fingers through his hair. By then the Kellys had come into the living room and their reactions were similar. They were anxious to get back to their own house to check on things in the light of day, and Daddy said he’d walk them over and make sure it was safe to be there. Mother and I went to the kitchen. She flipped a light switch, before remembering that we didn’t have power. Her thoughts must have been as jumbled as mine – so thankful that we were safe, and our house was spared, but praying the same be true for our family and all our friends. When Daddy came back, Mother asked him to go across the road and check on Dorothy and Lucille, even though it didn’t look like any trees or limbs had hit their house or garage – or the car, still in the driveway. He reported that Dorothy assured him they were fine. “But,” he added, “she looked pretty shaken up.” “Well, goodness,” Mother said, “two women, alone like that – of course, they would have been scared!” *** No one was quite sure whether we’d had an actual tornado, or just strong winds. It didn’t seem to me that it really mattered. Even though we knew how lucky we’d been – according to the paper, there had been no deaths or even serious injuries – things were still a mess. Anyone with a chainsaw or a truck was called on to help remove downed trees and haul debris. As soon as the streets were passable, linemen from the phone and power companies worked day and night to restore service. Still, it took some time to get everything up and running. Once Mother was able to talk to Grandma and Uncle Bob, she relaxed. She would have called Dorothy, but now her car was gone, and Mother speculated that she and Lucille had gone to stay with someone until services were restored. Most of the houses in our neighborhood had some sort of damage. Anyone who could take time off work stayed home to join the crew that formed to go house-to-house making repairs. Mother and several neighborhood ladies took lunches to the men at noon, so they could work as quickly as possible. There was almost an air of festivity about the project and Mother said it warmed her heart to see what good neighbors could do for each other. After a few days, Daddy went back to work, and the school board announced classes would begin the next Monday. Cheryl and I had been so relieved we were both okay, after the storm, we completely forgot our spat, and now we were excited about school starting. Except for the fact that Dorothy’s car still wasn’t in the driveway across the road, everything seemed to be getting back to normal. *** A couple nights later, we were having scalloped potatoes and ham for supper. It was the first oven-dish Mother had fixed in months, so it was no wonder she looked perturbed when we heard a knock on the front door. Daddy said he’d get it. A second later, we heard him say, “Harold, what can I do for you?” The only Harold we knew was Robinson – the county sheriff and also the husband of one of Mother’s Ladies Club friends. We laid our forks down and stopped chewing, so we could hear. At the name Matherson, we shot out of our seats and into the living room. Sheriff Robinson stepped inside and nodded to Mother and me as Daddy closed the door. More than likely, he said, there was nothing to worry about. It was just that – after the storm – the electrical company needed to test everybody’s meters. They’d tried calling Mrs. Matherson several times, and even stopped by, but could never catch her at home. The manager of the electrical substation mentioned the situation to Harold; Harold’s wife was the one who needed cookies for a baby shower a while back; and she suggested Mother might know what the story was. Mother felt guilty at having to admit that she hadn’t seen or talked to Dorothy for weeks and had no idea what was going on. When she noticed, right after the storm, that the car was gone, she’d assumed they went to stay with someone. The sheriff said that made sense. He’d tell the electrical folks to keep trying – the women would surely be home soon. Mother nodded, but I knew what she was thinking: The power had been back on for a week – would Lucille stay away from her kitchen that long? *** Over the next several days, my attention was consumed with new classes and all the things that went along with a new school year. Mother, however, had time to stew. She wished she’d done a better job of staying in touch with Dorothy, but it had seemed that, when Lucille (and by extension, Dorothy) got so busy with baking orders, her visits were somewhat of an imposition. The heat had given her a good reason not to intrude. Daddy said she shouldn’t worry, but Mother reiterated: something didn’t feel right. *** As September slid into October – and the weather turned from mild to crisp, and the leaves started to change – it began to seem as if our crazy-hot summer had just been a bad dream – and the Matherson women, a figment of our imagination. Then, Harold showed up again. He looked harried and said he needed to use our phone. He told us to wait in the living room until he was done. When he came back, he was pale and shaken. Harold stammered as he searched for the right words to tell us why he was there. The electric company had never been able to reach Mrs. Matherson, but since there wasn’t any indication of a problem with their meter, they let the matter slide – until a couple days ago, when some reading-or-other at the substation looked off. A serviceman was dispatched; but again, couldn’t raise anyone. This time, though, he peeked in the window of the small door at the side of the garage – and saw a car. He reported this to the manager, who remembered that Mother had assumed – because the car was gone – that the women were out of town. The manager called Harold and said it was time for the sheriff to get a warrant to access the house. After it was processed, Harold and the substation manager drove to the property. As expected, there was no answer when Harold knocked and called out. The door was locked, but Harold was a big man and it didn’t take much of a shoulder-bump to force it open. Here, the sheriff looked so bad my father had him sit down and told Mother to get a glass of water. After he’d taken a few sips and some of his color returned, Harold continued. The instant the door cracked open, they were assaulted by an unmistakable stench. The poor fellow from the electric company barely made it to the edge of the porch before he got sick. Knowing what he’d find, Harold held his handkerchief over his nose and mouth and inched his way inside – far enough to see two bodies on the kitchen floor. One lay face down, in a wide circle of dried-to-black blood. The other was slumped to the floor against a cupboard, head hanging down, soaked in what appeared to be gallons more of the inky substance. A blackened butcher’s knife lay between them. The color drained from Mother’s face and she nearly collapsed before Daddy got her to the sofa. She kept saying, “Oh, my Lord. Oh, my Lord,” as though it were a mantra. We grabbed each other’s hands as I slumped down beside her. Harold apologized over and over for having to tell us this, but he’d had to call the State Bureau of Criminal Investigation, he said, as soon as possible (murder was not in his job description) and he wanted us to know before they got there. *** The news tore through our community like a rampaging bull. The possibility that a cold-blooded killer was on the loose shook people to their core. SBCI investigators swarmed into town and, even though they issued statements about staying calm, people took to their houses in the same way they had during the heat wave. Now, though, everybody kept their doors locked day and night – and no one went anywhere alone. It was ascertained pretty quickly that my mother was the only person who actually knew anything about the Matherson women. Lucille’s baking customers sometimes picked up their orders at the house, but they were never invited inside and their interaction with Mrs. Matherson was brief and impersonal. There was no getting-to-know-you chit-chat. The more questions the state people asked Mother, though, the more apparent it became that she didn’t actually know much either. Dorothy had revealed nothing of substance about her situation. She’d never even said exactly where she and Lucille had come from. Mother hadn’t pried, of course, and perhaps never really realized how truly superficial hers and Dorothy’s conversations had been. A few days later Harold was at our door once again. He wanted to tell us the conclusion the state investigators had come to before it was made public. Murder/suicide. It was an older woman who was killed, he said, and a male, who had cut his own throat with the same knife. The news that there wasn’t a killer on the loose was, of course, a relief to the general public, but it provided no solace to my Mother. She was horrified, then sickened, then confounded. Still, she felt a modicum of relief that Lucille had escaped, and she implored Harold to find Dorothy’s daughter. He assured her that’s what the investigators were now focused on. *** The SBCI didn’t publicize their findings. Harold would probably, eventually, have told Mother what they learned, but his wife, Barbara – who was Mother’s friend (and perhaps looser-lipped than her husband would have liked) – loved having a story to tell. She kept Mother abreast. *** Dorothy, it seemed, had been determined not to leave a footprint. She didn’t receive any mail, and she hadn’t established a bank account. Her only reoccurring bills were for electricity and the telephone – and she paid those in cash, several months ahead. The purchase of the house and the repairs that were done were handled by an attorney in the city who hemmed and hawed about ethics and privacy. But when told that his cooperation was vital to the investigation of a murder/suicide and another woman’s disappearance, he abandoned his qualms and directed investigators to his client. A short time later, they asked James Miller about his relationship to Dorothy and Lucille Matherson. He staggered backwards, groping for the wall. “I’m… Dorothy’s husband.” *** As James Miller listened to what the detectives had come to tell him, he gripped the arms of his chair until his hands turned white. His face became a mask and his eyes went vacant. He knew, he whispered, he knew something would go wrong. The story came in fits and spurts, and at first it seemed as though the shock had caused James some sort of mental confusion. But the man’s distress was such that the detectives thought it best to let him talk, hoping he’d eventually tell them something that would help them find Lucille. *** James’s story started with his and Dorothy’s son. As soon as Louis was born, they decided to pronounce his name the way the French said it. “Lu-ee” sounded so much happier than the English “Lu-iss.” And as an infant and toddler, James said, Louis was the happiest, sweetest child you could imagine. But as he got older, Louis started having… difficulties. It wasn’t all the time, mind you, James said. Sometimes he was the funny, energetic, imaginative youngster he’d always been; but the next day, he wouldn’t be able to control his emotions or his anger. If he didn’t do something perfectly, by his own standards, Louis would fly into a rage – screaming and making himself do the thing he thought was not right over and over until it suited him. Louis’s teachers said he was high strung because of the way he lashed out when things didn’t go his way. During his last years in elementary school, James and Dorothy dealt with one incident after another when Louis fought with other students or destroyed projects in the classroom. Before he started high school, his parents considered moving to a different part of the city, so Louis could make a fresh start in a new school. But they knew it wouldn’t make any difference. If anything, their son was getting worse. Sometimes now, they heard him in his room arguing with unseen antagonists. (Mother could only imagine, she told Barbara, the heartbreak of having a child with such profound problems. “If the situation was that bad,” she asked, “did Dorothy send Lucille away – to live with relatives?” Barbara told her to be patient. The answers were coming.) James had paused here to ask for water. He was shaking so badly he had to use both hands to bring the glass to his mouth, but after he drank, he continued. He and Dorothy were exhausted and grief-stricken as they faced the fact that Louis would never have the life they had hoped he would have. They were considering taking him out of public school when Dorothy saw an article in the newspaper about a doctor who was successfully treating personality disorders with a combination of low-voltage electric shock therapy and a new drug. She made an appointment. After much evaluation, the doctor said Louis was a good candidate for the treatment. James and Dorothy anguished over having their son undergo something so extreme, but conceded, they had no choice. After several shock treatments and taking some time to it get the dosage of the drug right, they began to see some improvement in Louis. Even though he still didn’t interact easily with other people, his grades and his concentration got better. And even though the good-mood part of their son’s personality wasn’t as bright or energetic or imaginative as it had once been, he no longer erupted in violent rages. James and Dorothy knew they’d made the right decision. Eventually, James continued, some of the depressive effects of the medication lessened. One day, then-15-year-old Louis was hanging around the kitchen while Dorothy worked on dinner. She’d cut a recipe for a dessert out of the newspaper that morning and asked Louis to see if it was on the coffee table in the living room. When he didn’t come back, she found him sprawled on the sofa, as absorbed in the clipping as he would have been in a novel. When Dorothy asked if he thought it sounded good, he said he wanted to make it. She laughed and suggested he start with something less complicated. But Louis was determined. And even though he’d never before expressed an interest in cooking, and had no experience, the Baked Alaska they had for dessert that night was spectacular. He asked what some of the terms meant, and how to do this or that, but it all seemed to come quite naturally to him, Dorothy told James later, like when people discover they can play the piano by ear. From then on, Louis gave his mother grocery lists every morning and cooked every day after school. Sometimes it was only one dish or a dessert, but sometimes he cooked their entire meal. James worried that Louis was becoming obsessed (and, he didn’t like having supper at nine o’clock, so close to bedtime), but Dorothy shushed him, saying something was finally bringing their boy happiness. And, she chided James, when you’re having Beef Wellington, you call it dinner. (That made Mother wonder if it was Louis who had nurtured Lucille’s passion for cooking, but again, Barbara wouldn’t comment.) Nearly everything Louis made was delicious, James said, but sometimes he would find faults no one else saw and become angry. Once, he threw a beautiful layer cake into the trash because, he said, the middle layer was too thin, and it looked disgusting. When an episode like that occurred, Dorothy asked Louis if he was taking his medication. The doctor had said it should be his responsibility, but Dorothy knew the medicine made Louis tired and he didn’t like that, so she watched him carefully. By the time Louis graduated from high school there was no question about what he wanted to do with his life. He’d already taught himself so much about cooking and baking, his parents didn’t know what else there was to learn, but they gladly paid his tuition to a cooking school. Louis’s focus and attention to detail – in general, his quest for perfection – made him a star pupil, and when he completed the course, one of his instructors recommend him for a job in a popular restaurant. James and Dorothy worried about how their son would cope in such a high-stress environment and if he’d be able to get along with his coworkers, but Dorothy continued reminding him to take his medication every day. And besides, Louis’s talent went a long way in making up for the peculiarities of his personality. The head chef was so impressed with Louis’s work, he put him in charge of pastries. Louis was proud of himself and rightfully so. Now, he wanted his own apartment. James and Dorothy reluctantly agreed. *** James had to wipe his nose and his eyes with a balled-up handkerchief before he could continue. The deeper into the story he got, the more haggard he looked and the slower he talked, but the detectives allowed him to proceed at his own pace. (Mother, of course, was becoming more and more impatient to know where Lucille was while all of this was taking place. Still, Barbara would not be hurried.) Finally, James went on. For several months, things had gone well for Louis. Often, on Mondays, when the restaurant was closed, he stopped by to see his parents, and although James and Dorothy were alert to any changes in Louis’s mood or demeanor, their son seemed generally relaxed and in good spirits. Gradually, they allowed themselves to believe their son had finally grown into himself. And if, once in a while, they noticed he was a bit distracted or short-tempered, they told themselves not to worry, everyone had bad days. Then came the Monday Louis showed up before seven in the morning. Usually, he stopped by later in the day, having caught up on a bit of sleep on his day off. That morning, though, he handed his mother a box of raspberry-glazed scones that were so freshly-baked they were still warm. Obviously, Louis hadn’t been to bed. His clothes were rumpled, his hair looked greasy, and he needed a shave. Dorothy wanted to ask him if he was taking his pills, but instead she said the rolls smelled heavenly. Then she busied herself making coffee to go with them. Louis paced the kitchen until they were ready to sit down. The scones were every bit as delicious as they smelled, but when Dorothy said so, Louis exploded. They were crap, he said, and she was as bad as the toadies he worked with. Couldn’t anyone tell good food from garbage? Louis stormed out, and his parents knew he was headed toward a disastrous situation, but they didn’t know what they could do about it. When the call came in the afternoon, it was too late. *** According to the police, Louis had gone straight to the restaurant, even though it was closed. A janitor named Manny was sealing the grout in the storeroom when Louis burst in. Before Manny could make himself known, Louis began muttering angrily, like some buried rage was working its way to the surface. Manny stayed where he was. When Louis started sweeping utensils and cookware off the counters and onto the floor, Manny became more and more frightened. By the time an expensive mixer – that had been delivered only a few days earlier – crashed on the tile, Manny could no longer stand it. He made a run for the door. Louis saw him and gave chase, demanding to know if Manny was spying – if he was going to run to the boss. Manny tried to say no, no – he’d never do such a thing, but Louis wrestled him to the floor and held the janitor down with one arm across his neck and shoulders. A knife that Louis had swept off the counter during his fury lay near where the men scuffled. Louis grabbed for it. Manny struggled to direct the blade away from his body, but Louis was stronger. It may have been the sight of Manny lying so still, his eyes fixed in disbelief, or blood seeping onto the floor that brought Louis back to some semblance of reality. When he saw that his outburst, this time, hadn’t resulted in just broken dishes or a cake thrown into the trashcan, he was terrified, and he ran. The head chef came in a few minutes later to place an order for the next day’s produce. He called for help. Before Manny lost consciousness, he was able to tell the police what had happened. *** They’d both wanted to believe that Louis had his difficulties under control, James said. But Dorothy blamed herself, saying she’d been afraid Louis had stopped taking his medication, but she hadn’t had the courage to confront him. If she had, she might have prevented this horrible thing from happening. James tried calling Louis’s apartment, but there was no answer. The police had been adamant that James let them know if Louis got in touch, and James assured them he would. But when Louis showed up several hours later, sobbing like the nine-year-old who became hysterical with remorse after he destroyed a balsam wood model plane he’d worked on for weeks, James knew Dorothy wouldn’t let him make the call. When Louis was young, he said, Dorothy believed that if her love was strong enough, she could fix her son’s problems. And when she held him in her arms following a destructive outburst and he calmed down, it reinforced her belief. Holding her adult son, Dorothy told James she knew she couldn’t change what had happened, but she was going to keep Louis safe now, and make sure he never hurt anybody else. It was apparent to the detectives that a lifetime of worry had exhausted James, and he wouldn’t have had the strength to oppose his wife. He did exactly as she said. *** Dorothy’s plan may have been conceived on the fly; but, obviously, she never doubted it was right thing to do. She rented a studio apartment, under her maiden name, and took Louis there. She refilled his prescription and saw to it he took his pill every morning – doubling the dose if he seemed agitated. If he balked, Dorothy reminded him of what happened that Monday morning in the restaurant. Meanwhile, James looked for a place they could move to permanently. Where Louis would have a fresh start. Where it was quiet, and no one knew him. Where he wouldn’t face scrutiny or pressure. The old farmhouse, not too far out of the city, was perfect. James hired a lawyer to handle the sale and coordinate the work needed to get the place back in shape. After several weeks the house was ready, and Dorothy revealed the rest of her plan. She didn’t want James to move with them – at least, not right then. Manny had survived his injuries, but if the police found Louis, they would arrest him for assault. They were still checking in with James every few days and he continued to tell them he hadn’t heard from Louis. If James moved out of their apartment, it would arouse suspicion. Dorothy said she would continue to go by her maiden name after she and Louis moved, and she would pay for everything in cash. And…she would tell people her daughter lived with her. *** (By then, of course, Mother had guessed what was coming, but even so, hearing Barbara say the words was shocking.) James hadn’t seen it coming and he was aghast. Why, was it necessary to pretend she had a daughter instead of a son, he asked. Wouldn’t it just be one more deception to maintain? Dorothy said to trust her; she knew what she was doing. James vehemently disagreed with her, but he didn’t have the strength to challenger her. He knew that Dorothy believed that she alone could care for their son – and control his demons. And, truth be told, he was relieved to let Dorothy handle Louis. The admission clearly cost James. He hoisted himself up out of his chair and mumbled that he needed to use the bathroom. While he was gone, the detectives looked at a grouping of photos on the mantle – a short pictorial of Louis’s growing-up years. The first one was taken when he was a laughing toddler holding his arms up to the photographer. In another, an elementary class flashed toothy grins at the camera. There were no pictures of Louis’s early teenage years, and it was hard to believe the last two photos were of the same boy. One was taken at high school graduation – Louis in cap and gown. And the other, when Louis completed his culinary course – he was wearing a chef’s hat and holding his certificate. Those last pictures showed a young man whose face seemed to be carved from stone. His eyes were spiritless – completely devoid of any emotion, happiness or otherwise. The photo progression meant to show the promise of a young life, instead showed a joyful youngster that became an adult who looked like he was dead inside. (Mother shivered at the description of the photos as it had funneled down to Barbara, and then to her. But she was grateful the detectives were so observant. She understood why Dorothy couldn’t accept what the pictures showed. She was the boy’s mother. Of course, she kept believing a part of her sweet toddler was still in there somewhere.) James returned from the bathroom and sank back into his chair. The detectives had the information they needed to close the case and would have left the frail old man to his sorrow, but he asked them to sit down again, and they understood he needed to finish the story. *** James and Dorothy arranged to meet every few weeks so he could give her cash to cover hers and Louis’s living expenses. The first time they met, Dorothy looked tired and James could see she’d lost weight. It had been stressful, she said, getting unpacked and settled. Louis had arranged and rearranged the kitchen countless times. James’s heart broke for his wife, but a part of him was grateful not to be involved. At their next meeting, he was relieved to see Dorothy relaxed and upbeat. She had even gained some weight. Louis, she said, finally had things set up the way he liked and was spending every waking minute in his beautiful, new kitchen doing what he loved – making complicated main course dishes and delectable baked goods. Their biggest problem, she laughed, was that she was getting fat and the freezer James had had installed in the garage was already half-full. The next time they met, Dorothy brought James several bags of frozen food. And, she said, she was giving as many baked goods as she could (without raising too much curiosity) to a nice neighbor she’d met. (That, of course, pierced Mother’s heart.) Still it was hard to keep up. So, when the opportunity to start a little baking business presented itself, it seemed like the perfect solution. James was concerned that filling orders and having deadlines would be stressful for Louis; but Dorothy said it would be good for him to have a real purpose again. If he became anxious or tense, she would increase his medication. With cash coming in, Dorothy wasn’t as dependent on James as she had been; but they continued meeting – sometimes even having lunch or a glass of iced tea at a diner. It was a tremendous relief to James, seeing Dorothy cheerful and relaxed – like the girl he fell in love with so many years ago. He looked forward to their meetings and he could see Dorothy did too. For nearly three months their secret life seemed to be working for all of them. *** As the weather had gotten hotter and their tolerance to the heat had worn down, James suggested to Dorothy that they meet in the parking lot by the lake. It was one place they could find some shade, where it was a few degrees cooler. On this morning, they sat in her car with the doors open wide in an attempt to catch any hint of a breeze. James had arrived first, and as soon as he walked to Dorothy’s car and got in, he could see that she was tense. The clenched jaw, the cryptic answers to his questions – he knew what they meant. Suddenly he felt old and tired again. He asked her what had happened. Dorothy looked out across the lake before she answered, and when she finally did, her voice was barely audible. Louis had gotten a little wound up over all the orders he was getting. James didn’t know if he had the energy to hear more, but Dorothy went on without being prompted. They had never expected so much business, she said, but Louis wouldn’t turn anyone down. He was working much too hard, having trouble sleeping and balking about taking his medication because he thought it slowed him down. She continued gazing into the distance. What he needs, she said to herself as much as to James, is a break from all of it – for a while. Dorothy fell quiet for a few minutes. Heat waves shimmered across the surface of the lake, and only the buzz of insects broke the silence. Finally, she brought her eyes back to James, but he could tell she wasn’t seeing him. A trip, Dorothy said a little more decisively, but still to herself, would do Louis good. Maybe to the mountains – someplace cooler, where he could get outside. Actually, she continued with more conviction, it would do them both good to get away. In fact, she went on, her eyes coming into focus now as she firmly took hold of the idea, why didn’t James join them. Surely, by now no one would notice that he was out of the apartment for a few days. James loved his wife and he missed her, so how could he admit to her what a relief it had been these past months, to have been released of all responsibility for their troubled son. He knew he didn’t have the stamina to assume even a part of it again. And Dorothy knew it too. She laid her hand on her husband’s arm and gave him a small, sad, understanding smile. “Are you sure you can handle him by yourself?” James asked softly, guilt already like a lead weight on his shoulders. “I can handle Louis,” Dorothy said, in that determined way she’d always had when it came to her son. They sat quietly a few more minutes, then Dorothy said she must go. She and Louis would leave as soon as possible, and she would let James know when they returned. “But don’t worry if you don’t hear for a while,” she said, trying for a bit of levity. “We might find someplace so nice we’ll just stay a bit.” This time it was James who smiled the sad smile. He covered her hand with his, unable to tell her how sorry he was. *** When Dorothy didn’t get in touch, James tried to make himself believe that maybe they had found someplace nice. But when there was still no word, James knew. Dorothy hadn’t been able to handle Louis, after all. *** As hard as it was for Mother to hear, I’m glad she learned the whole truth. The mystery of our phantom baker would have haunted her, had she not. As for me, it was because of Lucille (it’s the only way I can think of the person I never saw) that I have a career I love, writing about food. The beautiful and delicious treats she produced and the delectable aromas that wafted from her kitchen during the Summer of ’66 captivated me. Would all of it have been as alluring had I not experienced it in the context of miserably hot weather and Mother’s cold suppers? I don’t know. What I do know is that when I write about a dish or a dessert that’s been perfectly prepared and served, I want my readers to see the beauty and art of it, and I want them to know the pleasure it can bring. Lucille gave me that.
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Gary’s Big Break |
Antonia Schuster is a social policy worker living in Brunswick, Melbourne, with a keen interest in writing about themes of being a foreigner in a strange land – both in Australia and elsewhere. Published works include her short stories ‘To Pailin’, Escape’ and ‘Service Disruption’. Antonia is originally a social worker, and when not writing, is busy being a parent of a teenager, member of two writers’ groups, cyclist and traveller. |
LISIEUX
Lisette
2018
Through the window
The summer sky is a wide blue dome encircling us as we stroll along the Esplanade, arm in arm, bathed in warmth and dazzling light. The air is so clear the container ships can be seen for miles as they churn their way steadily, relentlessly towards the heads – gradually shrinking until they steer right and vanish, steaming inexorably out and away, over the horizon.
The impulse of sadness when I see the ships departing, growing smaller, is an old acquaintance I push gently away, barely noticing.
I cast my gaze around at the palm trees with their fronds dancing in the light breeze, the bright sails on the bay, the burnished gold sand. Tom’s arm curves round my waist, his fingers lightly, almost indolently stroking my hip, and I snuggle closer in, smiling up at him.
‘Here it is!’ I point along the row of houses lining the opposite side of the Esplanade. The string of colourful residences reflects the changing fortunes of the beachside suburb over the decades: Art Deco edifaces adorned with cornices and painted an expensive fresh white tower over modest red brick terraces; concrete blocks of low-rise apartments have sprouted in every gap.
‘Lisieux,’ I murmur dreamily, letting my head fall on to Tom’s shoulder. ‘My namesake!’
Tom kisses me lightly on the cheek, stroking back my dark strands, and pulls me towards him. He knows what I’m thinking every time I see this house.
My mother named me Lisette after this house.
When I was small she told me she used to cycle past here on her way to the beach and would look at this house, wondering who lived here, wishing it was her. When she was a uni student, then all through the years as she got older – when she was married and my brother Emil was young, then when things turned sour and she used to go off for rides on her own, looking for respite. And then when she met my dad, and would cycle down here to meet him.
She told me about one sparkling winter afternoon she took off on her bike, riding back home from St Kilda to Fitzroy, the slanting sun in her eyes. She cycled effervescently, exhilarated, as he drove past her in his white car, glancing long at her, his eyes dark and loving, watching through his rearview mirror.
When she told me that story I could almost see his velvety eyes and feel her joy as she cycled into the sun, the skyline, the future that burned fierce and luminous in her.
It’s not the most beautiful house ever: in fact, I think it looks a bit sterile, with its boxy exterior jutting out from its more traditional façade. Mum says it used to be a kind of ivory colour and looked better, somehow warmer then. Now it’s a kind of trendy steel grey.
I like the big square window at the front – through it you can often see a huge vase of lilies inside, sitting in the middle of a vast mahogany table. The carpet is white and the walls are hung with gilt paintings.
You never see anyone in Lisieux, despite the soaring windows. Sometimes, when I walk past – or cycle past, like my mum used to – I feel it’s a stage set. Waiting for the cast to walk onstage. Holding its breath, waiting for the story to begin.
*****************************************************************************
2009
French Riviera
I can hear her jagged breathing through the wall as I’m hugging my ribs in my cramped box of a room, shivering slightly under the duvet. She’s crying again. I shut my eyes and sing a little song to myself.
Je vais m’en aller à Saint-Tropez
Je vais m’en aller à Saint-Tropez
Je vais quitter Paris
Et le ciel gris…
She’s still crying. I know she can’t hear me so I sing it again, and again, and again until I’m nearly asleep. As I wait for sleep to come, I watch the cracked blind swaying in the draft. The lights of the passing cars shining through sweep across to my wall, like fireflies. I hear the shouts of a passing drunk, and the ebb and flow of my mum’s quiet sobbing. My hands are clamped on my ribs for warmth.
At breakfast she sits and watches while I eat my muesli and fruit. It’s as if she wants to be sociable, but can’t think of anything to say. I watch the TV numbly, glassy-eyed. It’s ABC News Breakfast. I don’t know why she turns it on, she always sits with her back to it, and she can’t stand the newsreader. ‘Self-satisfied smug bourgeois who thinks she’s edgy because she lives in Carlton not South Yarra,’ I heard her comment once to Emil. Emil just grunted back – he used to join in with Mum’s critiques, but these days, he’s immersed in his own teenage life. I think she’s jealous of this woman with her good job on TV, jealous of her (presumably) nice renovated terrace house, probably a husband, and two kids who are both her husband’s kids too. Two kids, one dad, one mum. Perfect.
‘What’s on in school today?’ Mum asks me, stirring her coffee. “Is it grade six assembly this morning?’ She picks up a fork and plays with her fruit – no muesli, just fruit. She likes to stay thin, and I know it’s just in case my dad comes back one day.
I shake my head. ‘No… that was… Wednesday,’ I say vaguely. I’m tired, I never sleep that well the nights I hear her crying. I look at her dubiously. Her eyes are ringed in shadows and her hand is shaking slightly. She probably drank too much wine last night. I swivel my head to the recycling bin: yep, there’s a wine bottle upended in it.
‘Emil!’ Mum calls, suddenly remembering she’s a mother and he’s going to be late for school. But she doesn’t get up out of her chair. I guess she’s too tired; she looks so fragile and finished sitting there clutching her coffee in her black skivvy that’s seen better days and her short desperately bright geometric skirt. I’m sure if we lived in other parts of town - in the suburbs - people would think she was a bit unhinged. Actually, when I think about it, she probably is a bit unhinged.
I shuffle off to get my school bag. I collect my lunchbox off the kitchen bench and notice there’s no sandwich today, just an extra rice cracker. Mum sees me notice. ‘We ran out of bread and I didn’t realise till this morning,’ she smiles apologetically. ‘Sorry, sweetie.’
She reaches out and pulls me in for a hug as I walk past her chair. I stand still, obedient, while she hugs me, placing her hands on my shoulders and pushing me gently back for a moment, to look close at me. She brushes a lock of hair off my forehead and I see her looking longingly at it, as she curls it round her finger. My dad’s hair was black like mine.
I pull away, frowning, and twist my head so she has to let go. As I run down the stairs past the shut grimy doors of the other flats I think Un jour, je vais te trouver, salaud.
I traipse to school. Partly I’m tired because I’m already thinking ahead to French school, after normal school. Today we need to stand up the front and give a little talk about where we’re going for our next holiday. As I hurry across St Kilda Road at the lights, my eye on the green man, willing him not to switch to red till I’m past halfway, I remind myself I have to skip choir this lunchtime. I have to go the library and look up places on the Riviera in the atlas.
St Tropez…Antibes…Nice…which will I choose.
I get a tight feeling in my chest at the thought of skipping into French class with my chattering braided classmates, in their unladdered woollen tights, gleaming patent black shoes, and afterwards - even worse - skipping out again. To where all the parents are waiting, leaning on their expensive cars, coolly watchful behind sunglasses, their snatches of nonchalant conversation - Nous étions en Nouvelle-Calédonie, ces vacances - wafting with a smooth indifferent self-contentment through the playground.
All these Calvin Klein clad dads with their neat hair and lingering glances at the mini-skirted, gold-ringed mums of their kids’ classmates, their privileged visas and all-expenses-paid lives.
I skirt round them like a shadow, and make a direct line for the bus stop at the corner.
*******************************************************************************
Mira
1995
Chanson d’amour
He’s sliding into me, his body pressing down so hard I can barely breathe. I stretch my stilettoed heel up and against the white wall, reach my arm back to push against the wall behind, and move with him. I ignore the hard tiled floor beneath my back, wriggling slightly to position his coat under the small of my back. I’m gratified that he laid out his coat. We’ve used mine so many times it’ll need a dry-clean soon; I sometimes imagine it might have picked up a permanent smell of the disinfectant aroma of the changeroom.
He arches his back to stretch up and reaches down to touch me. I can’t last long; neither can he, as he slows down, whispering, ‘Oh oui, qu’est-ce que c’est bon,’. His eyes are closed as I look up at him, the sight of him so beautiful. Oh god…I’m spinning in a wave of pleasure, I close my eyes and plunge down somewhere deep and intense as I gasp and he clamps my lips gently with his fingers to muffle the sound. As I finally subside, a laugh of happiness wells up in me and he smiles back, then closes his eyes again, and breathes, ‘Oui...’ as I feel his warmth flooding through me, and cascading on my belly as he pulls back, a touch too late.
We smile at each other and go through the quiet business of mopping up with handfuls of tissue paper. He moves to the basin and I sit up, sticky and happy, leaning back on the palms of my hands, my eyes moving over his strong back with its fading tanline, then travelling over his firm white buttocks and his dark-haired thighs. Tristan is a soccer player, and a cyclist, with a compact, fit body – he works hard to keep it that way. As I stand up to sidle up behind him, my arms snaking round him, my lips on his neck, I can feel, with a fondness, the flab of his belly which has developed a little – just a little – over the last few months. He loves good food – I know he eats well every lunchtime, from the taste of garlic when we kiss in the afternoons. Every lunchbreak I think he goes to eat pasta with his French colleagues.
‘That was amazing!’ he whispers, his eyes lit with warmth as he looks at me through the mirror and I nestle my body beside him. We both contemplate the picture we make. My body so small next to his, fitting perfectly under his shoulder. Our eyes bright.
‘Hmmm, so sexy!’ he murmurs, his eyes travelling down to the tops of my stockings, his fingers caressing the lace belt. I laugh and we get dressed, quickly. I kneel down and hand him his white shirt; it’s almost domestic. He leaves first, I quickly survey the scene to check we haven’t left anything, then click the door open. I walk past the lifts of the office block, arranging my work bag as if I’ve just come straight from my desk.
On the concrete ramp behind my office building, he holds me tight. His bike leans against the wall, red helmet dangling off the handlebars, his warm neck smells lightly of his aftershave as my lips glide over it, tracing the line where his short black hair meets his skin. I lean into him and let him envelop me.
His hands are on my waist and he’s whispering in my ear, breathing his softly accented words into me. The way he murmurs so lightly makes it hard sometimes to work out if he’s saying, ‘I love you’ or ‘I love it’ but both are okay, though I prefer the former.
After, I ride fast up the hill to William Street, knowing his eyes are on me, and fly home alongside the peak-hour traffic, the warmth of him filling my chest, my eyes as luminous as the city lights around me.
1996
Green Light
Silence hangs heavy in the empty hallway. A shaft of autumn sun falls across the bare floorboards and I fix my eyes on it, cradling Emil in my arms as we wait for the taxi. He’s in a kind of shock but holding up well, quiet in my arms, his favourite cuddly tiger clenched in one fist.
All the furniture is gone – now it’s just us and our last few pieces of luggage piled around us like sandbags. Alex stands on the other side of them, his hands in his pockets. I can’t see his expression as the door is open and the morning light is behind him. In his long coat he looms menacing and melancholy.
But I won’t have to sit here under his oppressive gaze much longer. My ears are straining for the taxi.
When it arrives Alex doesn’t say much, as he grudgingly helps load the bags into the boot. He stands at the gate, his arms helpless by his side as we take off. I want to ask the driver to go as fast as he can. I’m still cradling Emil. I hunch down in the seat and don’t look back. My eyes are fixed on the traffic lights, willing them to stay green as we hurtle south.
Our new place is small and the paint is greyed and flaking but my heart is starting to sing as I throw open the kitchen window that looks down over the shared back garden. I set out my potplants on the rickety back verandah, the trembling in my hands gradually easing, and I stride across the creaky boards of the living room, my favourite picture in my outstretched arms.
My gaze sweeps over the rounded walls, the stained glass, the cracked cornices, and the first thing I want to do is hang my paintings. I tear open their boxes, one after the other, rip through their newspaper wrapping, and find places for them on the walls, until there is barely a space left and the room is vibrant with my colours – the azure sea, the ochre of cliffs like crushed velvet, the swirling magenta sunset sky, and the inky blue of midnight lit with stars.
I step back to look at them, tears of hope warming in my eyes and I tell myself I’m going to be okay.
Eight weeks
I don’t know if it ‘s the cold making my eyes sting or the shock around my heart. I walk, I keep walking, along the gritty streets, trying to concentrate enough not to get hit by a car when my eyesight is wavering and blurring with exhaustion, with horror and the howl of my emotions stripped bare.
This is what it’s going to be like when Tristan is gone is what echoes and rings through my body. I couldn’t see him today as he was home recovering from a bike accident – it’s Friday, we always see each other on Fridays – thank god he’s okay, not injured, just sore and aching and shocked – but my body is shaking with the horror that now I won’t see him till Monday, that’s a break of three days not two like usual – but the real horror is that in eight weeks time every Friday will be like this, every day will be like this, alone under the screaming sky, alone in the whipping wind, with my red-rimmed eyes, my seizing heart.
I realise I will have to start wearing sunglasses as I walk these pointless anonymous city streets with my aloneness.
Because he’s leaving, he’s going back to France, with his wife and kids.
I could go too, but then Emil would never see Alex. I can’t do that to my child. Regardless of how hateful Alex has been to me, refusing to acknowledge our relationship’s dead, refusing to accept it was over years ago, and all I’m trying to do now is find the way I want to live.
The twisted irony of finally walking away, freeing myself - to then lose Tristan – sits like lead in my gut, like something that will make me sick.
We’ve have been through all the scenarios, we’ve talked through them together, late nights in the warm red light of my bedroom, sitting on a bench in the church garden in our lunchbreaks, then – as the winter closed in – in cafés and bars, discreet places I find for us, where we sit in booths, our arms round each other, whispering. My head falls to his shoulder, every second sentence ends in a gentle brushing of lips and his serious gaze is close to mine, so close I can see every fleck, every strain around his eyes, every fleeting fear.
Six weeks
I talk a lot with my neighbour Angie, gripping my coffee cup in her kitchen or mine, while Emil is playing with Finn in our living room or theirs, across the landing.
As a single mum my life has unfolded, unfurled like a silk scarf floating in the breeze. My flat is borderless; open to visitors night and day, my weeks are fluid and vivid with work, afternoons helping at kinder, my painting, the arts association, my new painting group. Suddenly I can do anything. I lurch between giddy ascents into exhilaration and sickening plunges into dark.
My new life is a searing screaming ride at Luna Park under the glittering stars of a tipping night sky, heaving and gulping huge tracts of sharp winter air, stars glinting like knife slits or prayerful diamonds.
My old life has been so easily cleaved away like a thick canvas cut through with a murderously sharp Stanley knife, pallid heavy sheets of it tumbling to the floor. That inner-north life in the solid brick terrace with Alex, with the thick walls and the rules, the heavy silence of failure and constant treading on thin ice, is a black-and-white film that appears mostly just in my nightmares.
Angie taps her chipped red nail on the Laminex table as we huddle over our coffee. She sighs a little, and I know what’s coming.
‘Honey,’ she begins, reaching over to briefly clasp my knuckles. ‘Are you sure about this?’ She tucks her brown stray curls behind her ear, and fixes her clear hazel eyes on me. She’s a volunteer counsellor at Lifeline: it crosses my mind she’s practising on me.
‘I know it’s a long shot,’ I begin, twisting my cup round in awkward circles on the table, grasping for the words. I need to talk about this, it’s the only way I can test out how crazy it is. ‘And I wouldn’t wish a long-distance relationship on my worst enemy.’
She cocks an eyebrow. ‘Who’s your worst enemy then?’
I know what she’s thinking. It’s me. I grimace and shrug. ‘Look, the thing is – there’s nothing else we can do. We’d originally planned to have a kind of transition time for these last few weeks, you know, just see each other as friends – but as it’s gotten closer, we couldn’t, we ...’ I search for the words as her gaze stays on me, sombre.
‘We just don’t want it to end. He says he doesn’t want to end.’ I gulp some coffee, feeling I can believe it.
‘He’s going to try to come back,’ I say in a rush. ‘He’s staying on the same project so that he can – he just needs to sort things out first,’ I trail off at this point.
‘You mean he needs to tell his wife about it,’ says Angie matter-of-factly. ‘And leave her.’
She looks out the window at the seagulls circling outside. ‘And leave his kids behind.’
We sit silent, both watching the seagulls. Their downward circling.
‘Right?’
I nod, and our gazes meet. Neither of us say anything for a moment.
I hear Angie’s light sigh. ‘You know Mira, it takes a hell of a lot to put a bomb under a family.’ Her gaze is kind. ‘I honestly don’t think you should hang all your hopes on this. I mean, sure – maybe he’ll come back – but – who knows? Maybe he won’t, maybe it’ll just be…’
She hesitates and I look across the table at her as if her words will seal my fate.
‘…too hard.’
Too hard. The words float to the ground sadly. But to me the words too hard are a gauntlet thrown down. I’m a fighter, I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.
‘What’s too hard?’ Emil is in the doorway, his helicopter dangling from one hand. He holds it out to me.
‘What’s happened to your helicopter sweetheart?’ asks Angie, reaching over to inspect it, just as I manage a smile and say, too quickly, ‘Nothing darling!’
Emil looks from me to Angie and back to me.
‘I think the battery just needs recharging...’ says Angie, wresting it out of the back of the toy. She smiles at Emil. ‘Do you want to find the recharger Emil, and see if you can work it?’
I’m filled with gratitude for Angie. As I watch my son busily pulling open drawers, hauling out the stool to get to the top cupboards, I think, Two months ago, he would have asked me to do it. I smile and as I look round my warm chaotic kitchen. Thank god at least I have Emil.
I whisper a brave silent plea that maybe this can almost be enough.
The phone rings on the wall. I jump for it, hoping it’s Tristan. It’s not, it’s Steve from the painting group, asking if I want to come and have a beer tonight. I say yes, I invite Angie, and later as we lean against the wall at the Espy, watching a band, I sip on my beer, the day dwindling to its end. I rest my head back against the sticky wall, the thrash of the band reverberating through my temples, and I let my eyes drift across the bay, catching on the twinkling lights of ships.
I turn away when my stomach twists and wrenches, slapped with the sudden shock that these are container ships. One of them will carry his life away soon, in a big metal box, dirty cold steel encasing his belongings. His sterile furniture, dragged once again across the churning sea to their sleek two-storied home in a gated community on the outskirts of Toulouse.
I’ve been dreading the end of this day. It’s our sixteen month anniversary but like every Saturday now, it’s also the dismantling of another week. As I drain my beer, I feel the thudding of the relentless alarm clock in my chest which has just ticked over to six weeks left.
I throw my gaze up to the dusty art-deco ceiling. It’s an impulse, to stop the tears brimming, to distract myself, to look detached to any casual observer, or maybe to look for something up there in those dark corners, to pray to invisible angels in the cobwebs.
Five weeks
I can’t believe we’ve only just realised how the sink in here is the perfect height for me to perch, trembling with the effort not to fall, as Tristan stands before me, naked under his white shirt. He gently pushes apart my legs to lock the heel of my right shoe over the rim of the basin, lifts my left leg up against the wall, then he grips my hips.
His engineer’s skill at manoeuvring my body, his gentle unassuming creativity, the way he suggests this way or that with his soft questioning hands, fills me with delight as I acquiesce.
I am ready, poised on the edge of the sink, a taut-thighed trapeze artist in a breathtaking pose. He casts his eyes up and down over me, and is gasping and urgent as he moves in, as his rhythm accelerates, and with his lips on my neck, his breathless murmurs are the whispers of a happily drowning man, a man succumbing. As he pulls away to drop to his knees and bury his head into me, I reach down to touch the smooth shiny blackness of his hair between my fingers. I caress tentatively then I run my fingers through his hair, I look down at him flooded with a rush of amazement at his beauty and that he is with me, he is mine.
He reverberates through me with his wordless knowledge of my body, and I luxuriate in his expert delicacy, I tip my head back against the mirror and give myself over, as he glides me upwards in an arc of joy. As I laugh the incredulous, almost tearful laugh of my happiness, he rises from his knees to grab my hips and pull me to him again, to gently, rapidly moan into my ear as he jolts me back and forth, whispering, ‘Don’t move’. Within moments I feel him trembling, then diving into his primordial need, his deep sigh of release. I drink up every drop of his pleasure into the embrace of my body.
After, he smooths his jeans out across the floor to sit on, and draws me down on to his lap. We’re both still naked, our skins lightly sweating now despite the thirteen degree day outside. I reach over to my handbag and scrabble around, then draw out a brightly wrapped ginger chocolate bar, bought from the market this morning. I like to linger five minutes longer there on my weekly shop, to pick something out for us to share.
‘I got this for you,’ I show it to him. ‘as a pre-soccer snack,’ I smile back at him as he opens it and breaks the bar carefully in two.
I settle onto his warm thighs as we eat the chocolate together. ‘So how was your day, darling?’ he asks me. ‘What about your meeting?’ His soft low voice echoes off the cool white walls.
‘Oh it was fine in the end!’ I breathe a sigh of relief. ‘I’d thought it was going to be a lot worse – I thought I was going to have to explain why the catalogue wasn’t ready for the exhibition opening next week. But no one even asked me about it!’
I laugh, brushing aside the actual anxiety I had felt. These days I never have time to get everything done, now that I’m the one doing all the housework, rushing between the office and Tristan and kinder, and throwing myself into my painting every night when Emil’s asleep, the dishes are done and the flat is shrouded in peaceful quiet light. Work has become a thing I cram in on the side of my life – this job with the Office for Community Arts I should be grateful for, working with artists (real, paid artists) while I struggle to get even one showing a year of my own work.
Part of me thinks that once Tristan has gone, I won’t be running out of the office at three o’clock anymore. My work will get done on time, there will be none of these anxious meetings, or mornings furiously scribbling notes to myself at the kitchen table on how to explain why something wasn’t finished yesterday. I tell myself this will be an upside of his absence.
I look at him to check he understood. I think he has. He smiles and squeezes me. ‘You see? I told you, you were worrying for nothing. You’re an efficient woman, Mira, no one is going to notice if you didn’t finish something when you planned to, because they know you will do it in time, you won’t let them down!’
‘That’s true, I guess,’ I shrug off his support modestly. ‘How about you, chéri? How was your day?’
‘It was busy, as always...’ He doesn’t say much about his work anymore, now the guy has started who will be taking over his job. He’s in handover mode. Detaching.
‘And...’ he strokes my back gently. ‘How about your new painting, how is it going? When am I going to come and see it?’
‘Oh...’ I frown slightly, involuntarily, at the complexities emerging with this piece. It started out as a depiction of the city skyline – how I’ve seen it those mornings when I cycle into work, the song of the skyline soaring above me, beside me, yearning with me, the glass-plated buildings rockets of lean hope shooting upward, blazing sheets of light – and each time I see this vision of refracted beauty, I ache with the words why won’t you stay. The morning sun blinding me, I ask myself in frustration: how can you say no?
To this vista of beauty and blue sky.
My breathing gradually steadies as I sit at the lights, waiting for green, poised on the pedal, feeling my aloneness as I contemplate this dazzling blue and silver. Then one morning I pushed back the tears, pushed back at the dome of blue loneliness encasing me, and told myself with gritted teeth I’m going to paint this.
I sigh, and trace my fingertips along his neckline. I breathe in his aftershave. ‘It’s developing!’ I try to laugh and keep my mood light, while at the same time I’m concentrating with the utmost seriousness on telling him exactly what I feel, giving him my truth. It’s almost religious, my devotion to openness with him. He listens to me.
‘It started out a simple thing – just the morning sky, the sharpness of the clear winter air, and I wanted to capture...’ I look at him cautiously, ‘the clarity of my feelings, how I love you...’
He smiles. He likes it. He understands. My cheeks flood with a rush of warmth.
‘But now other things are weaving themselves in around the edges, a kind of – hysteria – desperation – hope that’s stretched so tight like a string that might break… I didn’t plan it like this!’
‘Like what - what do you mean?’ He looks at me in concern. ‘Is it your stress coming through, Mira?’ He kisses me lightly and brushes a strand of hair away from my eyes.
‘Maybe! Maybe this desperation, this darkness needs to be there... the other night I suddenly wanted to include a figure, a sole figure on the balcony of one of the buildings – I was thinking a kind of angel, an other-worldly thing, a kind of hovering bright shadow. But when I drew her, she became more like an orphan or a ghost, or a small lost girl… in a long blue velvet dress, with lace sleeves, her hair is bright gold, she’s kind of medieval. She doesn’t fit at all with the skyscrapers. She brings a kind of haunting sadness, a shadow, a question.’ I frown in frustration.
‘Hmm! Maybe it’s interesting, what do you think?’
‘I don’t know, you should come over this weekend and have a look,’ I lay my head on his shoulder. ‘Give me some advice!’
He nods, and I can feel he’s trying not to look at his watch, but it’s getting late, so I shift my weight and reach over for our clothes. We start to dress. I help him draw his soft grey jumper over his shirt, and he steadies me, his hand on my waist, as I reach down to pull on my stockings.
Four weeks
When I lie in his arms the warmth is an ancient sun-warmed stone in a place where I can breathe deep and without words.
When we lie in the dark together whispering – about anything, when he tells me every French national holiday, when I tell him the story of the dismissal of the Prime Minister in 1975, when he tells me about a song he heard, when I tell him word for word what happened with my staff member who always has a headache when I ask her to do something… we hold each other tight and his skin moulds into mine, then I turn so he can enfold me closer, and he keeps holding me, he doesn’t want to let go.
Ten days
I sit on the steps of my back balcony, in the wind and sun of this unexpected early spring, and as I watch the sheets blowing and dancing on the washing line below, I contemplate the ten days we have left.
I prod this fact. Somehow, now that he’s promising to come back, and we have a plan for next year, this looming date is less like a horrifying chasm and more like an unpleasant medicine to force down. At least over the months he’s gone, the advancing summer will walk beside me, it’s invisible calming hand on my shoulder.
I shift my weight on the cold iron step and look down at my rounded belly.
It’s time to do it. I have the peace and quiet this bright Saturday morning, with Emil at Alex’s, all the chores done, the flat silent. I can’t put it off any longer.
In the bathroom I peel the tester out of its plastic, I quietly, calmly, go through the procedure, then I start timing. I use the three minutes to wander over to my artroom –a tiny atrium adjoining the living room, sunlight streaming in through windows on three sides.
My current piece sits waiting and screaming questions at me on the easel. The angel standing motionless, her hands outstretched, in the cool shadows of her windy balcony, seems to have an expectant look to her today. I look back at her in silence.
Time’s up. I make myself walk back slowly; I almost stroll to the bathroom.
The moment hangs motionless as I look at the double lines.
Two days
We sit in the laneway with our arms wrapped round each other, and I ask tentatively, ‘And the kids? Do you ever think about that...?’
He nods. ‘Barbecues on the beach...’ he murmurs.
‘Road trips together!’
‘Yes, what was that place you went last summer...?’
‘Byron Bay!’ My eyes light up for the first time in days and he smiles at me.
‘We’ll dance together,’ that makes me say, with certainty.
And we will, and I’ll laugh with the exhilaration of dancing in the subtropical night with him, with the sheer happiness of being finally in the life I want.
Zero
It’s early morning, barely light.
We press our cheeks close together, warm skin touching warm skin, in the softly lit corner of the cafe. The number 61 on our table, his short black, my long macchiato sitting almost untouched.
Then we stand clinging to one another in William Street, outside an elegant pale stone building – somehow appropriate in its dignity and grace. Tears run down his cheeks and there is a strain in his dark-ringed eyes that has crept in over these last days. I can only suppose I look equally as drained.
He fixes his gaze on me unable to speak as I push out words we need. ‘We can have a good life together,’ I whisper, a smile of hope breaking through. ‘With our kids!’
I stroke his beautiful jawline and kiss him one last time, then take a deep breath and say bravely, ‘That’s it now.’
I pick up my bag, and after our last whispered goodbye, our last fleeting kiss, turn to walk away.
At work I am gentle with my staff, I spend an hour going through a process in slow, calm detail, I make sure everyone understands what they need to do.
I clean my desk, I walk softly on the soundless carpet to fetch my tea, aromatic and warming.
I stay for maybe three hours then I can’t hold it together anymore, I whisper my goodbyes to my colleagues, who hug me with compassion, and I catch the lift alone, holding my gaze in the mirrored wall, down to my bike.
I cycle bent over into the wind as fast as I can along the beachfront, and as the solid ivory square of Lisieux emerges in the streetscape, I straighten up and take my feet off the pedals. I hear my wracked breathing and feel my heart jumping under my coat.
I park my bike, lock it to a No Parking sign, and clamber awkwardly on to the rocky ledge overlooking the bay. I am shivering unstoppably as I claw my coat around me.
I twist around and my eyes are drawn across the road, through the constant stream of traffic hurtling past anonymous and unknowing. I look into Lisieux, the pale interior of this silent peaceful room, lit with the soft glow of a chandelier over the long gleaming table.
A vase of tall flowers stands in its centre, their fronds arching delicately upward, radiating warm orange.
My eyes hurt with longing for the life I want with Tristan. I turn and look out to the churning indigo sea. At once my face collapses, finally allowed now I’m alone - I let the tears flow unheeded, I hear my light high-pitched wail as my body shakes with sobs.
I stop when I notice a man looking with concern at me, parked in his truck twenty metres away. I pull down my sunglasses and keep my gaze fixed out to sea.
I watch the ships for some time.
*******************************************************************************
Lisette
2018
Angel on the Balcony
I shift from one high heel to the other, the cold of the concrete floor seeping up through my thin steep sole. Should have worn boots on a cold night like this instead of these crazy stacked sandals with patterned tights. Somehow I’d thought the fun and kind of offbeat glamour of the night would magically sweep away any cold or discomfort – but so far it’s not really working. I take a sip of the cheap gallery wine out of the plastic beaker I’m clutching, and look round to check if Mum’s arrived yet.
She hasn’t. As I glance at the time on my phone it occurs to me that maybe she won’t, if she’s having a bad night – even though it’s the first showing of her work that’s not just some kind of Arts Association event for the bunch of local eccentrics she used to drink and paint with.
Hmmm. I look round at the crowd of arty people who all seem to know each other. Should have brought Tom.
I grimace at the acidity of the wine, and catch Adam’s eye across the room. He raises his glass, so I decide to saunter over to him – as he’s the only person I really know here to talk to. Apart from that raffish old guy Steve who hangs round my mum with this sad devoted hangdog look – I know he’s been secretly in love with her since before I was born, and I can’t help thinking what a loser. He’s milling round the entry with a clutch of their old artist friends in their musty velvet jackets and fur trim coats with thin op shop dresses underneath. They’re all sculling so much free wine though, I bet they’re not feeling the cold.
‘So what do you think, Lisette, do you like the show?’ Adam looks at me with a slight anxiety – he’s been Mum’s unpaid agent for twenty years, he wants it to be a success. I always figured he called himself her agent because he couldn’t paint himself, but loved the glitzy seedy world they moved in back then. Nights of free entry to exhibitions, free drinks, stumbling home after. Adam always there to make sure she didn’t get mugged or lost teetering through the dark leafy sidestreets.
Even just looking at Adam brings back memories of being dragged awake by the muffled voices and heels clattering up the stairs, my mum’s voice a mix of girlish laughter and maternal concern, chiding, ‘Sshh, shshh, the kids are asleep!’, bottles opening, wine pouring and spilling, the clunk of the needle hitting a Nick Cave record.
‘I’m just glad she’s finally got it together!’ I smile back at him. ‘And it’s not a bad turnout, considering!’
‘Considering?’ I see his anxiety creep up a notch, the furrows in his brow deepening slightly.
I laugh. ‘Yeah, you know, because Mum’s got this thing of no Facebook, no social media – just word of mouth advertising! She’s so anti-Internet, dead against having an online presence, you know how - ’ I stop myself before I say crazy. That’s a sensitive word amongst her old friends who helped keep her out of hospital back when she was at her lowest point.
I change the subject. ‘Anyway, Angel on the Balcony looks great as the centrepiece.’ We both wander towards it and gaze up at it.
The lights set around the painting accentuate the intense blue of the sky, and of the angel’s dress. My eyes travel over the streams of sunlight glinting off the skyscrapers, golden rivers that glide through the air, between the buildings, illuminating the curve of a soaring small red balloon, the optimistic edge of a flag flying from a pole, swirling round the upper reaches of the city. I stand motionless for a moment, contemplating this song of melancholic beauty.
‘What do you think the angel means?’ I turn to Adam. ‘I’ve never really understood this painting!’
Adam shrugs, twirling slightly on his heels. He looks down at me sideways. ‘You know Mira painted it when she was pregnant with you?’
I nod. ‘Yes, she’s told me that – how it was the last thing she painted for years too.’ I look casually round – no, still not here.
I sigh. ‘But I don’t think the angel’s meant to be me!’ I add a laugh to show I don’t mean anything bad with that. I’m not alluding to the fact my mum doesn’t seem to know or care I exist, and maybe never cared, that maybe I was the mistake that sent her life spiralling downwards. The leftovers – aftermath - of my dad.
Adam smiles wryly; he’s probably starting to wonder too if she’ll turn up tonight, to her own opening. ‘Who knows?’ he replies, draining his cup of vinegary wine and clearing his throat. ‘But you’re right, she didn’t paint anything after this for years.’ He pauses. ‘I don’t know how much she told you about it all?’
I redden involuntarily. I can feel, despite his careful words, that Mum has told him she doesn’t communicate with me, that we hardly know anything about each other’s lives. I don’t know what to say. People flit around us and someone pushes another wine into Adam’s hand.
I finally reply, ‘Oh well, I know things were tough when I was born. My dad wasn’t around.’ My flush deepens and I can feel the sudden heat of tears rising. Those words seem to have dropped through me with more weight than I could have imagined. What is this about? God I am an idiot to not bring Tom tonight.
‘And I guess you know I’ve never met him,’ I stare Adam defiantly in the eye. He meets my gaze, and I can tell he’s a little afraid of my sudden intensity. I’m a little afraid of it myself – I never talk about my dad – or my mum, for that matter.
‘I know, Lisette,’ he says gently. ‘I’m really sorry about how all that went for your mum. It was an awful time.’ He looks down at the wine he’s agitating round in his glass. There’s a heavy silence as we both look up at the painting.
Adam coughs and adds quickly, with a new edge to his voice, ‘Good that he never came back on the scene though. That would have been disastrous.’
‘What?’ My head jerks sideways to scrutinise him. He’s looking grimly down at his wine sloshing in hectic waves in his glass.
I frown, not sure what to ask, then press my lips together and look away. We both know it’s wrong to talk about it here, to bring back these shadows of grief on a night which is as close to a celebration as Mum’s ever going to get. Anyway – we both smile in relief and move gingerly apart - she’s arrived.
She’s caught up in the swirl of her old friends, they’re smudging her cheek with their lipstick kisses and handing her wine. She’s probably already had a few, judging by the stains of colour in her cheeks and her high-pitched gaiety, which tonight, luckily, comes across as a happily uninhibited vivacity. Adam and I move over to her and wait our turn to kiss her congratulations, I pose with her for photos, our arms firmly clenched round each other’s waists, both trying to outdo each other’s smiles.
And at the end of the night, when the last stragglers have staggered off to a bar further down Acland St, when the staff have emerged to sweep up the crumbs and toss armloads of plastic cups into their black garbage bags, Adam, Steve, Mum and I are standing in a semi-circle at the door. Steve wants the honour of walking her home, he’s loving the chance to keep touching her arm, patting her back, hugging her. She puts up with it as patiently as she always did. Adam’s hanging round the edges like he always did, his warm eyes fixed on her.
I’m hanging round because I feel like I should, though I’m not sure, I’m really not sure what I’m doing and I can feel my unsureness like an ache written across my face, a counterpoint to the ache in the soles of my feet.
Abandonment
I’m up at the same time as always the next morning, despite the late night and four cheap wines. I slide into my ballet flats, the ones I can walk to the tramstop in. I brush my black hair severely back into a ponytail and observe myself in the mirror above the dresser. My eyes are dark and quiet and there’s something sad there today.
I shrug it off.
I gather my laptop and phone and chargers, store them neatly in my uni bag and click the door shut behind me.
My heart’s racing out of control, pumping like it has a life of its own and is about to leap right out of my chest, violently. I grip the phone so hard I almost switch it off by accident. My face is hot and I don’t care who can hear me on this morning peak hour tram.
‘What – did you say?’ I can barely get the words out for the tightness in my throat.
The background noise is louder than Tom’s voice. He’s standing in line for a coffee in his Collins St office block, in the café in the foyer. I close my eyes, stabbed with the thought I might never go there with him again.
‘Honey, I know it’s sudden.’ I can sense his boyish enthusiasm brimming under his careful tone of regret. He’s excited with this news and trying not to show it. ’It may only be a few months – maybe just a year. And we still have a few days…?’
I don’t say anything, I can’t. Tears of rage are choking me and there’s a film reel running through my head of all the savage words I want to say, viperous words, but they would kill any chance of a future, and right now I don’t know what I want.
‘Lisette, are you there?’ He sounds uncertain. ‘Honey, remember I told you I might get this offer – remember, London was always going to be an option?’
I swallow. ‘That was ages ago.’ When we first got together. ‘I didn’t think – I thought…’ I can’t go on. What I want is for him to say he doesn’t want this transfer anymore, or even just for him to ask if I can come too – or even visit – but he says none of those things.
Something curdles inside me and I feel my face set like stone. I glance sideways at my reflection in the dim early light, the charcoal grey of the June morning. My hair glints like black armour. My lipstick like blood. I set my jaw and stare back at my reflection.
I push my way past the black-clad knees pressing in around me and yank on the cord as the tram swerves around the corner, twisting away from the icy seafront, wheels screeching.
I get off at Mum’s place, I’m not thinking straight as I skittle along Fitzroy Street, pushed by the wind off the sea, my ponytail flying and slapping my cheek. As I’m running, I’m texting jittery texts to my classmate and best friend Georgia Fuck him, it’s over! NO WAY I’m hanging round for him for a year while he lives it up over there! Can you let Prof Gassin know je ne viens pas aujourd’hui, je suis en crise!!
You’re better off without him, don’t worry babe, you’ll find a way better option within a week! Georgia texts back. Come to the Politics bar crawl tomorrow, we’ll sort you out! 😊
I don’t want to get sorted out right now.
I bang on Mum’s door. I’ve never done this before, if I stopped to think for a minute I know I wouldn’t do it – I’d get back down to the tramstop and hop on the next tram, get myself to uni, be the sensible level-headed girl I am.
But for some reason, today – maybe I’m just tired and bleary after the wines last night – today I’m not that girl.
Mum is clearly surprised to see me at her door. She’s in her dressing gown holding a coffee. As she leans against the door and looks at me with her big black-smudged eyes, she brings her coffee to her lips to take a slow sip. Her gaze doesn’t leave mine.
‘Can I come in?’ My eyes fill with tears.
‘Of course, darling!’ She quickly reaches out to me and draws me in out of the cold. As she hustles me into the kitchen and goes through the business of putting on the coffee, she frowns and gives me a puzzled look. ‘Don’t you have uni today, love?’
I drop into a chair at the table and push aside two wineglasses, remnants of last night.
‘Mum, Tom’s moving to London next week. For work.’ I clamp my hands together, still shivering from the cold walk. I’d been too distracted to zip up my jacket or put my gloves back on.
She turns to me and her face falls. ‘Oh, darling,’
She comes over and hugs me. I shake with sobs as she cradles me, rocks me gentler than I can ever recall. She smells of stale perfume and wine but she’s warm and cocooning me in her soft pink dressing gown, and I let the tears flow.
‘I don’t know why I’m crying!’ I finally manage to choke out. I try a laugh. ‘I’m not even really that into him! It’s not like we were going to move in together or anything – but I just – I can’t believe he’s leaving me! I’m just shocked…’
‘I know, I know,’ Mum murmurs. She strokes my hair and pulls away as we hear the coffee steaming up through the pot on the stovetop.
‘I mean, he’s so boring!’ I continue with heaving sobs. ‘I don’t even spend a lot of time with him – I never thought he’s like – you know, ‘the one’ for me – but – I just can’t believe this! He must have known before today!’
‘Maybe,’ Mum replies, her voice soft. I can’t see her expression, her back is turned. ‘Or maybe not. You might never know, sweetheart.’
I watch her as she gathers cups and milk, the mussed up back of her blonde hair, the dressing gown cord tied firmly round her waist, her wrinkly hands that were once beautiful. She stoops a little and her lips are trembling. As she places my cup down in front of me and sits opposite, she smiles sadly, wearily.
‘Men,’ she says finally. She lowers her eyelids, and I suddenly feel she’s about to cry herself.
I half-smile and shrug. ‘Yeah, who needs them?’ The hollowness of that makes me rush to change the subject.
‘Last night was good?’ I offer.
Her eyes light up a little. ‘Yeah, it was fun. Adam’s done so much for me – putting that show together, getting the space for the night. I think it went pretty well.’ She doesn’t sound completely certain.
‘Any buyers?’ I firmly push thoughts of Tom down, I decide in that split second I don’t care. I slowly rotate my cup round on the table, as if drilling down the lid on him, on us.
She shrugs vaguely. ‘A couple of people were interested in Angel on the Balcony, and in another earlier one. Adam’s going to give me a call about it today.’ She yawns and stretches her arms upward. ‘Though I don’t know if I want to part with Angel! I wouldn’t mind if no one ever buys it really.’
‘What’s it actually about?’
She looks out the window to the backyard, her eyes glazing over. ‘Oh… a feeling I guess. A feeling I had at the time.’ She gets up and starts to move some dishes around on the draining board, turning her back to me.
‘Hope,’ her voice is shaky. ‘Love. Optimism. Beauty.’
I can hear she’s crying, and her shoulders shake with the frailty of spring leaves.
‘And the angel represents…’ She hesitates, gripping the side of the bench. ‘The small kernel of fear, the fear of loss, the fear things won’t work out. Or even - the sadness of knowing they won’t.’
She turns back to me and wipes away a single rolling tear with the back of her hand. ‘Which is what happened – so in a way I predicted it, I painted it. The moment before the angel falls off the balcony.’
‘Mum,’ I interject. ‘Why didn’t you ever do anything about it? Go and find him? And why – why didn’t you tell him you were pregnant with me?’
I’ve finally spoken these words. I sit loosely holding my coffee cup, my eyes fixed on her.
She tugs at her sleeve with nervous fingers and casts her eyes downward. I can see the blue of her leftover eyeshadow shimmering on her eyelids. Her tear is slowly tracing a dirty grey track down her cheek.
‘And when I was born, why didn’t you tell him then?’ I look at her curiously, wondering if my direct questioning will tip her over.
But it doesn’t – she comes back to the table and sits opposite me. ‘Darling, I couldn’t keep in contact with him. I …’ she looks at me helplessly. ‘I just … I gave up on him. He said he was coming back – I think, I really believe he wanted to … but ... months went by and he … I think he just couldn’t.’
I watch two more tears travel in slow sorrowful lines down her cheeks. ‘He couldn’t.’ she whispers again. ‘I think it was just…’
She brings her coffee cup up to her lips as if to warm them, and looks at me. ‘… Too hard.’
I kind of know the bare bones of this story, I’ve heard these lines, but I still don’t get it, and for once I plough on.
‘What do you mean, it was too hard? And that he couldn’t? If he wanted to?’
She’s silent for a moment, searching for words. She looks at her empty hands. ‘It wasn’t that simple, Lisette … yes he wanted to, we kept in touch, but it wasn’t easy and I … I didn’t know how to tell him about you, or when ... I didn’t want to pressure him ...’
‘You didn’t want to pressure him? What? I was his responsibility too!’ I stare at her in disbelief. ‘What if you’d told him, and he’d come back then?’ I swallow. ‘Everything would have been completely different – wasn’t that what you wanted?’ Unbidden images of a life flash through my mind – a life of living in a house, with a car, with a dad who mows the lawns, a dad speaking kindly to me, a brother playing cricket with him, and Mum laughing, staying young, sitting beside him, arms around each other.
She’s shaking her head in a kind of confusion, her face flushed. ‘I don’t know Lisette … I wasn’t in a good way … I stopped thinking it was possible with Tristan, I had to stop, I couldn’t go on hoping ...’
‘But Mum, why? Why did you give up? Why didn’t you go over there or something?’ My voice is lifting with impatience. ‘Why not? How could you just give up?’
‘Have you never asked yourself this?’ I try not to shout but my anger is rising in a torrent, a surging king tide. ‘If it mattered so much … you’ve spent so many years on him … wasting your life … and he’s my DAD for fuck’s sake!’ My voice breaks and I bring my hands up to cup my eyes.
‘So – did you stop contacting him, is that how it was?’ I don’t look at her but I know she’s sitting there silent and motionless.
‘Why didn’t you go and find him?’ I insist.
Mum continues to say nothing, and through my heaving sobs it hits me there’s a kind of guilt coming off her. Guilt? I think hazily. I’ve never known that from my mum. Guilt at giving up.
I pick up a red-stained wineglass and slam it down again. ‘Instead of wasting your life!’ She blushes, she knows what I mean.
‘Fuck it,’ I say, my eyes stinging with anger. I look across at her, meet her wide-eyed look. ‘I’ll go and find him myself.’
Departure
Mum hangs tentatively in the doorway to my bedroom – my old bedroom. I’ve come home for these last days, for evenings cradling cups of tea with her, listening to the stories starting to unfold gradually as she finds her voice for them. They’re sweet and slow tendrils of smoke, like eucalypt campfire.
I’m stuffing my backpack as she hovers in the door, twisting something in her hand.
I glance up and smile. ‘Look,’ I say, gesturing at the top layer of clothes toppling out of the bag. ‘I’m taking that old Kookai dress of yours!’
She frowns in a kind of mild confusion.
‘So I can show him,’ I add. I straighten up. ‘I can show my dad. I bet he’ll remember it, won’t he?’
Mum can’t help smiling as she steps over and picks up the red dress, shiny and tight-fitted, with the deep V at the front. Impossibly unprofessional, but in his last midwinter weeks these are the things she wore anyway, oblivious to the sidelong glances. Existing only for him.
She holds it up to watch it fall in shimmering folds. ‘It’s the one I wore the last morning I saw him,’ she says softly, her eyes faraway.
She’s told me so many stories this last fortnight, since I booked the flight. The time they cycled along the creek and stopped somewhere by a vast concrete drain – ugly, not what he’d wanted – but they’d stopped, waded through long harsh yellow weeds, with their bikes, and sat down against a tree. He’d cradled her in his arms and they’d talked about films in the spring evening sun.
And the time they’d gone to the Gin Palace, her in her black lace dress, and he’d leaned forward to whisper, in his best French stereotype, ‘Je te veux Mira...’ and then, ‘Maybe we can go to the changeroom?’, his eyes narrow with intent. She’d looked at him, insulted; she’d wanted to go out for a romantic dinner. They’d argued on the treacherous slope of Flinders Lane and parted, brokenly, to lie awake all night and reconcile at South Melbourne Market the next afternoon. He’d taken her hand gently as they crossed the street; she hadn’t cycled that day but caught the tram, afraid of an accident after no sleep.
Since she sold Angel to give me the money it’s unleashed something new in her. I can see hope flashing bright in her eyes. I don’t know if it’s hope for me or for her.
‘What’s that, Mum?’ I nod down at the folded paper she’s holding.
She hands me a photo. It’s creased and blurry with age, but I can see straightaway it’s her and Dad, up close in the back corner of some city bar. She’s holding the camera, her arm is stretched out to hold it, and she’s looking up into it, her eyes shining. She’s nestled in his arm, and he’s looking down at her, his eyes lowered to watch her, a slight tender smile playing on his lips.
Le Marais
I sit on a bench in the Place des Vosges, watching the pigeons circling, a ring of fluttering grey, wings beating against a cerulean sky.
I gaze around at the towering facades of rose-gold lining the edges of the square, at their centuries-old grandeur. Through my wavering veil of jetlag, these silent shuttered palaces swim a little in my vision.
I don’t hide my curiosity as my eyes follow the stream of passersby, clutching bags of shopping, children dawdling in clusters, commuters hurrying past without a sideways look. I strain to catch every word around me.
I look down at my feet in my new shoes. They arc to a confident point at the toes, their patent black sheen catching the late afternoon light as I stretch out my foot to appraise them. I smile to myself – it’s day three, and I’m managing this. I’ve not only bought shoes, I’ve found a market for bread and fruit and cheese – I’ve worked out where I like the coffee on the rue Saint Antoine – I’ve conquered the Métro. I sigh with satisfaction, sitting back to bask in the golden light. I could live here.
I don’t miss Tom, I don’t even care that he’s just across the Channel.
Every day of this dreamlike week I jump from one Métro station to the next, racing two steps at a time up the hot stairwells where black-hatted gypsies whip out a frenetic polka on double basses, to break out into the light. Where I pause momentarily, breathless - survey the scene, consider my possibilities - then plunge into the crowd and lose myself wandering these circular streets.
I have my map of Toulouse and in the top left corner I have written the early morning train times from Paris. There are twenty-three trains every day.
One afternoon as I hesitate on a steep street corner, a man stops to offer help, asks where I am from, and before continuing on his way, places sunflower seeds in my open palm.
‘To plant in the city,’ he explains. ‘We have a group, it’s a thing we do, to make the city beautiful!’
I smile and shrug OK, I have no idea how to garden but I’ll give it a go. Later I stoop awkwardly at a patch of dry soil outside a small nameless market near the Gare du Nord, and scrabble around to make a shallow dip amongst the weeds. I scatter the seeds in, cover them with dirt, and dust off my hands.
Twilit evenings I clatter back up five flights of steep steps to my rented room, sweat between my breastbones, seeking brief sanctuary after my day of heady journeying, to sit on my tiny balcony. I sip a cool wine and look over the darkening rooftops.
Watching the sinking sun I think soon, I’ll go, I’ll start to find him.
Then I summon up my energy again – close the door of my small oasis, my one-room flat with its mezzanine bedroom and two-cupboard kitchen - and descend back to the streets, the warmth of the day still rising off the pavement. I try out my French on students in basement bars, they try their English on me, as we compare the courses we’re doing and beam at each other in the delight of discovering our unexpected parallels. After, I sit on the riverbank to look at the lights on the other side, and then I walk and I walk and I walk.
I am walking myself into the other half of my life, the half that’s been in shadows all through my childhood. With each step, each smile, each word I’m taking shape, growing into the empty spaces. I’m the angel reassembling on the balcony.
But on the eighth day, as I wake up out of a chaotic dissolving dream, I can sense through my eyelids the sky is grey. The air is chill, and my ten day’s rental here in the rue des Tournelles is nearly up.
I get up to push the curtain aside and look out at the light drizzle falling. The receding edges of the dream - of running, then standing alone on the Esplanade watching the ships - tug at me.
Today I’ll go and book my train ticket.
Dead end
In the bleached gated suburb on the outskirts of Toulouse, the woman at the door stands and looks at me, first blank, then cold. I can see as her eyes traverse me that she’s recognising him in me.
She looks like the bitch she probably always was.
‘You may come in,’ she replies finally, and moves aside grudgingly to let me into her neutral-toned, soundless house. Her English is obviously still good, better than his ever was, I imagine. She was the strong one, the best earner, the ruler of the family. The decision maker.
‘You must be Simone then?’ I ask, my voice more challenging than I intend.
She half-smiles and drops gracefully into an armchair, gesturing for me to sit opposite. ‘Yes,’ she says simply.
She doesn’t seem surprised about me, or at least she doesn’t show it, despite the fact I’ve turned up unannounced. I’ve done my detective work, located their family name in the White Pages – and guessed already that he doesn’t live here anymore, because it’s just her name listed. She’s on Facebook too, so I’ve seen their sons – men now, my half-brothers – I’ve seen dozens of friends and family – but nothing about him, no mention.
He doesn’t have a social media presence at all, as if he never existed.
She’s a silver-haired woman in a dove-grey silk dress, with a cutting gaze and glinting jewellery. The polished frames on the mantlepiece, the black Mini in the open garage, the neatly trimmed rosebushes lining the driveway of sharp clean gravel – all speak of a cultivated, cashed-up existence. There is a silent and invisible presence of staff in the temperate air. The crisp smell of Euros defines everything about this contained woman in her silk belted dress, sitting opposite me nonchalant, calm, uncaring.
She doesn’t offer me a coffee and I don’t want one; I feel too sick.
‘So, I wanted to meet my father.’ I say, into the empty air.
She shrugs, and leans forward, bringing her hands together, her shiny crimson nails pointing at me. I get a sense she’s savouring what she’s about to say.
‘So, miss – Lisette?’ She smiles coolly. ‘My ex-husband no longer resides in France.’
I nod, my face wooden.
‘So you have come so far for nothing, that is a shame! You could have telephoned me and saved yourself the journey!’ She spreads her hands wide, deprecating.
It’s my turn to shrug, as if it doesn’t matter. I’d thought if he’s not here anymore, with his ex-wife, at least he’d be somewhere else in France. My mind is thumping with a sick mixture of disappointment and wariness.
‘Do you know where he is?’ I ask her.
She tosses her hair and laughs, her eyes softening. I think she’s possibly starting to feel sorry for me, as I sit frozen on the edge of her terracotta-hued suede chair, in my new dress bought two days ago at the Galeries Lafayette - the most expensive dress I’ve ever bought. It’s a tight elegant knitted number, black at the top, emblazoned with horizontal stripes in fire-alarm colours ringing my narrow hips – as if to say nothing scares me, with my new shoes, matching bag, matching nails that took me about three attempts with my shaky clumsy hand to get right. Fuck, this has cost me thousands.
Doing myself up as my mum always wanted to, tried to for him.
‘You really don’t know, do you?’ She appraises me up and down. ‘Incredible,’ she murmurs.
‘What do you mean? No, of course I don’t know,’ I return her gaze with growing impatience.
She looks at me levelly. ‘I don’t know his address. I haven’t spoken to him for years. My sons know, they are in touch with him, they have visited him.’ She pauses. ‘However, I am not going to ask them for his address for you, and I would prefer you do not contact them.’
I know their names, so I could find them, I think, but I say nothing.
Unless they’re a bit more careful than her with their contact details. Which, being younger, they probably are.
‘Okay,’ I say slowly. ‘I won’t contact your sons, I can understand you wouldn’t want that. But – can you tell me anything about where Tristan is? I’m sure you can understand my point of view as well.’ I’ve rehearsed these lines in their reasonable tone, I’m appealing to her goodwill if there is any. I’d figured even before I knocked on her door there may not be, but this seems to be all I’ve got left.
She smiles with cool irony. ‘Melbourne.’
On the train back to Paris I can hardly hear him, I don’t know if it’s because of the volume on my phone or he’s deliberately fading out. My brother was never really into willingly talking to me.
But I’ve called him because he’s the only person I can think of who my dad could have tracked down – he’s a normal person with social media presence, unlike my mum. And I don’t give a fuck what the time is over there.
‘What? Emil, you need to speak up!’
‘Yeah, yeah OK I did get a call from him, must have been about – I don’t know, six or seven years ago? Maybe more. I told him to fuck off.’
I can’t believe what I just heard. ‘What?’
Emil seems to be talking to someone else in the background, must be Saskia, his girlfriend. I don’t have a lot of time for her, the way she sucks up to Alex, because he’s the parent with money. Saskia treats Mum like one of her social work clients, like she’s a bag lady.
Saskia seems to be telling Emil to get off the phone as it’s late. I think I hear something like, ‘This is your half-sister who usually doesn’t have anything to do with you, right?’
‘Emil!’ I shout. The other passengers in my row look at me, but not as if they’re surprised – more along the lines of Annoying tourist. Touriste ennuyeux.
‘How could you do that to Mum?’
‘Look, Lisette.’ He sounds impatient and in charge. Always the one in charge, just like his uptight dad. I press my lips tight and squeeze my hands into fists.
‘He was never any good for Mum,’ Emil continues. ‘When he phoned me, he wasn’t even sure how long he’d be back in Melbourne for! It was just another work trip – a junket – a – what was the word?’ Emil pauses. ‘Oh yeah – a mission.’ He spits the word with contempt. ‘He was probably just going to use her then piss off again.’
It dawns on me that Emil hates my dad violently.
‘So what was I meant to do?’
I say nothing.
‘He broke up Mum and my dad.’ Emil’s voice is icy.
‘Oh no way!’ I splutter. ‘If it wasn’t him, it would have been someone else!’
‘Well it wasn’t someone else, it was him. He wrecked her life, then left her high and dry, then he comes back and expects just to pick up where they left off? Like hell. Asshole. I did the right thing, I told him to fuck off back to France and let Mum get on with her life.’
‘Yeah? What life?’ Something in Emil’s self-satisfied tone gives me a gut feeling about something. ‘What did you tell him about Mum?’
Emil hesitates. ‘I had to be sure he wouldn’t bother her again.’
‘So what did you say, you fucking do-gooder, know-it all? And what makes you think you can make decisions about her life? And about my life? He’s my fucking father, did that occur to you? Did that ever occur to anyone?’
‘Oh fuck off Lisette. Stop being a drama queen.’
I hear Saskia whingeing in the background again. Probably complaining it’s time to get off the phone because it’s after ten and she needs to get up early to go and do some kind of pilates or some shit.
I close my eyes and take a deep trembling breath. ‘OK sorry, so what did you say to him?’
‘I told him she was happily remarried to a really successful rich guy and she was living in Brighton. I told him she hated his guts and her husband would kill him if he tried to go anywhere near her.’
‘Anyway’, he continues coolly, ‘Don’t blame me. Talk to Adam. Tristan went to him first. Adam rang me and told me what to say.’ And I know as I almost scream that he’s hung up, the line’s gone dead. I hold the scream, punch the red hang-up symbol and close my eyes.
Charles de Gaulle
The early morning light slants into the terminal through dirty sheets of glass. Through my smeary sunglasses my gaze is fixed on the tarmac swarming with unknown airlines, crawling like sluggish cockroaches along their thick black lines. Landing, taking off, the sun glinting sharp and metallic off their tails as they vanish into the dull haze of the European summer sky. So many.
People rush around in swirls of dark burqas and summer-blue suits. Catches of languages eddy around me and announcements echo and bounce off the walls, indecipherable in French and English. Tentative dazed-looking family groups with bulging daypacks look like Australians. I recognise them instinctively, unwillingly, and avert my eyes.
I feel tired, although I slept an exhausted deep sleep last night, my last night in Paris, in a little Algerian hotel. I’d walked for hours and spoken to no one, traversing districts where I no longer get lost. Dinner was a lonely plate of penne, with olives, and a half-carafe of pale white wine, by a window where I could look out at the street. No longer looking for my dad.
I pick up my phone and scroll to Mum.
‘Mum?’ I can’t believe she’s picked up, she usually doesn’t.
‘Lisette?’ Down the blurry line her voice is excited, lilting.
‘’I’m at the airport.’ I swallow, play with my handbag strap. I look down almost ashamed at my flight outfit – given up on the chic dresses, I’m in a stretch skirt and singlet top, I can’t be fucked anymore. I’m heading home. Wherever that is.
‘I have to board in a sec,’ I continue.
‘Oh… so… how have you been these last few days sweetheart?’
I can hear behind the buzz of the bad line the restrained hope of my mother.
‘Okay, yeah good!’ I gulp my coffee out of its polystyrene cup and move sideways on the vinyl banquette, out of the incoming sunrise. It’s going to be thirty degrees in Paris today. Weirdly, thirty feels hotter here than at home.
I want to stay.
‘So – did you take the train to Toulouse on Monday, like you planned?’ She’s trying to keep her voice light.
I heave a deep shaking breath. ‘Yes I did. But I didn’t find my dad.’ I try to laugh. ‘Oh well! At least I tried.’
Her silence is heavy.
‘I’ll tell you about it when I’m back,’ I continue. My eyes follow the tail of an Etihad jet as it glides gracefully out to the runway. Full of people returning home, going on holidays, people with no cares.
Fuck this.
‘I’ll be home tomorrow night – about 6.30?’ I say, as she says, ‘Yes you tried!’ Our voices jangle together.
There’s a pause.
‘Well just come straight here darling.’ My mum’s voice is faraway.
I close my hot eyes in her pain and my pain. Fuck this, I will find him.
Through the window
Xavier Lefèvre is the man from the company who replies to my email. He calls me one hot blustery spring day as I’m cycling along the bay. I only hear my phone as I’d stopped to get a drink from the water fountain at Albert Park beach.
I’m drinking the metallic water, gulping it down, when I hear the song of my ringtone. I straighten up and reach for my phone out of my bag where it’s propped up in the bike basket. I’ve brought bathers and a sarong with me – optimistic that maybe this will be the first beach day for the season; a swathe of blue is widening across the sky, the bay is dotted with sails dancing on the waves.
I think maybe it’s Georgia calling from a landline at her work to say she’s coming down to meet me, but when this old guy starts talking, his accented words fumbling, I grip my phone and my heart starts to thud.
Xavier seems kind; he doesn’t ask why I’m looking for Tristan, but is eager to chat and reminisce about his former colleague. ‘Yes, I can certainly give him your details,’ he tells me. ‘And I can ask him to contact you. Are you close to the city?’
‘Yes, I live in Elwood,’ I reply.
‘That’s quite close, Tristan is in Albert Park,’ Xavier replies. ‘Where he always played soccer before, for the company!’ Xavier laughs. ‘We all did in our team, as long as we could, on Tuesday nights, till the young guys took over and pushed us out!’
‘Oh, I’m cycling along the beach in Albert Park right now!’ I exclaim. ‘It’s such a beautiful day, and I don’t have classes today, so I couldn’t resist!’
‘Along the beach?’ Xavier pauses. ‘Oh, so you are maybe very close to Tristan’s place!’
He promises to pass on my phone number and I hang up, trembling with excitement.
I don’t want to keep cycling. I lock my bike and take my things down on to the beach. It’s still too cold to get into my bikini, but I sit on the warm sand hugging my knees, and look out at the bay. When the wind whips up from the west, I turn to face the shoreline, and let my gaze wander across the road.
To Lisieux.
Where, for the first time, I see someone inside the vast front window. A slight, compact man with short grey-black hair stands motionless, his hands by his side, looking out.
I watch him pick something up off the table. He is looking down into the palm of his hand now, typing.
My phone starts to ring.
2018
Through the window
The summer sky is a wide blue dome encircling us as we stroll along the Esplanade, arm in arm, bathed in warmth and dazzling light. The air is so clear the container ships can be seen for miles as they churn their way steadily, relentlessly towards the heads – gradually shrinking until they steer right and vanish, steaming inexorably out and away, over the horizon.
The impulse of sadness when I see the ships departing, growing smaller, is an old acquaintance I push gently away, barely noticing.
I cast my gaze around at the palm trees with their fronds dancing in the light breeze, the bright sails on the bay, the burnished gold sand. Tom’s arm curves round my waist, his fingers lightly, almost indolently stroking my hip, and I snuggle closer in, smiling up at him.
‘Here it is!’ I point along the row of houses lining the opposite side of the Esplanade. The string of colourful residences reflects the changing fortunes of the beachside suburb over the decades: Art Deco edifaces adorned with cornices and painted an expensive fresh white tower over modest red brick terraces; concrete blocks of low-rise apartments have sprouted in every gap.
‘Lisieux,’ I murmur dreamily, letting my head fall on to Tom’s shoulder. ‘My namesake!’
Tom kisses me lightly on the cheek, stroking back my dark strands, and pulls me towards him. He knows what I’m thinking every time I see this house.
My mother named me Lisette after this house.
When I was small she told me she used to cycle past here on her way to the beach and would look at this house, wondering who lived here, wishing it was her. When she was a uni student, then all through the years as she got older – when she was married and my brother Emil was young, then when things turned sour and she used to go off for rides on her own, looking for respite. And then when she met my dad, and would cycle down here to meet him.
She told me about one sparkling winter afternoon she took off on her bike, riding back home from St Kilda to Fitzroy, the slanting sun in her eyes. She cycled effervescently, exhilarated, as he drove past her in his white car, glancing long at her, his eyes dark and loving, watching through his rearview mirror.
When she told me that story I could almost see his velvety eyes and feel her joy as she cycled into the sun, the skyline, the future that burned fierce and luminous in her.
It’s not the most beautiful house ever: in fact, I think it looks a bit sterile, with its boxy exterior jutting out from its more traditional façade. Mum says it used to be a kind of ivory colour and looked better, somehow warmer then. Now it’s a kind of trendy steel grey.
I like the big square window at the front – through it you can often see a huge vase of lilies inside, sitting in the middle of a vast mahogany table. The carpet is white and the walls are hung with gilt paintings.
You never see anyone in Lisieux, despite the soaring windows. Sometimes, when I walk past – or cycle past, like my mum used to – I feel it’s a stage set. Waiting for the cast to walk onstage. Holding its breath, waiting for the story to begin.
*****************************************************************************
2009
French Riviera
I can hear her jagged breathing through the wall as I’m hugging my ribs in my cramped box of a room, shivering slightly under the duvet. She’s crying again. I shut my eyes and sing a little song to myself.
Je vais m’en aller à Saint-Tropez
Je vais m’en aller à Saint-Tropez
Je vais quitter Paris
Et le ciel gris…
She’s still crying. I know she can’t hear me so I sing it again, and again, and again until I’m nearly asleep. As I wait for sleep to come, I watch the cracked blind swaying in the draft. The lights of the passing cars shining through sweep across to my wall, like fireflies. I hear the shouts of a passing drunk, and the ebb and flow of my mum’s quiet sobbing. My hands are clamped on my ribs for warmth.
At breakfast she sits and watches while I eat my muesli and fruit. It’s as if she wants to be sociable, but can’t think of anything to say. I watch the TV numbly, glassy-eyed. It’s ABC News Breakfast. I don’t know why she turns it on, she always sits with her back to it, and she can’t stand the newsreader. ‘Self-satisfied smug bourgeois who thinks she’s edgy because she lives in Carlton not South Yarra,’ I heard her comment once to Emil. Emil just grunted back – he used to join in with Mum’s critiques, but these days, he’s immersed in his own teenage life. I think she’s jealous of this woman with her good job on TV, jealous of her (presumably) nice renovated terrace house, probably a husband, and two kids who are both her husband’s kids too. Two kids, one dad, one mum. Perfect.
‘What’s on in school today?’ Mum asks me, stirring her coffee. “Is it grade six assembly this morning?’ She picks up a fork and plays with her fruit – no muesli, just fruit. She likes to stay thin, and I know it’s just in case my dad comes back one day.
I shake my head. ‘No… that was… Wednesday,’ I say vaguely. I’m tired, I never sleep that well the nights I hear her crying. I look at her dubiously. Her eyes are ringed in shadows and her hand is shaking slightly. She probably drank too much wine last night. I swivel my head to the recycling bin: yep, there’s a wine bottle upended in it.
‘Emil!’ Mum calls, suddenly remembering she’s a mother and he’s going to be late for school. But she doesn’t get up out of her chair. I guess she’s too tired; she looks so fragile and finished sitting there clutching her coffee in her black skivvy that’s seen better days and her short desperately bright geometric skirt. I’m sure if we lived in other parts of town - in the suburbs - people would think she was a bit unhinged. Actually, when I think about it, she probably is a bit unhinged.
I shuffle off to get my school bag. I collect my lunchbox off the kitchen bench and notice there’s no sandwich today, just an extra rice cracker. Mum sees me notice. ‘We ran out of bread and I didn’t realise till this morning,’ she smiles apologetically. ‘Sorry, sweetie.’
She reaches out and pulls me in for a hug as I walk past her chair. I stand still, obedient, while she hugs me, placing her hands on my shoulders and pushing me gently back for a moment, to look close at me. She brushes a lock of hair off my forehead and I see her looking longingly at it, as she curls it round her finger. My dad’s hair was black like mine.
I pull away, frowning, and twist my head so she has to let go. As I run down the stairs past the shut grimy doors of the other flats I think Un jour, je vais te trouver, salaud.
I traipse to school. Partly I’m tired because I’m already thinking ahead to French school, after normal school. Today we need to stand up the front and give a little talk about where we’re going for our next holiday. As I hurry across St Kilda Road at the lights, my eye on the green man, willing him not to switch to red till I’m past halfway, I remind myself I have to skip choir this lunchtime. I have to go the library and look up places on the Riviera in the atlas.
St Tropez…Antibes…Nice…which will I choose.
I get a tight feeling in my chest at the thought of skipping into French class with my chattering braided classmates, in their unladdered woollen tights, gleaming patent black shoes, and afterwards - even worse - skipping out again. To where all the parents are waiting, leaning on their expensive cars, coolly watchful behind sunglasses, their snatches of nonchalant conversation - Nous étions en Nouvelle-Calédonie, ces vacances - wafting with a smooth indifferent self-contentment through the playground.
All these Calvin Klein clad dads with their neat hair and lingering glances at the mini-skirted, gold-ringed mums of their kids’ classmates, their privileged visas and all-expenses-paid lives.
I skirt round them like a shadow, and make a direct line for the bus stop at the corner.
*******************************************************************************
Mira
1995
Chanson d’amour
He’s sliding into me, his body pressing down so hard I can barely breathe. I stretch my stilettoed heel up and against the white wall, reach my arm back to push against the wall behind, and move with him. I ignore the hard tiled floor beneath my back, wriggling slightly to position his coat under the small of my back. I’m gratified that he laid out his coat. We’ve used mine so many times it’ll need a dry-clean soon; I sometimes imagine it might have picked up a permanent smell of the disinfectant aroma of the changeroom.
He arches his back to stretch up and reaches down to touch me. I can’t last long; neither can he, as he slows down, whispering, ‘Oh oui, qu’est-ce que c’est bon,’. His eyes are closed as I look up at him, the sight of him so beautiful. Oh god…I’m spinning in a wave of pleasure, I close my eyes and plunge down somewhere deep and intense as I gasp and he clamps my lips gently with his fingers to muffle the sound. As I finally subside, a laugh of happiness wells up in me and he smiles back, then closes his eyes again, and breathes, ‘Oui...’ as I feel his warmth flooding through me, and cascading on my belly as he pulls back, a touch too late.
We smile at each other and go through the quiet business of mopping up with handfuls of tissue paper. He moves to the basin and I sit up, sticky and happy, leaning back on the palms of my hands, my eyes moving over his strong back with its fading tanline, then travelling over his firm white buttocks and his dark-haired thighs. Tristan is a soccer player, and a cyclist, with a compact, fit body – he works hard to keep it that way. As I stand up to sidle up behind him, my arms snaking round him, my lips on his neck, I can feel, with a fondness, the flab of his belly which has developed a little – just a little – over the last few months. He loves good food – I know he eats well every lunchtime, from the taste of garlic when we kiss in the afternoons. Every lunchbreak I think he goes to eat pasta with his French colleagues.
‘That was amazing!’ he whispers, his eyes lit with warmth as he looks at me through the mirror and I nestle my body beside him. We both contemplate the picture we make. My body so small next to his, fitting perfectly under his shoulder. Our eyes bright.
‘Hmmm, so sexy!’ he murmurs, his eyes travelling down to the tops of my stockings, his fingers caressing the lace belt. I laugh and we get dressed, quickly. I kneel down and hand him his white shirt; it’s almost domestic. He leaves first, I quickly survey the scene to check we haven’t left anything, then click the door open. I walk past the lifts of the office block, arranging my work bag as if I’ve just come straight from my desk.
On the concrete ramp behind my office building, he holds me tight. His bike leans against the wall, red helmet dangling off the handlebars, his warm neck smells lightly of his aftershave as my lips glide over it, tracing the line where his short black hair meets his skin. I lean into him and let him envelop me.
His hands are on my waist and he’s whispering in my ear, breathing his softly accented words into me. The way he murmurs so lightly makes it hard sometimes to work out if he’s saying, ‘I love you’ or ‘I love it’ but both are okay, though I prefer the former.
After, I ride fast up the hill to William Street, knowing his eyes are on me, and fly home alongside the peak-hour traffic, the warmth of him filling my chest, my eyes as luminous as the city lights around me.
1996
Green Light
Silence hangs heavy in the empty hallway. A shaft of autumn sun falls across the bare floorboards and I fix my eyes on it, cradling Emil in my arms as we wait for the taxi. He’s in a kind of shock but holding up well, quiet in my arms, his favourite cuddly tiger clenched in one fist.
All the furniture is gone – now it’s just us and our last few pieces of luggage piled around us like sandbags. Alex stands on the other side of them, his hands in his pockets. I can’t see his expression as the door is open and the morning light is behind him. In his long coat he looms menacing and melancholy.
But I won’t have to sit here under his oppressive gaze much longer. My ears are straining for the taxi.
When it arrives Alex doesn’t say much, as he grudgingly helps load the bags into the boot. He stands at the gate, his arms helpless by his side as we take off. I want to ask the driver to go as fast as he can. I’m still cradling Emil. I hunch down in the seat and don’t look back. My eyes are fixed on the traffic lights, willing them to stay green as we hurtle south.
Our new place is small and the paint is greyed and flaking but my heart is starting to sing as I throw open the kitchen window that looks down over the shared back garden. I set out my potplants on the rickety back verandah, the trembling in my hands gradually easing, and I stride across the creaky boards of the living room, my favourite picture in my outstretched arms.
My gaze sweeps over the rounded walls, the stained glass, the cracked cornices, and the first thing I want to do is hang my paintings. I tear open their boxes, one after the other, rip through their newspaper wrapping, and find places for them on the walls, until there is barely a space left and the room is vibrant with my colours – the azure sea, the ochre of cliffs like crushed velvet, the swirling magenta sunset sky, and the inky blue of midnight lit with stars.
I step back to look at them, tears of hope warming in my eyes and I tell myself I’m going to be okay.
Eight weeks
I don’t know if it ‘s the cold making my eyes sting or the shock around my heart. I walk, I keep walking, along the gritty streets, trying to concentrate enough not to get hit by a car when my eyesight is wavering and blurring with exhaustion, with horror and the howl of my emotions stripped bare.
This is what it’s going to be like when Tristan is gone is what echoes and rings through my body. I couldn’t see him today as he was home recovering from a bike accident – it’s Friday, we always see each other on Fridays – thank god he’s okay, not injured, just sore and aching and shocked – but my body is shaking with the horror that now I won’t see him till Monday, that’s a break of three days not two like usual – but the real horror is that in eight weeks time every Friday will be like this, every day will be like this, alone under the screaming sky, alone in the whipping wind, with my red-rimmed eyes, my seizing heart.
I realise I will have to start wearing sunglasses as I walk these pointless anonymous city streets with my aloneness.
Because he’s leaving, he’s going back to France, with his wife and kids.
I could go too, but then Emil would never see Alex. I can’t do that to my child. Regardless of how hateful Alex has been to me, refusing to acknowledge our relationship’s dead, refusing to accept it was over years ago, and all I’m trying to do now is find the way I want to live.
The twisted irony of finally walking away, freeing myself - to then lose Tristan – sits like lead in my gut, like something that will make me sick.
We’ve have been through all the scenarios, we’ve talked through them together, late nights in the warm red light of my bedroom, sitting on a bench in the church garden in our lunchbreaks, then – as the winter closed in – in cafés and bars, discreet places I find for us, where we sit in booths, our arms round each other, whispering. My head falls to his shoulder, every second sentence ends in a gentle brushing of lips and his serious gaze is close to mine, so close I can see every fleck, every strain around his eyes, every fleeting fear.
Six weeks
I talk a lot with my neighbour Angie, gripping my coffee cup in her kitchen or mine, while Emil is playing with Finn in our living room or theirs, across the landing.
As a single mum my life has unfolded, unfurled like a silk scarf floating in the breeze. My flat is borderless; open to visitors night and day, my weeks are fluid and vivid with work, afternoons helping at kinder, my painting, the arts association, my new painting group. Suddenly I can do anything. I lurch between giddy ascents into exhilaration and sickening plunges into dark.
My new life is a searing screaming ride at Luna Park under the glittering stars of a tipping night sky, heaving and gulping huge tracts of sharp winter air, stars glinting like knife slits or prayerful diamonds.
My old life has been so easily cleaved away like a thick canvas cut through with a murderously sharp Stanley knife, pallid heavy sheets of it tumbling to the floor. That inner-north life in the solid brick terrace with Alex, with the thick walls and the rules, the heavy silence of failure and constant treading on thin ice, is a black-and-white film that appears mostly just in my nightmares.
Angie taps her chipped red nail on the Laminex table as we huddle over our coffee. She sighs a little, and I know what’s coming.
‘Honey,’ she begins, reaching over to briefly clasp my knuckles. ‘Are you sure about this?’ She tucks her brown stray curls behind her ear, and fixes her clear hazel eyes on me. She’s a volunteer counsellor at Lifeline: it crosses my mind she’s practising on me.
‘I know it’s a long shot,’ I begin, twisting my cup round in awkward circles on the table, grasping for the words. I need to talk about this, it’s the only way I can test out how crazy it is. ‘And I wouldn’t wish a long-distance relationship on my worst enemy.’
She cocks an eyebrow. ‘Who’s your worst enemy then?’
I know what she’s thinking. It’s me. I grimace and shrug. ‘Look, the thing is – there’s nothing else we can do. We’d originally planned to have a kind of transition time for these last few weeks, you know, just see each other as friends – but as it’s gotten closer, we couldn’t, we ...’ I search for the words as her gaze stays on me, sombre.
‘We just don’t want it to end. He says he doesn’t want to end.’ I gulp some coffee, feeling I can believe it.
‘He’s going to try to come back,’ I say in a rush. ‘He’s staying on the same project so that he can – he just needs to sort things out first,’ I trail off at this point.
‘You mean he needs to tell his wife about it,’ says Angie matter-of-factly. ‘And leave her.’
She looks out the window at the seagulls circling outside. ‘And leave his kids behind.’
We sit silent, both watching the seagulls. Their downward circling.
‘Right?’
I nod, and our gazes meet. Neither of us say anything for a moment.
I hear Angie’s light sigh. ‘You know Mira, it takes a hell of a lot to put a bomb under a family.’ Her gaze is kind. ‘I honestly don’t think you should hang all your hopes on this. I mean, sure – maybe he’ll come back – but – who knows? Maybe he won’t, maybe it’ll just be…’
She hesitates and I look across the table at her as if her words will seal my fate.
‘…too hard.’
Too hard. The words float to the ground sadly. But to me the words too hard are a gauntlet thrown down. I’m a fighter, I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.
‘What’s too hard?’ Emil is in the doorway, his helicopter dangling from one hand. He holds it out to me.
‘What’s happened to your helicopter sweetheart?’ asks Angie, reaching over to inspect it, just as I manage a smile and say, too quickly, ‘Nothing darling!’
Emil looks from me to Angie and back to me.
‘I think the battery just needs recharging...’ says Angie, wresting it out of the back of the toy. She smiles at Emil. ‘Do you want to find the recharger Emil, and see if you can work it?’
I’m filled with gratitude for Angie. As I watch my son busily pulling open drawers, hauling out the stool to get to the top cupboards, I think, Two months ago, he would have asked me to do it. I smile and as I look round my warm chaotic kitchen. Thank god at least I have Emil.
I whisper a brave silent plea that maybe this can almost be enough.
The phone rings on the wall. I jump for it, hoping it’s Tristan. It’s not, it’s Steve from the painting group, asking if I want to come and have a beer tonight. I say yes, I invite Angie, and later as we lean against the wall at the Espy, watching a band, I sip on my beer, the day dwindling to its end. I rest my head back against the sticky wall, the thrash of the band reverberating through my temples, and I let my eyes drift across the bay, catching on the twinkling lights of ships.
I turn away when my stomach twists and wrenches, slapped with the sudden shock that these are container ships. One of them will carry his life away soon, in a big metal box, dirty cold steel encasing his belongings. His sterile furniture, dragged once again across the churning sea to their sleek two-storied home in a gated community on the outskirts of Toulouse.
I’ve been dreading the end of this day. It’s our sixteen month anniversary but like every Saturday now, it’s also the dismantling of another week. As I drain my beer, I feel the thudding of the relentless alarm clock in my chest which has just ticked over to six weeks left.
I throw my gaze up to the dusty art-deco ceiling. It’s an impulse, to stop the tears brimming, to distract myself, to look detached to any casual observer, or maybe to look for something up there in those dark corners, to pray to invisible angels in the cobwebs.
Five weeks
I can’t believe we’ve only just realised how the sink in here is the perfect height for me to perch, trembling with the effort not to fall, as Tristan stands before me, naked under his white shirt. He gently pushes apart my legs to lock the heel of my right shoe over the rim of the basin, lifts my left leg up against the wall, then he grips my hips.
His engineer’s skill at manoeuvring my body, his gentle unassuming creativity, the way he suggests this way or that with his soft questioning hands, fills me with delight as I acquiesce.
I am ready, poised on the edge of the sink, a taut-thighed trapeze artist in a breathtaking pose. He casts his eyes up and down over me, and is gasping and urgent as he moves in, as his rhythm accelerates, and with his lips on my neck, his breathless murmurs are the whispers of a happily drowning man, a man succumbing. As he pulls away to drop to his knees and bury his head into me, I reach down to touch the smooth shiny blackness of his hair between my fingers. I caress tentatively then I run my fingers through his hair, I look down at him flooded with a rush of amazement at his beauty and that he is with me, he is mine.
He reverberates through me with his wordless knowledge of my body, and I luxuriate in his expert delicacy, I tip my head back against the mirror and give myself over, as he glides me upwards in an arc of joy. As I laugh the incredulous, almost tearful laugh of my happiness, he rises from his knees to grab my hips and pull me to him again, to gently, rapidly moan into my ear as he jolts me back and forth, whispering, ‘Don’t move’. Within moments I feel him trembling, then diving into his primordial need, his deep sigh of release. I drink up every drop of his pleasure into the embrace of my body.
After, he smooths his jeans out across the floor to sit on, and draws me down on to his lap. We’re both still naked, our skins lightly sweating now despite the thirteen degree day outside. I reach over to my handbag and scrabble around, then draw out a brightly wrapped ginger chocolate bar, bought from the market this morning. I like to linger five minutes longer there on my weekly shop, to pick something out for us to share.
‘I got this for you,’ I show it to him. ‘as a pre-soccer snack,’ I smile back at him as he opens it and breaks the bar carefully in two.
I settle onto his warm thighs as we eat the chocolate together. ‘So how was your day, darling?’ he asks me. ‘What about your meeting?’ His soft low voice echoes off the cool white walls.
‘Oh it was fine in the end!’ I breathe a sigh of relief. ‘I’d thought it was going to be a lot worse – I thought I was going to have to explain why the catalogue wasn’t ready for the exhibition opening next week. But no one even asked me about it!’
I laugh, brushing aside the actual anxiety I had felt. These days I never have time to get everything done, now that I’m the one doing all the housework, rushing between the office and Tristan and kinder, and throwing myself into my painting every night when Emil’s asleep, the dishes are done and the flat is shrouded in peaceful quiet light. Work has become a thing I cram in on the side of my life – this job with the Office for Community Arts I should be grateful for, working with artists (real, paid artists) while I struggle to get even one showing a year of my own work.
Part of me thinks that once Tristan has gone, I won’t be running out of the office at three o’clock anymore. My work will get done on time, there will be none of these anxious meetings, or mornings furiously scribbling notes to myself at the kitchen table on how to explain why something wasn’t finished yesterday. I tell myself this will be an upside of his absence.
I look at him to check he understood. I think he has. He smiles and squeezes me. ‘You see? I told you, you were worrying for nothing. You’re an efficient woman, Mira, no one is going to notice if you didn’t finish something when you planned to, because they know you will do it in time, you won’t let them down!’
‘That’s true, I guess,’ I shrug off his support modestly. ‘How about you, chéri? How was your day?’
‘It was busy, as always...’ He doesn’t say much about his work anymore, now the guy has started who will be taking over his job. He’s in handover mode. Detaching.
‘And...’ he strokes my back gently. ‘How about your new painting, how is it going? When am I going to come and see it?’
‘Oh...’ I frown slightly, involuntarily, at the complexities emerging with this piece. It started out as a depiction of the city skyline – how I’ve seen it those mornings when I cycle into work, the song of the skyline soaring above me, beside me, yearning with me, the glass-plated buildings rockets of lean hope shooting upward, blazing sheets of light – and each time I see this vision of refracted beauty, I ache with the words why won’t you stay. The morning sun blinding me, I ask myself in frustration: how can you say no?
To this vista of beauty and blue sky.
My breathing gradually steadies as I sit at the lights, waiting for green, poised on the pedal, feeling my aloneness as I contemplate this dazzling blue and silver. Then one morning I pushed back the tears, pushed back at the dome of blue loneliness encasing me, and told myself with gritted teeth I’m going to paint this.
I sigh, and trace my fingertips along his neckline. I breathe in his aftershave. ‘It’s developing!’ I try to laugh and keep my mood light, while at the same time I’m concentrating with the utmost seriousness on telling him exactly what I feel, giving him my truth. It’s almost religious, my devotion to openness with him. He listens to me.
‘It started out a simple thing – just the morning sky, the sharpness of the clear winter air, and I wanted to capture...’ I look at him cautiously, ‘the clarity of my feelings, how I love you...’
He smiles. He likes it. He understands. My cheeks flood with a rush of warmth.
‘But now other things are weaving themselves in around the edges, a kind of – hysteria – desperation – hope that’s stretched so tight like a string that might break… I didn’t plan it like this!’
‘Like what - what do you mean?’ He looks at me in concern. ‘Is it your stress coming through, Mira?’ He kisses me lightly and brushes a strand of hair away from my eyes.
‘Maybe! Maybe this desperation, this darkness needs to be there... the other night I suddenly wanted to include a figure, a sole figure on the balcony of one of the buildings – I was thinking a kind of angel, an other-worldly thing, a kind of hovering bright shadow. But when I drew her, she became more like an orphan or a ghost, or a small lost girl… in a long blue velvet dress, with lace sleeves, her hair is bright gold, she’s kind of medieval. She doesn’t fit at all with the skyscrapers. She brings a kind of haunting sadness, a shadow, a question.’ I frown in frustration.
‘Hmm! Maybe it’s interesting, what do you think?’
‘I don’t know, you should come over this weekend and have a look,’ I lay my head on his shoulder. ‘Give me some advice!’
He nods, and I can feel he’s trying not to look at his watch, but it’s getting late, so I shift my weight and reach over for our clothes. We start to dress. I help him draw his soft grey jumper over his shirt, and he steadies me, his hand on my waist, as I reach down to pull on my stockings.
Four weeks
When I lie in his arms the warmth is an ancient sun-warmed stone in a place where I can breathe deep and without words.
When we lie in the dark together whispering – about anything, when he tells me every French national holiday, when I tell him the story of the dismissal of the Prime Minister in 1975, when he tells me about a song he heard, when I tell him word for word what happened with my staff member who always has a headache when I ask her to do something… we hold each other tight and his skin moulds into mine, then I turn so he can enfold me closer, and he keeps holding me, he doesn’t want to let go.
Ten days
I sit on the steps of my back balcony, in the wind and sun of this unexpected early spring, and as I watch the sheets blowing and dancing on the washing line below, I contemplate the ten days we have left.
I prod this fact. Somehow, now that he’s promising to come back, and we have a plan for next year, this looming date is less like a horrifying chasm and more like an unpleasant medicine to force down. At least over the months he’s gone, the advancing summer will walk beside me, it’s invisible calming hand on my shoulder.
I shift my weight on the cold iron step and look down at my rounded belly.
It’s time to do it. I have the peace and quiet this bright Saturday morning, with Emil at Alex’s, all the chores done, the flat silent. I can’t put it off any longer.
In the bathroom I peel the tester out of its plastic, I quietly, calmly, go through the procedure, then I start timing. I use the three minutes to wander over to my artroom –a tiny atrium adjoining the living room, sunlight streaming in through windows on three sides.
My current piece sits waiting and screaming questions at me on the easel. The angel standing motionless, her hands outstretched, in the cool shadows of her windy balcony, seems to have an expectant look to her today. I look back at her in silence.
Time’s up. I make myself walk back slowly; I almost stroll to the bathroom.
The moment hangs motionless as I look at the double lines.
Two days
We sit in the laneway with our arms wrapped round each other, and I ask tentatively, ‘And the kids? Do you ever think about that...?’
He nods. ‘Barbecues on the beach...’ he murmurs.
‘Road trips together!’
‘Yes, what was that place you went last summer...?’
‘Byron Bay!’ My eyes light up for the first time in days and he smiles at me.
‘We’ll dance together,’ that makes me say, with certainty.
And we will, and I’ll laugh with the exhilaration of dancing in the subtropical night with him, with the sheer happiness of being finally in the life I want.
Zero
It’s early morning, barely light.
We press our cheeks close together, warm skin touching warm skin, in the softly lit corner of the cafe. The number 61 on our table, his short black, my long macchiato sitting almost untouched.
Then we stand clinging to one another in William Street, outside an elegant pale stone building – somehow appropriate in its dignity and grace. Tears run down his cheeks and there is a strain in his dark-ringed eyes that has crept in over these last days. I can only suppose I look equally as drained.
He fixes his gaze on me unable to speak as I push out words we need. ‘We can have a good life together,’ I whisper, a smile of hope breaking through. ‘With our kids!’
I stroke his beautiful jawline and kiss him one last time, then take a deep breath and say bravely, ‘That’s it now.’
I pick up my bag, and after our last whispered goodbye, our last fleeting kiss, turn to walk away.
At work I am gentle with my staff, I spend an hour going through a process in slow, calm detail, I make sure everyone understands what they need to do.
I clean my desk, I walk softly on the soundless carpet to fetch my tea, aromatic and warming.
I stay for maybe three hours then I can’t hold it together anymore, I whisper my goodbyes to my colleagues, who hug me with compassion, and I catch the lift alone, holding my gaze in the mirrored wall, down to my bike.
I cycle bent over into the wind as fast as I can along the beachfront, and as the solid ivory square of Lisieux emerges in the streetscape, I straighten up and take my feet off the pedals. I hear my wracked breathing and feel my heart jumping under my coat.
I park my bike, lock it to a No Parking sign, and clamber awkwardly on to the rocky ledge overlooking the bay. I am shivering unstoppably as I claw my coat around me.
I twist around and my eyes are drawn across the road, through the constant stream of traffic hurtling past anonymous and unknowing. I look into Lisieux, the pale interior of this silent peaceful room, lit with the soft glow of a chandelier over the long gleaming table.
A vase of tall flowers stands in its centre, their fronds arching delicately upward, radiating warm orange.
My eyes hurt with longing for the life I want with Tristan. I turn and look out to the churning indigo sea. At once my face collapses, finally allowed now I’m alone - I let the tears flow unheeded, I hear my light high-pitched wail as my body shakes with sobs.
I stop when I notice a man looking with concern at me, parked in his truck twenty metres away. I pull down my sunglasses and keep my gaze fixed out to sea.
I watch the ships for some time.
*******************************************************************************
Lisette
2018
Angel on the Balcony
I shift from one high heel to the other, the cold of the concrete floor seeping up through my thin steep sole. Should have worn boots on a cold night like this instead of these crazy stacked sandals with patterned tights. Somehow I’d thought the fun and kind of offbeat glamour of the night would magically sweep away any cold or discomfort – but so far it’s not really working. I take a sip of the cheap gallery wine out of the plastic beaker I’m clutching, and look round to check if Mum’s arrived yet.
She hasn’t. As I glance at the time on my phone it occurs to me that maybe she won’t, if she’s having a bad night – even though it’s the first showing of her work that’s not just some kind of Arts Association event for the bunch of local eccentrics she used to drink and paint with.
Hmmm. I look round at the crowd of arty people who all seem to know each other. Should have brought Tom.
I grimace at the acidity of the wine, and catch Adam’s eye across the room. He raises his glass, so I decide to saunter over to him – as he’s the only person I really know here to talk to. Apart from that raffish old guy Steve who hangs round my mum with this sad devoted hangdog look – I know he’s been secretly in love with her since before I was born, and I can’t help thinking what a loser. He’s milling round the entry with a clutch of their old artist friends in their musty velvet jackets and fur trim coats with thin op shop dresses underneath. They’re all sculling so much free wine though, I bet they’re not feeling the cold.
‘So what do you think, Lisette, do you like the show?’ Adam looks at me with a slight anxiety – he’s been Mum’s unpaid agent for twenty years, he wants it to be a success. I always figured he called himself her agent because he couldn’t paint himself, but loved the glitzy seedy world they moved in back then. Nights of free entry to exhibitions, free drinks, stumbling home after. Adam always there to make sure she didn’t get mugged or lost teetering through the dark leafy sidestreets.
Even just looking at Adam brings back memories of being dragged awake by the muffled voices and heels clattering up the stairs, my mum’s voice a mix of girlish laughter and maternal concern, chiding, ‘Sshh, shshh, the kids are asleep!’, bottles opening, wine pouring and spilling, the clunk of the needle hitting a Nick Cave record.
‘I’m just glad she’s finally got it together!’ I smile back at him. ‘And it’s not a bad turnout, considering!’
‘Considering?’ I see his anxiety creep up a notch, the furrows in his brow deepening slightly.
I laugh. ‘Yeah, you know, because Mum’s got this thing of no Facebook, no social media – just word of mouth advertising! She’s so anti-Internet, dead against having an online presence, you know how - ’ I stop myself before I say crazy. That’s a sensitive word amongst her old friends who helped keep her out of hospital back when she was at her lowest point.
I change the subject. ‘Anyway, Angel on the Balcony looks great as the centrepiece.’ We both wander towards it and gaze up at it.
The lights set around the painting accentuate the intense blue of the sky, and of the angel’s dress. My eyes travel over the streams of sunlight glinting off the skyscrapers, golden rivers that glide through the air, between the buildings, illuminating the curve of a soaring small red balloon, the optimistic edge of a flag flying from a pole, swirling round the upper reaches of the city. I stand motionless for a moment, contemplating this song of melancholic beauty.
‘What do you think the angel means?’ I turn to Adam. ‘I’ve never really understood this painting!’
Adam shrugs, twirling slightly on his heels. He looks down at me sideways. ‘You know Mira painted it when she was pregnant with you?’
I nod. ‘Yes, she’s told me that – how it was the last thing she painted for years too.’ I look casually round – no, still not here.
I sigh. ‘But I don’t think the angel’s meant to be me!’ I add a laugh to show I don’t mean anything bad with that. I’m not alluding to the fact my mum doesn’t seem to know or care I exist, and maybe never cared, that maybe I was the mistake that sent her life spiralling downwards. The leftovers – aftermath - of my dad.
Adam smiles wryly; he’s probably starting to wonder too if she’ll turn up tonight, to her own opening. ‘Who knows?’ he replies, draining his cup of vinegary wine and clearing his throat. ‘But you’re right, she didn’t paint anything after this for years.’ He pauses. ‘I don’t know how much she told you about it all?’
I redden involuntarily. I can feel, despite his careful words, that Mum has told him she doesn’t communicate with me, that we hardly know anything about each other’s lives. I don’t know what to say. People flit around us and someone pushes another wine into Adam’s hand.
I finally reply, ‘Oh well, I know things were tough when I was born. My dad wasn’t around.’ My flush deepens and I can feel the sudden heat of tears rising. Those words seem to have dropped through me with more weight than I could have imagined. What is this about? God I am an idiot to not bring Tom tonight.
‘And I guess you know I’ve never met him,’ I stare Adam defiantly in the eye. He meets my gaze, and I can tell he’s a little afraid of my sudden intensity. I’m a little afraid of it myself – I never talk about my dad – or my mum, for that matter.
‘I know, Lisette,’ he says gently. ‘I’m really sorry about how all that went for your mum. It was an awful time.’ He looks down at the wine he’s agitating round in his glass. There’s a heavy silence as we both look up at the painting.
Adam coughs and adds quickly, with a new edge to his voice, ‘Good that he never came back on the scene though. That would have been disastrous.’
‘What?’ My head jerks sideways to scrutinise him. He’s looking grimly down at his wine sloshing in hectic waves in his glass.
I frown, not sure what to ask, then press my lips together and look away. We both know it’s wrong to talk about it here, to bring back these shadows of grief on a night which is as close to a celebration as Mum’s ever going to get. Anyway – we both smile in relief and move gingerly apart - she’s arrived.
She’s caught up in the swirl of her old friends, they’re smudging her cheek with their lipstick kisses and handing her wine. She’s probably already had a few, judging by the stains of colour in her cheeks and her high-pitched gaiety, which tonight, luckily, comes across as a happily uninhibited vivacity. Adam and I move over to her and wait our turn to kiss her congratulations, I pose with her for photos, our arms firmly clenched round each other’s waists, both trying to outdo each other’s smiles.
And at the end of the night, when the last stragglers have staggered off to a bar further down Acland St, when the staff have emerged to sweep up the crumbs and toss armloads of plastic cups into their black garbage bags, Adam, Steve, Mum and I are standing in a semi-circle at the door. Steve wants the honour of walking her home, he’s loving the chance to keep touching her arm, patting her back, hugging her. She puts up with it as patiently as she always did. Adam’s hanging round the edges like he always did, his warm eyes fixed on her.
I’m hanging round because I feel like I should, though I’m not sure, I’m really not sure what I’m doing and I can feel my unsureness like an ache written across my face, a counterpoint to the ache in the soles of my feet.
Abandonment
I’m up at the same time as always the next morning, despite the late night and four cheap wines. I slide into my ballet flats, the ones I can walk to the tramstop in. I brush my black hair severely back into a ponytail and observe myself in the mirror above the dresser. My eyes are dark and quiet and there’s something sad there today.
I shrug it off.
I gather my laptop and phone and chargers, store them neatly in my uni bag and click the door shut behind me.
My heart’s racing out of control, pumping like it has a life of its own and is about to leap right out of my chest, violently. I grip the phone so hard I almost switch it off by accident. My face is hot and I don’t care who can hear me on this morning peak hour tram.
‘What – did you say?’ I can barely get the words out for the tightness in my throat.
The background noise is louder than Tom’s voice. He’s standing in line for a coffee in his Collins St office block, in the café in the foyer. I close my eyes, stabbed with the thought I might never go there with him again.
‘Honey, I know it’s sudden.’ I can sense his boyish enthusiasm brimming under his careful tone of regret. He’s excited with this news and trying not to show it. ’It may only be a few months – maybe just a year. And we still have a few days…?’
I don’t say anything, I can’t. Tears of rage are choking me and there’s a film reel running through my head of all the savage words I want to say, viperous words, but they would kill any chance of a future, and right now I don’t know what I want.
‘Lisette, are you there?’ He sounds uncertain. ‘Honey, remember I told you I might get this offer – remember, London was always going to be an option?’
I swallow. ‘That was ages ago.’ When we first got together. ‘I didn’t think – I thought…’ I can’t go on. What I want is for him to say he doesn’t want this transfer anymore, or even just for him to ask if I can come too – or even visit – but he says none of those things.
Something curdles inside me and I feel my face set like stone. I glance sideways at my reflection in the dim early light, the charcoal grey of the June morning. My hair glints like black armour. My lipstick like blood. I set my jaw and stare back at my reflection.
I push my way past the black-clad knees pressing in around me and yank on the cord as the tram swerves around the corner, twisting away from the icy seafront, wheels screeching.
I get off at Mum’s place, I’m not thinking straight as I skittle along Fitzroy Street, pushed by the wind off the sea, my ponytail flying and slapping my cheek. As I’m running, I’m texting jittery texts to my classmate and best friend Georgia Fuck him, it’s over! NO WAY I’m hanging round for him for a year while he lives it up over there! Can you let Prof Gassin know je ne viens pas aujourd’hui, je suis en crise!!
You’re better off without him, don’t worry babe, you’ll find a way better option within a week! Georgia texts back. Come to the Politics bar crawl tomorrow, we’ll sort you out! 😊
I don’t want to get sorted out right now.
I bang on Mum’s door. I’ve never done this before, if I stopped to think for a minute I know I wouldn’t do it – I’d get back down to the tramstop and hop on the next tram, get myself to uni, be the sensible level-headed girl I am.
But for some reason, today – maybe I’m just tired and bleary after the wines last night – today I’m not that girl.
Mum is clearly surprised to see me at her door. She’s in her dressing gown holding a coffee. As she leans against the door and looks at me with her big black-smudged eyes, she brings her coffee to her lips to take a slow sip. Her gaze doesn’t leave mine.
‘Can I come in?’ My eyes fill with tears.
‘Of course, darling!’ She quickly reaches out to me and draws me in out of the cold. As she hustles me into the kitchen and goes through the business of putting on the coffee, she frowns and gives me a puzzled look. ‘Don’t you have uni today, love?’
I drop into a chair at the table and push aside two wineglasses, remnants of last night.
‘Mum, Tom’s moving to London next week. For work.’ I clamp my hands together, still shivering from the cold walk. I’d been too distracted to zip up my jacket or put my gloves back on.
She turns to me and her face falls. ‘Oh, darling,’
She comes over and hugs me. I shake with sobs as she cradles me, rocks me gentler than I can ever recall. She smells of stale perfume and wine but she’s warm and cocooning me in her soft pink dressing gown, and I let the tears flow.
‘I don’t know why I’m crying!’ I finally manage to choke out. I try a laugh. ‘I’m not even really that into him! It’s not like we were going to move in together or anything – but I just – I can’t believe he’s leaving me! I’m just shocked…’
‘I know, I know,’ Mum murmurs. She strokes my hair and pulls away as we hear the coffee steaming up through the pot on the stovetop.
‘I mean, he’s so boring!’ I continue with heaving sobs. ‘I don’t even spend a lot of time with him – I never thought he’s like – you know, ‘the one’ for me – but – I just can’t believe this! He must have known before today!’
‘Maybe,’ Mum replies, her voice soft. I can’t see her expression, her back is turned. ‘Or maybe not. You might never know, sweetheart.’
I watch her as she gathers cups and milk, the mussed up back of her blonde hair, the dressing gown cord tied firmly round her waist, her wrinkly hands that were once beautiful. She stoops a little and her lips are trembling. As she places my cup down in front of me and sits opposite, she smiles sadly, wearily.
‘Men,’ she says finally. She lowers her eyelids, and I suddenly feel she’s about to cry herself.
I half-smile and shrug. ‘Yeah, who needs them?’ The hollowness of that makes me rush to change the subject.
‘Last night was good?’ I offer.
Her eyes light up a little. ‘Yeah, it was fun. Adam’s done so much for me – putting that show together, getting the space for the night. I think it went pretty well.’ She doesn’t sound completely certain.
‘Any buyers?’ I firmly push thoughts of Tom down, I decide in that split second I don’t care. I slowly rotate my cup round on the table, as if drilling down the lid on him, on us.
She shrugs vaguely. ‘A couple of people were interested in Angel on the Balcony, and in another earlier one. Adam’s going to give me a call about it today.’ She yawns and stretches her arms upward. ‘Though I don’t know if I want to part with Angel! I wouldn’t mind if no one ever buys it really.’
‘What’s it actually about?’
She looks out the window to the backyard, her eyes glazing over. ‘Oh… a feeling I guess. A feeling I had at the time.’ She gets up and starts to move some dishes around on the draining board, turning her back to me.
‘Hope,’ her voice is shaky. ‘Love. Optimism. Beauty.’
I can hear she’s crying, and her shoulders shake with the frailty of spring leaves.
‘And the angel represents…’ She hesitates, gripping the side of the bench. ‘The small kernel of fear, the fear of loss, the fear things won’t work out. Or even - the sadness of knowing they won’t.’
She turns back to me and wipes away a single rolling tear with the back of her hand. ‘Which is what happened – so in a way I predicted it, I painted it. The moment before the angel falls off the balcony.’
‘Mum,’ I interject. ‘Why didn’t you ever do anything about it? Go and find him? And why – why didn’t you tell him you were pregnant with me?’
I’ve finally spoken these words. I sit loosely holding my coffee cup, my eyes fixed on her.
She tugs at her sleeve with nervous fingers and casts her eyes downward. I can see the blue of her leftover eyeshadow shimmering on her eyelids. Her tear is slowly tracing a dirty grey track down her cheek.
‘And when I was born, why didn’t you tell him then?’ I look at her curiously, wondering if my direct questioning will tip her over.
But it doesn’t – she comes back to the table and sits opposite me. ‘Darling, I couldn’t keep in contact with him. I …’ she looks at me helplessly. ‘I just … I gave up on him. He said he was coming back – I think, I really believe he wanted to … but ... months went by and he … I think he just couldn’t.’
I watch two more tears travel in slow sorrowful lines down her cheeks. ‘He couldn’t.’ she whispers again. ‘I think it was just…’
She brings her coffee cup up to her lips as if to warm them, and looks at me. ‘… Too hard.’
I kind of know the bare bones of this story, I’ve heard these lines, but I still don’t get it, and for once I plough on.
‘What do you mean, it was too hard? And that he couldn’t? If he wanted to?’
She’s silent for a moment, searching for words. She looks at her empty hands. ‘It wasn’t that simple, Lisette … yes he wanted to, we kept in touch, but it wasn’t easy and I … I didn’t know how to tell him about you, or when ... I didn’t want to pressure him ...’
‘You didn’t want to pressure him? What? I was his responsibility too!’ I stare at her in disbelief. ‘What if you’d told him, and he’d come back then?’ I swallow. ‘Everything would have been completely different – wasn’t that what you wanted?’ Unbidden images of a life flash through my mind – a life of living in a house, with a car, with a dad who mows the lawns, a dad speaking kindly to me, a brother playing cricket with him, and Mum laughing, staying young, sitting beside him, arms around each other.
She’s shaking her head in a kind of confusion, her face flushed. ‘I don’t know Lisette … I wasn’t in a good way … I stopped thinking it was possible with Tristan, I had to stop, I couldn’t go on hoping ...’
‘But Mum, why? Why did you give up? Why didn’t you go over there or something?’ My voice is lifting with impatience. ‘Why not? How could you just give up?’
‘Have you never asked yourself this?’ I try not to shout but my anger is rising in a torrent, a surging king tide. ‘If it mattered so much … you’ve spent so many years on him … wasting your life … and he’s my DAD for fuck’s sake!’ My voice breaks and I bring my hands up to cup my eyes.
‘So – did you stop contacting him, is that how it was?’ I don’t look at her but I know she’s sitting there silent and motionless.
‘Why didn’t you go and find him?’ I insist.
Mum continues to say nothing, and through my heaving sobs it hits me there’s a kind of guilt coming off her. Guilt? I think hazily. I’ve never known that from my mum. Guilt at giving up.
I pick up a red-stained wineglass and slam it down again. ‘Instead of wasting your life!’ She blushes, she knows what I mean.
‘Fuck it,’ I say, my eyes stinging with anger. I look across at her, meet her wide-eyed look. ‘I’ll go and find him myself.’
Departure
Mum hangs tentatively in the doorway to my bedroom – my old bedroom. I’ve come home for these last days, for evenings cradling cups of tea with her, listening to the stories starting to unfold gradually as she finds her voice for them. They’re sweet and slow tendrils of smoke, like eucalypt campfire.
I’m stuffing my backpack as she hovers in the door, twisting something in her hand.
I glance up and smile. ‘Look,’ I say, gesturing at the top layer of clothes toppling out of the bag. ‘I’m taking that old Kookai dress of yours!’
She frowns in a kind of mild confusion.
‘So I can show him,’ I add. I straighten up. ‘I can show my dad. I bet he’ll remember it, won’t he?’
Mum can’t help smiling as she steps over and picks up the red dress, shiny and tight-fitted, with the deep V at the front. Impossibly unprofessional, but in his last midwinter weeks these are the things she wore anyway, oblivious to the sidelong glances. Existing only for him.
She holds it up to watch it fall in shimmering folds. ‘It’s the one I wore the last morning I saw him,’ she says softly, her eyes faraway.
She’s told me so many stories this last fortnight, since I booked the flight. The time they cycled along the creek and stopped somewhere by a vast concrete drain – ugly, not what he’d wanted – but they’d stopped, waded through long harsh yellow weeds, with their bikes, and sat down against a tree. He’d cradled her in his arms and they’d talked about films in the spring evening sun.
And the time they’d gone to the Gin Palace, her in her black lace dress, and he’d leaned forward to whisper, in his best French stereotype, ‘Je te veux Mira...’ and then, ‘Maybe we can go to the changeroom?’, his eyes narrow with intent. She’d looked at him, insulted; she’d wanted to go out for a romantic dinner. They’d argued on the treacherous slope of Flinders Lane and parted, brokenly, to lie awake all night and reconcile at South Melbourne Market the next afternoon. He’d taken her hand gently as they crossed the street; she hadn’t cycled that day but caught the tram, afraid of an accident after no sleep.
Since she sold Angel to give me the money it’s unleashed something new in her. I can see hope flashing bright in her eyes. I don’t know if it’s hope for me or for her.
‘What’s that, Mum?’ I nod down at the folded paper she’s holding.
She hands me a photo. It’s creased and blurry with age, but I can see straightaway it’s her and Dad, up close in the back corner of some city bar. She’s holding the camera, her arm is stretched out to hold it, and she’s looking up into it, her eyes shining. She’s nestled in his arm, and he’s looking down at her, his eyes lowered to watch her, a slight tender smile playing on his lips.
Le Marais
I sit on a bench in the Place des Vosges, watching the pigeons circling, a ring of fluttering grey, wings beating against a cerulean sky.
I gaze around at the towering facades of rose-gold lining the edges of the square, at their centuries-old grandeur. Through my wavering veil of jetlag, these silent shuttered palaces swim a little in my vision.
I don’t hide my curiosity as my eyes follow the stream of passersby, clutching bags of shopping, children dawdling in clusters, commuters hurrying past without a sideways look. I strain to catch every word around me.
I look down at my feet in my new shoes. They arc to a confident point at the toes, their patent black sheen catching the late afternoon light as I stretch out my foot to appraise them. I smile to myself – it’s day three, and I’m managing this. I’ve not only bought shoes, I’ve found a market for bread and fruit and cheese – I’ve worked out where I like the coffee on the rue Saint Antoine – I’ve conquered the Métro. I sigh with satisfaction, sitting back to bask in the golden light. I could live here.
I don’t miss Tom, I don’t even care that he’s just across the Channel.
Every day of this dreamlike week I jump from one Métro station to the next, racing two steps at a time up the hot stairwells where black-hatted gypsies whip out a frenetic polka on double basses, to break out into the light. Where I pause momentarily, breathless - survey the scene, consider my possibilities - then plunge into the crowd and lose myself wandering these circular streets.
I have my map of Toulouse and in the top left corner I have written the early morning train times from Paris. There are twenty-three trains every day.
One afternoon as I hesitate on a steep street corner, a man stops to offer help, asks where I am from, and before continuing on his way, places sunflower seeds in my open palm.
‘To plant in the city,’ he explains. ‘We have a group, it’s a thing we do, to make the city beautiful!’
I smile and shrug OK, I have no idea how to garden but I’ll give it a go. Later I stoop awkwardly at a patch of dry soil outside a small nameless market near the Gare du Nord, and scrabble around to make a shallow dip amongst the weeds. I scatter the seeds in, cover them with dirt, and dust off my hands.
Twilit evenings I clatter back up five flights of steep steps to my rented room, sweat between my breastbones, seeking brief sanctuary after my day of heady journeying, to sit on my tiny balcony. I sip a cool wine and look over the darkening rooftops.
Watching the sinking sun I think soon, I’ll go, I’ll start to find him.
Then I summon up my energy again – close the door of my small oasis, my one-room flat with its mezzanine bedroom and two-cupboard kitchen - and descend back to the streets, the warmth of the day still rising off the pavement. I try out my French on students in basement bars, they try their English on me, as we compare the courses we’re doing and beam at each other in the delight of discovering our unexpected parallels. After, I sit on the riverbank to look at the lights on the other side, and then I walk and I walk and I walk.
I am walking myself into the other half of my life, the half that’s been in shadows all through my childhood. With each step, each smile, each word I’m taking shape, growing into the empty spaces. I’m the angel reassembling on the balcony.
But on the eighth day, as I wake up out of a chaotic dissolving dream, I can sense through my eyelids the sky is grey. The air is chill, and my ten day’s rental here in the rue des Tournelles is nearly up.
I get up to push the curtain aside and look out at the light drizzle falling. The receding edges of the dream - of running, then standing alone on the Esplanade watching the ships - tug at me.
Today I’ll go and book my train ticket.
Dead end
In the bleached gated suburb on the outskirts of Toulouse, the woman at the door stands and looks at me, first blank, then cold. I can see as her eyes traverse me that she’s recognising him in me.
She looks like the bitch she probably always was.
‘You may come in,’ she replies finally, and moves aside grudgingly to let me into her neutral-toned, soundless house. Her English is obviously still good, better than his ever was, I imagine. She was the strong one, the best earner, the ruler of the family. The decision maker.
‘You must be Simone then?’ I ask, my voice more challenging than I intend.
She half-smiles and drops gracefully into an armchair, gesturing for me to sit opposite. ‘Yes,’ she says simply.
She doesn’t seem surprised about me, or at least she doesn’t show it, despite the fact I’ve turned up unannounced. I’ve done my detective work, located their family name in the White Pages – and guessed already that he doesn’t live here anymore, because it’s just her name listed. She’s on Facebook too, so I’ve seen their sons – men now, my half-brothers – I’ve seen dozens of friends and family – but nothing about him, no mention.
He doesn’t have a social media presence at all, as if he never existed.
She’s a silver-haired woman in a dove-grey silk dress, with a cutting gaze and glinting jewellery. The polished frames on the mantlepiece, the black Mini in the open garage, the neatly trimmed rosebushes lining the driveway of sharp clean gravel – all speak of a cultivated, cashed-up existence. There is a silent and invisible presence of staff in the temperate air. The crisp smell of Euros defines everything about this contained woman in her silk belted dress, sitting opposite me nonchalant, calm, uncaring.
She doesn’t offer me a coffee and I don’t want one; I feel too sick.
‘So, I wanted to meet my father.’ I say, into the empty air.
She shrugs, and leans forward, bringing her hands together, her shiny crimson nails pointing at me. I get a sense she’s savouring what she’s about to say.
‘So, miss – Lisette?’ She smiles coolly. ‘My ex-husband no longer resides in France.’
I nod, my face wooden.
‘So you have come so far for nothing, that is a shame! You could have telephoned me and saved yourself the journey!’ She spreads her hands wide, deprecating.
It’s my turn to shrug, as if it doesn’t matter. I’d thought if he’s not here anymore, with his ex-wife, at least he’d be somewhere else in France. My mind is thumping with a sick mixture of disappointment and wariness.
‘Do you know where he is?’ I ask her.
She tosses her hair and laughs, her eyes softening. I think she’s possibly starting to feel sorry for me, as I sit frozen on the edge of her terracotta-hued suede chair, in my new dress bought two days ago at the Galeries Lafayette - the most expensive dress I’ve ever bought. It’s a tight elegant knitted number, black at the top, emblazoned with horizontal stripes in fire-alarm colours ringing my narrow hips – as if to say nothing scares me, with my new shoes, matching bag, matching nails that took me about three attempts with my shaky clumsy hand to get right. Fuck, this has cost me thousands.
Doing myself up as my mum always wanted to, tried to for him.
‘You really don’t know, do you?’ She appraises me up and down. ‘Incredible,’ she murmurs.
‘What do you mean? No, of course I don’t know,’ I return her gaze with growing impatience.
She looks at me levelly. ‘I don’t know his address. I haven’t spoken to him for years. My sons know, they are in touch with him, they have visited him.’ She pauses. ‘However, I am not going to ask them for his address for you, and I would prefer you do not contact them.’
I know their names, so I could find them, I think, but I say nothing.
Unless they’re a bit more careful than her with their contact details. Which, being younger, they probably are.
‘Okay,’ I say slowly. ‘I won’t contact your sons, I can understand you wouldn’t want that. But – can you tell me anything about where Tristan is? I’m sure you can understand my point of view as well.’ I’ve rehearsed these lines in their reasonable tone, I’m appealing to her goodwill if there is any. I’d figured even before I knocked on her door there may not be, but this seems to be all I’ve got left.
She smiles with cool irony. ‘Melbourne.’
On the train back to Paris I can hardly hear him, I don’t know if it’s because of the volume on my phone or he’s deliberately fading out. My brother was never really into willingly talking to me.
But I’ve called him because he’s the only person I can think of who my dad could have tracked down – he’s a normal person with social media presence, unlike my mum. And I don’t give a fuck what the time is over there.
‘What? Emil, you need to speak up!’
‘Yeah, yeah OK I did get a call from him, must have been about – I don’t know, six or seven years ago? Maybe more. I told him to fuck off.’
I can’t believe what I just heard. ‘What?’
Emil seems to be talking to someone else in the background, must be Saskia, his girlfriend. I don’t have a lot of time for her, the way she sucks up to Alex, because he’s the parent with money. Saskia treats Mum like one of her social work clients, like she’s a bag lady.
Saskia seems to be telling Emil to get off the phone as it’s late. I think I hear something like, ‘This is your half-sister who usually doesn’t have anything to do with you, right?’
‘Emil!’ I shout. The other passengers in my row look at me, but not as if they’re surprised – more along the lines of Annoying tourist. Touriste ennuyeux.
‘How could you do that to Mum?’
‘Look, Lisette.’ He sounds impatient and in charge. Always the one in charge, just like his uptight dad. I press my lips tight and squeeze my hands into fists.
‘He was never any good for Mum,’ Emil continues. ‘When he phoned me, he wasn’t even sure how long he’d be back in Melbourne for! It was just another work trip – a junket – a – what was the word?’ Emil pauses. ‘Oh yeah – a mission.’ He spits the word with contempt. ‘He was probably just going to use her then piss off again.’
It dawns on me that Emil hates my dad violently.
‘So what was I meant to do?’
I say nothing.
‘He broke up Mum and my dad.’ Emil’s voice is icy.
‘Oh no way!’ I splutter. ‘If it wasn’t him, it would have been someone else!’
‘Well it wasn’t someone else, it was him. He wrecked her life, then left her high and dry, then he comes back and expects just to pick up where they left off? Like hell. Asshole. I did the right thing, I told him to fuck off back to France and let Mum get on with her life.’
‘Yeah? What life?’ Something in Emil’s self-satisfied tone gives me a gut feeling about something. ‘What did you tell him about Mum?’
Emil hesitates. ‘I had to be sure he wouldn’t bother her again.’
‘So what did you say, you fucking do-gooder, know-it all? And what makes you think you can make decisions about her life? And about my life? He’s my fucking father, did that occur to you? Did that ever occur to anyone?’
‘Oh fuck off Lisette. Stop being a drama queen.’
I hear Saskia whingeing in the background again. Probably complaining it’s time to get off the phone because it’s after ten and she needs to get up early to go and do some kind of pilates or some shit.
I close my eyes and take a deep trembling breath. ‘OK sorry, so what did you say to him?’
‘I told him she was happily remarried to a really successful rich guy and she was living in Brighton. I told him she hated his guts and her husband would kill him if he tried to go anywhere near her.’
‘Anyway’, he continues coolly, ‘Don’t blame me. Talk to Adam. Tristan went to him first. Adam rang me and told me what to say.’ And I know as I almost scream that he’s hung up, the line’s gone dead. I hold the scream, punch the red hang-up symbol and close my eyes.
Charles de Gaulle
The early morning light slants into the terminal through dirty sheets of glass. Through my smeary sunglasses my gaze is fixed on the tarmac swarming with unknown airlines, crawling like sluggish cockroaches along their thick black lines. Landing, taking off, the sun glinting sharp and metallic off their tails as they vanish into the dull haze of the European summer sky. So many.
People rush around in swirls of dark burqas and summer-blue suits. Catches of languages eddy around me and announcements echo and bounce off the walls, indecipherable in French and English. Tentative dazed-looking family groups with bulging daypacks look like Australians. I recognise them instinctively, unwillingly, and avert my eyes.
I feel tired, although I slept an exhausted deep sleep last night, my last night in Paris, in a little Algerian hotel. I’d walked for hours and spoken to no one, traversing districts where I no longer get lost. Dinner was a lonely plate of penne, with olives, and a half-carafe of pale white wine, by a window where I could look out at the street. No longer looking for my dad.
I pick up my phone and scroll to Mum.
‘Mum?’ I can’t believe she’s picked up, she usually doesn’t.
‘Lisette?’ Down the blurry line her voice is excited, lilting.
‘’I’m at the airport.’ I swallow, play with my handbag strap. I look down almost ashamed at my flight outfit – given up on the chic dresses, I’m in a stretch skirt and singlet top, I can’t be fucked anymore. I’m heading home. Wherever that is.
‘I have to board in a sec,’ I continue.
‘Oh… so… how have you been these last few days sweetheart?’
I can hear behind the buzz of the bad line the restrained hope of my mother.
‘Okay, yeah good!’ I gulp my coffee out of its polystyrene cup and move sideways on the vinyl banquette, out of the incoming sunrise. It’s going to be thirty degrees in Paris today. Weirdly, thirty feels hotter here than at home.
I want to stay.
‘So – did you take the train to Toulouse on Monday, like you planned?’ She’s trying to keep her voice light.
I heave a deep shaking breath. ‘Yes I did. But I didn’t find my dad.’ I try to laugh. ‘Oh well! At least I tried.’
Her silence is heavy.
‘I’ll tell you about it when I’m back,’ I continue. My eyes follow the tail of an Etihad jet as it glides gracefully out to the runway. Full of people returning home, going on holidays, people with no cares.
Fuck this.
‘I’ll be home tomorrow night – about 6.30?’ I say, as she says, ‘Yes you tried!’ Our voices jangle together.
There’s a pause.
‘Well just come straight here darling.’ My mum’s voice is faraway.
I close my hot eyes in her pain and my pain. Fuck this, I will find him.
Through the window
Xavier Lefèvre is the man from the company who replies to my email. He calls me one hot blustery spring day as I’m cycling along the bay. I only hear my phone as I’d stopped to get a drink from the water fountain at Albert Park beach.
I’m drinking the metallic water, gulping it down, when I hear the song of my ringtone. I straighten up and reach for my phone out of my bag where it’s propped up in the bike basket. I’ve brought bathers and a sarong with me – optimistic that maybe this will be the first beach day for the season; a swathe of blue is widening across the sky, the bay is dotted with sails dancing on the waves.
I think maybe it’s Georgia calling from a landline at her work to say she’s coming down to meet me, but when this old guy starts talking, his accented words fumbling, I grip my phone and my heart starts to thud.
Xavier seems kind; he doesn’t ask why I’m looking for Tristan, but is eager to chat and reminisce about his former colleague. ‘Yes, I can certainly give him your details,’ he tells me. ‘And I can ask him to contact you. Are you close to the city?’
‘Yes, I live in Elwood,’ I reply.
‘That’s quite close, Tristan is in Albert Park,’ Xavier replies. ‘Where he always played soccer before, for the company!’ Xavier laughs. ‘We all did in our team, as long as we could, on Tuesday nights, till the young guys took over and pushed us out!’
‘Oh, I’m cycling along the beach in Albert Park right now!’ I exclaim. ‘It’s such a beautiful day, and I don’t have classes today, so I couldn’t resist!’
‘Along the beach?’ Xavier pauses. ‘Oh, so you are maybe very close to Tristan’s place!’
He promises to pass on my phone number and I hang up, trembling with excitement.
I don’t want to keep cycling. I lock my bike and take my things down on to the beach. It’s still too cold to get into my bikini, but I sit on the warm sand hugging my knees, and look out at the bay. When the wind whips up from the west, I turn to face the shoreline, and let my gaze wander across the road.
To Lisieux.
Where, for the first time, I see someone inside the vast front window. A slight, compact man with short grey-black hair stands motionless, his hands by his side, looking out.
I watch him pick something up off the table. He is looking down into the palm of his hand now, typing.
My phone starts to ring.
Tera Bisbee has had one short story published by the Coastal Dunes chapter of the California Writer’s Club in their inaugural anthology, “Shifting Sands,” and a creative nonfiction piece published in their second anthology, “A Drift of Golden Sand.” She is currently completing a novel, as well as working on several short stories and creative non-fiction pieces. Tera lives in Nevada, close to a sister, also a writer. |
Margaret Turns the Tables
Twirling in front of the mirror in her sequined gown on her wedding day, Margaret thought no one had been as much in love as she and Lloyd were. He treated her like a queen, well most of the time. Okay, maybe not most of the time, but some of the time.
On their first date, they went to a movie, some action adventure flick, not really her favorite, but tolerable. When the movie ended, they stood outside the theatre and he asked her, “You hungry?”
Margaret wasn’t hungry, but she thought he was, so she said, “Yeah, kinda,” as she tucked a long strand of her shiny chestnut hair behind an ear.
“Let’s go eat then.” He put his arm around her shoulders for the first time, and steered her down the sidewalk for several blocks, then into a small brick Italian restaurant that smelled of garlic. He apprized her, “This place has the best goddammed pizza I’ve ever eaten.” When the waiter came to the table, Lloyd waved the menu away, saying “We’ll take a large pepperoni and black olive pizza, and a pitcher of beer.”
Margaret hated olives, but he hadn’t asked, not that she planned to eat much anyway. Watching her weight became a way of life for her ever since she turned thirteen, or maybe twelve, right after her parents divorced, thinking that if she slimmed down, her entire life would be better, although she couldn’t be called overweight. When the pizza came and he looked at her, she put the smallest piece on her plate and commented how delicious it looked. After the first few bites, she picked at it, trying to simultaneously get rid of the olives, not eat the slice, and make it look like she was. Lloyd, engaged in telling her a story about something that happened at the construction site where he worked, didn’t notice.
After they dated for a few weeks, he told her they were now exclusive with each other. She didn’t object because she didn’t want to see anyone else. Although just twenty-two, she thought he could be “the one.” Whenever he introduced her to one of his friends, he said something like, “This is my girl,” or “I want you to meet my woman,” making her feel like she revolved at the center of his universe. Very affectionate with her, he liked to walk with their fingers interlocking when they were in public.
One day he announced, “I don’t like the name Margaret. It’s sounds like an old lady name. I’m going to call you Mags.”
“Eew. I don’t really like Mags,” she responded. “Maggie is better.”
“Tough shit. That’s your nickname now, Mags,” he said emphasizing it. “I’m the man and I make the decisions around here.” He must have called her Mags fifteen times that day. It didn’t do any good to protest, because he did what he wanted, and he acted like it just a big joke anyway. Lloyd could be funny, especially when he got going in front of his friends. Margaret found it easier to just go along with him; he didn’t like objections or when she disagreed with him.
When they’d been going out for two months, Lloyd generously offered to buy her a mobile phone, a brand-new product at the time. “I’ll even add you to my plan, babe” he said, meaning he would pay for it. Margaret thought, he’s so considerate, not realizing the sole purpose for his overture was to enable him to monitor her calls on the bill.
She worked at a salon downtown doing hair, and would have her esthetician’s license soon, so she could give facials and peels. Lloyd liked to call her several times a day at work, and would get mad at her if she didn’t pick up when he called, no matter how many times she explained she might be with a client and up to her elbows in hair color. Also, Margaret noted to herself that the same rule didn’t apply to him picking up her calls. But then he would come to see her, telling her, “You’re so gorgeous! I missed you and I can’t keep my hands off you,” which he didn’t, and so Margaret would let it slide. Five years older than her, worldly and handsome, she believed he was worth making a few accommodations for.
Four months into the relationship he proclaimed, “I think we should live together.”
Margaret, taken aback, tried to say in the nicest, most gentle way possible, because she didn’t want to hurt his feelings or piss him off, “Um, well that sounds really great and all, but I think we should wait just a teensy bit longer.”
“What are you waiting for darlin’?” he said in his best charming cowboy imitation. He took her by the hand, swung her around and danced a few steps with her. “I love you and you love me, so why wait?” Before she could answer, he pressed, “You do love me, don’t you?” His tone grew stern with this last question, and he tightened his grip on her.
“Of course I do. You know I do,” she reassured him with a big wide smile, as he dipped her backwards.
Spinning her a few more times, he declared, “It’s settled then. You’ll move into my place with me. Besides, that way we can save money if we’re not both paying rent.” Margaret nodded and that was that. Two weeks later on a Saturday, they made several trips back and forth in his black pick-up truck with the oversize wheels and then they were officially cohabitating.
They hadn’t even broached a conversation about how they would handle their finances yet. Margaret managed her money well, sticking to a budget, and squirreling away something every month in her savings account. As a teenager, her mom made the most of their barely sufficient income, and taught Margaret the importance of saving for the future. This occurred prior to her mom remarrying, to a man Margaret nicknamed “The Creep.”
In the time they’d been together, Margaret learned Lloyd liked to spend money, thought budget was a dirty word, and didn’t want to worry about tomorrow. It turned out Lloyd wanted to have a joint checking account for paying all their bills. She didn’t know how much money Lloyd made; when she’d asked him earlier after he’d asked her how much she made, he said, “You realize it varies baby. It depends on if I get overtime or not, and also on the weather. Too much rain, no gain.”
Once Margaret moved in with him, she realized Lloyd didn’t like her going out by herself, even for simple errands and would accompany her whenever he could. For example, he would always tag along with her when she did the grocery shopping, although he didn’t provide any help. She didn’t mind for the most part, feeling lucky that he wanted to spend so much time with her.
One evening she told him that a friend from her salon planned on having a “girl’s night” birthday party on the coming Friday. Margaret chattered about what kind of gift she should get her, when Lloyd harshly interrupted her, “You know Friday night is normally our date night!” His face clouded with anger, and he glared at her with iron eyes.
Margaret stopped mid-sentence. She put on a fake smile and cheery voice saying, “Well, we won’t be out too late.”
“Well, Mags how do I know who you’re going to be with?” he snarled, implying she would be out with other men.
“It’s just a few of us girls from work,” she tried to reassure him, but to no avail.
“I don’t like it. I don’t want other guys hitting on you.” He rose from the couch, the football game blaring, and approached the counter where she stood scraping sliced carrots and onions into a frying pan. “You’re not going,” he pronounced. He stood blocking her, his muscular arms crossed, as if she was trying to escape right now. Margaret felt a little afraid, watching the scorpion tattoo crawl on Lloyd’s forearm with his flexing muscle, but this event meant something to her.
“I don’t see why I can’t go for just a little while, and then come home early,” she tried to compromise with him.
“You’re not hearing me.” He wildly struck the handle of the pan, upending it. Clattering to the floor, the carrots, onions and oil spilled all over the scuffed linoleum. “Look what you made me do,” he yelled at her, furious.
She took a couple of steps back, but still he came at her. Reaching out with both arms, he pushed her hard, and she fell back against the fridge, its handle gouging into her shoulder and back. Margaret gasped, in both surprise and pain. “Now clean this damn mess up,” Lloyd yelled at her and stomped out of the room. Slumped over at the kitchen table, Margaret wondered what had just happened. She massaged her shoulder, then cleaned up the floor, and finished cooking dinner. When ready, Lloyd filled his plate without looking at her or talking to her, and plunked back down in front of the game. Margaret sat alone at the kitchen table, unable to swallow any food past what felt like a tumor in her throat, as she tried to stifle her tears. Later that night, after they’d gone to bed and Margaret finally fell asleep, Lloyd woke her up. He whispered to her, “I’m sorry baby. I only acted that way because I love you so much.” He made gentle, sweet love to her, and when he hugged her tight, she winced in silence because her shoulder and back were badly bruised.
A few months later, when Margaret successfully pushed that incident into a shadowy crevice in the basement of her mind, behind Lloyd’s glowing promises that it would never happen again, he surprised her at dinner one night. Taking her to an especially fancy restaurant, he insisted they both get dressed up. Margaret wore a low-cut red dress, with black high heeled sandals. Her nails were painted a matching candy-apple red, and she’d even curled her thick brown hair so it waved perfectly around her face and cascaded onto her shoulders. Lloyd dressed in black slacks and a teal button-down shirt that complemented his black hair and dark eyes. That evening, being extra caring, and the perfect gentleman, he helped her take her short black jacket off once they were inside, and pulled out her chair for her. He kept reaching over to squeeze her hand and told her several times, “I just can’t imagine my life without you.” Margaret felt flattered and basked in the aura of his attention. When the entrée plates were cleared, Lloyd announced he already ordered dessert for them. The waiter brought a plate of chocolate lava cake, covered with vanilla bean ice cream, and surrounded by ripe strawberries. As the waiter retreated, Margaret saw the sparkling ring poking up through the sweet mound, like ice glinting in the sunny snow. As she extracted it with a squeal, Lloyd dropped to one knee next to her chair, and proposed to her.
“Yes, yes, oh my God” she said breathless, as she cleaned the ice cream off the ring so Lloyd could slip it onto her finger. It was beautiful, and Margaret loved the princess cut diamond. She looked at her ring in the wake of every fight during their engagement, including the time when he slammed her hard up against the wall and choked her because he didn’t want her having a bachelorette party, where a male stripper might show up, even though she promised him repeatedly none would.
Lloyd always apologized afterwards, telling her, “I’m so in love with you Mags! I just go crazy over you. I promise it won’t happen again; I swear.” She wanted to believe him, and squelching any misgivings, she told herself maybe his temper would calm down once they married.
But it didn’t. It actually got worse. Although she suspected Lloyd of being too self-centered to be a great father, she thought she could make up for him, as she’d always wanted children. When she first told him of her pregnancy, he grew excited. “I hope it’s a boy Mags!”
At five months pregnant, they got into a big argument. Margaret wanted her mother to come stay with them for a while once the baby arrived, but Lloyd wouldn’t hear of it. “Just a couple days, no more,” he warned.
She pleaded with him, “It’s our first baby. My mother is happy to help out. Besides, if she flies all the way out here, she should stay for at least a few weeks.”
“No one stays here unless I say so!” His anger boiled over as the fight escalated; he kicked her in the stomach and the baby was stillborn in the emergency room shortly thereafter. Margaret felt the light inside her drain out along with the blood, and once she returned home, hunkered down in her bed for three days straight. In spite of her overwhelming grief, Lloyd nonetheless declared they weren’t going to go through that again, meaning another pregnancy.
Two years later, when a pregnancy test came back positive, she thought he would change his mind. “I want to have this baby,” she begged him. “I want to be a mom.”
“No. I told you we’re not having kids. You better make an appointment at the clinic.” She thought about leaving him, defying him, and having the baby. She couldn’t go back and live with her mom though, because she would never live in the same house or town as her stepfather again. Without more money or support, the idea proved to be overwhelming and Margaret succumbed to Lloyd’s pressure. He drove her to the clinic for her abortion, where there were some unanticipated complications. She got released to go home that night, but the doctor warned she probably wouldn’t be able to get pregnant in the future.
Margaret didn’t speak to Lloyd the next day, and again found it hard to get out of bed for a week. She felt worthless and discarded, like a cigarette butt crushed under the heel of a heavy boot. Lloyd tried to comfort her, telling her it really was for the best, and even bringing her hot tea, toast and soup on a tray. “Look at it this way. Now we only have to worry about ourselves. We’ll have so much more money without the expense of kids. We could buy a house or go on that rad Caribbean vacation we talked about.” Of course, they did neither at the time.
Over the ensuing years he dragged her across the floor by her hair, gave her black eyes, split lips, a broken nose, cracked ribs, and countless other scrapes, scars and injuries, not to mention how he started berating her, calling her ugly, useless, and stupid. “No one else would ever want you,” he snarled. Margaret grew skilled at covering up with lies and make-up.
Spending as much time as she could at the salon, Margaret excelled with the customers, and managed the salon when the owner couldn’t be there. When her boss retired, Margaret, on impulse, secretly made a down payment on the enterprise with some money stashed in tampon boxes at home. Opening up a business bank account, she ensured the statements were delivered to the salon address so Lloyd wouldn’t know. He still controlled all the bills and finances at home.
As Margaret’s career blossomed in size and prosperity, Lloyd’s shrunk. He got himself fired from numerous job sites for being belligerent or getting into physical altercations with one of the guys. Although he wanted the money she brought in, Margaret realized he couldn’t stand that she was more successful than him, and he took it out on her.
Braving his scathing verbal abuse, she nevertheless left the house for the monthly book club she joined, and her volunteer work in the children’s ward at the hospital. Over the next decade, she thought about leaving Lloyd occasionally, but never did, choosing to immerse herself in outside activities and with her friends as much as possible. Now in their forties, the physical abuse declined some but Lloyd persisted in being as verbally abusive as ever, so she didn’t bother telling him when she got appointed to a prominent city board position. One close friend, Sara, who knew more than her other acquaintances, convinced her to talk to a lawyer about her situation and her options should she ever decide to exercise them. Margaret turned the ideas over in her mind, trying to imagine a completely different life.
One day she got a call just as she finished a lavender-infused body wrap and facial. Having obtained a temporary job on the clean-up crew at a commercial construction site, Lloyd suffered a terrible accident. An improperly secured steel beam fell on him, crushing his right side, including his arm, lower back, hips and legs. Margaret rushed to the hospital. After almost a week of tests and several surgeries, the prognosis was worse than hoped for. Lloyd remained paralyzed from the waist down and his right arm possessed extremely limited movement. Necessity now confined him to a wheelchair, and Margaret struggled with the caregiving in addition to her burgeoning salon business.
Volatile before, Lloyd became constantly disgruntled with his condition, bitter as a mouthful of lemons. Although they hired a part-time care giver to help Lloyd while Margaret worked, he grew more demanding of his wife whenever she was home. One evening, a client of Margaret’s ran later than expected; the customer now wanted full highlights instead of partial highlights, and Margaret arrived home well after the caregiver left for the day. In a foul mood, Lloyd commenced cursing at Margaret as soon as she walked through the door.
“I’m all alone here, you stupid bitch! Why the hell are you so late? No, don’t tell me, cuz whatever the hell the reason is, it’s obviously more important than me!” he spat out.
“My client changed her mind about-”
“Save it!” Lloyd yelled. “I don’t give a flying fuck! Just get me my dinner, I’m starving.” He picked up a nearby mug with his left hand and heaved it at her, missing widely. It hit the wall and smashed into pieces.
Margaret looked at the ceramic shards scattered on the floor, then looked at Lloyd calmly. Something clicked in her brain, like a rusty lock springing open. She nodded to herself, then proceeded to prepare her own meal. “You can fix your own dinner,” she told him, “and clean up the mess you made.” With her hot food in hand, she took her plate and went out to her car where she enjoyed her meal in peace. Lloyd, still yelling when she went back in, finally realized that she wasn’t going to fix him anything. Only then did he decide to open the fridge, where he found some cold chicken within his reach. His home accommodation aids were on order, but they hadn’t arrived yet, so he couldn’t reach the upper shelves.
That weekend, Margaret planned to weed her garden, and Lloyd wanted to get outside with her. They were using a portable ramp until the contractor could come out and install a permanent one for the wheelchair. Watching Margaret work, Lloyd began to criticize her, then made the attacks personal. “Why even bother with any vegetables,” he sneered, “you’re such a fat cow anyway.” Margaret gave him a look, removed her gardening gloves, lifted the wheelchair ramp off the steps and disappeared into the house, where she remained for the rest of the afternoon. She went to retrieve Lloyd hours later, slumped over in his wheelchair, sunburned and sleeping in his soiled diaper.
Margaret wondered how long it would take for Lloyd to catch on; even when he made the connection, it seemed to her he couldn’t stop himself sometimes. Over the next week or so, following his outbursts, she left him in the bathtub, while the water grew tepid, then cold; she deprived him of his phone, hiding it in the garage; and refused to do his laundry.
Since his accident and stay at the hospital, Margaret now brought in the mail. She discovered the true state of their finances, opening the bills addressed to him. Unbeknownst to her, Lloyd opened a credit card in her name, forging her signature, and running up the debt. When she confronted him about this, he downplayed it. “It’s not that much money,” he whined. “I needed new tires for my truck and some other stuff.”
Leaving him at home one day to “run errands,” she went to the lawyer’s office, and then their bank. She closed down all their joint credit cards and accounts, and opened accounts in her own name at a different national bank. Loathe to pay off the credit card he opened behind her back, she did it anyway, just to be done with it. In reviewing the mortgage statement, she realized the house they finally bought was still in her name only; Lloyd’s credit so bad, he begrudgingly agreed to put the loan in her name to keep the payment lower, with the idea he would be added to the title later. She made a final stop before going home, to a realtor and long-time customer at her salon.
A week later on Sunday, after cleaning the entire house on Saturday, Margaret told Lloyd, “I’m taking you out for a surprise today.” The day’s activities included going to the car museum several towns over, stopping at his favorite BBQ joint for lunch, and visiting friends to play poker. Lloyd had no idea that Margaret’s realtor was holding an open house at their home since Margaret decided to sell it. The realtor called Margaret that evening and said the event went very well; she hoped multiple offers were going to be forthcoming, which they were. Accepting the highest offer, Margaret signed all the paperwork, and like an unstoppable whirlwind, she also sold her salon for a handsome profit.
As Lloyd sat in his undershirt and drank his morning coffee, he looked out the living room window. A moving truck screeched to a stop in front of their house and backed into the driveway. “What the hell are these idiots doing?” he asked Margaret rhetorically.
“They must be here to move me,” she replied in an even tone.
“What are you talking about?” Lloyd demanded with a frown.
“I’m moving out Lloyd.”
“You can’t do that!” he sputtered.
“I can and I am,” she stated as she opened the door to let the movers in. Under her direction, they packed up almost everything in the house, leaving Lloyd his clothes, the fold-out sofa, a few kitchen items, and his tools. Lloyd wheeled around the house, following Margaret, alternately demanding and pleading with her not to leave.
“I know it’s been difficult, and I haven’t always been easy to live with, but you’re my wife. It’s always been me and you. Through thick and thin.”
“Not anymore. I’m done Lloyd. I’m filing for divorce, so this is good-bye.” Sitting in his wheelchair, in the near bare living room, as dust motes swirled around him, he looked stunned.
“Oh, and I sold the house too, so you’ll have to move,” Margaret fired her parting shot as she exited the front door.
Lloyd’s face turned purple as he screamed, “You can’t do that! It’s my house too! I own half if it!” But, in fact, he didn’t. He scooted over to the window and watched her climb into her car and pull away behind the moving van, as tears formed in the corners of his eyes.
Margaret drove off, smiling broadly, then breaking into a wild laugh. Free; she was free! She felt light, giddy, spacious; a balloon cut loose and lifted into the endless deep blue sky. It would take a few days to reach the coast. She’d always wanted to live near the beach.
Six months later, Margaret got an email from Sara. Things were going well at the old salon, although they all missed her and wished her well with her new “spalon” she just opened. Sara wanted to let her know she’d seen Lloyd recently. He’d lost some weight, and raced down the sidewalk in his wheelchair, a younger woman in a motorized wheelchair behind him.
“I told you I could beat you,” Lloyd crowed at his companion. Then Sara heard him say, “Now let’s go cash your disability check babe, I’m in the mood for a steak.”
Margaret thought as she deleted the email, Poor woman. She doesn’t know what she’s in for. Then she hurried to put the final updates on her services price list, so she could be on time for her dance class.
On their first date, they went to a movie, some action adventure flick, not really her favorite, but tolerable. When the movie ended, they stood outside the theatre and he asked her, “You hungry?”
Margaret wasn’t hungry, but she thought he was, so she said, “Yeah, kinda,” as she tucked a long strand of her shiny chestnut hair behind an ear.
“Let’s go eat then.” He put his arm around her shoulders for the first time, and steered her down the sidewalk for several blocks, then into a small brick Italian restaurant that smelled of garlic. He apprized her, “This place has the best goddammed pizza I’ve ever eaten.” When the waiter came to the table, Lloyd waved the menu away, saying “We’ll take a large pepperoni and black olive pizza, and a pitcher of beer.”
Margaret hated olives, but he hadn’t asked, not that she planned to eat much anyway. Watching her weight became a way of life for her ever since she turned thirteen, or maybe twelve, right after her parents divorced, thinking that if she slimmed down, her entire life would be better, although she couldn’t be called overweight. When the pizza came and he looked at her, she put the smallest piece on her plate and commented how delicious it looked. After the first few bites, she picked at it, trying to simultaneously get rid of the olives, not eat the slice, and make it look like she was. Lloyd, engaged in telling her a story about something that happened at the construction site where he worked, didn’t notice.
After they dated for a few weeks, he told her they were now exclusive with each other. She didn’t object because she didn’t want to see anyone else. Although just twenty-two, she thought he could be “the one.” Whenever he introduced her to one of his friends, he said something like, “This is my girl,” or “I want you to meet my woman,” making her feel like she revolved at the center of his universe. Very affectionate with her, he liked to walk with their fingers interlocking when they were in public.
One day he announced, “I don’t like the name Margaret. It’s sounds like an old lady name. I’m going to call you Mags.”
“Eew. I don’t really like Mags,” she responded. “Maggie is better.”
“Tough shit. That’s your nickname now, Mags,” he said emphasizing it. “I’m the man and I make the decisions around here.” He must have called her Mags fifteen times that day. It didn’t do any good to protest, because he did what he wanted, and he acted like it just a big joke anyway. Lloyd could be funny, especially when he got going in front of his friends. Margaret found it easier to just go along with him; he didn’t like objections or when she disagreed with him.
When they’d been going out for two months, Lloyd generously offered to buy her a mobile phone, a brand-new product at the time. “I’ll even add you to my plan, babe” he said, meaning he would pay for it. Margaret thought, he’s so considerate, not realizing the sole purpose for his overture was to enable him to monitor her calls on the bill.
She worked at a salon downtown doing hair, and would have her esthetician’s license soon, so she could give facials and peels. Lloyd liked to call her several times a day at work, and would get mad at her if she didn’t pick up when he called, no matter how many times she explained she might be with a client and up to her elbows in hair color. Also, Margaret noted to herself that the same rule didn’t apply to him picking up her calls. But then he would come to see her, telling her, “You’re so gorgeous! I missed you and I can’t keep my hands off you,” which he didn’t, and so Margaret would let it slide. Five years older than her, worldly and handsome, she believed he was worth making a few accommodations for.
Four months into the relationship he proclaimed, “I think we should live together.”
Margaret, taken aback, tried to say in the nicest, most gentle way possible, because she didn’t want to hurt his feelings or piss him off, “Um, well that sounds really great and all, but I think we should wait just a teensy bit longer.”
“What are you waiting for darlin’?” he said in his best charming cowboy imitation. He took her by the hand, swung her around and danced a few steps with her. “I love you and you love me, so why wait?” Before she could answer, he pressed, “You do love me, don’t you?” His tone grew stern with this last question, and he tightened his grip on her.
“Of course I do. You know I do,” she reassured him with a big wide smile, as he dipped her backwards.
Spinning her a few more times, he declared, “It’s settled then. You’ll move into my place with me. Besides, that way we can save money if we’re not both paying rent.” Margaret nodded and that was that. Two weeks later on a Saturday, they made several trips back and forth in his black pick-up truck with the oversize wheels and then they were officially cohabitating.
They hadn’t even broached a conversation about how they would handle their finances yet. Margaret managed her money well, sticking to a budget, and squirreling away something every month in her savings account. As a teenager, her mom made the most of their barely sufficient income, and taught Margaret the importance of saving for the future. This occurred prior to her mom remarrying, to a man Margaret nicknamed “The Creep.”
In the time they’d been together, Margaret learned Lloyd liked to spend money, thought budget was a dirty word, and didn’t want to worry about tomorrow. It turned out Lloyd wanted to have a joint checking account for paying all their bills. She didn’t know how much money Lloyd made; when she’d asked him earlier after he’d asked her how much she made, he said, “You realize it varies baby. It depends on if I get overtime or not, and also on the weather. Too much rain, no gain.”
Once Margaret moved in with him, she realized Lloyd didn’t like her going out by herself, even for simple errands and would accompany her whenever he could. For example, he would always tag along with her when she did the grocery shopping, although he didn’t provide any help. She didn’t mind for the most part, feeling lucky that he wanted to spend so much time with her.
One evening she told him that a friend from her salon planned on having a “girl’s night” birthday party on the coming Friday. Margaret chattered about what kind of gift she should get her, when Lloyd harshly interrupted her, “You know Friday night is normally our date night!” His face clouded with anger, and he glared at her with iron eyes.
Margaret stopped mid-sentence. She put on a fake smile and cheery voice saying, “Well, we won’t be out too late.”
“Well, Mags how do I know who you’re going to be with?” he snarled, implying she would be out with other men.
“It’s just a few of us girls from work,” she tried to reassure him, but to no avail.
“I don’t like it. I don’t want other guys hitting on you.” He rose from the couch, the football game blaring, and approached the counter where she stood scraping sliced carrots and onions into a frying pan. “You’re not going,” he pronounced. He stood blocking her, his muscular arms crossed, as if she was trying to escape right now. Margaret felt a little afraid, watching the scorpion tattoo crawl on Lloyd’s forearm with his flexing muscle, but this event meant something to her.
“I don’t see why I can’t go for just a little while, and then come home early,” she tried to compromise with him.
“You’re not hearing me.” He wildly struck the handle of the pan, upending it. Clattering to the floor, the carrots, onions and oil spilled all over the scuffed linoleum. “Look what you made me do,” he yelled at her, furious.
She took a couple of steps back, but still he came at her. Reaching out with both arms, he pushed her hard, and she fell back against the fridge, its handle gouging into her shoulder and back. Margaret gasped, in both surprise and pain. “Now clean this damn mess up,” Lloyd yelled at her and stomped out of the room. Slumped over at the kitchen table, Margaret wondered what had just happened. She massaged her shoulder, then cleaned up the floor, and finished cooking dinner. When ready, Lloyd filled his plate without looking at her or talking to her, and plunked back down in front of the game. Margaret sat alone at the kitchen table, unable to swallow any food past what felt like a tumor in her throat, as she tried to stifle her tears. Later that night, after they’d gone to bed and Margaret finally fell asleep, Lloyd woke her up. He whispered to her, “I’m sorry baby. I only acted that way because I love you so much.” He made gentle, sweet love to her, and when he hugged her tight, she winced in silence because her shoulder and back were badly bruised.
A few months later, when Margaret successfully pushed that incident into a shadowy crevice in the basement of her mind, behind Lloyd’s glowing promises that it would never happen again, he surprised her at dinner one night. Taking her to an especially fancy restaurant, he insisted they both get dressed up. Margaret wore a low-cut red dress, with black high heeled sandals. Her nails were painted a matching candy-apple red, and she’d even curled her thick brown hair so it waved perfectly around her face and cascaded onto her shoulders. Lloyd dressed in black slacks and a teal button-down shirt that complemented his black hair and dark eyes. That evening, being extra caring, and the perfect gentleman, he helped her take her short black jacket off once they were inside, and pulled out her chair for her. He kept reaching over to squeeze her hand and told her several times, “I just can’t imagine my life without you.” Margaret felt flattered and basked in the aura of his attention. When the entrée plates were cleared, Lloyd announced he already ordered dessert for them. The waiter brought a plate of chocolate lava cake, covered with vanilla bean ice cream, and surrounded by ripe strawberries. As the waiter retreated, Margaret saw the sparkling ring poking up through the sweet mound, like ice glinting in the sunny snow. As she extracted it with a squeal, Lloyd dropped to one knee next to her chair, and proposed to her.
“Yes, yes, oh my God” she said breathless, as she cleaned the ice cream off the ring so Lloyd could slip it onto her finger. It was beautiful, and Margaret loved the princess cut diamond. She looked at her ring in the wake of every fight during their engagement, including the time when he slammed her hard up against the wall and choked her because he didn’t want her having a bachelorette party, where a male stripper might show up, even though she promised him repeatedly none would.
Lloyd always apologized afterwards, telling her, “I’m so in love with you Mags! I just go crazy over you. I promise it won’t happen again; I swear.” She wanted to believe him, and squelching any misgivings, she told herself maybe his temper would calm down once they married.
But it didn’t. It actually got worse. Although she suspected Lloyd of being too self-centered to be a great father, she thought she could make up for him, as she’d always wanted children. When she first told him of her pregnancy, he grew excited. “I hope it’s a boy Mags!”
At five months pregnant, they got into a big argument. Margaret wanted her mother to come stay with them for a while once the baby arrived, but Lloyd wouldn’t hear of it. “Just a couple days, no more,” he warned.
She pleaded with him, “It’s our first baby. My mother is happy to help out. Besides, if she flies all the way out here, she should stay for at least a few weeks.”
“No one stays here unless I say so!” His anger boiled over as the fight escalated; he kicked her in the stomach and the baby was stillborn in the emergency room shortly thereafter. Margaret felt the light inside her drain out along with the blood, and once she returned home, hunkered down in her bed for three days straight. In spite of her overwhelming grief, Lloyd nonetheless declared they weren’t going to go through that again, meaning another pregnancy.
Two years later, when a pregnancy test came back positive, she thought he would change his mind. “I want to have this baby,” she begged him. “I want to be a mom.”
“No. I told you we’re not having kids. You better make an appointment at the clinic.” She thought about leaving him, defying him, and having the baby. She couldn’t go back and live with her mom though, because she would never live in the same house or town as her stepfather again. Without more money or support, the idea proved to be overwhelming and Margaret succumbed to Lloyd’s pressure. He drove her to the clinic for her abortion, where there were some unanticipated complications. She got released to go home that night, but the doctor warned she probably wouldn’t be able to get pregnant in the future.
Margaret didn’t speak to Lloyd the next day, and again found it hard to get out of bed for a week. She felt worthless and discarded, like a cigarette butt crushed under the heel of a heavy boot. Lloyd tried to comfort her, telling her it really was for the best, and even bringing her hot tea, toast and soup on a tray. “Look at it this way. Now we only have to worry about ourselves. We’ll have so much more money without the expense of kids. We could buy a house or go on that rad Caribbean vacation we talked about.” Of course, they did neither at the time.
Over the ensuing years he dragged her across the floor by her hair, gave her black eyes, split lips, a broken nose, cracked ribs, and countless other scrapes, scars and injuries, not to mention how he started berating her, calling her ugly, useless, and stupid. “No one else would ever want you,” he snarled. Margaret grew skilled at covering up with lies and make-up.
Spending as much time as she could at the salon, Margaret excelled with the customers, and managed the salon when the owner couldn’t be there. When her boss retired, Margaret, on impulse, secretly made a down payment on the enterprise with some money stashed in tampon boxes at home. Opening up a business bank account, she ensured the statements were delivered to the salon address so Lloyd wouldn’t know. He still controlled all the bills and finances at home.
As Margaret’s career blossomed in size and prosperity, Lloyd’s shrunk. He got himself fired from numerous job sites for being belligerent or getting into physical altercations with one of the guys. Although he wanted the money she brought in, Margaret realized he couldn’t stand that she was more successful than him, and he took it out on her.
Braving his scathing verbal abuse, she nevertheless left the house for the monthly book club she joined, and her volunteer work in the children’s ward at the hospital. Over the next decade, she thought about leaving Lloyd occasionally, but never did, choosing to immerse herself in outside activities and with her friends as much as possible. Now in their forties, the physical abuse declined some but Lloyd persisted in being as verbally abusive as ever, so she didn’t bother telling him when she got appointed to a prominent city board position. One close friend, Sara, who knew more than her other acquaintances, convinced her to talk to a lawyer about her situation and her options should she ever decide to exercise them. Margaret turned the ideas over in her mind, trying to imagine a completely different life.
One day she got a call just as she finished a lavender-infused body wrap and facial. Having obtained a temporary job on the clean-up crew at a commercial construction site, Lloyd suffered a terrible accident. An improperly secured steel beam fell on him, crushing his right side, including his arm, lower back, hips and legs. Margaret rushed to the hospital. After almost a week of tests and several surgeries, the prognosis was worse than hoped for. Lloyd remained paralyzed from the waist down and his right arm possessed extremely limited movement. Necessity now confined him to a wheelchair, and Margaret struggled with the caregiving in addition to her burgeoning salon business.
Volatile before, Lloyd became constantly disgruntled with his condition, bitter as a mouthful of lemons. Although they hired a part-time care giver to help Lloyd while Margaret worked, he grew more demanding of his wife whenever she was home. One evening, a client of Margaret’s ran later than expected; the customer now wanted full highlights instead of partial highlights, and Margaret arrived home well after the caregiver left for the day. In a foul mood, Lloyd commenced cursing at Margaret as soon as she walked through the door.
“I’m all alone here, you stupid bitch! Why the hell are you so late? No, don’t tell me, cuz whatever the hell the reason is, it’s obviously more important than me!” he spat out.
“My client changed her mind about-”
“Save it!” Lloyd yelled. “I don’t give a flying fuck! Just get me my dinner, I’m starving.” He picked up a nearby mug with his left hand and heaved it at her, missing widely. It hit the wall and smashed into pieces.
Margaret looked at the ceramic shards scattered on the floor, then looked at Lloyd calmly. Something clicked in her brain, like a rusty lock springing open. She nodded to herself, then proceeded to prepare her own meal. “You can fix your own dinner,” she told him, “and clean up the mess you made.” With her hot food in hand, she took her plate and went out to her car where she enjoyed her meal in peace. Lloyd, still yelling when she went back in, finally realized that she wasn’t going to fix him anything. Only then did he decide to open the fridge, where he found some cold chicken within his reach. His home accommodation aids were on order, but they hadn’t arrived yet, so he couldn’t reach the upper shelves.
That weekend, Margaret planned to weed her garden, and Lloyd wanted to get outside with her. They were using a portable ramp until the contractor could come out and install a permanent one for the wheelchair. Watching Margaret work, Lloyd began to criticize her, then made the attacks personal. “Why even bother with any vegetables,” he sneered, “you’re such a fat cow anyway.” Margaret gave him a look, removed her gardening gloves, lifted the wheelchair ramp off the steps and disappeared into the house, where she remained for the rest of the afternoon. She went to retrieve Lloyd hours later, slumped over in his wheelchair, sunburned and sleeping in his soiled diaper.
Margaret wondered how long it would take for Lloyd to catch on; even when he made the connection, it seemed to her he couldn’t stop himself sometimes. Over the next week or so, following his outbursts, she left him in the bathtub, while the water grew tepid, then cold; she deprived him of his phone, hiding it in the garage; and refused to do his laundry.
Since his accident and stay at the hospital, Margaret now brought in the mail. She discovered the true state of their finances, opening the bills addressed to him. Unbeknownst to her, Lloyd opened a credit card in her name, forging her signature, and running up the debt. When she confronted him about this, he downplayed it. “It’s not that much money,” he whined. “I needed new tires for my truck and some other stuff.”
Leaving him at home one day to “run errands,” she went to the lawyer’s office, and then their bank. She closed down all their joint credit cards and accounts, and opened accounts in her own name at a different national bank. Loathe to pay off the credit card he opened behind her back, she did it anyway, just to be done with it. In reviewing the mortgage statement, she realized the house they finally bought was still in her name only; Lloyd’s credit so bad, he begrudgingly agreed to put the loan in her name to keep the payment lower, with the idea he would be added to the title later. She made a final stop before going home, to a realtor and long-time customer at her salon.
A week later on Sunday, after cleaning the entire house on Saturday, Margaret told Lloyd, “I’m taking you out for a surprise today.” The day’s activities included going to the car museum several towns over, stopping at his favorite BBQ joint for lunch, and visiting friends to play poker. Lloyd had no idea that Margaret’s realtor was holding an open house at their home since Margaret decided to sell it. The realtor called Margaret that evening and said the event went very well; she hoped multiple offers were going to be forthcoming, which they were. Accepting the highest offer, Margaret signed all the paperwork, and like an unstoppable whirlwind, she also sold her salon for a handsome profit.
As Lloyd sat in his undershirt and drank his morning coffee, he looked out the living room window. A moving truck screeched to a stop in front of their house and backed into the driveway. “What the hell are these idiots doing?” he asked Margaret rhetorically.
“They must be here to move me,” she replied in an even tone.
“What are you talking about?” Lloyd demanded with a frown.
“I’m moving out Lloyd.”
“You can’t do that!” he sputtered.
“I can and I am,” she stated as she opened the door to let the movers in. Under her direction, they packed up almost everything in the house, leaving Lloyd his clothes, the fold-out sofa, a few kitchen items, and his tools. Lloyd wheeled around the house, following Margaret, alternately demanding and pleading with her not to leave.
“I know it’s been difficult, and I haven’t always been easy to live with, but you’re my wife. It’s always been me and you. Through thick and thin.”
“Not anymore. I’m done Lloyd. I’m filing for divorce, so this is good-bye.” Sitting in his wheelchair, in the near bare living room, as dust motes swirled around him, he looked stunned.
“Oh, and I sold the house too, so you’ll have to move,” Margaret fired her parting shot as she exited the front door.
Lloyd’s face turned purple as he screamed, “You can’t do that! It’s my house too! I own half if it!” But, in fact, he didn’t. He scooted over to the window and watched her climb into her car and pull away behind the moving van, as tears formed in the corners of his eyes.
Margaret drove off, smiling broadly, then breaking into a wild laugh. Free; she was free! She felt light, giddy, spacious; a balloon cut loose and lifted into the endless deep blue sky. It would take a few days to reach the coast. She’d always wanted to live near the beach.
Six months later, Margaret got an email from Sara. Things were going well at the old salon, although they all missed her and wished her well with her new “spalon” she just opened. Sara wanted to let her know she’d seen Lloyd recently. He’d lost some weight, and raced down the sidewalk in his wheelchair, a younger woman in a motorized wheelchair behind him.
“I told you I could beat you,” Lloyd crowed at his companion. Then Sara heard him say, “Now let’s go cash your disability check babe, I’m in the mood for a steak.”
Margaret thought as she deleted the email, Poor woman. She doesn’t know what she’s in for. Then she hurried to put the final updates on her services price list, so she could be on time for her dance class.
Jenean McBrearty is a graduate of San Diego State University, who taught Political Science and Sociology. Her fiction, poetry, and photographs have been published in over two-hundred print and on-line journals. Her how-to book, Writing Beyond the Self; How to Write Creative Non-fiction that Gets Published was published by Vine Leaves Press in 2018. She won the Eastern Kentucky English Department Award for Graduate Creative Non-fiction in 2011, and a Silver Pen Award in 2015 for her noir short story: Red’s Not Your Color. She lives in Kentucky and writes full time ⸺when she’s not watching classic movies and eating chocolate. |
The Nineteen Gears of the Killing Machine
MAY 7, 2018
Mike took an empty stool at Carrie’s Luncheonette. His back hurt. His feet ached. And he couldn’t un-see what the Harbor Patrol fished out of Dayton bay. “Got a bad one, Captain Reed.” Keith Grover had told him. “Looks like our newest citizen decided to move in with Davy Jones.”
Mike had been half asleep early Sunday morning. “Okay, I’ll be down as soon as I get there.” It didn’t make any sense to him either, but twenty minutes later he was staring at the water-logged corpse of the Honorable Ronald Hirschel laying in a black bag on a morgue table.
“He’s sixty-eight. Retired three years after Mrs. Hirschel died of cancer and bought the Northern Belle to fish the rest of his life away. All seven days of it,” Keith explained.
Mike was scanning the Harbor Patrol’s report. “The M.E.’s says it’s an accidental drowning. Why’d you call me at three-thirty in the morning?”
“Because it’s bullshit. The M.E. set the time of death as any time before noon Saturday. Hirschel’s a Jew and wouldn’t have been on his fishing boat on the Sabbath. He died on Friday.”
“And you know this, how?”
“My brother Kevin’s a Deputy in King County. He worked in Hirschel’s court for twenty years.”
Nobody knew the court system like the Grover family. Three deputies, two cops, a social worker and an uncle serving a five-ten stretch for armed robbery. Did the lawyer who got him off easy count? “Which one of you called the other at three in the morning?”
“I called him as soon as I learned who the swimmer was.”
“Give Keith my number, I want to talk to him.”
It’s not unusual for spouses to buy the farm shortly after the other one goes to glory. Mike lost both his parents within a year. But, when a guy buys a boat, he usually intends to have a long peaceful life with the floating wife.
“I’ll have pie and coffee, Carrie,” he said. She’d forget the fork and then the cream just to have more flirty time.
“What you doin’ up so early anyway?”
“The Harbor Patrol fished a new boat owner out of the bay.”
She put a hand on her hip, and rolled her eyes. “The first of the summer dummies. Out there alone, right?”
“Right,” Keith said as he sat next to Mike. “I’ll have whatever the Sheriff’s having.”
She softened. “You got it.”
“Did Kevin say if Hirschel knew his way around boats?” Mike said as Carrie sauntered off to the pie case, and they moved to the back booth. “Boats ain’t like driving a car.”
“He was a Navy J.A.G. before he was a judge, if that means anything. He did have vertigo. Something with ear tubes. Kevin said he almost tumbled down the stairs to the bench once.”
“That could explain a fall over the side. Did he have any enemies?”
“Only everyone found guilty in his court. Nobody important. He and the D.A. Clay are … were tight. They knew the drill, according to Kevin.”
Carrie brought a carafe of coffee and a huge slab of apple pie and a fork, and a cup to Keith, then got busy near the register. She knew better than to eavesdrop. She’d hear it all from Keith’s wife.
“What was their drill?” Mike said.
“A well-greased plea machine. Get ‘em in. Get ‘em out. And make them all pay a hefty fine and court costs.”
“I’ll bet the county fathers loved him.”
Kevin nodded. “I never met a politician who doesn’t love a predictable revenue stream. Not to mention the gratitude of every business and professional sued for malpractice.” The remark evidenced a boat-load of bitterness.
“What’s Clay’s conviction rate down there?”
“Ninety-eight percent. Judge Hirschel was known as Ol’ Rubberstamp.”
“If it wasn’t murder, it sounds like it should have been. Text Kevin and give him my number.”
“Already did. He said if he hears anything, he’ll get back to me. Kevin’s got faults like the rest of us, but disloyalty ain’t one of them. You understand, Mike.”
It made sense. Whistleblowing was a blood sport. He wondered how long Kevin had until his retirement. Maybe they could write a book: Judicial Misconduct and Local Government Solvency.
Keith stirred two Splendas into his cup. “I wonder what Kevin’s ‘one case’ is. There’s gotta be that one doggin’ his conscience. If we could find out which one, we’d have a lead. If it’s murder we’re dealin’ with.”
“You got a one case?” Mike asked.
“Yep. Luckily, I got mine when I was new to the job. I arrested Marie Stockton.”
“The woman wrongly accused of battering the toddler?” Mike winced at the memory of the details. Broken bones and a crushed skull.
“She’s the one. God, what the courts did to her! And the press finished her off. If I live thousand years, I’ll never forget the look on her face when they finally let her go. I walked her into the jail and I walked her out. She turned to me and said, ‘I told you I didn’t do it.’ I’d rather she’d cursed me, you know? A man can stand a woman’s anger, but despair?”
Mike had heard much the same thing from everyone close to the case, everyone who wasn’t fired by the time he was hired as Sheriff of Dayton County. By that time, Stockton had moved. Some said to Cincinnati. Others said Vegas. “Did you ever find out where she went? What happened to her?”
“That was twenty-five years ago and I doubt she wants to be found. People had shame back then too.”
How did sunrise coffee and pie turn into a wake for justice and privacy? Mike hauled out his wallet. “It’s on me.” He had a death to investigate and a report to write, and he’d start with a visit to the Northern Belle.
***
Reclaimed, renovated and resold, the Northern Belle was seventy-thousand-dollars’ worth of retirement heaven berthed at #42. She was a forty-four-foot Alaskan Tug, with a forward master suite and a guest room aft, and her six-hundred-gallon diesel tank gave her a range of seventeen-hundred miles. Cruising at eight knots, she’d only use three gallons of fuel which means Hirschel could take her as far as Seattle and back without refueling.
According to the Harbor Master Nelson Riles, Hirschel signed out at 11:00 a.m. Friday morning, as soon as the fog cleared. “He said he was going to anchor about a half-mile off-shore. What happened after that, I couldn’t say. I went home about five, and never saw him or the tug again until she was towed in.”
“Have you been aboard?”
“Nope. I didn’t have a need. The HP guys went over her pretty good.”
“I’m going aboard. Just to poke around. Maybe they missed something.”
“Suit yourself, Sheriff,” Nelson said.
The first thing Mike noticed was how pristine the Belle was. He checked the life-jacket rack; all four were hung up and unused. The bait-box was full. No signs of a struggle on the newly varnished deck. He went below. Neither bed had been slept in; the sheets were taut. No glasses in the sink. Nothing in the galley ice-box but a six-pack of Olympia beer. Neither the steering wheel nor the gears had finger prints on them. It was murder alright. And whoever did it had sanitized the boat. Unless Hirschel wore gloves and the perp was never on the boat. Somebody could have grabbed him and pulled him off. And pulled off his gloves?
He answered his cell phone. “Mike? This is Keith. Doc Sawyer’s tox screen came back. Hirschel tested positive for Oxy and fentanyl. He was probably dead before he went into the water.”
“Okay. I’ll get Nelson’s security tapes, and I’m done here. Have you heard from Kevin?”
“Nope, but I got a list of all fifty people who have boats at McEvoy Marina. I’ve got Eddy tracking down all forty-nine. Nobody else’s is dead, yet. And I’ve requested Hirschel’s case docket for the past six months. Doc Sawyer’s is notifying next of kin. Two daughters and two sons. An Aunt lives in Portland. She’s flying into Sea-Tac tonight. You going to the funeral? It’s Thursday at the Bikur Cholim cemetery.”
“Yeah. I’m going. I’ll drive down with the hearse.”
One by one, the Hirschel children straggled in: Ezekiel, Edith, Elizabeth. Emanuel, who arrived an hour before the service. They were all approaching middle-aged, well-dressed, and paid little attention to the court and law enforcement personnel who’d come to pay their respects. Hirschel’s sister, Miriam, on the other hand was gracious before handing the lot of them over to ushers handing out skull caps.
Two hours later, he was back on the road to Dayton Bay, having learned that Mr. Greenbaum, the probate attorney, would be contacting him about selling the Northern Belle. Soon. Greenbaum came Friday.
“It’s a nice boat,” Mike told him as they walked towards Nelson’s office. “Are the heirs sure they want to sell her?”
“Nobody’s interested in fishing,” Greenbaum said. “They’re more the horse and tennis set.”
“I’m interested. How did Hirschel find out she was for sale?”
“That I don’t know for sure, but the previous owner was a guy named Bill Cross —he has an on-line business called The Boatman. Some people flip houses, Cross flips boats I guess, from the list of renovations he included with the listing. I can get you the title ASAP if you’ve got fifty grand laying around. The family just wants to unload it.”
“Which one of them should I call if I can talk my wife into mortgaging our souls?”
“Miriam Weiss. His sister. You met her.” Greenbaum said as he handed Mike a calling card embossed with Miriam’s contact information. “You can let her know if there’s a break in the case, too.”
***
SEPTEMBER 3, 2018
By September, the Hirschel case was relegated to the warm-case files, kept in the drawer above the cold-case drawer. Once a week, he entered an update on his review of the King County Court’s case dockets that he reviewed five days at a time. Hirschel’s bench was reserved for criminal cases, and once in a while high-profile civil cases involving the University of Washington. Nothing. He’d have to give up chasing clues down that rabbit hole unless he extended the time from six months to —what, six years?
County Clerk Jane Cross interrupted him, and handed him a signed warrant. “I know you’re waiting on this…”
“Only since January. Thanks.” He was picking up the phone when he heard Keith’s voice. “Wow, that was weird. Can you read my mind?”
“Kevin called me not more than two seconds ago,” Keith said. “Patrick Waxer was found dead in a hunting cabin!”
Mike grabbed a pen. “Who is Patrick Waxer and why should I care if he’s dead?”
“He was Hirschel’s favorite jailer in King County.
“Son-of-a-bitch. What does the M.E. say? Murder, suicide or natural causes?”
“Lead poisoning by a .38 caliber hand gun. Not sure if it was self-inflicted. But the important thing is that as soon as the D.A. Clay and ADA Carrione got the news, they called Sheriff Mendoza for chit-chat. Kevin says I should tell you to expect a call from one of them.”
“What do they want to talk to me for?” He felt his heart pounding, and it wasn’t the caffeine. “Is this about Hirschel?”
“Duh….”
“Okay. But get your ass back here. I finally got a warrant signed for 6420 Adelaide. We need to get that meth shit out of there before the house blows up.” That’s the way it always was. Just when he was lulled into a false sense of boredom. Wham!
“I’m pulling into the drive-way now. You riding with me?”
They donned Kevlar vests, and Mike called his other two deputies to meet them at the house. It had taken six months of surveillance to get probable cause and another month to get a judge to sign off on the warrant. “It’s like they don’t trust me,” he’d complained to Annie. What the hell did they hire me for?”
His answer was adrenaline pumping through a thirty-year old heart. He sent Sgt. Frank around to the back door, and ordered Sgt. Don to cover the side window. He and Keith went to the front door. “On the count of three,” he whispered. “One. Two. Three!’ He banged on the door and shouted, “Sheriff’s department! Open up. We have a warrant.”
Nothing. He jammed his foot into the door and it swung open so easily, he almost fell. He and Keith warily took a few steps inside the empty room. “Get in here, guys!” he yelled and Frank came through the back door followed by Don who was holstering his weapon.
“Where the hell is Redding?” Don said.
“Damn it,” Frank said and sank his .45 into his holster.
“He was here yesterday,” Keith said. “I saw him myself. He couldn’t move a houseful of furniture in less than twelve hours, could he?”
“He could if he decided to book a month ago and took out a room at a time,” Mike said. “And who said there was furniture in here?”
“Where’d he sleep?” Frank said.
“Not on a bed, obviously. We couldn’t watch him 24-7. Besides, maybe he sold the furniture before we started watching him. Let’s get out of here guys,” Mike said as he put up his gun too. “Lock the back door, Frank.”
Before he reached the car, Frank came towards him, waving a piece of notebook paper. “I found this on the counter.” Mike took it and read the scrawl next to the smiley face:
gone to greener pastures.
Four deputies, two cars, and a bunch of crooked politicians in bed with the drug cartels was a recipe for failure. “Good, he’s somebody else’s problem now,” Mike said. “Don, grab yourself some grub and patrol. Frank, you’re with me and Keith at the office.”
The drive back was silent, with the eight-hundred-pound gorilla named “Leaker” in the backseat with Frank. Maybe this was why the County Board of Supervisors hired him, to chase shadows and ghosts. Because fighting crime in Dayton County seemed to be a euphemism for ‘look busy.” Mayor Burt Owel had told him he was working too hard. Was he the leak? Maybe it was Dayton County D.A. Chris Jankel.
“It wasn’t me who tipped him off,” Frank said las he lingered outside with Mike. Keith had unlocked the door and gone straight to the bathroom.
Mike surveyed the sorry state of the Sheriff’s office parking lot. It needed weeding, repaving … pot-hole filling. “Who’s first on your list of suspects?”
Frank leaned against the car. “It wasn’t Donnie, if that’s what you’re thinking.
Mike shook his head, no. “Don’s too dense to be a stoolie. No, it has to be someone who works at the courthouse, and knew the warrant was going to be signed.”
“I wonder what else they’re telling people about,” Frank said. “A leak could get us killed. Redding might have been waiting for us with an army inside.”
“I hear you, Frank. Watch what you say to Ellen. Wives can get chatty waiting in line at the grocery store. Confidentiality is crucial.”
“Will do. You comin’ in?”
“Naw, I’m going home to grab some sleep. I’ll take the graveyard tonight. Give Keith and Don a head’s up.”
***
Stationed in the Dairy Queen parking lot, nursing an Oreo blizzard, Mike waited for the King County D.A. to call. That Lawrence Clay’s text specifically said he wanted to keep the communication private spoke volumes. Even if the public suspected a connection between the deaths of the judge and now the jailer, Clay seemed determined to maintain the fiction of a coincidence. The question wasn’t really if they were connected so much as which cast of case characters was responsible. But why would Clay think he knew anything about their rogue’s gallery?
“I knew judge Hirschel well, so naturally, I want to follow the investigation. After four months, I figured you might at least have a lead.”
“With all due respect, Mr. Clay, I can’t discuss an on-going investigation. Contact Chris Jankel. I have no control over what he tells you.”
“I did talk to him. He said the case was almost cold. But you and I know there’s always unofficial facts. Tentative suspects. Or people of interest? Maybe I can help you solve your case in the process of solving ours. Share notes. That sort of thing. Off the record and confidential of course.”
When a D.A. sounds chummy, it’s time to man the barricades. If the key to solving Hirschel’s murder really did depend on Clay’s involvement in some case irregularity, he didn’t want to be part of a cover-up. “Give me a for instance, Mr. Clay.”
“For instance, did you know Hirschel had a mistress? Angela Anjou. A nice, middle-aged shiksa in Olympia. He met her at a conference when he was in his thirties. She was a twenty-something waitress. He bought a B&B as an investment, and hired her to run it.”
“And you think she murdered her golden goose?”
“No, not her. But they had a son, Paul. I think you should add him to your list of maybes. He only found out he was Hirschel’s kid when Mrs. Hirschel died.”
It sounded like more than BS, but less than irrelevant information. “I’ll check into it, Clay, but how would Bobby figure into the jailer’s death?”
“Paul was arrested on a DUI and spent a week in our county jail. “
“Did you prosecute?”
“No, I called Hirschel and he got Paul off the hook with a call to the traffic court judge. Professional courtesy. The kid was screwed up over the whole thing and blames Hirschel for breaking his mother’s heart. Maybe.”
The tip smelled like red herring. The kid might have been shocked he was a bastard of a sitting judge, but he didn’t grow up in poverty. More than likely, he had a college fund somewhere, and he and mom were probably named in the will. That would account for the icy reception Hizz Honor’s heirs gave the court personnel. He damn sure wouldn’t kill a father he never knew or a jailer. Or a compliant D.A. in the crosshairs.
“Thanks for the info, but I don’t have anything I haven’t shared with my bosses,” Mike said. “I can tell you Hirschel was dead before he went into the water. Do you know if he had problems? Health? Addiction?”
“I never saw any evidence of that.”
It was a typical lawyer’s answer. “Well, if you think of anything, give me a call. Right now, it looks like our perp is a disgruntled criminal … maybe a disgruntled employee. One capable of murder.”
“It could be anyone who ever appeared before Hirschel or worked for him.” There was forlorn resignation in Clay’s voice.
“Check your memory, Clay. Check your records and Hirschel’s case notes. See if there’s that one case that might jump out at you.”
“I’ll get back to you on that,” Clay said.
The conversation sent Mike to the internet. He typed in: notorious court cases in King County Washington last five years. Nada. Then: Judge Hirschel’s most notorious cases. Two criminal cases popped up, but they were over twenty years old. Plea bargained cases weren’t listed, of course.
“Kevin’s the key,” Mike told Keith when the met up at Carrie’s back booth. “I’m not saying strong arm him, but let him know his options in case he thinks he might be on the perp’s list. A little family leverage wouldn’t hurt none, too.”
“He did call me first,” Keith said with a shrug. “That’s a sign, I think.”
“When’s the next family get-together? You got a birthday anytime soon?”
“Not me, but Peggy turns forty-five in a few weeks …”
“I’m not lookin’ to jam him up, Keith. If we get some solid info we may be able to save Clay’s life. Maybe his, too. Tell him that.”
***
All small towns are the same. They suffer from shrinking tax bases and shrinking populations. The old are dying and the young are bored. They need home-care nurses but not teachers. Danville. Greenville. Charlesville. Mike had seen them wither and disappear in Kansas. Eventually, the counties started laying off the newest employees and convinced the older ones to stay to postpone the pension payouts. Annie urged him to apply for any job available or return to the mechanics bay at the Wichita Ford dealership.
“Nobody’s going to hire a rookie like me,” he’d insisted. “Three years’ experience, and go from Deputy to Sheriff? It ain’t gonna happen.”
“You’re a cop, so cop, Mike. You can do it anywhere in any color uniform. Blue, green or khaki.”
The Dayton County Board of Supervisors agreed with her. Why? Because they equated inexperience and desperation with a willingness to ignore the drug trade? As the days passed after the failed warrant search, it seemed they were right.
“How do you like Dayton Bay?’ he asked Annie two weeks later.
“It’s greyer than Kansas and it has more mountains and trees, but Mama said coastal areas won’t go out of business.”
“Okay, but do you like it here?”
“You want to move. Okay, what’s happened, Mike?”
“I just got thousand-dollar a year performance raise. Why?”
“Because they love you. I want a baby. We’re staying.”
It sounded fine to her, but he posted his resume with Linkdin after she went to bed.
Corruption is a funny thing. It doesn’t start with a dirty guy in a dirty trench coat offering a bribe in an alley. It starts with finding a mark who needs money, not for a new car but to make ends meet so he can afford a kid or two, then braces, a prom dress, and then a college fund. It’s all for family, the guy tells himself. Maybe that’s the way it started for Hirschel. No verbal agreements, just tacit understanding that law enforcement and the court system are businesses like any other.
“Kevin and Sarah are driving up for Peggy’s birthday on the twenty-first. We’re having dinner at the Blue Crab. You’re invited.” Keith sounded spur-of-the-moment casual.
“That was quick,” Mike said with a nod.
Keith followed him into his office and closed the door. “Kevin’s nervous. The courthouse was locked down today. Suspicious package in the mail room. They thought it was a bomb.”
“For a thousand more a year, they want me to save lives without blowing the whistle on anyone. It’s impossible, Keith. You know that.” He could see Frank and Don, coffee cups from Carrie’s in hand, through the window. Frank flipped a coin, and Don got the keys to the squad car. He’d lost. “Why don’t you tell me what’s really going on, Keith. A judge and a jailer have been murdered, and now bomb scares? They screwed somebody and they were all in on it. Who’s the shattered soul willing to die to get justice?”
“It’s not that easy.” Keith said. “Maybe in places like Kansas it is. But here … You’re young enough to start over, but guys like me and Kevin, Frank and Don, we’re close to retirement. Without our pensions, what have we got to show for thirty-five years of public service?”
Mike went to the Keurig Annie gave him for Christmas. Making coffee by the cup was supposed to save the environment. Bullshit. All the little plastic pods would take billions of years to decompose when paper filters dissolved in twenty-four hours.
“I don’t know how these small communities are going to fund the pensions, but I do know it’s illegal to do it with drug money and a plea bargain racket.”
Keith kept his head down, staring through the tile into an abyss. “He’s my brother. I wish he hadn’t got caught up in this mess, but he has and I can’t help him. He’s a good husband, a good father…”
“But a lousy lawman. And there’s not a damn thing anybody can do to help him unless he’s willing to go to the DOJ.” Mike sank into his creaky swivel chair, feeling old as its leather. “Does Clay know he’s coming up here?”
“I don’t know. He was so shook up about the bomb scare, the dumb bastard.”
“I’m glad you said it and not me.”
“Can I get a cup of decaf?” Keith said.
“Sure, help yourself.” There was obviously more to the bomb threat, and Keith needed some time to spit it.
“It’s one of the nineteen. It’s got to be,” Keith said as he examined the light brown liquid in his mug.
Didn’t he know you can’t reuse a pod? Mike took the mug from his hands, and emptied it into the bar sink he’d had installed in the counter, and started over. “What’s the nineteen?”
“About ten years ago the State sent a bunch of social workers around to the schools to do a stranger-danger outreach. You know, telling the kids to be careful and how to report sexual abuse … that sort of thing. My two daughters got the lectures. It was mandatory. In King County there’s this Holden Middle School where nineteen men were arrested for in-home molestations … all of them poor white guys around thirty to forty-five …”
Mike handed Keith his coffee and three creamers. “Nineteen?” he said and quickly sat down to take notes. “What were the charges?”
“Felonies … rape, battery, molestation of minors under sixteen, over thirteen. You name it. The girls reported everything from indecent exposure to sodomy. There was no physical or forensics evidence, but it didn’t matter. None of the cases went to trial.”
Mike tried to steady his hand, but every sentence turned to scribble. “They all pleaded out?”
“All of them, eventually,” Keith said. “Kevin said they were all kept in solitary until ...” He wiped sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. “Clay told the men the girls passed their polygraphs and were facing twenty-to life. Pete Carrione told them their wives and girlfriends would be indicted as accessories, so they better take the plea.”
“Did any of them have real lawyers?” The stare he got from Keith gave him his answer. “And ADA Carrione was their public defender. Damn it! Didn’t the County get suspicious when Carrione was promoted?” Mike paused. “No, why would it. No trial, no paper trail.” Mike let out a sigh. “Well, we have nineteen suspects. It’s more than what I expected.”
“Not exactly. One guy committed suicide. Another is in prison for armed robbery. One guy was killed in a drinking and driving accident. One guy shot his daughter and is serving a life sentence.” Keith wiped his eyes. Tears this time. “The girls didn’t know once you fire a gun you can’t stop the bullet. They didn’t know about life-time registration and unemployment …”
“Or about what injustice does to the soul. Yeah, I get it. Thanks for not wanting to burden me with this…”
“Stop it, Mike! Please. I want it to be your problem. Damn Hirschel! Why did he have to die in our county? It’s like the cancer came here on purpose.”
Frank knocked softly, then cracked open the door. “If you want me on graveyard, I’ll have to get some sleep, Mike.”
“Yeah, go on. I’ll take swing. Keith you might as well go home.”
Frank gave him a sloppy salute, and Keith put his mug in the sink. “You want me to do anything, Mike?”
“Keep your mouth shut is all.”
Keith had called the debacle a cancer and he called it right. After ten years, there was no way to know if it had metastasized in other counties. Maybe in other states. All he knew is that he had fifteen victims who had families —maybe large ones. Even a conservative estimate of four each meant sixty possible perps. But at least he had a connection between the murders of Hirschel and the jailer, and an accurate list of those marked for death: the entire justice personnel of a King County court.
***
SEPTEMBER 21, 2018
Kevin Grover couldn’t be anybody but Keith’s brother. Same height, same wiry frame, and a mound of sandy-red hair and round blue eyes. All the Grovers liked their steaks medium rare and Thousand Island salad dressing. They reminded him of Annie’s family. Genetic signatures manifesting themselves in behavior. Annie and Peggy were already friends and Kevin’s Sarah immediately endeared herself to them. Annie made friends easily, he decided she could withstand another move. Springfield, Missouri had contacted him for an interview, and he sent an acceptance e-mail from the men’s room of the Blue Crab.
He’d hit ‘send’ only a second before Keith came looking for him, breathless and stammering. “We’ve got to get to the office, Mike. Frank says somebody took a shot at Lawrence Clay.”
“Alright. Take Annie home and drop Peggy and Sarah at your place. I’m taking Kevin with me. Get to the office as soon as you can. And lose the panic face! It ain’t us.”
“It must be serious,” Annie said as Mike kissed her good-bye.
“Nothing we can’t handle. It’s late anyway.” She was a good law enforcement wife. Calm. Collected. He might as well have been an auto mechanic. “It looks like you got out of town just in time,” he told Kevin as they drove the half mile to the Sheriff’s office. “You won’t be a suspect.”
Kevin got out of the car, and managed to get inside before collapsing in the nearest chair next to Frank’s desk.
“Damn, he’s jerking like a dying fish,” Frank whispered to Mike when he came out of the bathroom.
“Come in my office and tell me what’s going on, Frank.”
Frank followed him into the office, and Mike kept an eye on Kevin through open blinds. “The Seattle police chief called looking for you. Said Clay pulled up to a traffic light and somebody took a shot at him. Passenger side. Guess they wanted to send a message ‘cause he’s still alive. He says Clay wants to talk to you ASAP.”
“Keep Mr. Grover company. Try to calm him down.” Mike got Clay on the phone and heard the same story with the addition that Clay was scared, he needed to know everything about the Hirschel case pronto, and was Kevin there? “Yeah, Grover’s here. Sends his love. How soon can you drive up?”
“I was thinking you could drive down.”
“You’ve got more manpower then I do. I’ve got a county to take care of. Warrants to serve and all.”
He heard a disgusted sigh. “Okay. I’ll fly in. How close are you to the airport?”
“I’ll make sure a deputy is there to meet you.” He radioed Don, went to the door and waved Kevin in. “Before Clay and Carrione get here, tell me about that one case.”
Kevin smoked Pall Mall Light 100’s and said a beer would steady his nerves. Mike got him an ashtray and a cold one from the fridge under the counter, and closed the door before secretly turning on his cell phone recorder:
“Social Services brought in this fifteen-year old. Heather Poole. I’d picked her and her friends up once for drinking in the Redi-Mart parking lot. She said her step-father, Gerry O’Brien, had been raping her since she was three-years-old, but Gerry didn’t even know her mom until she was seven according to her mom and older sister. So, she changed her story. He started raping her when she was ten. Allegedly, he chased her around the house and she tried to fight him off, but he was too fast and strong. She flunked her polygraph, but Clay told him she passed. O’Brien kept saying it was impossible because he had a fucked-up leg from the Gulf War, and had the VA hospital papers and a Purple Heart to prove it. He said his wounds included PTSD and losing lymph glands and his testosterone count was so low, he had to take injections and that only brought him up to half normal levels. But Waxer wouldn’t let him have any of his meds, or see or talk to his wife.
After a week in solitary, Gerry was a mess. Clay had charged him with twenty-one counts of forcible rape, molestation and sodomy. But Gerry said he’d take his chances with the jury because he had so much evidence to prove he couldn’t rape anybody, including VA medical records that showed he couldn’t get it up, even for his wife.
Carrione told him that his evidence wasn’t worth squat because in sex crimes, the victim is always believed and her testimony alone is persuasive. Still, Gerry said no deal. He’d lost over forty pounds, and needed his meds bad. Clay got really pissed off, but Gerry held out until Carrione told him the D.A. had his wife in custody. And that his other step-daughter would probably be arrested too unless she corroborated Heather’s story.
Gerry accepted a plea, only on condition it was an Alford Plea. Clay said okay, because it would get the state off the hook for a malicious prosecution law suit based on insufficient evidence. Anyway, the terms were, he’d lose his voting and gun rights, registration as a sex offender for ten years, a psych evaluation and treatment if he was found deviant, and $4,500.00 in fees, fines, and incarceration reimbursement.
They took it to Ol’ Rubberstamp, but he didn’t want to sign off on an Alford. Corrione and Clay stumbled around trying to find a way to explain how a twenty-one felony count indictment was pared down to one count of inappropriate touching. Hirschel read over Clay’s notes on the case, and finally agreed to the plea bargain even though we all knew the guy was innocent. Hirschel didn’t even make Gerry allocute. Carrione told him to keep quiet because if he maintained his innocence on the record, Hirschel wouldn’t be able to sign off on the Alford. Hirschel sentenced Gerry to five months with time served, and eight weeks later we let him out.”
Kevin stopped talking. “I’m going to be sick.”
Mike slid the trashcan in front of him, and Kevin tossed up his steak and salad in three big heaves, followed by three deep sobs. “They tortured that poor bastard for five fucking months. Heather didn’t even show up for the sentencing hearing. She’d refused to testify in court the day they indicted Gerry. That’s why they couldn’t have a trial and Carrione never told him. Straight out lied to him.” He looked up at Mike. “How in God’s name could they do that to a guy who’d been to war and never even had a speeding ticket? Tell me, how could they have done that to him?”
“They, Kevin? Don’t you mean, we?” Mike went to the sink and filled Keith’s mug with water. “Drink this. Where is Gerry O’Brien now?”
“In Florida with his wife and other step-daughter. He left the state as soon as he paid up. Heather’s in Oregon, last I heard. We’ve kept tabs on the O’Briens. They’ve never left Avon Park even for vacation. He’s registered there, but his ten years is up in a few weeks, and he’ll come off the registry.”
“Were all the cases as bad as O’Brien’s? Keith said one of the men shot his accuser.”
“That would be the Colton case. O’Brien was able to get an outside evaluation, but Colton and the others were evaluated by the State and found to be deviant. They had to go through treatment and that tacked thousands of dollars onto their debt. Colton’s wife left him, and he lost everything. His business. His house. And you can’t get money owed to the government discharged in bankruptcy. The worst thing is, Heather refused to testify, but Colton’s daughter recanted in writing to Clay. I saw the letter. Nobody told Colton.”
Frank knocked, and opened the door. “Keith’s here, and Donnie’s on his way to get Clay.”
“Give me a minute.”
“Roger.”
“Kevin, you said the nineteen were all white, middle-aged and poor but what else did they have in common other than fitting the child-molester profile? Because none of this makes any sense.”
“If I tell you, I’m a dead man.” Kevin was calm at last. Resigned to reality, Annie would say.
“If you don’t tell me, The Nineteen are going to become an urban legend and you’re going to be dead anyway.”
“There’s nothing worse in law enforcement than disloyalty … except … Hirschel and Carrione and Clay are part of a group that wants to disarm people they think are dangerous. White supremacists … and anti-Semites. They wanted to figure out a way to legally disarm and track their whereabouts … sex crimes convictions, Mike. See, even if they do their time, serve their probation, and even go into treatment, they can’t legally own guns or leave the state until they fulfill all the terms of their plea agreements —and that means paying their fines and fees, plus interest. They’re all poor, you see. Nobody can ever pay the debt off because the interest accrues. The Courts own them, lock, stock, and barrel forever. That’s the secret.
All of the guys had Facebook accounts, and once they were arrested, everything about their lives became accessible … the arrest was the probable cause for search warrants for everything about them. Tax returns. Bank accounts. Even their wives and girlfriends lost their privacy. Gerry’s other step-daughter and her boyfriend too. But then, O’Brien paid up, and as soon as his probation was up, he could leave as long as he checked in with the state where he moved. And that state had to recognize the ten-year registration under full faith and credit, so O’Brien got his rights back.”
Kevin’s last words on tape: “O’Brien’s free. He’s the only one who got free and is still alive. Clay’s scared. We’re all scared.” Kevin drank the last of the water. “Sorry about your trashcan.”
“That’s okay. Take it to the bathroom and clean it up. There’s Lysol in the cabinet. One more thing, who paid O’Brien’s court fees?”
“Irene Schmidt. His mother. By credit card. She’s on Social Security.”
Frank was at the door as Kevin left. “Donnie called in from the airport. Clay can’t make it. The FBI was called in on the bomb threat, and he has to stick around. You want to see Keith?”
“Naw, tell him to take Kevin home with him. I’ll see them tomorrow.”
***
Long after Annie was asleep, Mike stayed awake thinking of O’Brien and feeling his guts twist in knots. Yet, he had to think about it all, from Hirschel’s water-bloated body to Kevin’s apology for the dirty trashcan. Maybe the FBI would get to the bottom of the swamp through investigating the bomb threat. Maybe Kevin would confess to the feds. Maybe Keith would come clean. Maybe somebody, anybody else. What was it his dad always said about maybe? Maybe monkeys would fly out of his ass and sing the Star Spangled Banner.
He felt Annie’s hand move up and down his inner thigh. “So, you’re finally home, big boy,” she whispered and rolled over to lay her cheek on his chest.
“Yeah, I’m home, but I ain’t feeing so big. I’m feeling like an ant about to be squashed between rolling boulders.”
She sat up and turned on the nightstand lamp. “Keith said there was a situation in Seattle. It’s about that damn Hirschel murder, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, and the bomb threat today that’s on the news …” He propped himself up on his pillow.
“They said it was a false alarm. Some stupid kids wann’abe terrorists.”
“Don’t believe everything you hear. Scare tactics get people just as dead as the real thing.” The sounded like fighting words. He changed tactics. “Do you love me lots and lots?’
Annie brushed his hair away from his eyes. “Gobs and gobs.”
“Would you love me less if you knew I was a coward?”
She paused as though weighing her answer. “Is this a trick question?”
“It’s a serious question.”
“It depends on what kind of coward. I wouldn’t want you selling out America to our enemies. I’d still love you, Mike, but I’d be pissed off.”
“Enough to turn me in?”
“Enough to nag you until you turned yourself in.” She pulled the blanket around her shoulders.
“It might mean I’d have to go back to being a mechanic.”
“Hooray! You’d make more money than you make as a sheriff.”
“And they say women aren’t practical. Ha! Do we have any cocoa?”
“I offer the man sex then good career advice, and he wants cocoa. What’s wrong with this guy?”
Mike grabbed her and held her close. “I love you, Miss Sassy-pants.” Could their marriage survive an O’Brien ordeal? Winter storms in Dayton Bay were wicked and scary, but Annie said they couldn’t compare to Kansas tornados; the rocks keep the water at bay, and the thunder and lightning is all fuss and feathers. But what about storms of people hate? What about war. What about a label that made you a leper among men? He began to rock her slowly in his arms, and felt tears tracking down his cheeks.
“Oh, Mike, what’s wrong? What have you done that’s so terrible, Dear?”
“It’s not what I’ve done, it’s what I know. In the down stair’s den, I’ve got evidence of this ghastly crime, and it’s like having a rabid dog on a leash. All of sudden, I’ve got custody of the damn thing way up here in Dayton Bay where I thought we’d live an unimportant life. I’m pissed because it’s not fair, but then I think of Gerry O’Brien and I realize I don’t know what unfair means.”
“Who’s Gerry O’Brien, Mike?”
“He’s an innocent man. Just an innocent man who’s putting the whole justice universe on trial.”
***
SEPTEMBER 22, 2018
Mike expected Irene’s Facebook page to be filed with recipes and cute kitty photos. After all, she had to be at least sixty if Gerry was forty-seven. But no, her friends were mostly tough-looking nationalists who lived in places like Poland, Romania, and had names like Olaf Cordescu that posted daily from groups like Justice Wolverines. Whatever happened to sweet grannies who looked like Mrs. Santa and baked pies for orphans? This ol’ broad posted photos of battleships and German flying aces. “You gotta love those Boomers,” Mike said to himself as he scrolled through her site. “Vivid imaginations.” A background check on Irene turned up no police records and no affiliations with white supremacists. He checked with the feds to see if the Justice Wolverines were known terrorist group, but found out they were rated as Known Harmless.
“You’re the second guy this week who’s called about Schmidt,” Greene County Sheriff’s Deputy Russel told hm over the phone. “Like I told Mr. Clay, we’ve kept an eye on her since Judge Hirschel’s death but the only time she leaves her house is to go to church, the Food Lion, and the mall. She’s never left the state unless she’s sneaked out by car or alien aircraft. But she’s got two cats and a dog somebody would have to take care of. If she’s a hit granny, I’m the king of Sweden. As for Waxer the jailer, how would she know he was going to a cabin in the pines? No, your perp’s a local.”
A tiny voice inside Mike said, “He’s right.” Hirschel and Waxer were both killed far from home, in out-of-the-way places where there were few people around, so whoever the murderer was, he had access to their leisure plans and itineraries and could move about quickly and without suspicion. Disabled Gerry and his elderly mother didn’t commit these crimes, but they might know who did. Policepeople had an information network, and convicted sex offenders did too. The Nineteen were probably the motive for the murder of Hirschel and Waxer, but who cared enough about them to find the means and opportunity to avenge them?
Leave it to Annie to cut to give him a new perspective. “If it was me, I’d concentrate on solving the murder in my own yard instead of trying to prevent a hypothetical,” she said as they ate pancakes and bacon. “You and Keith are going to get burned playing with Seattle fire.”
She stopped stirring her coffee. “Where would a judge get fentanyl anyway?” her eyes were wide with curiosity. “It’s not like you can buy drugs without knowing who’s selling.”
The Adelaide raid failure took on a new significance. He believed he was after a meth lab because a guy named Joe-Sean Monroe got popped with half a pound of crank there, but he tested positive for an opioid and cannabis, not speed, and there was no evidence of manufacture. So, if Monroe wasn’t a speed user, he might be a mule. What if the Adelaide house was just a local drug convenience store, and Redding just a clerk —who worked part time at the airport?
“What’re you looking for, Sheriff? Maybe I can save you some time.” Mr. Zimbel smoked a pipe and liked to pose as an old salt with the tourists.
“I need to see your log book for May. I’m trying to find out how Judge Hirschel arrived in Dayton Bay. The motel doesn’t have a car license for him on the registration card. Maybe he flew in?” Like the Harbor Master, Zimbel was required to keep records of flight plans and manifests of both commercial and private aircraft.
“He didn’t come in while I was here. Sam Redding would have been on duty after five o’clock,” he said as he pulled the log book from under the counter. “I’m gonna have to stop all night flights now that he’s gone.”
Mike scanned the March pages first. Keith said Hirschel only bought the boat a week before he died, and he certainly wouldn’t have paid out seventy-grand for merchandise sight unseen. He either made an earlier trip to Dayton Bay or Bill Cross got the boat down to Seattle for him to see. Funny that Jane Cross never mentioned Hirschel bought the Belle from her husband. Perhaps because the deal established a link between Judge Thomas and Judge Hirschel? “Did Redding say where he was going?”
Zimbel scratched his chin stubble. “He didn’t leave a forwarding address. Told me he was going to greener pastures. You can’t much greener than Washington, I say. They picked up Sam’s last check the Saturday before they skedaddled.”
“They who?” Mike said. He was into the April pages now, and still no entries for evening or night arrivals.
“Him and his friend. I guess they were friends. Big guy. He was driving a black SUV. Mazda, I think. Idaho plates. Remined me of the potato farmer on T.V. who’s always chasing the big spud.”
It wasn’t much to go on, but Redding’s log entry listed a plane from Star-Lite Charter arriving from Seattle at 8:00 p.m. Wednesday night with a guy named Carl Waters aboard. “Wonder what Redding did with that old red pick-up he got back from impound.”
“Beats me. Could’ve sold it again, I guess. You know how these young guys are around here. Always looking for trucks to take into the woods for fishin’ and huntin’. They beat the hell out of them, and buy another.”
Zimbel was talking too much. Sam Redding wasn’t the first guy he’d hired for the night shift, nor the first drifter to rent the house on Adelaide. He flipped through the June and July and August, noting that Redding last initialed the log was August 31st. He closed the log book. “Thanks, Mr. Zimbel.”
“Find what you were looking for, Sheriff?”
Mike glanced to his left. On the wall next to the counter were three stacked rows of small lockers. For a quarter, under the watchful eye of Zimbel and his temporary help, people could stash anything from cash to China White. “Well, at least I know Hirschel didn’t fly in.” He glanced to his right. Three gedunk machines: coke, candy, and self-serve lottery tickets. “Have a good day.”
Everybody in Dayton Bay could potentially make money off the drug trade. The hotel on Main Street had a safe to hide cash, the used car lot could buy and sell legal vehicles to haul product, mules could mingle with tourists, and Redding could take drug orders as easily as the Dairy Queen took order for hot dogs and shakes.
“What do you know about Sam Redding?” Mike asked Keith as he was looking over the M.E.’s report on Hirschel for the up-teenth time.
Keith looked up from the scheduling sheet where he was trying to be heroically fair about sharing the graveyard shift. “Only that he showed up about six months before you were hired. Why? You got a lead on him?”
“I’m just wondering how much he knew about Hirschel.”
“Not much, if we buy that Hirschel didn’t get to Dayton Bay until early May.
Maybe the Belle wasn’t a retirement dream but a business venture like his B & B. How much would a cartel pay a retired judge to mule their product?”
Keith said, “Holy shit, a ton of money!”
“Just an idea for your ears only. You watch the office, I’ll patrol.”
He drove to the Adelaide house, not expecting to find anything new, but to jog his memory. He’d parked his ’09 green Explorer half a block away from the house. He was still learning the country roads, and on his day off would drive around, stopping periodically to make notations on a paper map. He’d noted that this was a great place to surveil the road, the pine branches were low enough to make a car difficult to see, but not low enough to obstruct vision. From this vantage point, he had a clear view of the intersection, and the driveway that curved around to the back of the Adelaide house where there was a gravel parking area between it and the garage, wide enough for two vehicles, and to turn around.
Sam had come out of the back door in pajama bottoms and a t-shirt, stretched like he’d just gotten out of bed, and checked his watch. An old red pick-up truck pulled into the driveway, and drove to the back porch. The men went inside, and a few minutes later they emerged, Sam held a cup —most likely coffee, and the other guy carried a small black case abut the size of a kid’s backpack that put in the truck. He handed Sam what looked like a stack of bills, and Sam stuffed the money into his pajama pocket.
Mike called Keith, gave him a description of the truck, and said, “I’m tailing him. Get ready to roll. I think I just witnessed a drug deal.”
The three of them met up in the D.Q. parking lot, and Keith collared Joe-Sean Monroe with a half-pound of meth and two joints. He brought Redding in for questioning.
“Where do you know Monroe from?” Mike said. He offered Redding a cigarette.
“I sold him my truck. He paid me yesterday, but I couldn’t find the registration. The sign says no smoking.”
“We’re not arresting you for smoking tobacco. You won’t mind if we search our house to help you find that registration, will you?”
“Get a warrant and knock yourself out.”
“Are you related to Joe-Sean Monroe?” Frank said.
“He’s my cousin.”
“Do you know why your cousin tested positive for Oxy?” Mike said.
“’Cause he swallowed some?”
Frank leaned across the table, and glared at Sam. “Smart asses give me a pain in the butt.”
“Maybe Monroe can help you out with some Oxy,” Redding said, and Mike left the room to laugh.
Frank followed him out. “I hate funny guys. And guys who think they’re funny. What now Mike?”
“We cut him loose and get a warrant.”
Monroe tested positive for Oxy and weed alright, and D.A. Jankel had charged him with a laundry list of felonies, but he was a minor and was sent to a rehab facility in King County. As for the warrant? Jankel did everything but say no. “Where’s your probable cause, Sheriff? You thought you saw Monroe give Redding money, but you weren’t close enough to see that it was money, right? It’ll take a lot more to get a warrant from Judge Thomas.”
“Like what, a confession?”
That’s how the warrant chase began. Endless requests, endless hours of half-assed surveillance for the ‘lot more.’ End of story, except for Hirschel’s murder on Friday and the green pastures part on Monday.
He called Greenbaum on his cell phone. “I know it’s early,” he explained to his secretary. “I just have a question about Judge Hirschel. Yes, maybe you can answer it. Did the Judge have any physical ailments, or a recent injury that required pain medication?”
“No, but his wife did. Cancer.”
There’s pain and then there’s heartache. Loneliness. Guilt. Kids that might despise their father for a mistress they allegedly didn’t know about but probably did. Lots of older people needed help to sleep at night, and lots of opioid addictions began with prescriptions they found in a family member’s medicine chest. He went into the NCIC data base and typed in: Carl Waters Seattle Washington. Three hits. A twenty-three-year old arrested for DUI; a deceased twenty-five-year-old wanted for child support; and fifty-two-year-old wanted for drug possession. That Carl Waters could pass for sixty-eight. He left a message with Star-Lite Charter for the pilot of the May flight to call him. The rest of the morning, he’d do what his Dad said was the most important thing a man can do: think.
Scenario I: Hirschel is and addict and part of Dayton Bay drug running. He used Bill Waters’ identity, flew in on May second, picked up the drugs, and delivered then to Seattle, got back and died of an overdose, fell over the side tangled up in deck rope.
Scenario II: Hirschel isn’t part of Dayton Bay drug running, but was an addict and Redding sold him some laced Oxy. He OD’d, and fell over the side tangled in deck rope.
Scenario III: Hirschel is an addict and brought his wife’s prescription with him, OD’d accidentally or on purpose, and fell over the side tangled in deck rope.
Scenario IV: Hirschel is not an addict and was killed accidentally or on purpose. By Redding, one of The Nineteen for revenge, or by someone who wanted his money. If he had any.
The possibilities hadn’t changed in four months. He could put the case away in a shoe-box on the shelf because he’d never solve it unless he tackled the bigger case first. Like it or not, Seattle’s crap had floated up stream. He went into his contact list and stared at the Missouri phone number of Irene Schmidt. She and Gerry were the only way he could get the names of the Nineteen without going through Kevin or Clay, and they wouldn’t trust him unless he had something to trade for their cooperation.
Was he ready to go back to being a mechanic?
SEPTEMBER 17,2019
“Annie, we have to talk,” he said. She was standing at the sink washing fresh carrots for coleslaw salad. She wore a t-shirt, her gray cotton pants, and an apron she inherited from her Mama —the picture of bygone femininity. “I giving up being a cop.”
“Okay, Dear,” she said. “Should I start packing?” She got a knife from the second drawer of the undercounter drawers, a bowl from the second shelf of the cupboard, and quartered a cabbage.
“Aren’t you even going to ask why?”
“I know why. And if I’m wrong, you’ll let me know.”
He sat at the kitchen table. “What’s your why?”
She hunted around for the grater. Found it in the dishwasher she hadn’t emptied. “You can’t solve the Hirschel case and you’ve decided you’re a crappy Sheriff. So, we’re moving. Close?”
“Close enough to depress me. I wanted my reason to sound noble, but now I sound like a weenie.” She put the bowl, the cabbage chunks and the grater in front of him. “I can’t solve the Hirschel case without blowing the whistle on the other people involved,” he said flatly. “There’ll be a scandal and I’ll be in the middle of it. It’ll ruin our lives. No law enforcement agency will hire me, even to clean toilets. I’ll be an unemployable … unless … unless Irene Schmidt and Gerry O’Brien have mercy on me and why would they?”
Annie poured them some iced tea, and joined him at the table. “On the other hand, you’ll be famous, write a book and be on C-Span book TV. Maybe get a watch-dog job with the DOJ. Or Judicial Watch. Teach criminal justice classes.”
“Can I make love to you? You’re the only person I know who can make a tragedy sound like a good thing.”
She began scraping carrot chucks across the grater. “After hearing Kevin’s confession, I’d say you don’t know what tragedy is, Mike. Maybe you’ll get your turn when some young honey accuses you of rape. Maybe when you make a traffic stop on a moonlit night and she gets pissed off.”
There was that ‘maybe’ again. It was coiled up like a snake under his chair, waiting for him to decide what he was going to do. “I’ve got a job interview next Thursday. Green County, Missouri. Can you go with me? Irene Schmidt lives there.”
***
SEPTEMBER 27, 2018
Irene lived in a working-class neighborhood on Mt. Vernon Street, Springfield, Missouri. All neighbors should be as conscientious as she was. Her trashcans were inside the chain-link fence and cordoned off from her neatly trimmed yard by a white wooden fence. Two Dachshunds sounded the alarm when he stopped in front of the house and approached the porch. Irene called them in around the back door, then greeted him from behind the front screen door. “You Mike Reed?”
“Yes, Ma’am.” He took off his hat and handed her his badge. A wrinkly hand took it inside, and the door opened as she handed it back.
“C’mon in.” Once inside, he smelled chocolate-chip cookies and fresh coffee. “Gerry got in last night. He’s off the registry, you know. He can travel to see his mama any time he wants now.”
On the end table next to the sofa was a picture of a younger version of Irene with a plump balding man with a goat-tee. “Is this you and Mr. Schmidt?” he asked as he picked up the photograph.
“That’s our weddin’ picture. Whenever I get to feelin’ blue, I look at it and remember my Merle’s waitin’ for me on the other side.”
“That’s what my mama said when my daddy passed.”
“Here’s Gerry now.”
Mike looked up and saw a man, who looked almost as old as Irene and supported by a silver-topped carved wooden cane, hobbling over to the love seat. Mike stood and offered his hand. “Mr. O’Brien, I’m glad to meet you. Glad you could make it here on such short notice. I’m sort of killing two birds, as they say.”
“Mom said you’d applied to the sheriff’s department. Sit on down,” Gerry said as he eased himself down.
“I’ll come right to the point. I don’t know if you’ve heard any news out of Washington, but Judge Hirschel and jailer Waxer are dead. Murdered.”
Gerry and his Mother exchanged glances. “And you think I did it?” Gerry said.
“Good Lord, no.” He took out his cell phone. “The brother of Deputy Grover works for me in Dayton County, and he was visitin’ when Waxer got it. He confessed, Mr. O’Brien.” Mike started the recording and let it play. Irene came to Gerry’s side, and they sat on the love seat and listened without a word. Irene’s put her arm around her son’s shoulder, the both of them staring at the cell phone like they were watching a movie.
“Kevin doesn’t know I recorded him. Neither does Clay or Carrione, or Kevin’s brother. I want to turn it over to the DOJ in D.C. but … I wanted to ask you what you thought about that before I did it. There’ll be a scandal. You’ll have to testify. You all will. It’s been ten years for you. Longer or shorter for some of the others. I … I don’t know it you want to revisit the ordeal. Plain and simple. You’re the only jury that has a right to hear the case and pass judgment on these bastards. I’ve got a box of throw-away phones out in the car, and each one has a recording of Kevin’s confession.”
Irene was crying. Gerry was trying to comfort her as best he could with his own tears pouring over his cheeks.
“Is there any way you can put me in touch with the others? I can’t get their names without alerting King County, and I don’t want to do that. The bigger the net, the more fish we’ll catch. If that’s what you want to do. Judge Hirschel has a large estate. It’s going through probate but can’t be settled until his boat is sold and that ain’t gonna happen as long as the Sheriff’s department has it in impound as a crime scene.” Mike handed Gerry a business card. “I’ve talked to a lawyer at the Washington Chapter of the Innocence Roundtable people. They’ll take your case, Mr. O’Brien.”
Gerry took the card and let Irene read it. “Do you think there’ a chance they’ll take the other cases, too? Some of the guys owe so much money, they’ll never be able to pay up,” he said.
“I guarantee it. Maybe between all of you, I can contact them all eventually. Can you give me a few names?”
“I can,” Irene said. She went to a small desk behind the sofa, and brought him an address book. “The names are marked with red stars. The ones that are marked out …I’ve paid their debt …”
“You paid? For how many?” Mike said as flipped the pages he saw bright red asterisks next to faded names.
“Four. Only four. I pay with a credit card and then they make payments. Me and Gerry make payments too, so we can help the next one.”
He thumbed through Irene’s address book to the “Rs”. No Sam Redding. “Is this a complete list, Mrs. Schmidt?”
“No. I couldn’t track them all down.”
“I don’t see the name Redding. Is that name familiar to you?
“I don’t know anyone by that name.”
“What about you, Gerry?”
“I never met anyone by that name, either.”
They were lawyer-like answers. “If you remember, call me …” Ten years was a long time to comply with the terms of injustice. For poor people, anything costing more than a hundred dollars was devastating. Indebtedness to the government wad a financial death sentence. He and Gerry shook hands. Was it enough for him to hear one of the perpetrators acknowledge guilt and regret? “Is there anything I can do to help you or the other fourteen?” he asked. “Maybe we could all meet up …” He had told himself he had no expectations, not even of gratitude, but it wasn’t true. “I’ll be heading home is a few days, so think about it. Plans can always change. Personally, I hope you sue the hell out of every one of the bastards.”
They walked to Mike’s rental in silence. He hoped Gerry would give him an indication of what he was thinking, but heard Annie’s vice of reason inside his head: Give it up; people need time.
“People do what they think they have to do,” Gerry said. It sounded like he was talking to himself, justifying the information he doled out. “There’s a guy, Bob Hamilton. Lives at 1013 Larkspur in the Green Pastures subdivision. He knows Sam Redding.”
It was his one and only shot at solving the Hirschel case, but he couldn’t tell anyone about it or he’d never cop again. He’d spend the rest of his life in a mechanic’s bay changing oil and rotating tires, thanks to the Grover brothers dumping their garbage in his front yard. “Thanks, Gerry. I hope I’m wrong about him.”
Address book in hand, he went back to the Extended Stay Hotel where Annie was waiting. “How’d it go?” she asked.
“I’ll be extending our stay a few more days. I’ve got an appointment with the FBI. Any news from Seattle?”
“No more murders, yet. If that’s what you mean. What about the O’Briens?”
“It’s a lot to process. I’ve got to remember they’re going to need time. You remind me, okay?”
“I can reheat the KFC. And I bought some Coke and a beer. Mr. Greenbaum’s called you twice. He wants to know when the Northern Belle can be put on the market. I told him it was still in impound but he wants to talk to you. Peggy called. She and Keith got a rescue dog from the pound. They named it Fritz.”
“I’ll call Greenbaum. I love you.” The first call, however, was to Hamilton, but before he could get an outside line, there was a knock at the door.
“Are you Mike Reed?” A middle-aged guy in a gray suit was holding a photo and comparing it to the guy in front of him.
“Who wants to know?”
The guy held up a badge and I.D. case. “Agent Marion Sullivan. FBI. May I come in, Sheriff?”
“Okay.” It was odd. Annie came out of the kitchenette, and immediately turned around and went back in. “Is this official business. I’ve got an appointment with your office day after tomorrow.”
“You met with Gerry O’Brien today. I thought there might be a connection between your meeting with him and your meeting with the bureau.”
Mike got a beer from the refrigerator under the TV, and sat at the round table in front of the window. “What kind of connection? Is O’Brien under surveillance?”
Sullivan sat at the table. “We got a call from Lawrence Clay about possible suspects in the courthouse bomb threat case. O’Brien’s on the list.”
“Interesting coincidence, isn’t it? Why would Clay suspect him?”
“Can I get one of those beers?’
“Only if you stop playing games.”
Sullivan helped himself and came back to the table. “I interviewed Clay and Carrione and right away I knew they had a reason to be scared shitless. O’Brien was the first and only guy to pay off his court fees, and didn’t have a lawyer. When Schmidt paid off Gunther Siles’ fees, Clay was dumbfounded. Then she paid off Xavier Ramirez’s account. Where would a poor old hillbilly like her get that kind of money?”
“I asked myself the same question,” Mike said. “But the answer is always the same in cases like that. Laundered money. I can understand why the families went through an intermediary like Schmidt, though. They don’t want people like you showing up on their doorstep. Can you blame them? They’ve paid their debt to society, but people like Clay get pissed off. He won’t let them be free.”
“That’s not fair, Reed. Clay’s got a right to be scared after a judge and a jailer get killed.”
Mike shrugged. “You’re on their doorstep, aren’t you?”
“True. But I haven’t contacted any of these people and I don’t intend to intrude any more than I have to. That’s why I’m asking you why you went there and not them.”
Maybe Sullivan thought Gerry and his mother would lie if he asked. Or maybe he didn’t want them to know Clay had provided the feds with “probable cause” to surveil them —an him. “I’m looking for a POI named Sam Redding in connection with the Hirschel case. Kevin Grover told me I might find him in Springfield through Schmidt, so I figured while I’m here for a job interview, I’d kill two birds. I didn’t know Gerry was going to be there. That’s all I know.”
“Do they know where Redding is?”
“They’ve never met him.”
Sullivan put his business card on the table. “If you learn anything, give me a call. Thanks for the beer.” He started for the door, then stopped. “One more thing, we’re on the same side despite what you hear on the news. Whatever axe this bomber thinks he has to grind, he’s gotta be stopped before he kills somebody.”
Somebody? “I’ll keep you in the loop, Agent Sullivan. But stop following me. I don’t like it and you’re going to blow my investigation.”
Even if his phone wasn’t being tapped, Irene Schmidt’s phone was, and her house was under surveillance. He needed to warn Gerry but a feeling of dread and entrapment engulfed him. He hadn’t done anything illegal, yet he felt hunted. He had to consider every action how his every word would appear to the all-seeing presence of the government. He’d have to think and speak in code, encrypt his opinions, camouflage his intentions. “Same side, my ass.” He put Schmidt’s address book in his pocket, and drove back to Mt. Vernon Ave.
“Sorry to come uninvited, but I need to return the address book to Gerry,” he said to Irene at the door, and motioned Gerry out to the porch. “The FBI visited me, and you and yours are being watched. Clay named all fourteen of you as suspects in the bombing threat. Be careful.”
Gerry scanned the yard, and took off his baseball cap, holding it to his face as he spoke. “You could be next and they’re not going to be pleased at you warning their pigeons.”
“I’m already next. If they ask, tell them the truth. I returned your address book.” He handed the little red book to him. “I don’t like fellow law people spying on me without telling me beforehand, and I don’t like questions about my private conversations. I’m not going to make trouble for you, Gerry. I’m going home tomorrow and if you want to talk to me, use a disposable phone. That recording I gave you? Make copies. In fact, you ought to post it on U-tube.”
Mike saw a smile creep over Gerry’s face. “The FBI will ask how I got the confession.”
“Two words: Fifth Amendment. Dummy up and call the Innocence Roundtable. Let Kevin explain. I have to go.”
***
“Gerry says you hail from Washington, Sheriff. You’re asking after Sam Redding, is that right?” Bob Hamilton was one of those tall, slim, sleek lookin’ fellas who wore his hair slicked back with styling gel. He didn’t look like he’d have any problem buying his freedom from the government.
“I just want to ask him who tipped him off about the search warrant I tried to serve him. It took me months to get it, and he disappeared on me. Said he was coming here.”
“Sure, come ‘round the back.”
Bob led him along the side of the house to a backyard patio. Waiting there was a man in a wheelchair, sitting at a card table. On it was a checker-board, an ashtray, and three tall glasses of what looked like iced-tea. “Meet Sam Redding,” Bob said. “Sam, this here’s Sheriff Reed all the way from Dayton Bay.” Mike sat on a striped canvas backed swing, letting Bob have one of the metal folding chairs. “He’s the guy who recorded Kevin Grover’s sob story.”
Whoever Dayton Bay’s airport clerk was, he wasn’t Sam Redding. “Were you a victim of identity theft?” Mike asked.
“I was lucky, in a way, Sheriff. I had an accident at a lumber yard where I was working. Got a boatload of cash in a settlement and bought this place. I paid off Bob’s costs and had Uncle Sam hire Bob-o-Link here, to take care of me. Of course, he still had to register and couldn’t live near kids … that burned my ass good, believe me. But, I found Green Pastures. And we operate a railroad, you might say. Some of our travelers need passports now and then. I rent my name out.”
“One of your travelers may have killed a judge. Another may have threatened to blow up a court house. Now the FBI is running around violating every provision of the Constitution to find him ... or them.” Mike saw Sam’s resemblance to Washington Sam as soon as the man began talking. Related for sure. “Letting someone pose as you, is downright stupid. That wheelchair isn’t going to protect you from prison. If your boy won’t talk to me, perhaps he’ll talk to the FBI. They’ll be here next, I guarantee it.” Redding’s eye twitched and he looked nervously at Bob. “Who gave Hirschel a hot Oxy?” Mike demanded.
Bob went inside and dragged the Adelaide house renter out by the collar. “I didn’t kill nobody!” the man said, and Bob shoved him into the folding chair.
“What’s your real name?” Mike said.
“Ramon Salcedo. People call me Cecil.”
“What are you to this piece of cow dung?” Mike said to Redding.
“He’s my brother-in-law,” Sam admitted.
“Illegal connection’s more like it. Spill it, Cecil.”
“I met this guy in Seattle who needs a guy to meet the mules at the airport, to make sure they dropped the shit. I didn’t know the Bill guy was a judge. He got off the plane and right away he starts talking about how he left his script at home. So, he says, he’s going to buy a few pills from the load he was carrying. I called my boss, and he says, okay. I take his money, he takes two pills, and I never saw him again. I swear. I didn’t know the oxy was laced with Apache.”
“But your boss knew. Who would that be?”
“Unh-unh … that I ain’t saying’. I ain’t gonna wind up dead.” Suddenly Cecil turned pale. “I ain’t getting no witness protection. I’ll get deported and wind up in a ditch with no hands and no head.”
Mike recognized terror when he saw it. “Okay, who tipped you off about the warrant? That you’re going to tell me if I have to beat it out of you.”
“Signora Cross. She said I should pack my stuff and get out of the house.”
“And the furniture?”
“What furniture? I sleep on the floor when a mule’s coming through. Other times, I sleep at the airport.”
“Tell me about the Belle …”
“I sail her down to Seattle for Senor Waters to see.”
Cecil was calmer now. Bob Hamilton had moved from his side to the third metal chair, and didn’t seem so menacing. He had the same guarded body language as Gerry, eyes staring at the ground, arms folded casually across his chest, bulging with tension. “Cecil, who else saw the Belle in Seattle when you showed her to Waters?” Mike said.
“La Signora Waters.”
“Describe her to me.”
“I don’t remember …”
“Young, old, black, white?”
“Middle-aged. White. Long silver hair. Thin. She wore red-rimmed sun glasses. White shorts. A T-shirt. Voted Seattle’s Best B & B.”
That explained why the family wanted to rid themselves of the Belle so quickly. Maybe there was something to Clay’s tip after all. He looked at Bob. “You own a black SUV?”
“Hirschel brought a load up from Seattle by plane. I was supposed to come to transfer the stuff to the car, and this idiot gave him a hot pill. He called me all hysterical and I rushed over to the airport, and Hirschel’s keeled over. Deader than shit. Zimbel called Riles, told him we were towing the boat out to open sea, and to say Hirschel signed the boat out at eleven. We staged the accident …”
“So, no one actually boarded the Belle?”
“She was just a prop. Something to tie Hirschel’s body to.”
“Do you know how Hirschel got in with the cartel? I mean, he wasn’t always dirty, was he? That you knew of before … before he got into the plea bargain business?”
Bob finally made eye contact and shifted in the chair, slowly, like it was painful to move. “Naw, I don’t have a clue. I never had no run-ins with the law before. I worked for a printer and we did some flyers for the Sheriff’s Department once in a while is all. I was never a rowdy kinda guy after I graduated high school. I never heard the name Hirschel until … well, you know.”
Criminals don’t tell you so minute details unless they want you to buy a bullshit story to cover up the real story. What were the odds that Hirschel just happened to bring up a load under an assumed name that one of the Nineteen just happened to be picking up? Astronomical. No, once people know a person in power is for sale, they can buy him. Hirschel wasn’t killed accidentally because joined the same drug cartel as Bob Hamilton. Bob Hamilton joined the drug cartel on purpose so he’d have a way to kill Hirschel. Bob’s name wasn’t in Irene’s address book because she didn’t pay off his court fees. Redding did.
“You’re gonna run into the law again if you keep runnin drugs, you know that, right? Especially when you’ve got idiots like Cecil battin’ for your team,” Mike warned. “He didn’t tell you about the note he left for me, I’ll bet. It said he was going to greener pastures.”
Cecil started to speak, but Sam socked him in the shoulder. “Shut-up, you.”
“Even if you took Cecil to rehab —yeah, I know an addict when I see one —he’d still be stupid, Bob,” Mike continued. “I told Gerry, and I’ll tell you. The FBI is checking out everybody who has a grudge against the court, and the Nineteen are in their investigation crosshairs. Clay still hates you and scared you’ll bring him down. Get one of Sam’s passports and take a vacation.”
“You’re not going to turn us in?” Cecil said. Sam socked him again.
“Hirschel reaped what he sowed,” Mike said. “Drugs are dangerous.”
That was undisputed truth. As for Waxer the jailer, it wasn’t his case to solve. He called Greenbaum on his way back to the hotel. “I’m sending deputy Grover a text to release the Northern Bell from impound. You can put her on the market whenever you want. As soon as you pay the impound fees. Roughly twenty-three hundred-dollars. And give the family my best.”
***
Annie had room service bring them tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner. “The way I figure it, gourmet food will only give s indigestion. Lawrence Clay has been calling here every twenty minutes since you left at ten. Now there’s a guy who’d benefit from social anxiety drugs. What a gruff son-of-a-bitch.”
It may have been a peasant meal but the staff had put the cart in front of the sliding windows that looked out over an English garden courtyard. The tableware reminded him of the kind they used on trains. Heavy silver. Funny how the little things made people feel catered to.
“Did Clay say what he wanted? This doesn’t taste like American cheese … you think they used Gouda?”
Annie went to her lap-top on the dresser, and gathered up sticky notes from the rim. “They all say the same thing. It’s important.” She answered the room phone. “Yes, hold on. … Mike, it’s Clay, will you talk to him, please?”
“Oh, alright.” Mike left the pleasantness of the view, and flopped on the bed. “Yeah?”
Clay: I’ve been trying to reach you for hours. Somebody took a shot art Carrione from a hundred-yards away. You know what means? Sniper training. Sullivan tells me you’re in Springfield and talked to Gerry O’Brien. Is that true?”
Mike: Sullivan told me you suspected him. I interviewed him, and I can tell you without a doubt he had nothing to do with Hirschel’s murder.”
Clay: I don’t give a damn about Hirschel’s murder! Carrione was almost killed! And O’Brien knows who did it.”
Mike: When did it happen?
Clay: This morning as he was coming to work. Somebody was on the overpass. I tell you, O’Brien was in the army. He knows snipers.
Mike: Does O’Brien have a motive?”
Clay: Don’t fuck with me Reed.
Mike: I’m out of my jurisdiction Clay, wha’dya want me to do?”
Clay: Give Sullivan probable cause to arrest him. Something he did or said —anything to let the FBI take him into custody. And if you can’t do that, just back off and let Sullivan do his job and keep your mouth shut. Somebody has to make him tell what he knows about the shit that’s happening up here. He knows plenty, too. Bastard thinks he can intimidate the law.
Mike: O’Brien doesn’t know squat. He get’s a disability check from uncle Sam and helps his aging mother. He can barely walk …
Clay: Just stay out of Sullivan’s way….
Mike: And if I don’t?
Clay: You’ll find yourself behind bars for obstructing justice. The feds don’t play games.
Mike heard the line go dead. He hung up the receiver and rolled over. Clay’s words were like implosion explosives detonating inside his head. The threat was not directed at him alone. It meant agony for Annie like it meant hell for the families of the Nineteen. He’d do anything to protect her from that. Clay had little sympathy from him after Kevin’s confession, but now the victims of injustice had become more than a tragedy. Heir cause had become a vendetta. Annie sat on the side of the bed, leaned over and caressed his cheek. “You’re a good wife, Annie,” he said. “You’ve never come right out and said I’m a lousy cop.”
“Because you’re not. You’re a great cop … you’d be great at anything you try.”
Her optimism was contagious. It’s one of the reasons he married her. “Oh, yeah, I’m a lousy cop. No good at politics, and that seems to be job one.”
She took his hand. “You’ll solve the Hirschel case, Mike. You need to give yourself a little time is all …”
“It’s solved.”
Her eyes brightened. “You know who killed the judge?”
He brought her hand to his lips. “Yep. Who, how, and why. But I can’t tell anyone. No, I won’t tell anyone. I can live with that, can you?”
“I don’t understand, Mike.”
“Clay just demanded that I let the federal boys to fuck over O’Brien the way he did or he’s going to have me arrested for obstruction.”
Her face drained white. “What?”
“O’Brien caved in once, why not a second time? All they have to do is pull him into the system again, and he’ll go down for all of it. Hirschel, Waxer, the bomb threat, the two warning shots to Clay and Carrione … they’ll make an example out of him and intimidate the rest of the Nineteen to leave them alone and disappear. At least that was the plan until I screwed it up.”
Annie called the front desk. “Hi, this is room 212. I’m going to put our lunch cart outside the door. You can come get it.” She maneuvered the cart to the hallway and closed the door. “Well, at least we know Clay doesn’t know about Kevin’s confession. It’s somewhat of an insurance policy, yeah?”
Mike noticed she often got busy when she thought about problems. It was like moving around was the key to her solutions. Had she already figured out the end game?
“Gerry doesn’t want to re-live his nightmare,” he explained. “None of them do. From what I gather, the less contact they have with one another, the safer they are. Plausible deniability. Hamilton runs drugs. Irene pays off the fees with the money he provides. Gerry probably does know snipers who’ll take shots at these guys. Eventually, they’ll all wind up dead. Carrione. Clay. Kevin. Whoever else is on their list.” He went to the refrigerator, pulled out a complimentary-sized bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label and a Coke Zero, and got two glasses.
“You’re ginning, Mike reed. I haven’t seen you smile like that in months.”
“I’ve made a decision, my lady love.” He handed her a mostly-coke drink, and kept the mostly-bourbon drink for himself.
“Does that decision mean we’re leaving the drizzle of Dayton Bay?”
“It means we’re going to choose a town, and move there so I can go back to being a grease monkey. In five years, I’ll have my own garage. Salut!”
“I’ll gladly drink to that,” Annie said. “What about Sullivan and O’Brien?”
Mike already had his cell-phone out and was thumbing numbers. “Mr. Hamilton, this is Sheriff Mike Reed. I know you know all about plea deals, but do you know the story of Sammy Gravano? He was a bodyguard for a gangster named John Gotti. He killed nineteen people and never spent a day in prison for it. You know why? Because he dropped a dime on Gotti and the Feds wanted his testimony more than they wanted justice for a bunch of thugs. Think about how badly they might want to hush up information that would bankrupt a city, and call into question every case adjudicated by the Washington state court system over the course of fifteen years. Give O’Brien a head’s up about use immunity. My best guesstimate, you’ve got about a forty-eight-hour window of opportunity.”
Clay was like an unfaithful husband. If he’d cheat on his wife, why not his mistress? The Nineteen weren’t the only people he’d fucked over. He’d turned he entire criminal justice system into one big killing machine. Killing lives, and rights, and dreams, and the souls of every poor bastard unlucky enough to cross paths with his shadow. There were no better insulated or powerful people in America than those in law enforcement. All the money in the world couldn’t compensate the Nineteen. Like Marie Stockton, they’d never be made whole. Until justice was done, the debt would never be paid. What is justice? Blood.
Annie put down her cell phone, and was busy again. She had opened their suitcases on the luggage stools, and was packing up their belongings. “We can get a flight out this evening. She glanced over at him. “I assume we’re going home so you can tidy up things in Dayton Bay.” She closed the suitcases and went to the window. “I like this town. What say we chose this one to raise our chillin’ in?”
***
DECEMBER 1, 2019
“I wish you’d stay on, Mike,” Keith said as they shared a last cup of morning coffee at Carrie’s. “If all the good people leave, what’s left except the crappy people?”
“You’re good people. And it’s your town,” Mike reminded him. “With Kevin and Sarah up here now, it’s up to you guys to make it or break it.”
“Are you really turning in your badge and hangin’ up your guns?”
“Well, you got the badge part right. It’s Missouri after all.”
Keith laughed. “I got’cha. It’s just that, whatever strings you pulled, it seems like you saved Kevin’s life. So far, anyway. It’s too bad about Clay and Carrione.”
Eventually, Mike knew, Keith would get around to the murders of two of Seattle’s most powerful legal eagles. “Yeah, too bad.” Keith wanted information. Maybe to sell, or bargain for a raise. Maybe just out of curiosity. Maybe out of unspoken dread that Kevin might still be on the waiting list for a sniper’s bullet. Maybe monkeys ... he heard his father say. He’d learned not to trust in maybes. Hamilton still wasn’t on law enforcement’s radar and Gerry O’Brien still hadn’t contacted the Innocence Roundtable. They might still be in the vigilante business.
When it came to criminal justice, he knew when to keep his mouth shut.
Mike took an empty stool at Carrie’s Luncheonette. His back hurt. His feet ached. And he couldn’t un-see what the Harbor Patrol fished out of Dayton bay. “Got a bad one, Captain Reed.” Keith Grover had told him. “Looks like our newest citizen decided to move in with Davy Jones.”
Mike had been half asleep early Sunday morning. “Okay, I’ll be down as soon as I get there.” It didn’t make any sense to him either, but twenty minutes later he was staring at the water-logged corpse of the Honorable Ronald Hirschel laying in a black bag on a morgue table.
“He’s sixty-eight. Retired three years after Mrs. Hirschel died of cancer and bought the Northern Belle to fish the rest of his life away. All seven days of it,” Keith explained.
Mike was scanning the Harbor Patrol’s report. “The M.E.’s says it’s an accidental drowning. Why’d you call me at three-thirty in the morning?”
“Because it’s bullshit. The M.E. set the time of death as any time before noon Saturday. Hirschel’s a Jew and wouldn’t have been on his fishing boat on the Sabbath. He died on Friday.”
“And you know this, how?”
“My brother Kevin’s a Deputy in King County. He worked in Hirschel’s court for twenty years.”
Nobody knew the court system like the Grover family. Three deputies, two cops, a social worker and an uncle serving a five-ten stretch for armed robbery. Did the lawyer who got him off easy count? “Which one of you called the other at three in the morning?”
“I called him as soon as I learned who the swimmer was.”
“Give Keith my number, I want to talk to him.”
It’s not unusual for spouses to buy the farm shortly after the other one goes to glory. Mike lost both his parents within a year. But, when a guy buys a boat, he usually intends to have a long peaceful life with the floating wife.
“I’ll have pie and coffee, Carrie,” he said. She’d forget the fork and then the cream just to have more flirty time.
“What you doin’ up so early anyway?”
“The Harbor Patrol fished a new boat owner out of the bay.”
She put a hand on her hip, and rolled her eyes. “The first of the summer dummies. Out there alone, right?”
“Right,” Keith said as he sat next to Mike. “I’ll have whatever the Sheriff’s having.”
She softened. “You got it.”
“Did Kevin say if Hirschel knew his way around boats?” Mike said as Carrie sauntered off to the pie case, and they moved to the back booth. “Boats ain’t like driving a car.”
“He was a Navy J.A.G. before he was a judge, if that means anything. He did have vertigo. Something with ear tubes. Kevin said he almost tumbled down the stairs to the bench once.”
“That could explain a fall over the side. Did he have any enemies?”
“Only everyone found guilty in his court. Nobody important. He and the D.A. Clay are … were tight. They knew the drill, according to Kevin.”
Carrie brought a carafe of coffee and a huge slab of apple pie and a fork, and a cup to Keith, then got busy near the register. She knew better than to eavesdrop. She’d hear it all from Keith’s wife.
“What was their drill?” Mike said.
“A well-greased plea machine. Get ‘em in. Get ‘em out. And make them all pay a hefty fine and court costs.”
“I’ll bet the county fathers loved him.”
Kevin nodded. “I never met a politician who doesn’t love a predictable revenue stream. Not to mention the gratitude of every business and professional sued for malpractice.” The remark evidenced a boat-load of bitterness.
“What’s Clay’s conviction rate down there?”
“Ninety-eight percent. Judge Hirschel was known as Ol’ Rubberstamp.”
“If it wasn’t murder, it sounds like it should have been. Text Kevin and give him my number.”
“Already did. He said if he hears anything, he’ll get back to me. Kevin’s got faults like the rest of us, but disloyalty ain’t one of them. You understand, Mike.”
It made sense. Whistleblowing was a blood sport. He wondered how long Kevin had until his retirement. Maybe they could write a book: Judicial Misconduct and Local Government Solvency.
Keith stirred two Splendas into his cup. “I wonder what Kevin’s ‘one case’ is. There’s gotta be that one doggin’ his conscience. If we could find out which one, we’d have a lead. If it’s murder we’re dealin’ with.”
“You got a one case?” Mike asked.
“Yep. Luckily, I got mine when I was new to the job. I arrested Marie Stockton.”
“The woman wrongly accused of battering the toddler?” Mike winced at the memory of the details. Broken bones and a crushed skull.
“She’s the one. God, what the courts did to her! And the press finished her off. If I live thousand years, I’ll never forget the look on her face when they finally let her go. I walked her into the jail and I walked her out. She turned to me and said, ‘I told you I didn’t do it.’ I’d rather she’d cursed me, you know? A man can stand a woman’s anger, but despair?”
Mike had heard much the same thing from everyone close to the case, everyone who wasn’t fired by the time he was hired as Sheriff of Dayton County. By that time, Stockton had moved. Some said to Cincinnati. Others said Vegas. “Did you ever find out where she went? What happened to her?”
“That was twenty-five years ago and I doubt she wants to be found. People had shame back then too.”
How did sunrise coffee and pie turn into a wake for justice and privacy? Mike hauled out his wallet. “It’s on me.” He had a death to investigate and a report to write, and he’d start with a visit to the Northern Belle.
***
Reclaimed, renovated and resold, the Northern Belle was seventy-thousand-dollars’ worth of retirement heaven berthed at #42. She was a forty-four-foot Alaskan Tug, with a forward master suite and a guest room aft, and her six-hundred-gallon diesel tank gave her a range of seventeen-hundred miles. Cruising at eight knots, she’d only use three gallons of fuel which means Hirschel could take her as far as Seattle and back without refueling.
According to the Harbor Master Nelson Riles, Hirschel signed out at 11:00 a.m. Friday morning, as soon as the fog cleared. “He said he was going to anchor about a half-mile off-shore. What happened after that, I couldn’t say. I went home about five, and never saw him or the tug again until she was towed in.”
“Have you been aboard?”
“Nope. I didn’t have a need. The HP guys went over her pretty good.”
“I’m going aboard. Just to poke around. Maybe they missed something.”
“Suit yourself, Sheriff,” Nelson said.
The first thing Mike noticed was how pristine the Belle was. He checked the life-jacket rack; all four were hung up and unused. The bait-box was full. No signs of a struggle on the newly varnished deck. He went below. Neither bed had been slept in; the sheets were taut. No glasses in the sink. Nothing in the galley ice-box but a six-pack of Olympia beer. Neither the steering wheel nor the gears had finger prints on them. It was murder alright. And whoever did it had sanitized the boat. Unless Hirschel wore gloves and the perp was never on the boat. Somebody could have grabbed him and pulled him off. And pulled off his gloves?
He answered his cell phone. “Mike? This is Keith. Doc Sawyer’s tox screen came back. Hirschel tested positive for Oxy and fentanyl. He was probably dead before he went into the water.”
“Okay. I’ll get Nelson’s security tapes, and I’m done here. Have you heard from Kevin?”
“Nope, but I got a list of all fifty people who have boats at McEvoy Marina. I’ve got Eddy tracking down all forty-nine. Nobody else’s is dead, yet. And I’ve requested Hirschel’s case docket for the past six months. Doc Sawyer’s is notifying next of kin. Two daughters and two sons. An Aunt lives in Portland. She’s flying into Sea-Tac tonight. You going to the funeral? It’s Thursday at the Bikur Cholim cemetery.”
“Yeah. I’m going. I’ll drive down with the hearse.”
One by one, the Hirschel children straggled in: Ezekiel, Edith, Elizabeth. Emanuel, who arrived an hour before the service. They were all approaching middle-aged, well-dressed, and paid little attention to the court and law enforcement personnel who’d come to pay their respects. Hirschel’s sister, Miriam, on the other hand was gracious before handing the lot of them over to ushers handing out skull caps.
Two hours later, he was back on the road to Dayton Bay, having learned that Mr. Greenbaum, the probate attorney, would be contacting him about selling the Northern Belle. Soon. Greenbaum came Friday.
“It’s a nice boat,” Mike told him as they walked towards Nelson’s office. “Are the heirs sure they want to sell her?”
“Nobody’s interested in fishing,” Greenbaum said. “They’re more the horse and tennis set.”
“I’m interested. How did Hirschel find out she was for sale?”
“That I don’t know for sure, but the previous owner was a guy named Bill Cross —he has an on-line business called The Boatman. Some people flip houses, Cross flips boats I guess, from the list of renovations he included with the listing. I can get you the title ASAP if you’ve got fifty grand laying around. The family just wants to unload it.”
“Which one of them should I call if I can talk my wife into mortgaging our souls?”
“Miriam Weiss. His sister. You met her.” Greenbaum said as he handed Mike a calling card embossed with Miriam’s contact information. “You can let her know if there’s a break in the case, too.”
***
SEPTEMBER 3, 2018
By September, the Hirschel case was relegated to the warm-case files, kept in the drawer above the cold-case drawer. Once a week, he entered an update on his review of the King County Court’s case dockets that he reviewed five days at a time. Hirschel’s bench was reserved for criminal cases, and once in a while high-profile civil cases involving the University of Washington. Nothing. He’d have to give up chasing clues down that rabbit hole unless he extended the time from six months to —what, six years?
County Clerk Jane Cross interrupted him, and handed him a signed warrant. “I know you’re waiting on this…”
“Only since January. Thanks.” He was picking up the phone when he heard Keith’s voice. “Wow, that was weird. Can you read my mind?”
“Kevin called me not more than two seconds ago,” Keith said. “Patrick Waxer was found dead in a hunting cabin!”
Mike grabbed a pen. “Who is Patrick Waxer and why should I care if he’s dead?”
“He was Hirschel’s favorite jailer in King County.
“Son-of-a-bitch. What does the M.E. say? Murder, suicide or natural causes?”
“Lead poisoning by a .38 caliber hand gun. Not sure if it was self-inflicted. But the important thing is that as soon as the D.A. Clay and ADA Carrione got the news, they called Sheriff Mendoza for chit-chat. Kevin says I should tell you to expect a call from one of them.”
“What do they want to talk to me for?” He felt his heart pounding, and it wasn’t the caffeine. “Is this about Hirschel?”
“Duh….”
“Okay. But get your ass back here. I finally got a warrant signed for 6420 Adelaide. We need to get that meth shit out of there before the house blows up.” That’s the way it always was. Just when he was lulled into a false sense of boredom. Wham!
“I’m pulling into the drive-way now. You riding with me?”
They donned Kevlar vests, and Mike called his other two deputies to meet them at the house. It had taken six months of surveillance to get probable cause and another month to get a judge to sign off on the warrant. “It’s like they don’t trust me,” he’d complained to Annie. What the hell did they hire me for?”
His answer was adrenaline pumping through a thirty-year old heart. He sent Sgt. Frank around to the back door, and ordered Sgt. Don to cover the side window. He and Keith went to the front door. “On the count of three,” he whispered. “One. Two. Three!’ He banged on the door and shouted, “Sheriff’s department! Open up. We have a warrant.”
Nothing. He jammed his foot into the door and it swung open so easily, he almost fell. He and Keith warily took a few steps inside the empty room. “Get in here, guys!” he yelled and Frank came through the back door followed by Don who was holstering his weapon.
“Where the hell is Redding?” Don said.
“Damn it,” Frank said and sank his .45 into his holster.
“He was here yesterday,” Keith said. “I saw him myself. He couldn’t move a houseful of furniture in less than twelve hours, could he?”
“He could if he decided to book a month ago and took out a room at a time,” Mike said. “And who said there was furniture in here?”
“Where’d he sleep?” Frank said.
“Not on a bed, obviously. We couldn’t watch him 24-7. Besides, maybe he sold the furniture before we started watching him. Let’s get out of here guys,” Mike said as he put up his gun too. “Lock the back door, Frank.”
Before he reached the car, Frank came towards him, waving a piece of notebook paper. “I found this on the counter.” Mike took it and read the scrawl next to the smiley face:
gone to greener pastures.
Four deputies, two cars, and a bunch of crooked politicians in bed with the drug cartels was a recipe for failure. “Good, he’s somebody else’s problem now,” Mike said. “Don, grab yourself some grub and patrol. Frank, you’re with me and Keith at the office.”
The drive back was silent, with the eight-hundred-pound gorilla named “Leaker” in the backseat with Frank. Maybe this was why the County Board of Supervisors hired him, to chase shadows and ghosts. Because fighting crime in Dayton County seemed to be a euphemism for ‘look busy.” Mayor Burt Owel had told him he was working too hard. Was he the leak? Maybe it was Dayton County D.A. Chris Jankel.
“It wasn’t me who tipped him off,” Frank said las he lingered outside with Mike. Keith had unlocked the door and gone straight to the bathroom.
Mike surveyed the sorry state of the Sheriff’s office parking lot. It needed weeding, repaving … pot-hole filling. “Who’s first on your list of suspects?”
Frank leaned against the car. “It wasn’t Donnie, if that’s what you’re thinking.
Mike shook his head, no. “Don’s too dense to be a stoolie. No, it has to be someone who works at the courthouse, and knew the warrant was going to be signed.”
“I wonder what else they’re telling people about,” Frank said. “A leak could get us killed. Redding might have been waiting for us with an army inside.”
“I hear you, Frank. Watch what you say to Ellen. Wives can get chatty waiting in line at the grocery store. Confidentiality is crucial.”
“Will do. You comin’ in?”
“Naw, I’m going home to grab some sleep. I’ll take the graveyard tonight. Give Keith and Don a head’s up.”
***
Stationed in the Dairy Queen parking lot, nursing an Oreo blizzard, Mike waited for the King County D.A. to call. That Lawrence Clay’s text specifically said he wanted to keep the communication private spoke volumes. Even if the public suspected a connection between the deaths of the judge and now the jailer, Clay seemed determined to maintain the fiction of a coincidence. The question wasn’t really if they were connected so much as which cast of case characters was responsible. But why would Clay think he knew anything about their rogue’s gallery?
“I knew judge Hirschel well, so naturally, I want to follow the investigation. After four months, I figured you might at least have a lead.”
“With all due respect, Mr. Clay, I can’t discuss an on-going investigation. Contact Chris Jankel. I have no control over what he tells you.”
“I did talk to him. He said the case was almost cold. But you and I know there’s always unofficial facts. Tentative suspects. Or people of interest? Maybe I can help you solve your case in the process of solving ours. Share notes. That sort of thing. Off the record and confidential of course.”
When a D.A. sounds chummy, it’s time to man the barricades. If the key to solving Hirschel’s murder really did depend on Clay’s involvement in some case irregularity, he didn’t want to be part of a cover-up. “Give me a for instance, Mr. Clay.”
“For instance, did you know Hirschel had a mistress? Angela Anjou. A nice, middle-aged shiksa in Olympia. He met her at a conference when he was in his thirties. She was a twenty-something waitress. He bought a B&B as an investment, and hired her to run it.”
“And you think she murdered her golden goose?”
“No, not her. But they had a son, Paul. I think you should add him to your list of maybes. He only found out he was Hirschel’s kid when Mrs. Hirschel died.”
It sounded like more than BS, but less than irrelevant information. “I’ll check into it, Clay, but how would Bobby figure into the jailer’s death?”
“Paul was arrested on a DUI and spent a week in our county jail. “
“Did you prosecute?”
“No, I called Hirschel and he got Paul off the hook with a call to the traffic court judge. Professional courtesy. The kid was screwed up over the whole thing and blames Hirschel for breaking his mother’s heart. Maybe.”
The tip smelled like red herring. The kid might have been shocked he was a bastard of a sitting judge, but he didn’t grow up in poverty. More than likely, he had a college fund somewhere, and he and mom were probably named in the will. That would account for the icy reception Hizz Honor’s heirs gave the court personnel. He damn sure wouldn’t kill a father he never knew or a jailer. Or a compliant D.A. in the crosshairs.
“Thanks for the info, but I don’t have anything I haven’t shared with my bosses,” Mike said. “I can tell you Hirschel was dead before he went into the water. Do you know if he had problems? Health? Addiction?”
“I never saw any evidence of that.”
It was a typical lawyer’s answer. “Well, if you think of anything, give me a call. Right now, it looks like our perp is a disgruntled criminal … maybe a disgruntled employee. One capable of murder.”
“It could be anyone who ever appeared before Hirschel or worked for him.” There was forlorn resignation in Clay’s voice.
“Check your memory, Clay. Check your records and Hirschel’s case notes. See if there’s that one case that might jump out at you.”
“I’ll get back to you on that,” Clay said.
The conversation sent Mike to the internet. He typed in: notorious court cases in King County Washington last five years. Nada. Then: Judge Hirschel’s most notorious cases. Two criminal cases popped up, but they were over twenty years old. Plea bargained cases weren’t listed, of course.
“Kevin’s the key,” Mike told Keith when the met up at Carrie’s back booth. “I’m not saying strong arm him, but let him know his options in case he thinks he might be on the perp’s list. A little family leverage wouldn’t hurt none, too.”
“He did call me first,” Keith said with a shrug. “That’s a sign, I think.”
“When’s the next family get-together? You got a birthday anytime soon?”
“Not me, but Peggy turns forty-five in a few weeks …”
“I’m not lookin’ to jam him up, Keith. If we get some solid info we may be able to save Clay’s life. Maybe his, too. Tell him that.”
***
All small towns are the same. They suffer from shrinking tax bases and shrinking populations. The old are dying and the young are bored. They need home-care nurses but not teachers. Danville. Greenville. Charlesville. Mike had seen them wither and disappear in Kansas. Eventually, the counties started laying off the newest employees and convinced the older ones to stay to postpone the pension payouts. Annie urged him to apply for any job available or return to the mechanics bay at the Wichita Ford dealership.
“Nobody’s going to hire a rookie like me,” he’d insisted. “Three years’ experience, and go from Deputy to Sheriff? It ain’t gonna happen.”
“You’re a cop, so cop, Mike. You can do it anywhere in any color uniform. Blue, green or khaki.”
The Dayton County Board of Supervisors agreed with her. Why? Because they equated inexperience and desperation with a willingness to ignore the drug trade? As the days passed after the failed warrant search, it seemed they were right.
“How do you like Dayton Bay?’ he asked Annie two weeks later.
“It’s greyer than Kansas and it has more mountains and trees, but Mama said coastal areas won’t go out of business.”
“Okay, but do you like it here?”
“You want to move. Okay, what’s happened, Mike?”
“I just got thousand-dollar a year performance raise. Why?”
“Because they love you. I want a baby. We’re staying.”
It sounded fine to her, but he posted his resume with Linkdin after she went to bed.
Corruption is a funny thing. It doesn’t start with a dirty guy in a dirty trench coat offering a bribe in an alley. It starts with finding a mark who needs money, not for a new car but to make ends meet so he can afford a kid or two, then braces, a prom dress, and then a college fund. It’s all for family, the guy tells himself. Maybe that’s the way it started for Hirschel. No verbal agreements, just tacit understanding that law enforcement and the court system are businesses like any other.
“Kevin and Sarah are driving up for Peggy’s birthday on the twenty-first. We’re having dinner at the Blue Crab. You’re invited.” Keith sounded spur-of-the-moment casual.
“That was quick,” Mike said with a nod.
Keith followed him into his office and closed the door. “Kevin’s nervous. The courthouse was locked down today. Suspicious package in the mail room. They thought it was a bomb.”
“For a thousand more a year, they want me to save lives without blowing the whistle on anyone. It’s impossible, Keith. You know that.” He could see Frank and Don, coffee cups from Carrie’s in hand, through the window. Frank flipped a coin, and Don got the keys to the squad car. He’d lost. “Why don’t you tell me what’s really going on, Keith. A judge and a jailer have been murdered, and now bomb scares? They screwed somebody and they were all in on it. Who’s the shattered soul willing to die to get justice?”
“It’s not that easy.” Keith said. “Maybe in places like Kansas it is. But here … You’re young enough to start over, but guys like me and Kevin, Frank and Don, we’re close to retirement. Without our pensions, what have we got to show for thirty-five years of public service?”
Mike went to the Keurig Annie gave him for Christmas. Making coffee by the cup was supposed to save the environment. Bullshit. All the little plastic pods would take billions of years to decompose when paper filters dissolved in twenty-four hours.
“I don’t know how these small communities are going to fund the pensions, but I do know it’s illegal to do it with drug money and a plea bargain racket.”
Keith kept his head down, staring through the tile into an abyss. “He’s my brother. I wish he hadn’t got caught up in this mess, but he has and I can’t help him. He’s a good husband, a good father…”
“But a lousy lawman. And there’s not a damn thing anybody can do to help him unless he’s willing to go to the DOJ.” Mike sank into his creaky swivel chair, feeling old as its leather. “Does Clay know he’s coming up here?”
“I don’t know. He was so shook up about the bomb scare, the dumb bastard.”
“I’m glad you said it and not me.”
“Can I get a cup of decaf?” Keith said.
“Sure, help yourself.” There was obviously more to the bomb threat, and Keith needed some time to spit it.
“It’s one of the nineteen. It’s got to be,” Keith said as he examined the light brown liquid in his mug.
Didn’t he know you can’t reuse a pod? Mike took the mug from his hands, and emptied it into the bar sink he’d had installed in the counter, and started over. “What’s the nineteen?”
“About ten years ago the State sent a bunch of social workers around to the schools to do a stranger-danger outreach. You know, telling the kids to be careful and how to report sexual abuse … that sort of thing. My two daughters got the lectures. It was mandatory. In King County there’s this Holden Middle School where nineteen men were arrested for in-home molestations … all of them poor white guys around thirty to forty-five …”
Mike handed Keith his coffee and three creamers. “Nineteen?” he said and quickly sat down to take notes. “What were the charges?”
“Felonies … rape, battery, molestation of minors under sixteen, over thirteen. You name it. The girls reported everything from indecent exposure to sodomy. There was no physical or forensics evidence, but it didn’t matter. None of the cases went to trial.”
Mike tried to steady his hand, but every sentence turned to scribble. “They all pleaded out?”
“All of them, eventually,” Keith said. “Kevin said they were all kept in solitary until ...” He wiped sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. “Clay told the men the girls passed their polygraphs and were facing twenty-to life. Pete Carrione told them their wives and girlfriends would be indicted as accessories, so they better take the plea.”
“Did any of them have real lawyers?” The stare he got from Keith gave him his answer. “And ADA Carrione was their public defender. Damn it! Didn’t the County get suspicious when Carrione was promoted?” Mike paused. “No, why would it. No trial, no paper trail.” Mike let out a sigh. “Well, we have nineteen suspects. It’s more than what I expected.”
“Not exactly. One guy committed suicide. Another is in prison for armed robbery. One guy was killed in a drinking and driving accident. One guy shot his daughter and is serving a life sentence.” Keith wiped his eyes. Tears this time. “The girls didn’t know once you fire a gun you can’t stop the bullet. They didn’t know about life-time registration and unemployment …”
“Or about what injustice does to the soul. Yeah, I get it. Thanks for not wanting to burden me with this…”
“Stop it, Mike! Please. I want it to be your problem. Damn Hirschel! Why did he have to die in our county? It’s like the cancer came here on purpose.”
Frank knocked softly, then cracked open the door. “If you want me on graveyard, I’ll have to get some sleep, Mike.”
“Yeah, go on. I’ll take swing. Keith you might as well go home.”
Frank gave him a sloppy salute, and Keith put his mug in the sink. “You want me to do anything, Mike?”
“Keep your mouth shut is all.”
Keith had called the debacle a cancer and he called it right. After ten years, there was no way to know if it had metastasized in other counties. Maybe in other states. All he knew is that he had fifteen victims who had families —maybe large ones. Even a conservative estimate of four each meant sixty possible perps. But at least he had a connection between the murders of Hirschel and the jailer, and an accurate list of those marked for death: the entire justice personnel of a King County court.
***
SEPTEMBER 21, 2018
Kevin Grover couldn’t be anybody but Keith’s brother. Same height, same wiry frame, and a mound of sandy-red hair and round blue eyes. All the Grovers liked their steaks medium rare and Thousand Island salad dressing. They reminded him of Annie’s family. Genetic signatures manifesting themselves in behavior. Annie and Peggy were already friends and Kevin’s Sarah immediately endeared herself to them. Annie made friends easily, he decided she could withstand another move. Springfield, Missouri had contacted him for an interview, and he sent an acceptance e-mail from the men’s room of the Blue Crab.
He’d hit ‘send’ only a second before Keith came looking for him, breathless and stammering. “We’ve got to get to the office, Mike. Frank says somebody took a shot at Lawrence Clay.”
“Alright. Take Annie home and drop Peggy and Sarah at your place. I’m taking Kevin with me. Get to the office as soon as you can. And lose the panic face! It ain’t us.”
“It must be serious,” Annie said as Mike kissed her good-bye.
“Nothing we can’t handle. It’s late anyway.” She was a good law enforcement wife. Calm. Collected. He might as well have been an auto mechanic. “It looks like you got out of town just in time,” he told Kevin as they drove the half mile to the Sheriff’s office. “You won’t be a suspect.”
Kevin got out of the car, and managed to get inside before collapsing in the nearest chair next to Frank’s desk.
“Damn, he’s jerking like a dying fish,” Frank whispered to Mike when he came out of the bathroom.
“Come in my office and tell me what’s going on, Frank.”
Frank followed him into the office, and Mike kept an eye on Kevin through open blinds. “The Seattle police chief called looking for you. Said Clay pulled up to a traffic light and somebody took a shot at him. Passenger side. Guess they wanted to send a message ‘cause he’s still alive. He says Clay wants to talk to you ASAP.”
“Keep Mr. Grover company. Try to calm him down.” Mike got Clay on the phone and heard the same story with the addition that Clay was scared, he needed to know everything about the Hirschel case pronto, and was Kevin there? “Yeah, Grover’s here. Sends his love. How soon can you drive up?”
“I was thinking you could drive down.”
“You’ve got more manpower then I do. I’ve got a county to take care of. Warrants to serve and all.”
He heard a disgusted sigh. “Okay. I’ll fly in. How close are you to the airport?”
“I’ll make sure a deputy is there to meet you.” He radioed Don, went to the door and waved Kevin in. “Before Clay and Carrione get here, tell me about that one case.”
Kevin smoked Pall Mall Light 100’s and said a beer would steady his nerves. Mike got him an ashtray and a cold one from the fridge under the counter, and closed the door before secretly turning on his cell phone recorder:
“Social Services brought in this fifteen-year old. Heather Poole. I’d picked her and her friends up once for drinking in the Redi-Mart parking lot. She said her step-father, Gerry O’Brien, had been raping her since she was three-years-old, but Gerry didn’t even know her mom until she was seven according to her mom and older sister. So, she changed her story. He started raping her when she was ten. Allegedly, he chased her around the house and she tried to fight him off, but he was too fast and strong. She flunked her polygraph, but Clay told him she passed. O’Brien kept saying it was impossible because he had a fucked-up leg from the Gulf War, and had the VA hospital papers and a Purple Heart to prove it. He said his wounds included PTSD and losing lymph glands and his testosterone count was so low, he had to take injections and that only brought him up to half normal levels. But Waxer wouldn’t let him have any of his meds, or see or talk to his wife.
After a week in solitary, Gerry was a mess. Clay had charged him with twenty-one counts of forcible rape, molestation and sodomy. But Gerry said he’d take his chances with the jury because he had so much evidence to prove he couldn’t rape anybody, including VA medical records that showed he couldn’t get it up, even for his wife.
Carrione told him that his evidence wasn’t worth squat because in sex crimes, the victim is always believed and her testimony alone is persuasive. Still, Gerry said no deal. He’d lost over forty pounds, and needed his meds bad. Clay got really pissed off, but Gerry held out until Carrione told him the D.A. had his wife in custody. And that his other step-daughter would probably be arrested too unless she corroborated Heather’s story.
Gerry accepted a plea, only on condition it was an Alford Plea. Clay said okay, because it would get the state off the hook for a malicious prosecution law suit based on insufficient evidence. Anyway, the terms were, he’d lose his voting and gun rights, registration as a sex offender for ten years, a psych evaluation and treatment if he was found deviant, and $4,500.00 in fees, fines, and incarceration reimbursement.
They took it to Ol’ Rubberstamp, but he didn’t want to sign off on an Alford. Corrione and Clay stumbled around trying to find a way to explain how a twenty-one felony count indictment was pared down to one count of inappropriate touching. Hirschel read over Clay’s notes on the case, and finally agreed to the plea bargain even though we all knew the guy was innocent. Hirschel didn’t even make Gerry allocute. Carrione told him to keep quiet because if he maintained his innocence on the record, Hirschel wouldn’t be able to sign off on the Alford. Hirschel sentenced Gerry to five months with time served, and eight weeks later we let him out.”
Kevin stopped talking. “I’m going to be sick.”
Mike slid the trashcan in front of him, and Kevin tossed up his steak and salad in three big heaves, followed by three deep sobs. “They tortured that poor bastard for five fucking months. Heather didn’t even show up for the sentencing hearing. She’d refused to testify in court the day they indicted Gerry. That’s why they couldn’t have a trial and Carrione never told him. Straight out lied to him.” He looked up at Mike. “How in God’s name could they do that to a guy who’d been to war and never even had a speeding ticket? Tell me, how could they have done that to him?”
“They, Kevin? Don’t you mean, we?” Mike went to the sink and filled Keith’s mug with water. “Drink this. Where is Gerry O’Brien now?”
“In Florida with his wife and other step-daughter. He left the state as soon as he paid up. Heather’s in Oregon, last I heard. We’ve kept tabs on the O’Briens. They’ve never left Avon Park even for vacation. He’s registered there, but his ten years is up in a few weeks, and he’ll come off the registry.”
“Were all the cases as bad as O’Brien’s? Keith said one of the men shot his accuser.”
“That would be the Colton case. O’Brien was able to get an outside evaluation, but Colton and the others were evaluated by the State and found to be deviant. They had to go through treatment and that tacked thousands of dollars onto their debt. Colton’s wife left him, and he lost everything. His business. His house. And you can’t get money owed to the government discharged in bankruptcy. The worst thing is, Heather refused to testify, but Colton’s daughter recanted in writing to Clay. I saw the letter. Nobody told Colton.”
Frank knocked, and opened the door. “Keith’s here, and Donnie’s on his way to get Clay.”
“Give me a minute.”
“Roger.”
“Kevin, you said the nineteen were all white, middle-aged and poor but what else did they have in common other than fitting the child-molester profile? Because none of this makes any sense.”
“If I tell you, I’m a dead man.” Kevin was calm at last. Resigned to reality, Annie would say.
“If you don’t tell me, The Nineteen are going to become an urban legend and you’re going to be dead anyway.”
“There’s nothing worse in law enforcement than disloyalty … except … Hirschel and Carrione and Clay are part of a group that wants to disarm people they think are dangerous. White supremacists … and anti-Semites. They wanted to figure out a way to legally disarm and track their whereabouts … sex crimes convictions, Mike. See, even if they do their time, serve their probation, and even go into treatment, they can’t legally own guns or leave the state until they fulfill all the terms of their plea agreements —and that means paying their fines and fees, plus interest. They’re all poor, you see. Nobody can ever pay the debt off because the interest accrues. The Courts own them, lock, stock, and barrel forever. That’s the secret.
All of the guys had Facebook accounts, and once they were arrested, everything about their lives became accessible … the arrest was the probable cause for search warrants for everything about them. Tax returns. Bank accounts. Even their wives and girlfriends lost their privacy. Gerry’s other step-daughter and her boyfriend too. But then, O’Brien paid up, and as soon as his probation was up, he could leave as long as he checked in with the state where he moved. And that state had to recognize the ten-year registration under full faith and credit, so O’Brien got his rights back.”
Kevin’s last words on tape: “O’Brien’s free. He’s the only one who got free and is still alive. Clay’s scared. We’re all scared.” Kevin drank the last of the water. “Sorry about your trashcan.”
“That’s okay. Take it to the bathroom and clean it up. There’s Lysol in the cabinet. One more thing, who paid O’Brien’s court fees?”
“Irene Schmidt. His mother. By credit card. She’s on Social Security.”
Frank was at the door as Kevin left. “Donnie called in from the airport. Clay can’t make it. The FBI was called in on the bomb threat, and he has to stick around. You want to see Keith?”
“Naw, tell him to take Kevin home with him. I’ll see them tomorrow.”
***
Long after Annie was asleep, Mike stayed awake thinking of O’Brien and feeling his guts twist in knots. Yet, he had to think about it all, from Hirschel’s water-bloated body to Kevin’s apology for the dirty trashcan. Maybe the FBI would get to the bottom of the swamp through investigating the bomb threat. Maybe Kevin would confess to the feds. Maybe Keith would come clean. Maybe somebody, anybody else. What was it his dad always said about maybe? Maybe monkeys would fly out of his ass and sing the Star Spangled Banner.
He felt Annie’s hand move up and down his inner thigh. “So, you’re finally home, big boy,” she whispered and rolled over to lay her cheek on his chest.
“Yeah, I’m home, but I ain’t feeing so big. I’m feeling like an ant about to be squashed between rolling boulders.”
She sat up and turned on the nightstand lamp. “Keith said there was a situation in Seattle. It’s about that damn Hirschel murder, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, and the bomb threat today that’s on the news …” He propped himself up on his pillow.
“They said it was a false alarm. Some stupid kids wann’abe terrorists.”
“Don’t believe everything you hear. Scare tactics get people just as dead as the real thing.” The sounded like fighting words. He changed tactics. “Do you love me lots and lots?’
Annie brushed his hair away from his eyes. “Gobs and gobs.”
“Would you love me less if you knew I was a coward?”
She paused as though weighing her answer. “Is this a trick question?”
“It’s a serious question.”
“It depends on what kind of coward. I wouldn’t want you selling out America to our enemies. I’d still love you, Mike, but I’d be pissed off.”
“Enough to turn me in?”
“Enough to nag you until you turned yourself in.” She pulled the blanket around her shoulders.
“It might mean I’d have to go back to being a mechanic.”
“Hooray! You’d make more money than you make as a sheriff.”
“And they say women aren’t practical. Ha! Do we have any cocoa?”
“I offer the man sex then good career advice, and he wants cocoa. What’s wrong with this guy?”
Mike grabbed her and held her close. “I love you, Miss Sassy-pants.” Could their marriage survive an O’Brien ordeal? Winter storms in Dayton Bay were wicked and scary, but Annie said they couldn’t compare to Kansas tornados; the rocks keep the water at bay, and the thunder and lightning is all fuss and feathers. But what about storms of people hate? What about war. What about a label that made you a leper among men? He began to rock her slowly in his arms, and felt tears tracking down his cheeks.
“Oh, Mike, what’s wrong? What have you done that’s so terrible, Dear?”
“It’s not what I’ve done, it’s what I know. In the down stair’s den, I’ve got evidence of this ghastly crime, and it’s like having a rabid dog on a leash. All of sudden, I’ve got custody of the damn thing way up here in Dayton Bay where I thought we’d live an unimportant life. I’m pissed because it’s not fair, but then I think of Gerry O’Brien and I realize I don’t know what unfair means.”
“Who’s Gerry O’Brien, Mike?”
“He’s an innocent man. Just an innocent man who’s putting the whole justice universe on trial.”
***
SEPTEMBER 22, 2018
Mike expected Irene’s Facebook page to be filed with recipes and cute kitty photos. After all, she had to be at least sixty if Gerry was forty-seven. But no, her friends were mostly tough-looking nationalists who lived in places like Poland, Romania, and had names like Olaf Cordescu that posted daily from groups like Justice Wolverines. Whatever happened to sweet grannies who looked like Mrs. Santa and baked pies for orphans? This ol’ broad posted photos of battleships and German flying aces. “You gotta love those Boomers,” Mike said to himself as he scrolled through her site. “Vivid imaginations.” A background check on Irene turned up no police records and no affiliations with white supremacists. He checked with the feds to see if the Justice Wolverines were known terrorist group, but found out they were rated as Known Harmless.
“You’re the second guy this week who’s called about Schmidt,” Greene County Sheriff’s Deputy Russel told hm over the phone. “Like I told Mr. Clay, we’ve kept an eye on her since Judge Hirschel’s death but the only time she leaves her house is to go to church, the Food Lion, and the mall. She’s never left the state unless she’s sneaked out by car or alien aircraft. But she’s got two cats and a dog somebody would have to take care of. If she’s a hit granny, I’m the king of Sweden. As for Waxer the jailer, how would she know he was going to a cabin in the pines? No, your perp’s a local.”
A tiny voice inside Mike said, “He’s right.” Hirschel and Waxer were both killed far from home, in out-of-the-way places where there were few people around, so whoever the murderer was, he had access to their leisure plans and itineraries and could move about quickly and without suspicion. Disabled Gerry and his elderly mother didn’t commit these crimes, but they might know who did. Policepeople had an information network, and convicted sex offenders did too. The Nineteen were probably the motive for the murder of Hirschel and Waxer, but who cared enough about them to find the means and opportunity to avenge them?
Leave it to Annie to cut to give him a new perspective. “If it was me, I’d concentrate on solving the murder in my own yard instead of trying to prevent a hypothetical,” she said as they ate pancakes and bacon. “You and Keith are going to get burned playing with Seattle fire.”
She stopped stirring her coffee. “Where would a judge get fentanyl anyway?” her eyes were wide with curiosity. “It’s not like you can buy drugs without knowing who’s selling.”
The Adelaide raid failure took on a new significance. He believed he was after a meth lab because a guy named Joe-Sean Monroe got popped with half a pound of crank there, but he tested positive for an opioid and cannabis, not speed, and there was no evidence of manufacture. So, if Monroe wasn’t a speed user, he might be a mule. What if the Adelaide house was just a local drug convenience store, and Redding just a clerk —who worked part time at the airport?
“What’re you looking for, Sheriff? Maybe I can save you some time.” Mr. Zimbel smoked a pipe and liked to pose as an old salt with the tourists.
“I need to see your log book for May. I’m trying to find out how Judge Hirschel arrived in Dayton Bay. The motel doesn’t have a car license for him on the registration card. Maybe he flew in?” Like the Harbor Master, Zimbel was required to keep records of flight plans and manifests of both commercial and private aircraft.
“He didn’t come in while I was here. Sam Redding would have been on duty after five o’clock,” he said as he pulled the log book from under the counter. “I’m gonna have to stop all night flights now that he’s gone.”
Mike scanned the March pages first. Keith said Hirschel only bought the boat a week before he died, and he certainly wouldn’t have paid out seventy-grand for merchandise sight unseen. He either made an earlier trip to Dayton Bay or Bill Cross got the boat down to Seattle for him to see. Funny that Jane Cross never mentioned Hirschel bought the Belle from her husband. Perhaps because the deal established a link between Judge Thomas and Judge Hirschel? “Did Redding say where he was going?”
Zimbel scratched his chin stubble. “He didn’t leave a forwarding address. Told me he was going to greener pastures. You can’t much greener than Washington, I say. They picked up Sam’s last check the Saturday before they skedaddled.”
“They who?” Mike said. He was into the April pages now, and still no entries for evening or night arrivals.
“Him and his friend. I guess they were friends. Big guy. He was driving a black SUV. Mazda, I think. Idaho plates. Remined me of the potato farmer on T.V. who’s always chasing the big spud.”
It wasn’t much to go on, but Redding’s log entry listed a plane from Star-Lite Charter arriving from Seattle at 8:00 p.m. Wednesday night with a guy named Carl Waters aboard. “Wonder what Redding did with that old red pick-up he got back from impound.”
“Beats me. Could’ve sold it again, I guess. You know how these young guys are around here. Always looking for trucks to take into the woods for fishin’ and huntin’. They beat the hell out of them, and buy another.”
Zimbel was talking too much. Sam Redding wasn’t the first guy he’d hired for the night shift, nor the first drifter to rent the house on Adelaide. He flipped through the June and July and August, noting that Redding last initialed the log was August 31st. He closed the log book. “Thanks, Mr. Zimbel.”
“Find what you were looking for, Sheriff?”
Mike glanced to his left. On the wall next to the counter were three stacked rows of small lockers. For a quarter, under the watchful eye of Zimbel and his temporary help, people could stash anything from cash to China White. “Well, at least I know Hirschel didn’t fly in.” He glanced to his right. Three gedunk machines: coke, candy, and self-serve lottery tickets. “Have a good day.”
Everybody in Dayton Bay could potentially make money off the drug trade. The hotel on Main Street had a safe to hide cash, the used car lot could buy and sell legal vehicles to haul product, mules could mingle with tourists, and Redding could take drug orders as easily as the Dairy Queen took order for hot dogs and shakes.
“What do you know about Sam Redding?” Mike asked Keith as he was looking over the M.E.’s report on Hirschel for the up-teenth time.
Keith looked up from the scheduling sheet where he was trying to be heroically fair about sharing the graveyard shift. “Only that he showed up about six months before you were hired. Why? You got a lead on him?”
“I’m just wondering how much he knew about Hirschel.”
“Not much, if we buy that Hirschel didn’t get to Dayton Bay until early May.
Maybe the Belle wasn’t a retirement dream but a business venture like his B & B. How much would a cartel pay a retired judge to mule their product?”
Keith said, “Holy shit, a ton of money!”
“Just an idea for your ears only. You watch the office, I’ll patrol.”
He drove to the Adelaide house, not expecting to find anything new, but to jog his memory. He’d parked his ’09 green Explorer half a block away from the house. He was still learning the country roads, and on his day off would drive around, stopping periodically to make notations on a paper map. He’d noted that this was a great place to surveil the road, the pine branches were low enough to make a car difficult to see, but not low enough to obstruct vision. From this vantage point, he had a clear view of the intersection, and the driveway that curved around to the back of the Adelaide house where there was a gravel parking area between it and the garage, wide enough for two vehicles, and to turn around.
Sam had come out of the back door in pajama bottoms and a t-shirt, stretched like he’d just gotten out of bed, and checked his watch. An old red pick-up truck pulled into the driveway, and drove to the back porch. The men went inside, and a few minutes later they emerged, Sam held a cup —most likely coffee, and the other guy carried a small black case abut the size of a kid’s backpack that put in the truck. He handed Sam what looked like a stack of bills, and Sam stuffed the money into his pajama pocket.
Mike called Keith, gave him a description of the truck, and said, “I’m tailing him. Get ready to roll. I think I just witnessed a drug deal.”
The three of them met up in the D.Q. parking lot, and Keith collared Joe-Sean Monroe with a half-pound of meth and two joints. He brought Redding in for questioning.
“Where do you know Monroe from?” Mike said. He offered Redding a cigarette.
“I sold him my truck. He paid me yesterday, but I couldn’t find the registration. The sign says no smoking.”
“We’re not arresting you for smoking tobacco. You won’t mind if we search our house to help you find that registration, will you?”
“Get a warrant and knock yourself out.”
“Are you related to Joe-Sean Monroe?” Frank said.
“He’s my cousin.”
“Do you know why your cousin tested positive for Oxy?” Mike said.
“’Cause he swallowed some?”
Frank leaned across the table, and glared at Sam. “Smart asses give me a pain in the butt.”
“Maybe Monroe can help you out with some Oxy,” Redding said, and Mike left the room to laugh.
Frank followed him out. “I hate funny guys. And guys who think they’re funny. What now Mike?”
“We cut him loose and get a warrant.”
Monroe tested positive for Oxy and weed alright, and D.A. Jankel had charged him with a laundry list of felonies, but he was a minor and was sent to a rehab facility in King County. As for the warrant? Jankel did everything but say no. “Where’s your probable cause, Sheriff? You thought you saw Monroe give Redding money, but you weren’t close enough to see that it was money, right? It’ll take a lot more to get a warrant from Judge Thomas.”
“Like what, a confession?”
That’s how the warrant chase began. Endless requests, endless hours of half-assed surveillance for the ‘lot more.’ End of story, except for Hirschel’s murder on Friday and the green pastures part on Monday.
He called Greenbaum on his cell phone. “I know it’s early,” he explained to his secretary. “I just have a question about Judge Hirschel. Yes, maybe you can answer it. Did the Judge have any physical ailments, or a recent injury that required pain medication?”
“No, but his wife did. Cancer.”
There’s pain and then there’s heartache. Loneliness. Guilt. Kids that might despise their father for a mistress they allegedly didn’t know about but probably did. Lots of older people needed help to sleep at night, and lots of opioid addictions began with prescriptions they found in a family member’s medicine chest. He went into the NCIC data base and typed in: Carl Waters Seattle Washington. Three hits. A twenty-three-year old arrested for DUI; a deceased twenty-five-year-old wanted for child support; and fifty-two-year-old wanted for drug possession. That Carl Waters could pass for sixty-eight. He left a message with Star-Lite Charter for the pilot of the May flight to call him. The rest of the morning, he’d do what his Dad said was the most important thing a man can do: think.
Scenario I: Hirschel is and addict and part of Dayton Bay drug running. He used Bill Waters’ identity, flew in on May second, picked up the drugs, and delivered then to Seattle, got back and died of an overdose, fell over the side tangled up in deck rope.
Scenario II: Hirschel isn’t part of Dayton Bay drug running, but was an addict and Redding sold him some laced Oxy. He OD’d, and fell over the side tangled in deck rope.
Scenario III: Hirschel is an addict and brought his wife’s prescription with him, OD’d accidentally or on purpose, and fell over the side tangled in deck rope.
Scenario IV: Hirschel is not an addict and was killed accidentally or on purpose. By Redding, one of The Nineteen for revenge, or by someone who wanted his money. If he had any.
The possibilities hadn’t changed in four months. He could put the case away in a shoe-box on the shelf because he’d never solve it unless he tackled the bigger case first. Like it or not, Seattle’s crap had floated up stream. He went into his contact list and stared at the Missouri phone number of Irene Schmidt. She and Gerry were the only way he could get the names of the Nineteen without going through Kevin or Clay, and they wouldn’t trust him unless he had something to trade for their cooperation.
Was he ready to go back to being a mechanic?
SEPTEMBER 17,2019
“Annie, we have to talk,” he said. She was standing at the sink washing fresh carrots for coleslaw salad. She wore a t-shirt, her gray cotton pants, and an apron she inherited from her Mama —the picture of bygone femininity. “I giving up being a cop.”
“Okay, Dear,” she said. “Should I start packing?” She got a knife from the second drawer of the undercounter drawers, a bowl from the second shelf of the cupboard, and quartered a cabbage.
“Aren’t you even going to ask why?”
“I know why. And if I’m wrong, you’ll let me know.”
He sat at the kitchen table. “What’s your why?”
She hunted around for the grater. Found it in the dishwasher she hadn’t emptied. “You can’t solve the Hirschel case and you’ve decided you’re a crappy Sheriff. So, we’re moving. Close?”
“Close enough to depress me. I wanted my reason to sound noble, but now I sound like a weenie.” She put the bowl, the cabbage chunks and the grater in front of him. “I can’t solve the Hirschel case without blowing the whistle on the other people involved,” he said flatly. “There’ll be a scandal and I’ll be in the middle of it. It’ll ruin our lives. No law enforcement agency will hire me, even to clean toilets. I’ll be an unemployable … unless … unless Irene Schmidt and Gerry O’Brien have mercy on me and why would they?”
Annie poured them some iced tea, and joined him at the table. “On the other hand, you’ll be famous, write a book and be on C-Span book TV. Maybe get a watch-dog job with the DOJ. Or Judicial Watch. Teach criminal justice classes.”
“Can I make love to you? You’re the only person I know who can make a tragedy sound like a good thing.”
She began scraping carrot chucks across the grater. “After hearing Kevin’s confession, I’d say you don’t know what tragedy is, Mike. Maybe you’ll get your turn when some young honey accuses you of rape. Maybe when you make a traffic stop on a moonlit night and she gets pissed off.”
There was that ‘maybe’ again. It was coiled up like a snake under his chair, waiting for him to decide what he was going to do. “I’ve got a job interview next Thursday. Green County, Missouri. Can you go with me? Irene Schmidt lives there.”
***
SEPTEMBER 27, 2018
Irene lived in a working-class neighborhood on Mt. Vernon Street, Springfield, Missouri. All neighbors should be as conscientious as she was. Her trashcans were inside the chain-link fence and cordoned off from her neatly trimmed yard by a white wooden fence. Two Dachshunds sounded the alarm when he stopped in front of the house and approached the porch. Irene called them in around the back door, then greeted him from behind the front screen door. “You Mike Reed?”
“Yes, Ma’am.” He took off his hat and handed her his badge. A wrinkly hand took it inside, and the door opened as she handed it back.
“C’mon in.” Once inside, he smelled chocolate-chip cookies and fresh coffee. “Gerry got in last night. He’s off the registry, you know. He can travel to see his mama any time he wants now.”
On the end table next to the sofa was a picture of a younger version of Irene with a plump balding man with a goat-tee. “Is this you and Mr. Schmidt?” he asked as he picked up the photograph.
“That’s our weddin’ picture. Whenever I get to feelin’ blue, I look at it and remember my Merle’s waitin’ for me on the other side.”
“That’s what my mama said when my daddy passed.”
“Here’s Gerry now.”
Mike looked up and saw a man, who looked almost as old as Irene and supported by a silver-topped carved wooden cane, hobbling over to the love seat. Mike stood and offered his hand. “Mr. O’Brien, I’m glad to meet you. Glad you could make it here on such short notice. I’m sort of killing two birds, as they say.”
“Mom said you’d applied to the sheriff’s department. Sit on down,” Gerry said as he eased himself down.
“I’ll come right to the point. I don’t know if you’ve heard any news out of Washington, but Judge Hirschel and jailer Waxer are dead. Murdered.”
Gerry and his Mother exchanged glances. “And you think I did it?” Gerry said.
“Good Lord, no.” He took out his cell phone. “The brother of Deputy Grover works for me in Dayton County, and he was visitin’ when Waxer got it. He confessed, Mr. O’Brien.” Mike started the recording and let it play. Irene came to Gerry’s side, and they sat on the love seat and listened without a word. Irene’s put her arm around her son’s shoulder, the both of them staring at the cell phone like they were watching a movie.
“Kevin doesn’t know I recorded him. Neither does Clay or Carrione, or Kevin’s brother. I want to turn it over to the DOJ in D.C. but … I wanted to ask you what you thought about that before I did it. There’ll be a scandal. You’ll have to testify. You all will. It’s been ten years for you. Longer or shorter for some of the others. I … I don’t know it you want to revisit the ordeal. Plain and simple. You’re the only jury that has a right to hear the case and pass judgment on these bastards. I’ve got a box of throw-away phones out in the car, and each one has a recording of Kevin’s confession.”
Irene was crying. Gerry was trying to comfort her as best he could with his own tears pouring over his cheeks.
“Is there any way you can put me in touch with the others? I can’t get their names without alerting King County, and I don’t want to do that. The bigger the net, the more fish we’ll catch. If that’s what you want to do. Judge Hirschel has a large estate. It’s going through probate but can’t be settled until his boat is sold and that ain’t gonna happen as long as the Sheriff’s department has it in impound as a crime scene.” Mike handed Gerry a business card. “I’ve talked to a lawyer at the Washington Chapter of the Innocence Roundtable people. They’ll take your case, Mr. O’Brien.”
Gerry took the card and let Irene read it. “Do you think there’ a chance they’ll take the other cases, too? Some of the guys owe so much money, they’ll never be able to pay up,” he said.
“I guarantee it. Maybe between all of you, I can contact them all eventually. Can you give me a few names?”
“I can,” Irene said. She went to a small desk behind the sofa, and brought him an address book. “The names are marked with red stars. The ones that are marked out …I’ve paid their debt …”
“You paid? For how many?” Mike said as flipped the pages he saw bright red asterisks next to faded names.
“Four. Only four. I pay with a credit card and then they make payments. Me and Gerry make payments too, so we can help the next one.”
He thumbed through Irene’s address book to the “Rs”. No Sam Redding. “Is this a complete list, Mrs. Schmidt?”
“No. I couldn’t track them all down.”
“I don’t see the name Redding. Is that name familiar to you?
“I don’t know anyone by that name.”
“What about you, Gerry?”
“I never met anyone by that name, either.”
They were lawyer-like answers. “If you remember, call me …” Ten years was a long time to comply with the terms of injustice. For poor people, anything costing more than a hundred dollars was devastating. Indebtedness to the government wad a financial death sentence. He and Gerry shook hands. Was it enough for him to hear one of the perpetrators acknowledge guilt and regret? “Is there anything I can do to help you or the other fourteen?” he asked. “Maybe we could all meet up …” He had told himself he had no expectations, not even of gratitude, but it wasn’t true. “I’ll be heading home is a few days, so think about it. Plans can always change. Personally, I hope you sue the hell out of every one of the bastards.”
They walked to Mike’s rental in silence. He hoped Gerry would give him an indication of what he was thinking, but heard Annie’s vice of reason inside his head: Give it up; people need time.
“People do what they think they have to do,” Gerry said. It sounded like he was talking to himself, justifying the information he doled out. “There’s a guy, Bob Hamilton. Lives at 1013 Larkspur in the Green Pastures subdivision. He knows Sam Redding.”
It was his one and only shot at solving the Hirschel case, but he couldn’t tell anyone about it or he’d never cop again. He’d spend the rest of his life in a mechanic’s bay changing oil and rotating tires, thanks to the Grover brothers dumping their garbage in his front yard. “Thanks, Gerry. I hope I’m wrong about him.”
Address book in hand, he went back to the Extended Stay Hotel where Annie was waiting. “How’d it go?” she asked.
“I’ll be extending our stay a few more days. I’ve got an appointment with the FBI. Any news from Seattle?”
“No more murders, yet. If that’s what you mean. What about the O’Briens?”
“It’s a lot to process. I’ve got to remember they’re going to need time. You remind me, okay?”
“I can reheat the KFC. And I bought some Coke and a beer. Mr. Greenbaum’s called you twice. He wants to know when the Northern Belle can be put on the market. I told him it was still in impound but he wants to talk to you. Peggy called. She and Keith got a rescue dog from the pound. They named it Fritz.”
“I’ll call Greenbaum. I love you.” The first call, however, was to Hamilton, but before he could get an outside line, there was a knock at the door.
“Are you Mike Reed?” A middle-aged guy in a gray suit was holding a photo and comparing it to the guy in front of him.
“Who wants to know?”
The guy held up a badge and I.D. case. “Agent Marion Sullivan. FBI. May I come in, Sheriff?”
“Okay.” It was odd. Annie came out of the kitchenette, and immediately turned around and went back in. “Is this official business. I’ve got an appointment with your office day after tomorrow.”
“You met with Gerry O’Brien today. I thought there might be a connection between your meeting with him and your meeting with the bureau.”
Mike got a beer from the refrigerator under the TV, and sat at the round table in front of the window. “What kind of connection? Is O’Brien under surveillance?”
Sullivan sat at the table. “We got a call from Lawrence Clay about possible suspects in the courthouse bomb threat case. O’Brien’s on the list.”
“Interesting coincidence, isn’t it? Why would Clay suspect him?”
“Can I get one of those beers?’
“Only if you stop playing games.”
Sullivan helped himself and came back to the table. “I interviewed Clay and Carrione and right away I knew they had a reason to be scared shitless. O’Brien was the first and only guy to pay off his court fees, and didn’t have a lawyer. When Schmidt paid off Gunther Siles’ fees, Clay was dumbfounded. Then she paid off Xavier Ramirez’s account. Where would a poor old hillbilly like her get that kind of money?”
“I asked myself the same question,” Mike said. “But the answer is always the same in cases like that. Laundered money. I can understand why the families went through an intermediary like Schmidt, though. They don’t want people like you showing up on their doorstep. Can you blame them? They’ve paid their debt to society, but people like Clay get pissed off. He won’t let them be free.”
“That’s not fair, Reed. Clay’s got a right to be scared after a judge and a jailer get killed.”
Mike shrugged. “You’re on their doorstep, aren’t you?”
“True. But I haven’t contacted any of these people and I don’t intend to intrude any more than I have to. That’s why I’m asking you why you went there and not them.”
Maybe Sullivan thought Gerry and his mother would lie if he asked. Or maybe he didn’t want them to know Clay had provided the feds with “probable cause” to surveil them —an him. “I’m looking for a POI named Sam Redding in connection with the Hirschel case. Kevin Grover told me I might find him in Springfield through Schmidt, so I figured while I’m here for a job interview, I’d kill two birds. I didn’t know Gerry was going to be there. That’s all I know.”
“Do they know where Redding is?”
“They’ve never met him.”
Sullivan put his business card on the table. “If you learn anything, give me a call. Thanks for the beer.” He started for the door, then stopped. “One more thing, we’re on the same side despite what you hear on the news. Whatever axe this bomber thinks he has to grind, he’s gotta be stopped before he kills somebody.”
Somebody? “I’ll keep you in the loop, Agent Sullivan. But stop following me. I don’t like it and you’re going to blow my investigation.”
Even if his phone wasn’t being tapped, Irene Schmidt’s phone was, and her house was under surveillance. He needed to warn Gerry but a feeling of dread and entrapment engulfed him. He hadn’t done anything illegal, yet he felt hunted. He had to consider every action how his every word would appear to the all-seeing presence of the government. He’d have to think and speak in code, encrypt his opinions, camouflage his intentions. “Same side, my ass.” He put Schmidt’s address book in his pocket, and drove back to Mt. Vernon Ave.
“Sorry to come uninvited, but I need to return the address book to Gerry,” he said to Irene at the door, and motioned Gerry out to the porch. “The FBI visited me, and you and yours are being watched. Clay named all fourteen of you as suspects in the bombing threat. Be careful.”
Gerry scanned the yard, and took off his baseball cap, holding it to his face as he spoke. “You could be next and they’re not going to be pleased at you warning their pigeons.”
“I’m already next. If they ask, tell them the truth. I returned your address book.” He handed the little red book to him. “I don’t like fellow law people spying on me without telling me beforehand, and I don’t like questions about my private conversations. I’m not going to make trouble for you, Gerry. I’m going home tomorrow and if you want to talk to me, use a disposable phone. That recording I gave you? Make copies. In fact, you ought to post it on U-tube.”
Mike saw a smile creep over Gerry’s face. “The FBI will ask how I got the confession.”
“Two words: Fifth Amendment. Dummy up and call the Innocence Roundtable. Let Kevin explain. I have to go.”
***
“Gerry says you hail from Washington, Sheriff. You’re asking after Sam Redding, is that right?” Bob Hamilton was one of those tall, slim, sleek lookin’ fellas who wore his hair slicked back with styling gel. He didn’t look like he’d have any problem buying his freedom from the government.
“I just want to ask him who tipped him off about the search warrant I tried to serve him. It took me months to get it, and he disappeared on me. Said he was coming here.”
“Sure, come ‘round the back.”
Bob led him along the side of the house to a backyard patio. Waiting there was a man in a wheelchair, sitting at a card table. On it was a checker-board, an ashtray, and three tall glasses of what looked like iced-tea. “Meet Sam Redding,” Bob said. “Sam, this here’s Sheriff Reed all the way from Dayton Bay.” Mike sat on a striped canvas backed swing, letting Bob have one of the metal folding chairs. “He’s the guy who recorded Kevin Grover’s sob story.”
Whoever Dayton Bay’s airport clerk was, he wasn’t Sam Redding. “Were you a victim of identity theft?” Mike asked.
“I was lucky, in a way, Sheriff. I had an accident at a lumber yard where I was working. Got a boatload of cash in a settlement and bought this place. I paid off Bob’s costs and had Uncle Sam hire Bob-o-Link here, to take care of me. Of course, he still had to register and couldn’t live near kids … that burned my ass good, believe me. But, I found Green Pastures. And we operate a railroad, you might say. Some of our travelers need passports now and then. I rent my name out.”
“One of your travelers may have killed a judge. Another may have threatened to blow up a court house. Now the FBI is running around violating every provision of the Constitution to find him ... or them.” Mike saw Sam’s resemblance to Washington Sam as soon as the man began talking. Related for sure. “Letting someone pose as you, is downright stupid. That wheelchair isn’t going to protect you from prison. If your boy won’t talk to me, perhaps he’ll talk to the FBI. They’ll be here next, I guarantee it.” Redding’s eye twitched and he looked nervously at Bob. “Who gave Hirschel a hot Oxy?” Mike demanded.
Bob went inside and dragged the Adelaide house renter out by the collar. “I didn’t kill nobody!” the man said, and Bob shoved him into the folding chair.
“What’s your real name?” Mike said.
“Ramon Salcedo. People call me Cecil.”
“What are you to this piece of cow dung?” Mike said to Redding.
“He’s my brother-in-law,” Sam admitted.
“Illegal connection’s more like it. Spill it, Cecil.”
“I met this guy in Seattle who needs a guy to meet the mules at the airport, to make sure they dropped the shit. I didn’t know the Bill guy was a judge. He got off the plane and right away he starts talking about how he left his script at home. So, he says, he’s going to buy a few pills from the load he was carrying. I called my boss, and he says, okay. I take his money, he takes two pills, and I never saw him again. I swear. I didn’t know the oxy was laced with Apache.”
“But your boss knew. Who would that be?”
“Unh-unh … that I ain’t saying’. I ain’t gonna wind up dead.” Suddenly Cecil turned pale. “I ain’t getting no witness protection. I’ll get deported and wind up in a ditch with no hands and no head.”
Mike recognized terror when he saw it. “Okay, who tipped you off about the warrant? That you’re going to tell me if I have to beat it out of you.”
“Signora Cross. She said I should pack my stuff and get out of the house.”
“And the furniture?”
“What furniture? I sleep on the floor when a mule’s coming through. Other times, I sleep at the airport.”
“Tell me about the Belle …”
“I sail her down to Seattle for Senor Waters to see.”
Cecil was calmer now. Bob Hamilton had moved from his side to the third metal chair, and didn’t seem so menacing. He had the same guarded body language as Gerry, eyes staring at the ground, arms folded casually across his chest, bulging with tension. “Cecil, who else saw the Belle in Seattle when you showed her to Waters?” Mike said.
“La Signora Waters.”
“Describe her to me.”
“I don’t remember …”
“Young, old, black, white?”
“Middle-aged. White. Long silver hair. Thin. She wore red-rimmed sun glasses. White shorts. A T-shirt. Voted Seattle’s Best B & B.”
That explained why the family wanted to rid themselves of the Belle so quickly. Maybe there was something to Clay’s tip after all. He looked at Bob. “You own a black SUV?”
“Hirschel brought a load up from Seattle by plane. I was supposed to come to transfer the stuff to the car, and this idiot gave him a hot pill. He called me all hysterical and I rushed over to the airport, and Hirschel’s keeled over. Deader than shit. Zimbel called Riles, told him we were towing the boat out to open sea, and to say Hirschel signed the boat out at eleven. We staged the accident …”
“So, no one actually boarded the Belle?”
“She was just a prop. Something to tie Hirschel’s body to.”
“Do you know how Hirschel got in with the cartel? I mean, he wasn’t always dirty, was he? That you knew of before … before he got into the plea bargain business?”
Bob finally made eye contact and shifted in the chair, slowly, like it was painful to move. “Naw, I don’t have a clue. I never had no run-ins with the law before. I worked for a printer and we did some flyers for the Sheriff’s Department once in a while is all. I was never a rowdy kinda guy after I graduated high school. I never heard the name Hirschel until … well, you know.”
Criminals don’t tell you so minute details unless they want you to buy a bullshit story to cover up the real story. What were the odds that Hirschel just happened to bring up a load under an assumed name that one of the Nineteen just happened to be picking up? Astronomical. No, once people know a person in power is for sale, they can buy him. Hirschel wasn’t killed accidentally because joined the same drug cartel as Bob Hamilton. Bob Hamilton joined the drug cartel on purpose so he’d have a way to kill Hirschel. Bob’s name wasn’t in Irene’s address book because she didn’t pay off his court fees. Redding did.
“You’re gonna run into the law again if you keep runnin drugs, you know that, right? Especially when you’ve got idiots like Cecil battin’ for your team,” Mike warned. “He didn’t tell you about the note he left for me, I’ll bet. It said he was going to greener pastures.”
Cecil started to speak, but Sam socked him in the shoulder. “Shut-up, you.”
“Even if you took Cecil to rehab —yeah, I know an addict when I see one —he’d still be stupid, Bob,” Mike continued. “I told Gerry, and I’ll tell you. The FBI is checking out everybody who has a grudge against the court, and the Nineteen are in their investigation crosshairs. Clay still hates you and scared you’ll bring him down. Get one of Sam’s passports and take a vacation.”
“You’re not going to turn us in?” Cecil said. Sam socked him again.
“Hirschel reaped what he sowed,” Mike said. “Drugs are dangerous.”
That was undisputed truth. As for Waxer the jailer, it wasn’t his case to solve. He called Greenbaum on his way back to the hotel. “I’m sending deputy Grover a text to release the Northern Bell from impound. You can put her on the market whenever you want. As soon as you pay the impound fees. Roughly twenty-three hundred-dollars. And give the family my best.”
***
Annie had room service bring them tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner. “The way I figure it, gourmet food will only give s indigestion. Lawrence Clay has been calling here every twenty minutes since you left at ten. Now there’s a guy who’d benefit from social anxiety drugs. What a gruff son-of-a-bitch.”
It may have been a peasant meal but the staff had put the cart in front of the sliding windows that looked out over an English garden courtyard. The tableware reminded him of the kind they used on trains. Heavy silver. Funny how the little things made people feel catered to.
“Did Clay say what he wanted? This doesn’t taste like American cheese … you think they used Gouda?”
Annie went to her lap-top on the dresser, and gathered up sticky notes from the rim. “They all say the same thing. It’s important.” She answered the room phone. “Yes, hold on. … Mike, it’s Clay, will you talk to him, please?”
“Oh, alright.” Mike left the pleasantness of the view, and flopped on the bed. “Yeah?”
Clay: I’ve been trying to reach you for hours. Somebody took a shot art Carrione from a hundred-yards away. You know what means? Sniper training. Sullivan tells me you’re in Springfield and talked to Gerry O’Brien. Is that true?”
Mike: Sullivan told me you suspected him. I interviewed him, and I can tell you without a doubt he had nothing to do with Hirschel’s murder.”
Clay: I don’t give a damn about Hirschel’s murder! Carrione was almost killed! And O’Brien knows who did it.”
Mike: When did it happen?
Clay: This morning as he was coming to work. Somebody was on the overpass. I tell you, O’Brien was in the army. He knows snipers.
Mike: Does O’Brien have a motive?”
Clay: Don’t fuck with me Reed.
Mike: I’m out of my jurisdiction Clay, wha’dya want me to do?”
Clay: Give Sullivan probable cause to arrest him. Something he did or said —anything to let the FBI take him into custody. And if you can’t do that, just back off and let Sullivan do his job and keep your mouth shut. Somebody has to make him tell what he knows about the shit that’s happening up here. He knows plenty, too. Bastard thinks he can intimidate the law.
Mike: O’Brien doesn’t know squat. He get’s a disability check from uncle Sam and helps his aging mother. He can barely walk …
Clay: Just stay out of Sullivan’s way….
Mike: And if I don’t?
Clay: You’ll find yourself behind bars for obstructing justice. The feds don’t play games.
Mike heard the line go dead. He hung up the receiver and rolled over. Clay’s words were like implosion explosives detonating inside his head. The threat was not directed at him alone. It meant agony for Annie like it meant hell for the families of the Nineteen. He’d do anything to protect her from that. Clay had little sympathy from him after Kevin’s confession, but now the victims of injustice had become more than a tragedy. Heir cause had become a vendetta. Annie sat on the side of the bed, leaned over and caressed his cheek. “You’re a good wife, Annie,” he said. “You’ve never come right out and said I’m a lousy cop.”
“Because you’re not. You’re a great cop … you’d be great at anything you try.”
Her optimism was contagious. It’s one of the reasons he married her. “Oh, yeah, I’m a lousy cop. No good at politics, and that seems to be job one.”
She took his hand. “You’ll solve the Hirschel case, Mike. You need to give yourself a little time is all …”
“It’s solved.”
Her eyes brightened. “You know who killed the judge?”
He brought her hand to his lips. “Yep. Who, how, and why. But I can’t tell anyone. No, I won’t tell anyone. I can live with that, can you?”
“I don’t understand, Mike.”
“Clay just demanded that I let the federal boys to fuck over O’Brien the way he did or he’s going to have me arrested for obstruction.”
Her face drained white. “What?”
“O’Brien caved in once, why not a second time? All they have to do is pull him into the system again, and he’ll go down for all of it. Hirschel, Waxer, the bomb threat, the two warning shots to Clay and Carrione … they’ll make an example out of him and intimidate the rest of the Nineteen to leave them alone and disappear. At least that was the plan until I screwed it up.”
Annie called the front desk. “Hi, this is room 212. I’m going to put our lunch cart outside the door. You can come get it.” She maneuvered the cart to the hallway and closed the door. “Well, at least we know Clay doesn’t know about Kevin’s confession. It’s somewhat of an insurance policy, yeah?”
Mike noticed she often got busy when she thought about problems. It was like moving around was the key to her solutions. Had she already figured out the end game?
“Gerry doesn’t want to re-live his nightmare,” he explained. “None of them do. From what I gather, the less contact they have with one another, the safer they are. Plausible deniability. Hamilton runs drugs. Irene pays off the fees with the money he provides. Gerry probably does know snipers who’ll take shots at these guys. Eventually, they’ll all wind up dead. Carrione. Clay. Kevin. Whoever else is on their list.” He went to the refrigerator, pulled out a complimentary-sized bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label and a Coke Zero, and got two glasses.
“You’re ginning, Mike reed. I haven’t seen you smile like that in months.”
“I’ve made a decision, my lady love.” He handed her a mostly-coke drink, and kept the mostly-bourbon drink for himself.
“Does that decision mean we’re leaving the drizzle of Dayton Bay?”
“It means we’re going to choose a town, and move there so I can go back to being a grease monkey. In five years, I’ll have my own garage. Salut!”
“I’ll gladly drink to that,” Annie said. “What about Sullivan and O’Brien?”
Mike already had his cell-phone out and was thumbing numbers. “Mr. Hamilton, this is Sheriff Mike Reed. I know you know all about plea deals, but do you know the story of Sammy Gravano? He was a bodyguard for a gangster named John Gotti. He killed nineteen people and never spent a day in prison for it. You know why? Because he dropped a dime on Gotti and the Feds wanted his testimony more than they wanted justice for a bunch of thugs. Think about how badly they might want to hush up information that would bankrupt a city, and call into question every case adjudicated by the Washington state court system over the course of fifteen years. Give O’Brien a head’s up about use immunity. My best guesstimate, you’ve got about a forty-eight-hour window of opportunity.”
Clay was like an unfaithful husband. If he’d cheat on his wife, why not his mistress? The Nineteen weren’t the only people he’d fucked over. He’d turned he entire criminal justice system into one big killing machine. Killing lives, and rights, and dreams, and the souls of every poor bastard unlucky enough to cross paths with his shadow. There were no better insulated or powerful people in America than those in law enforcement. All the money in the world couldn’t compensate the Nineteen. Like Marie Stockton, they’d never be made whole. Until justice was done, the debt would never be paid. What is justice? Blood.
Annie put down her cell phone, and was busy again. She had opened their suitcases on the luggage stools, and was packing up their belongings. “We can get a flight out this evening. She glanced over at him. “I assume we’re going home so you can tidy up things in Dayton Bay.” She closed the suitcases and went to the window. “I like this town. What say we chose this one to raise our chillin’ in?”
***
DECEMBER 1, 2019
“I wish you’d stay on, Mike,” Keith said as they shared a last cup of morning coffee at Carrie’s. “If all the good people leave, what’s left except the crappy people?”
“You’re good people. And it’s your town,” Mike reminded him. “With Kevin and Sarah up here now, it’s up to you guys to make it or break it.”
“Are you really turning in your badge and hangin’ up your guns?”
“Well, you got the badge part right. It’s Missouri after all.”
Keith laughed. “I got’cha. It’s just that, whatever strings you pulled, it seems like you saved Kevin’s life. So far, anyway. It’s too bad about Clay and Carrione.”
Eventually, Mike knew, Keith would get around to the murders of two of Seattle’s most powerful legal eagles. “Yeah, too bad.” Keith wanted information. Maybe to sell, or bargain for a raise. Maybe just out of curiosity. Maybe out of unspoken dread that Kevin might still be on the waiting list for a sniper’s bullet. Maybe monkeys ... he heard his father say. He’d learned not to trust in maybes. Hamilton still wasn’t on law enforcement’s radar and Gerry O’Brien still hadn’t contacted the Innocence Roundtable. They might still be in the vigilante business.
When it came to criminal justice, he knew when to keep his mouth shut.
Jesse Brooks is a Kansas resident, currently attending classes at Full Sail University to attain his bachelor’s degree in creative writing. He is in the process of writing his first novel, working avidly to reach his goals. He is married to Savanah Brooks-Jennings and loves playing with his two dogs, Lukas & Sebastian. Today, Brooks is hard at work writing on a daily basis and building his portfolio. He is an avid gamer of both console and tabletop games and is always looking for that next creative spark. |
A Victim of Circumstance
Sebastian Murphy winced as the zip tie was tightened around his wrist binding him to a wooden chair. A cry escaped his mouth, muffled by silver tape. He pulled against his bonds but only succeeded in rubbing deep gashes into his wrist. The pain lit him on fire.
“I’m sorry about this,” His captor strode around to Sebastian’s front, reading the stolen name tag as he pinned it to his chest. “Murphy? Heh, I have a cousin named Murphy. He’s a foot doctor or something like that.”
Sebastian gripped the chair he was fastened to and glared at the thief.
“Don’t look at me like that,” The thief started buttoning up the shirt, fumbling as he went. “I’m not a bad guy alright. I’m just a victim of circumstance.” He finished the buttons and tucked the shirt in the slacks before adjusting the belt and securing his disguise.
“I got into this life real young,” He continued. “I shoplifted from the cornerstone by my house when I was ten and just kept going from there. I never did it for the thrill or anything. I’m not some adrenalin junkie, getting high off crime. We were poor and just needed to eat.” He paused to fall back into a chair, letting a heaviness roll off his shoulders.
“I eventually met a girl in the business, you know the story. Two kids fall in love and all that fairy tale stuff, except this was real. We got married and kept on conning and stealing, enough to make a life ya know.”
The thief leaned forward putting his face close to Sebastian’s, a smile tugging on his lip. “Then one day she tells me she was late. Me being an intelligent fella says, ‘late for what’ and she just smiles and it takes me longer than it should’ve to figure it out. Once we found out for sure we decided to go legit. That life ain’t no way to raise a kid man. I got a job with a locksmith and she started working one of them telemarketing gigs, so we were still kinda doing what we were good at.” The thief chuckled softly and leaned back in the chair. Sebastian sat still now. He tried to jump on the silence to speak but his words were still stifled.
The thief paid him no mind as he continued. “Later that year, we have the most beautiful baby girl. I mean, when I looked in that nursery and saw this tiny person that was half me, I lost it. I started crying right there, with my face pressed against the glass.” He stood with a purpose and made his way to a desk in the corner and picked up a mug that said proudly #1 Dad “I guess you got kids so you know how it is.”
He placed the mug down and turned, leaning on the desk. “Now she’s seven and were playing tag in the park, having a fun family day, when she just falls over. I think she tripped but she doesn’t get up. That fear you feel when something like that happens. Ain’t nothing like it. I pick her up and I’m saying, ‘baby open your eyes, please’ and she’s just lying there barely breathing.” The thief stops for a moment a takes a deep breath. Sebastian listens having given up the struggle.
“Next day in the hospital we get told she has Leukemia, and my heart just drops so fast it craks the linoleum. The doctor gives us treatment options and we pour everything into saving our little girl. Radiation, chemo, everything we can afford. We see this quack for six months trying to save our little girl and he looks us in the eye and tells us nothings working. I get mad and get in his face, I mean I want to tear this guy apart who’s telling me my little girl ain’t gonna live to her next birthday.” He wipes a tear from his face on the sleeve of his shirt and exhales.
“We wind up leaving and take her around to find something, anything, to hold onto. You know you’d do anything for your kids, right?” The thief starts pacing, his feet grinding along the stone floor of the surveillance room. “Then we find this guy who works the cancer ward at Montgomery General and he tells us there’s a new study for cancer patients that ain’t responding to treatments. It was like a miracle man. You should have seen the hope in my wife’s eyes when we sat in his office as he explains it to us. We sign some forms and tell our little princess that everything is going to be alright. That we found someone who can help.”
The thief moved to Sebastian, placing his hands on the bound man’s shoulders. He looks through Sebastian at something only he can see. “Last week I get a call saying she got denied. Insurance won’t cover it because it’s too experimental. I still have the scars on my hand from busting a hole in the kitchen wall. I found out its fifty thousand dollars to get her into the program. We managed to scrounge up two grand selling practically everything we own but we aint gonna make it. This is the only thing I can do to make sure my little girl can see her eighth birthday.” Sebastian sat still. He had stopped struggling awhile ago. Sebastian watched the man wipe his eyes and stand up placing the security guard hat atop his head.
“I know you have a lot of assumptions about me but don’t think I’m doing this because I want to. I can’t sit around and watch my kid die man. No parent can.”
Sebastian watched him walk out locking the door behind him. He turned his head to the mug on his desk, blinking moisture from his eyes. There was no point in breaking free tonight.
END
The Shadow
The trees groaned and squealed in protest as the wind assaulted them with a gust of arctic wind. Rain covered everything in sight, and lightning struck across the dreary midnight sky. This is the night John will never forget, this is the night that changed everything. Ding ding, the doorbell echoed throughout the entire house as the sound of the doorbell screamed to let John know of a visitor. “Hello, I’m sorry, this isn’t really a great ti…” He stopped speaking as he realized no one was there, the only evidence there ever had been a visitor was a medium sized box with dents on every corner. This thing is soaking wet, must not be anything too important he thought as he reached down to grab the mysterious package.
He sat the package on the kitchen table and turned to grab a knife from the wooden block on the counter; soon the sharp knife slid between the cardboard, separating the tape holding the beaten box together. The second the box opened John noticed a translucent but unmistakable gray mass as it began to pour down the edges of the box onto the marble counter. Panicking, John backed away and looked in fear at the box. The mass continued to pour off the counter and onto the floor. “What the fuck is this thing” John asked aloud to no one. The mass began to rise and form a vague outline, first something that resembled feet, legs, torso, arms, shoulders, and finally a head. It’s a shadow? John asked himself incredulously. The shadow inched closer towards John, who was frozen in fear as his mind tried to rationalize the absurd scene before him. The shadow walked even closer until its hand pressed against Johns chest. Finally coming to his senses, with a ragged breath John looked up at where the head should be and noticed that the holes where its eyes and mouth should be created tears in the figure of the shadow.
The second after John realized what he was seeing, the shadow disappeared into a thin, bone chilling mist, the only proof it had been there a wet beaten box on his table. John cautiously walked up and peered into the box to find a small piece of paper with a picture of his lost twin, James. Hurriedly, he grabbed the box and threw it into the fire. I must be losing it he thought to himself if I just go to bed I’ll wake up and everything will be back to normal. John scrambled up the stairs and slid between the sheets of his king-sized bed.
The next day started out like any other day, with a hot cup of coffee and some warm food to fill his stomach. The day was uneventful, bland even, until that night. John and his mother, father, and two sisters met at his house to watch a movie like every Friday night. After debating what they should watch, they finally settled on one of John’s favorite movies, a recent comedy movie that never failed to make him laugh. Something’s different this time, however, as nothing made him so much as crack a smile. A cold feeling fell over John as he sensed a foreign presence push its way into his mind. Startled, he looked around and noticed his shadow on the floor. The light above John usually cast a shadow onto the floor when he sat in this seat, his favorite seat, but what made his blood freeze was the fact that it seemed to be smiling at him. You didn’t forget about me, did you brother? The voice echoed in his mind, the voice of his brother.
The voice disappeared as quickly as it came, the bellowing laughter of John’s family filled the room, he blew off the voice and the jagged smile of the shadow as his mind playing tricks on him. It must be the lack of sleep lately, work has been hell he rationalized to himself, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t make himself smile. This isn’t funny he thought to himself I usually can’t stop laughing at this part, but it just isn’t funny right now. After his family left and he sat alone on the couch browsing the various programs available, the voice returned. Hey brother, you stayed here, after all. The same small town we always planned on leaving together, I guess you didn’t amount to anything after all. You’re thirty, John. By 30 you should have done something with yourself, a wife, or kids. You matter to only our parents, and even they would get over your death soon, like they did mine. The chilling cackle of his brother’s ghost assaulted his mind. You know what I would have done, John? I’d have done everything you can’t. I would have mattered, would have made a difference. John took his head in his hands as tears streaked down his face. The shadow of his brother repeated precisely all the doubts John himself had thought throughout his life.
The cycle continued for days: Shadow, negative emotions, and then alcohol. No matter what John did, the shadow came and whispered to him each negative thought he, himself had tried to bury in the depths of his mind. The cycle was finally broken when John was sitting on his porch drinking coffee and watching the neighborhood children ride skateboards. The three kids that live in the houses surrounding John showed off a display of ollies, kickflips, and more when all of a sudden, one fell and skinned his knee. After a moment of whining the boy got up and tried his kickflip again. This time, however, he nailed it and a smile split his face. In that very moment John realized that even though he may have failed himself, and became stuck where he is, there is always time to do better.
The End
He sat the package on the kitchen table and turned to grab a knife from the wooden block on the counter; soon the sharp knife slid between the cardboard, separating the tape holding the beaten box together. The second the box opened John noticed a translucent but unmistakable gray mass as it began to pour down the edges of the box onto the marble counter. Panicking, John backed away and looked in fear at the box. The mass continued to pour off the counter and onto the floor. “What the fuck is this thing” John asked aloud to no one. The mass began to rise and form a vague outline, first something that resembled feet, legs, torso, arms, shoulders, and finally a head. It’s a shadow? John asked himself incredulously. The shadow inched closer towards John, who was frozen in fear as his mind tried to rationalize the absurd scene before him. The shadow walked even closer until its hand pressed against Johns chest. Finally coming to his senses, with a ragged breath John looked up at where the head should be and noticed that the holes where its eyes and mouth should be created tears in the figure of the shadow.
The second after John realized what he was seeing, the shadow disappeared into a thin, bone chilling mist, the only proof it had been there a wet beaten box on his table. John cautiously walked up and peered into the box to find a small piece of paper with a picture of his lost twin, James. Hurriedly, he grabbed the box and threw it into the fire. I must be losing it he thought to himself if I just go to bed I’ll wake up and everything will be back to normal. John scrambled up the stairs and slid between the sheets of his king-sized bed.
The next day started out like any other day, with a hot cup of coffee and some warm food to fill his stomach. The day was uneventful, bland even, until that night. John and his mother, father, and two sisters met at his house to watch a movie like every Friday night. After debating what they should watch, they finally settled on one of John’s favorite movies, a recent comedy movie that never failed to make him laugh. Something’s different this time, however, as nothing made him so much as crack a smile. A cold feeling fell over John as he sensed a foreign presence push its way into his mind. Startled, he looked around and noticed his shadow on the floor. The light above John usually cast a shadow onto the floor when he sat in this seat, his favorite seat, but what made his blood freeze was the fact that it seemed to be smiling at him. You didn’t forget about me, did you brother? The voice echoed in his mind, the voice of his brother.
The voice disappeared as quickly as it came, the bellowing laughter of John’s family filled the room, he blew off the voice and the jagged smile of the shadow as his mind playing tricks on him. It must be the lack of sleep lately, work has been hell he rationalized to himself, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t make himself smile. This isn’t funny he thought to himself I usually can’t stop laughing at this part, but it just isn’t funny right now. After his family left and he sat alone on the couch browsing the various programs available, the voice returned. Hey brother, you stayed here, after all. The same small town we always planned on leaving together, I guess you didn’t amount to anything after all. You’re thirty, John. By 30 you should have done something with yourself, a wife, or kids. You matter to only our parents, and even they would get over your death soon, like they did mine. The chilling cackle of his brother’s ghost assaulted his mind. You know what I would have done, John? I’d have done everything you can’t. I would have mattered, would have made a difference. John took his head in his hands as tears streaked down his face. The shadow of his brother repeated precisely all the doubts John himself had thought throughout his life.
The cycle continued for days: Shadow, negative emotions, and then alcohol. No matter what John did, the shadow came and whispered to him each negative thought he, himself had tried to bury in the depths of his mind. The cycle was finally broken when John was sitting on his porch drinking coffee and watching the neighborhood children ride skateboards. The three kids that live in the houses surrounding John showed off a display of ollies, kickflips, and more when all of a sudden, one fell and skinned his knee. After a moment of whining the boy got up and tried his kickflip again. This time, however, he nailed it and a smile split his face. In that very moment John realized that even though he may have failed himself, and became stuck where he is, there is always time to do better.
The End
Dark Circle Girl
Julia stared at the clock.
A rap at the door would come, but until it did there was an infinity to endure, and within that infinity, when the red second hand would push forward a notch, each stop became a finite infinity, when Julia would concentrate on the red hand so hard she no longer heard the swell of voices rising, no longer saw Mrs. Johnson, legs crossed on her desk, peering over her paperback, scanning the class, did not see Mrs. Johnson stare at her, did not remember their talk a few months back, which Mrs. Johnson now thought of, squatting as she had in front of Julia’s desk in the empty room, her father’s tombstone in her mind as she placed a hand on Julia’s shoulder and whispered, You are brave, and that’s never easy, and it may never be easy, but you can do it, Julia’s head lowered, staring through the floor as Mrs. Johnson pushed her thoughts away for fear of crying in front of her student, no, never that, and here she was again, watching Julia watch the clock, wondering what Julia would be going home to, wondering what her life was like that made her quieter and quieter as January became June, no longer calling on the girl with questions. Julia no longer saw Ben sitting in front of her, Ben, who would steal looks and no-look toss her notes over his shoulder, random thoughts and silly doodles and Walk hone today? What’s for lunch? Study for test? none of which she answered, no, Ben was gone, Mrs. Johnson was gone, five minutes more, a finite time that, maybe, Julia thought, hoped, she could break, a clock unmoving, bending her will to this red second hand, Do not move forward, just stop, just stop, I don’t want school to end, I don’t want summer vacation, stop moving now, stop moving now, her hope swelling in that pause, that potential of infinity when the second hand lay still, her hope swelling and swelling that the hand would stop, that the red hand would never move, that it would remain forever in place, it was possible, she believed, she hoped, this impossibility, until it moved again, crushing Julia’s will once again, a will she forced herself to mount again and again, and then again yet.
Then the rap at the door, and Mrs. Powell walked in. Hello class, so nice to meet you all, I’ll be your teacher next year--
And again the clock had stopped for its infinite pause, the object again of an infinity of prayer, the girl’s hand clasped, her fingers pink to purple to white with strain, please God please God please God please
—you to bring in for the first of the year. A little icebreaker, right? Pass those back please. Who here knows what a diorama is? Handouts were coming towards her. I can tell you they’re a lot of fun, and really quickly, all you have to do is design a scene. Take a picture or a memory and make it real. Make it into a model. The handout has examples. Make a sculpture of your life, something fun you’ll do over the summer. Use your imagination. Be creative! And make sure they’re ready for the first day of school.
“Sooooooo, maybe,” Ben said as he handed her the papers, “I was thinking that you and I can work on these together?” Julia took a handout and passed on the rest. “What do you think?”
Julia studied her handout and shrugged. “I don't know. Maybe.”
“Sounds like a plan! We’ll talk about it soon, m’lady.”
The paper she held, Julia realized, was a miracle in the making, this diorama, her project for the summer, her means to escape, and when the bell rang, she was the last to leave, though not for the same reason she’d thought it would be before.
+++++++
She held the screen door until it closed, then slipped from her sneakers, laid her backpack on the couch, and glided to the darkened kitchen, the floor cool though her socks.
At the table with some stale crackers, she flew to and fro through the handout. This diorama project, she saw, would be her lifeline of distraction. She looked at the bottom of her sock, covered with dust got from the front door to the kitchen. Supplies wouldn’t be a problem, but where would she work? Somewhere quiet, somewhere by herself, not her room, not the attic, not the basement. At the thought of Justin’s room her heart raced, and she pushed the idea away. The tree house! she thought, and stood up. It was perfect. More than perfect, perfectly perfect! But. But but but, did she have the nerve to go there? And she’d need the shoeboxes in mom’s closet, and that thought turned her stomach. So. That first then.
“mom?” she said. A lump on the bed made a muffled grunt. “momma, I’ve got a summer project, for school, to work on, so I wanted to take some of your shoeboxes. If that’s all right.” The lump grunted again, thankfully without malice. Jula made her way to the closet as another, different grunt crept from the bed, dad on the left, she knew now, and mom on the right. She grabbed the two biggest boxes and stacked smaller ones in them. Leaving, her mother croaked about the light from the door, the light, the light, and her head and something else so close that goddamned door.
+++++++
The tree. The only tree in the yard. And the treehouse. I’m not afraid, yes you are, it may never be easy but there’s no ghost up there, you know, you’re safe up there, yes, I believe that, but not his ghost, his ghost isn’t there, but I’ll go anyway, I’ll pretend to be safe.
Brown grass, too early for late June, stood tall up against the chain link fence, the other side of which Ben was playing basketball in his yard with some other boys. Victor. Marty. Tim Sullivan. She fixed on the tree, its shade for the picnic table, shelter for rainy day games. She followed the rungs nailed to the trunk, stopping at the one carved with Justin’s name only to say, I see you ghost. The treehouse loomed above, nearly a part of the tree itself it was so camouflaged now. dad and Uncle Jack had spent a whole spring building it, ladders and brown bottles, no arguing then, except about sports, Julia safe nearby, dolls and dirt, the men spitting nails and hammering drinks.
Yes, I believe that.
Up eight rungs to the hole in the floor. Don’t think, don’t stop, don’t look at his name, don’t call on the ghost.
She popped through the hole in the floor and pulled herself in. There were leaves and dust and candy wrappers and other things Justin, looked like his bedroom in a way, posters, books, batting glove. These were his things, here or there, and he was neither, not any more, or both, if she let herself believe. It was quiet up here, too, the shouting of the boys next door diminished.
She stretched out on the floor and looked up at the ceiling, hands behind her head. When was the last time she’d been up here? Never without Justin, but that was her choice, not his. Mi casa Julia casa, that’s what he s—that was his saying. Maybe he was still here after all. He was, yes, and now she was swallowed by memories untouched for months, birthday cake fights and catching him in the bathroom, his cap backwards on her head, listening to him whisper to Stacey on the phone. She looked at her feet. She’d forgotten to put on her shoes.
The quiet settled round, the heat dimmed her eyes, and she fell asleep.
+++++++
Jesus, hamburger again?
dad sat down opposite Julia. His tie, faded and irregular, bore the stains of previous hamburger dinners, as did the kitchen table. mom stirred something at the stove, her nightgown as old and yellow as the linoleum.
Maybe when you stop avoiding home you can cook something you like, mom said. What’s your excuse today?
You. You’re my excuse.
Ot did you actually stop at the pharmacy for me?
No, and you know--
Well thanks, Doctor Asshole, but until you actually, you know, are a doctor--
—goddamned pills make you—
—through the day is all I—
—drooling zombie!
—me my pills!
mom threw the frying pan onto the table.. Saucy meat slopped over the rim, further staining the table.
Goddamn it! Where’s the salt?
If I don’t have my pills--
All right already! I’ll go after dinner! Can you shut up now?
You mean go to the bar.
Your poison ain’t that different from mine, sweetheart.
Don’t call me that! Ever! You have no right--
Says the woman living in her bathrobe.
You know what? Fuck you!
A word lashed into Julia’s mind: doomed. She put down the salt shaker she’d been holding out to dad.
You can go to the grocery store too while you’re out.
For what.
What do you think?
Get it yourself. You can drive. Or walk. Or stumble, whatever you want to call it.
Jesus Christ! Why don’t you just leave already? Just get out!
Julia looked at the salt shaker.
Or better yet, I’ll leave. I just figured I’d give you first option, since abandonment seems to be becoming your thing. Especially when someone needs her f--
dad threw the frying pan towards mom. It clattered off the wall above her, spraying meat and sauce on the stove and fridge and Julia’s hair. Almost before the pan hit the floor, dad shot up from his chair, look at the salt shaker, the slight curve it has, like a sculpture maybe, or a lamp, it was Grandma’s, how long ago did she die?, and in two steps took mom by the throat and pinned her to the fridge.
Don’t you ever, ever! Suggest that I was a bad father!
mom quit her job, then we moved here, perfect for a family of four, not big enough for three. dad slammed mom against the fridge again, then let her go and strode from the kitchen while mom slid down the fridge and Julia picked meat from her hair, the salt shaker, yes, more of a sculpture than lamp, and mom cried, then screamed I’m sorry! I’m sorry! towards a slamming front door while Julia put the salt shaker in her lap, concealed it with both hands.
+++++++
“Julia!”
Every inch of the shoe box surface was covered. Light yellow construction paper for the linoleum, pale blue for the walls. A couple of stacked matchboxes painted brown for a fridge. A doll set table in the middle, along with four chairs. Almost done.
“Julia! Hey!”
Four chairs, three dolls, two sitting, one not. Now the title. She took a black marker and wrote on the front edge: FAMILY TIME.
“Joooooooooooliaaaaaaaaa!”
It wasn’t right though, wasn’t accurate. She removed the three dolls from the box. Better, yes. Even perfect.
“Hey! I know you’re up there!”
Someone was calling her. She leaned out the window. Ben, on the ground below, smiling.
“M’lady!” he said, bowing low from the waist, arms posed theatrically. “Hey, aren’t you hot up there?”
“Not really.”
“Why don’t you come over for a while? We can shoot hops, and you can have something to drink.”
“What about Victor and them?”
He smiled. “Aren’t you a little lonely up there? Come on!”
Lonely. A word as foreign to Julia as diorama had been last week, a word that hit her just as hard, blunt. “I . . . I don’t think so.” Ben looked at her, his eyebrows expectant. “Maybe it is a little hot though.”
“My mom’ll be happy to see you too. She asks about you all the time.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” Ben said, his hands in his pockets. “Just come on! I’ll teach you how to play Donkey.”
Julia looked at the walls and the floor and all that Justin had left behind, all that was left to remember him by. “Okay.”
They scaled the chain link fence between her yard and Ben’s.
“You want a drink?”
“Sure.”
It was the first time she’d been in Ben’s yard, and it felt strange and familiar both. The sight of cut grass, bikes on the drive. Her own yard, once, but that was last summer, so long ago seeming that she couldn’t even say those thoughts were from her own memory. The familiarity, that felt good though. Normal. Ben’s yard felt like a place where she could relax. Drift on her own terms, not because she had to. Was this what normal was? What did she want as normal? What would Justin want? He would never have been in this spot. He was too confident for that, sure of what he wanted, mom and dad never argued around him, that wasn’t fair.
Ben had two glasses now. “M’lady,” he said, bowing again lightly, conscious of the glasses. “My mom says hi, says come over for dinner anytime.”
“Thanks.”
“What about tonight?”
“I’ve got a lot to do.”
“What, your summer project? You’ve still got more than two months. And if you come over tonight, you can help me with mine. You already promised.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“What are you making yours on anyway?”
“Summer vacation stuff. From last year.”
“I don’t know what I want to do. Maybe you have some good ideas? Maybe I can make mine about something we do.”
“What about your other friends?”
“They always do the same things. Plus, you and I share a backyard fence. You said you’d help, and, if you need it, I could help you too.”
Julia sipped her drink. It tasted good. “Okay.”
“What should we do first?”
“No skateboards or rock fights.”
“Rock fights?”
“I’ve seen you from up in the treehouse.”
“Okay, no rock fights. Cross my fart. Or is that too gross?”
“I had a big brother you know.” And she looked at Ben and forgot about the treehouse.
+++++++
Who’s your friend.
Julia looked up from her cereal.
mom turned on the faucet and began to wash her face. Your friend. The boy I saw you with in the backyard yesterday.
That’s just Ben.
Just Ben, huh? Well, men suck so stay away from him. God, can you find me the aspirin? Check the bathroom. Oh, and by the way, some bad news. Your dad’ll be gone for a few days. Your Aunt Corrine died last night. Decapitated in a car accident. Hah, almost sounds good, right? Get me a glass of water too. He has to go to the funeral. I’m too sick to go. So. There’s leftovers in the fridge. You know where everything is. At least it’ll be quiet around here for a few days. Why are you still here? Go get the aspirin already.
Julia left the kitchen. Aunt Corrine, decapitated? She remembered how excited she’d felt flying on an airplane by herself, down to Houston. She’d stayed with Aunt Corrine for two weeks, two weeks of doing what she’d wanted, mini golf and ice cream, coloring books and cartoons, no curfew, waffles for dinner. She’d forgotten about that trip. Now there would never be another.
mom wasn’t in the kitchen. Julia put the aspirin on the counter and headed to the treehouse.
+++++++
She woke up cold and sore. Where was she? In the night’s dark, the treehouse was another world.
Leaves rustled. The crickets had taken over. There was the new shoebox she’d been working on. There was the car, hot pink, there was the pencil telephone pole leaning over the windshield, the shoelace wire strung across the front of the car, there was the toilet paper roll tree, the car smashed against it, and there in the driver’s seat a doll, headless. Or it had been. The head was on top of the body, not by the tree, and not just as if she’d laid the head back on, but connected, as if whole, as if never removed. She knew she’d cut the doll’s head off, colored the neck stump red with marker, a red ring, put body behind wheel and head by tree. And the neck still showed red where she’d colored it, but now, with the head back in place never removed the red ring looked more like a drawn-in scarf. She pulled on the head to be sure. Maybe she hadn’t cut the head off. Maybe she’d only dreamt it. She’d been working on the diorama, it had been daylight still, yes, she was sure she’d cut the head off, she’d finished the diorama as much as she’d wanted to. Then came thoughts of Houston, wishing Aunt Corrine wasn’t dead, thoughts of promises and plans never to be realized. Then it got warm. That must’ve been when she’d fallen asleep. But what did that explain.
Now she was cold, and she didn’t have a pillow or a blanket. She’d have to go inside, and remember to bring them out for tomorrow night.
+++++++
Someone was shouting. Julia left her bed and walked to the living room. It was dad, on the couch, on the phone. She stood there until he threw the phone at the table. When finally he noticed her he flung himself back on the cushions.
Jesus!
“How come you’re here?”
I’m the parent, so you don’t get to ask that.
“I mean, I thought mom said you were going to Houston.”
Sure she did, because that’s what she wants.
“But I thought Aunt Corrine was . . . sick or something.”
She’s fine, wonderful bitch she is.
Julia headed to the kitchen. When she looked back dad was rubbing his scruff, staring at a stain on the carpet.
+++++++
She held the doll, stared at the neck, the red ring now pink and smeared. The ink was real. And, yes, the head was attached. Still, there was a thin line around the neck, wavy and irregular, a line right where she’d made the break with her scissor blade. Did she glue it back on? She couldn’t have. No way her glue would’ve worked so well. The answer was obvious. Aunt Corrine was still alive. Julia hadn’t cut the doll’s head off.
“Joooooooooilaaaaaaaa!”
Ben on his side of the fence, waving. “Come ohhhhhhhverrrrrr!”
But she knew. She’d cut the head off. She knew it, and she knew it, and here was proof against it. So she was wrong, somewhere. She climbed down from the treehouse.
It happened again as soon as she hopped the fence: that change in the air, like she was on another planet. And her house, covered in tree shade.
“I’ve got a new game for you. It’s called Hoops or Dare.”
“Hoops or Dare?”
“Yeah. If one of us makes a shot and the other misses, then instead of getting penalized like in Donkey you have to do some sort of challenge.”
“Like what kind?”
“Like we got to throw a bucket of water at Victor every time he tried to shoot until he finally got one in. Nothing embarrassing. I promise.”
Julia shrugged.
“Just try it, and if you don’t like it, we’ll do something else, okay?”
Ben shot first and missed. They traded misses for a while until Julia scored first from the free throw line. Ben smiled. “You gonna tell me what I have to do if I miss?”
“Of course not.”
“Not that I’m worried, I shoot a thousand of these every—” Ben’s shot clanged off the rim. “Fuck!” He looked at Julia and froze. “Sorry. You probably don’t swear, do you.”
“I’ve heard them all before.”
“Yeah, but do you swear? Have you ever said one before?” She shook her head. Ben gestured with his hands for her to continue.
Julia set herself, legs straight. “Um . . . fuck. Fuck.” She rolled the word in her mouth, tasted it, her cheeks hot, the word now an echo, a memory, an experience, a rung. She smiled, and Ben nodded.
“Fuck,” he said, smiling.
She wondered whether Ben ever thought of her when they weren’t together, what he was thinking now and why she was even wondering and what did it mean. Ben’s mom thought about her, or so he said, and maybe that made sense because that’s what Moms did, they thought about their kids, they cared for them. Ben stepped towards her and her heart thudded and she noticed another change, a field of flowers on this new planet, he looked so serious, but not, his smile had altered some, she could feel his smile, it wrapped her up, overwhelmed her, it was a relief, she didn’t fight it but let it roll.
“Are you all right?”
Julia cried then, oh such relief, a blessing after those long months of nothing, her head light, she let the tears come, something new, something foreign, a first taste of maybe not happiness but at least a release from sadness, unbearable, she’d felt this way forever it seemed, she couldn't remember anything else, what it felt like not to hurt. Justin was gone and mom and dad might as well be and no friends came over anymore, she had the treehouse now and Justin’s stuff, but that wasn’t enough no, not nearly, Justin was gone, now, gone gone gone and . . . What? Kindness. Ben was kind to her, and that was something, that was everything. That was what she felt. She was opening again.
“Can I ask you a question?” she said, wiping her cheeks on her arms.
Ben gripped the basketball, head down. “Sure.”
“Have you ever had a dream that seemed so real that when you woke up you thought it actually happened?”
“Oh.” He tucked the basketball under his arm. “I don’t think so?”
“I had a dream, I think, that my aunt died, and when I woke up I asked my dad about it, and he said it didn’t happen, that she was still alive. But i know that my mom told me about her funeral in Houston.”
“That’s probably something that could seem real in a dream. Dying I mean.”
“But it wasn’t like my normal dreams. When my mom told me that my aunt was dead, I know I was awake. But my dad says she’s not dead.”
“Maybe your dad’s lying to you.”
“Maybe.”
“If she’s still alive then you had to dream it, right?” Ben put a hand on her shoulder. Warm, even in the sun. He looked her in the eye. “It’ll be alright. I promise. I’ll help you.”
She didn’t know what to do, what to say, until he pulled her into his toothpick arms. She stayed stiff, unsure, didn’t notice his rabbit heartbeat when pressed up against him, asking herself instead, over and over, what’s wrong with me, what’s wrong with me?
+++++++
The kitchen faucet was running, and mom was on the floor, holding one hand with the other, crying. Blood seeped out between her fingers.
“mom?”
God, Julia, get me a towel or something.
Julia grabbed a dish towel, a 1956 calendar printed on it. mom stuck out her hand. A gash ran diagonal across her palm. The hand shook, sending blood in all directions, and when Julia touched the hand with the towel, mom hissed.
No no, you need to do it, put it on tight, I can’t, tight as you can.
She wrapped the towel around the hand and pulled it tight.
Oh dammit fuck!
mom’s fingertips went pink to purple to blue to white. Julia wrapped the towel around again, the towel yellow to red.
That should be good. Let me sit for a minute. Hold it on.
Julia cupped her hand around the towel--Ben, Ben, is this real Ben, what’s wrong with me, help me, help me, help
I just need to lie down now. Help me get to the couch.
Julia held mom’s hand as she stood, mom’s legs shaking worse than her hand, her free hand before her as if walking blind. She shuffled forward, the rushing water loud now in Julia’s head, slow, so slow, into the living room and onto the couch.
I need my pills.
Julia rushed back into the kitchen. Where were they? Water rushed over a knife and a cracked pill bottle and something else, a red chunk of something raw in the corner of the sink. There was blood everywhere, sink, counter, and floor, an actual pool of it. Is this real is this real. There was a gash on the side of the bottle, a slice that ended in a jagged dent. Her head swam. She put the bottle on the counter and gripped the edges of the sink. She closed her eyes, the faucet a waterfall, white dots drifting on her eyelids. Then it passed. She opened her eyes. The knife was still there, the pill bottle, the chunk of something red.
Pills! Fucking pills already!
mom was slumped into the couch, her hand limp beside her, as if she’d tried to throw it away.
Put them in my mouth. Five or six.
Julia tilted the bottle over mom’s mouth, a bird feeding her baby. Pills rattled out and Julia watched her mom chew and swallow.
Better. God, better already. Go get the first aid kit in the bathroom.
By the time Julia returned, mom was unconscious. Julia shook her. What’s wrong with her, what’s wrong with dad, what’s wrong with Aunt Corrine? Why did Justin die? Nothing. She took the towel off mom’s hand. It was red and wet and already crust had filled the slash. Blood seeped from the hole of missing flesh. Maybe mom is dreaming maybe I’m just a part of her dream. She spread vaseline over the cut, wrapped it in a bandage, laid the hand back by mom’s side. Now what?
+++++++
Julia stared out at Ben’s house. Which room was he in? Did his room look like Justin’s? What did Justin’s look like? She couldn’t remember. No more Justin. Not right now. Half an hour ago, mom was still knocked out on the sofa. She couldn’t find dad’s work number anywhere. A flashlight lay on the floor before her, the light cone shining on another box. She’d had an idea earlier, an intuition, a desire to make another diorama. The Aunt Corrine diorama sat in a corner, spent. Her aunt, her dreams, mom’s blood under her fingernails, already the new doll, the mom doll, borrowed from “Family Time,” was dressed in a one-piece ratty outfit, the painted rouge still faint on its cheeks, its hair disheveled. She took a screwdriver and gouged out a piece of plastic from the palm of a hand, left hand, left, a little surprised to see no blood. Red marker then to color in the cut, read all over, the hand almost covered, she got some on her own hands too, but that was fine. That was normal now.
How would this work? What had she done last time? She remembered thinking about Aunt Corrine, wishing her head had never been chopped off, and then there were images, vivid, past and future, playing in the park, driving down to Houston after graduation . . .
Would her life be better if mom had never hurt her hand? mom was alone, just like Julia, and how did mom feel about that? Was it worse to be alone when you were an adult? To have your son die and always need pills, was that worse than feeling alone? Maybe not worse, but both were bad, both had pain, Julia didn’t know, she might know someday when she had a life she couldn’t imagine, but to lose a son, to cut a hand, to not get out of bed for days, to not even want to eat, what was that like, what? Julia put a fingertip on the doll’s cut hand, please mom, get better, please, and she saw mom at the stove with a healthy hand, making dinner, fully dressed, and mom turned from the stove and whispered something into Julia’s ear, a secret, intimate and pure, mom smiling as she whispered, Julia could feel it, It’s so easy being brave, no, that wasn’t it, and now her head throbbed, her jaw muscles ached, her arm throbbed too, she could feel the doll’s hand warming under her finger, please mom please.
+++++++
“Jooooooollllll . . . “
She looked at the shoebox, the air fresh and cool. Ben’s voice was louder than normal. Was he down below? The scene in the box had mom in it still, the hand still covered in blood, but the shard of plastic she’d carved out to make the wound was back in its original place. She closed an eye and studied the doll’s hand. There were marks on it, definitely, the scratch was still visible, and there were fault lines where the hand had been gouged.
“Hold on!” she called. “I’m coming down!”
“Yes, m’lady.”
Julia jumped, landed on an old frisbee, shattered the black plastic.
“Did you sleep out here last night?”
“Maybe.”
“I wish I could sleep outside. My parents don’t trust me though.” Julia put her hands in her pockets. “What’s that on your nose? Is that blood? And on your shirt, too!”
Julia felt the stickiness above her lip. “I must’ve bumped it last night. I didn’t feel anything.”
“Come over for breakfast then. We have cereal and stuff. And you can clean up.”
“I have food inside.”
He nodded towards the tree. “You must be almost done up there.”
“I’m not ready to show it to anyone, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Now you’re making me nervous. I still haven’t started.” He looked at her, squinting. “I think tonight you should come over and we can start on mine. After a movie. And maybe popcorn too. I’ll even let m’lady pick the movie.”
Maybe I should run away. Maybe? “Okay, I’ll come over.” Ben smiled, and were his cheeks red? “I have to ask my mom first.” Or do I? Has anyone wondered where I was last night? “I’ll be back in a bit.”
“I’ll wait right here. Yep.”
“But I’m going to have something to eat. And clean up.”
“I don’t mind.”
“Okay, but promise me you won’t go into the treehouse.”
“Yep, yep. Promise.” He smiled, and she smiled back, and the warmth returned, now more familiar, now more intense. She thought about the doll hand, and then Ben’s hand, and how that felt. A daydream? Maybe, but a good one. Normal.
“See you in a bit.”
In the kitchen everything was like it had always been. She kicked her sneakers off to keep the sink from knowing she was coming, because otherwise it wouldn’t be real. But which real would be real, and which real did she want? The sink was empty. No knife, no blood, no chunk of something red. She stuck her head under the faucet, peered at the sink walls. Was that a spot of blood? Where was the towel, the bottle of pills? She looked at the floor. Not clean, but no sign of blood either. She looked at the bottom of her foot. Nothing. She looked for the bloody towel in the garbage, the laundry, underneath the sink, the bathroom, the front lawn even, nothing nothing nothing at all. What did it mean? And where was mom?
Julia opened the bedroom door, waited for her eyes to adjust. It would be there, the cut was real. But what if? On the bed, above the sleeping lump, it was still too dark, she had to risk some light, where was the hand, which one was it. She ran a finger over mom’s hand, tracing the wrinkles in the palm, wrinkles that seemed familiar, unblemished, uncut. mom rolled over and groaned.
Get out of here. I don’t want you here.
“I’m not dad,” Julia said.
mom rolled away, pulling the comforter with her. Julia shuffled across the carpet, that old trick again, close that door.
+++++++
“Joooooliaaaa, your diorama is so cooooooooliaaaaaa . . . “
Julia sprinted across the yard and took the rungs two by. Ben sat next to her boxes, legs crossed, back to her. “Let’s go swim at the poooooooliaaaa, don’t make me a f—”
“What are you doing?”
He spun around. “Oh man, busted.” He lowered his head, a slight smile. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you with my singing.” He looked at the shoeboxes. “I don’t know why you didn’t want me to see these, they’re better than I—”
“But you promised!”
“I know, I know, but then I thought you might’ve really wanted me to look, which is why you made me promise, because one of these might’ve been about—”
“No! Get out! Now!
“I’m sorry. Honest. Really. I didn’t—”
“I don’t care! Just go!”
Ben’s head sagged. He watched Julia scooping all her shoeboxes towards her. “Okay.” He walked past her, slow, keeping her distance, a magnet only allowed so close to the opposite pole, down the rungs, across the yard, head still down, jumped the fence, into his house.
Was it really so bad he’d looked? Should she have instead explained herself to him? She’d already talked to him about dreams. Make sure Ben didn’t get the wrong idea about them, like she was going to hurt herself. What if he told his parents? What if mom and dad found out? Or the police? The hair on her arms was up. Everything was ruined. She raised her leg to smash the shoebox, but stopped. What else did she have anymore other than her dioramas? Nothing, just like her, a long string of zeros. If she destroyed her dioramas, how would she know what was real? She would smash them all, soon, burn them even, and maybe the treehouse, and that would feel good, but for now, she had to know, had to find out one way or other what was real. Justin’s room. That might help her figure things out. If only she was brave enough.
+++++++
Julia walked the trees’s shadow trail back to her house. Justin’s room, Justin’s room, I can do it, into the kitchen, Justin’s room, Justin was real, I am real--
mom was in the living room, bent over the back of the couch, ratty nightgown bunched up around her waist, and dad behind her, slamming into her back, grunt, sweat, his eyes closed, his hands on her hips, mom looking into the couch with glassy eyes, her hands running the sides of the middle cushion, dad slapping away, then mom’s head jerked and she grunted, too, a triumph, a hand springing from the couch with a familiar orange bottle.
Hey sto-op that for a mi-inute. mom yanked at the cap.
Shuh huh, dad said.
His pants and shoes were in a pile on the floor. The bottle cap popped and pills flew out. mom dropped the bottle and shoved back against dad, sending him stuttering back, now exposed to Julia, red, swollen.
The cover popped. mom scrabbled at the couch to pluck up the pills with her vacuum hands, and pop them in her mouth, no scabs, no scars. Then dad slammed into her again, mom distracted by the search, dad then looking at Julia, looking right through her, his eyes greasy, vacant and blue, and Julia turned and ran from the house.
+++++++
No more Ben. She didn’t want to involve him in her problems. That was too much to ask. She wanted to be alone, like she’d been most of the time, live forever in the treehouse, never go back to mom and dad.
“Julia! Hey!”
Leave me alone! Wasn’t it obvious that was what she wanted? The fence rattled. Ben yelled, then a fleshy thud, a squish-snap, distinct, sonorous, then Ben yelled again, louder, and now he was crying. Ow! Ow ow ow ow ow! God, why now? Why did this have to happen?
Justin was real. Justin.
She wiped the tears from her cheeks. Fumbled down the rungs, Ben still crying, his mom by his side, crying along with him, the fence rattling and rattling, his father there, now, telling Ben softly he’d be okay. Julia’s heart pounded and her legs shook, her hands on the rung with Justin’s name while Ben’s father caressed Ben’s head, saying, it’s all right, it’s all right and Julia jumped down and turned and ran from it all.
+++++++
Julia stirred her cereal. The pepper mill stood alone in the center of the stained table.
Nice mess you made, mom said as she plodded in. Having boys sneak over in the dark? You think I don’t know what that’s about?
Couches and flying pills. Julia stared at the pepper mill.
Jesus F, now that kid’s got a broken arm, and it’s whose fault? God, my fucking head wants to explode! I can’t deal with this. Can’t! Your ass is punished. mom rubbed her head, her eyes slits. And you’ll find out just how bad when your father gets home. Just go outside. I can’t even look at you right now.
She’d already thought Ben’s broken arm was her fault, and now to hear mom say it too. She felt heavy, couldn’t even move. If she hadn’t yelled at Ben. If she told him the truth. If she’d been stronger.
But she could fix this. Couldn’t she?
Couldn’t she?
+++++++
She worked straight through the morning, despite the heat, the sweat, the outside world, the boys next door shooting hoops, Ben with a cast she tried to copy as best she could for her boy doll, breaking off its arm and patching it back together with a gluey wet paper cast. The boy doll lay by the fence she’d drawn on the side wall, the father doll kneeling over the boy, the mother doll standing by the fence, a black circle O drawn over the thin red prepackaged doll lips, one hand to her cheek and the other holding a raisin phone. This diorama wasn’t nearly as good as her first two, not nearly as thorough, but she didn’t think that mattered.
She ripped off wads of toilet paper and stuffed them up each of her nostrils. Each breath now nervous, gasping, knowing what would come, hot, hot and hopeful, this would work. She didn’t have any power. She couldn’t make this one right. It was a dream. You’re just a dream.
No. This would work. Watch and see. Even if she’d only imagined Ben breaking his arm, and this could make it better, then what did it matter?
Immediately her head pulsed, her stomach turned sour. It was going to work. There was nothing for it to work on that warm sensation when she brought Ben to mind, unbroken. Ben’s arms, and she was warm, and she felt like she was going to faint, dinner, movie, definitely not a date! not yet, Ben, Ben, light-headed now, focused on Ben, focused on his arm, m’arm m’lady, and she heard her face hit something.
+++++++
Blood glued her face to the floor. She touched her nose, the paper wads in her nostrils squishy. Her head felt awful. She never wanted to eat again.
Her blood had made its way to the base of the box, a patch on the bottom now rust brown. The inside looked clean. She picked up the Ben doll and ripped off the cast. The plastic arm was whole, a thin fracture line running around the circumference of the forearm. The dad doll still held its kneeling pose, but the mom doll’s black mouth was gone, the original smile there. She tugged at the arm. It was solid. It was whole.
Was that proof? She needed to see Ben. She would wait. And watch.
She scratched flecks of dried blood off her face. A car droned by. Justin. Would he have the courage to confront mom and dad? Would he believe he had the power to change reality, to make things whole, would he believe in the power to heal? Why couldn’t it have been her? Why did mom and dad ignore her? Was she worth less than him? She was alone. No friends, no relatives, no brother parent aunt, useless. Where was he? She looked at his driveway. Only one car there. Didn’t they have two? Ben’s dad probably worked, but what if they were on vacation? But how could they be on vacation if he had broken his arm two days ago? If he hadn’t broken his arm, if nothing had happened, they could be on vacation. They could’ve left last night, or this morning, any time. Did he break his arm? Did Aunt Corrine cut her hand, did mom get decapitated? Did Justin die or even ever live? A spider slid down a single string of web outside the window. What if she was the only person alive? If this was a dream, why did it hurt? It’s not brave to be easy. Who had said that? Her classmates at school had avoided her since December, a leper with a dead brother, chosen last for everything, games, meals, what was real?
It was time then. Justin’s room.
+++++++
Julia left skidprints in the dust. No one had been down this hallway in over half a year. Not since mom made Julia go get Justin’s suit.
It was a room full of dust and faded colors, but it was Justin’s. Clothes, books, baseball bat, all of it his. She smelled his pillow and a t-shirt and went through his drawers, tossing everything here and there—red shirts, notes written in floral cursive, socks and socks and deep in a sock a switchblade, and still she pulled all from the drawers and then the desk and the closet too, boxes and boxes of games, and under his bed dirty clothes and fast food wrappers, she pulled and pulled until there was no more.
Here, then, was Justin. Had been. Justin, Justin, dead, not dead, a ghost, no, real, at least once. But what if she was the dead one? What if she was a ghost or a dream? What if she was the one who didn’t belong?
And then she knew what she would do. Through the piles she scrapped and searched, there had to be stuff small enough, a pair of shorts with a drawstring and a t-shirt, yes, from when he was younger. She put the clothes on, but something was still missing. The ball cap! That went on too, backwards, just like always.
She was Justin now. She was he, and he was alive.
She sprinted through the house, looking for Mom and Dad.
What would they do? Hug him, kiss him, kindness, kind words, for him, for each other, loving things, words of warmth, hope, a family again, a child again, not an outcast. But the rooms were all empty. Someone had to be in the bedroom at least. The room was dark and an old fear seized her, followed by a voice: You’re Justin now, I am Justin. Not afraid. She flipped the light switch. The bed was empty, its comforter bunched up at the foot. She ran to the window. Two cars in the drive. She hadn’t checked the basement or the attic, though when she did they were the same—empty. That left only the backyard.
The fence, the yard, Ben’s yard, it all stood empty, unblemished. She couldn’t see or hear so much as a dog, a car, a mailman, a squirrel, a bird, a mosquito. She was. Alone.
Julia fell to the ground with her brother’s shorts and backwards cap, her blood-stained face, wanting only to cry, but she couldn’t because she was empty. She was someone else’s dream. Justin was gone again, faded back into shriveled invisible Julia, a ghost, a dreamer, a red second hand, a nobody, a nothing.
The treehouse, then. The diorama. The answer. Right over pain, life over not.
“Family Time” was still empty. She searched amongst her scattered things, the kitchen table, three chairs, the three dolls transformed back from Ben’s mom and dad and Ben to Justin’s mom and dad and Justin. With some quick marker work, she made the three dolls smile. She sat them at the table, she heard the laughter as Justin talked about his accident during his driving test, the scene was so real, a family once more, and Julia felt it, the loss, the loss of family, the loss of belonging, the loss of self. Then it was gone, and she was empty, she was at peace, right over pain, she was ready, it’s so easy to be brave when you don’t exist, and hours from now Ben would climb into the treehouse and scream and scream, he would understand eventually she thought, her body curled up around a box called “Family TIme,” protected, Justin, Mom, Dad, her hands almost touching, circled on the floor around a box, a life, a circle almost whole but for one flaw, she closed her eyes and pressed herself forward, her core, and she felt the blood flow from her nose and eyes and ears and her heart, one thought only, the answer, the prize, only one thought, please please let Justin be alive please God don’t let him be her heart beating infinitely fast, finite beats with no space between, a potential now come to pass, the blood running down her chest the last thing she felt thinking, Justin Justin Justin
Inspired by her children and grandchildren, Renata Kell is currently enrolled in Full Sail university taking her Bachelor’s in Fin Arts: Creative Writing for Entertainment. Working diligently to master the art of writing and create new and exciting entertainment she holds a 3.8 G.P.A. In Renata’s spare time she is an outspoken advocate for women and children effected by abuse. She also openly speaks about her own experience with abuse as well as her recovery from medical addiction to pain pills. Renata’s can- do attitude inspired her to publish a book about her experiences with abuse and addiction long before she attended school. She openly admits “In part I published the book because someone said I couldn’t, but ten years later I realize that it was the beginning of chasing my dream.” “Now, I am determined to combine my experiences and my passion for writing to help where I can.” |
Flying the Coop
A flicker of light luminates the pitch- black foyer as the girls’ creep through the entry way of a modern- day mansion.
Kelsea holds a lighter in front of her and strikes it. Shayla whips around and grabs Kelsea by the arms.
“Shh,” “Fucking pay attention before you get us busted!”
“Oh, cool your jets,” Says Kelsea. “That old hag has more drugs in her tonight than an elephant on tranquilizers,”
Kelsea puts out the lighter and sticks it in her pocket.
“You did give her the pills, didn’t you?”
“No, I’m just going to hope she wakes up as we rob her blind,” Shayla says, throwing her hand in the air.
The girls slither through the gourmet kitchen and up the service stairs to the second- floor hallway lined with stolen art. They stop at each door and peer in as they go. The first door decorated in Ancient Egypt artifacts, the second in a Roman Empire motif.
“You think the old woman’s going to hell for raising a family of thieves to follow in her footsteps? Asks Kelsea.
Shayla just stops looks at Kelsea and shrugs her shoulders.
“You’re sure you can disable the security, right?” Kelsea asks.
“I installed it dumb ass,” spats Shayla. “You really need to stop smoking pot; you’re getting dumber by the day.”
“Kiss my ass,” says Kelsea. “Let’s just get this over with.” “We have to be at school for graduation in less than six hours.”
The girls stop at Grandma’s room and peer in. Grandma lay shriveled up in the middle of a four- poster bed.
“Just think, tomorrow the four of us cousins will be on a plane to freedom while the rest of the vultures hover over her rotting corpse to get their hands on her money,” Shayla says.
“Do you think anyone will know that we have been poisoning her for months?” Asks Kelsea.
“Do you really think that anybody will give a damn?” “She’s the one who sent Nikki into that setup and got her killed!”
The girls move across the hall to a locked door. Shayla pops the cover to the keypad and rips the red wire clean out.
“Just like magic,” Shayla says.
The girls enter the room full of Grandma’s most lucrative scores and make their way to the Picasso on the far wall.
“Hello, twenty million dollars.” Kelsea sings.
“Ten, million,” Corrects Shayla.
“I still think we should just sell it ourselves and get all the money,” says Kelsea.
“You know what that FBI dude said; If we don’t split it with him, he will turn us in and then we’ll get nothing,” says Shayla.
“Fucking thief,” says Kelsea.
Both girls break out in laughter.
Shayla disconnects a hidden security wire installed in the sconce above the Picasso and removes the painting from the wall. Kelsea removes the painting from the gold -plated frame and puts in the replica. Both girls jump at a crash near- by.
“What the fuck was that noise,” Says Shayla.
“You don’t think?” Kelsea asks. “No, She couldn’t, could she?”
“Go check it out,” Barks Shayla.
Kelsea moves to the old woman’s door and peers inside. The woman lays motionless. Kelsea returns to Shayla.
“I don’t know, but let’s get the hell out of here. I’m getting creeped out.”
The girls hang the painting on the wall and Shayla reconnects the security. They leave the room.
“You wanna have one last look?” asks Shayla.
“I don’t know.” “What if she wakes up and sees us?” says Kelsea.
“Really, what’s she going to do?”
The girls stand at the foot of the four-poster bed.
“Dude, I don’t think she’s breathing,” Says Kelsea.
“Oh, shit, she’s not,” Says Shayla.
The girls look at one another simultaneously, smile and high five.
“Take that you old bitch,” Says Kelsea.
“That’s for Nikki,” Shayla says.
Shayla wipes a tear that has made its way down her face.
“What’s that?” Kelsea says.
“What?” Asks Shayla.
“That,” says Kelsea
Kelsea points to a piece of paper on the bedside table next to a picture of Shayla, Kelsea and three other teenage girls all wearing Capella Family Reunion t- shirts. Both girls shuffle to the bedside table. Shayla picks up the stationary paper and reads…
“Have a nice flight, Love Grandma.”
Shayla leans in to feel the old woman’s neck just as she lets out her final breath. The girls scream and run out of the room.
Kelsea holds a lighter in front of her and strikes it. Shayla whips around and grabs Kelsea by the arms.
“Shh,” “Fucking pay attention before you get us busted!”
“Oh, cool your jets,” Says Kelsea. “That old hag has more drugs in her tonight than an elephant on tranquilizers,”
Kelsea puts out the lighter and sticks it in her pocket.
“You did give her the pills, didn’t you?”
“No, I’m just going to hope she wakes up as we rob her blind,” Shayla says, throwing her hand in the air.
The girls slither through the gourmet kitchen and up the service stairs to the second- floor hallway lined with stolen art. They stop at each door and peer in as they go. The first door decorated in Ancient Egypt artifacts, the second in a Roman Empire motif.
“You think the old woman’s going to hell for raising a family of thieves to follow in her footsteps? Asks Kelsea.
Shayla just stops looks at Kelsea and shrugs her shoulders.
“You’re sure you can disable the security, right?” Kelsea asks.
“I installed it dumb ass,” spats Shayla. “You really need to stop smoking pot; you’re getting dumber by the day.”
“Kiss my ass,” says Kelsea. “Let’s just get this over with.” “We have to be at school for graduation in less than six hours.”
The girls stop at Grandma’s room and peer in. Grandma lay shriveled up in the middle of a four- poster bed.
“Just think, tomorrow the four of us cousins will be on a plane to freedom while the rest of the vultures hover over her rotting corpse to get their hands on her money,” Shayla says.
“Do you think anyone will know that we have been poisoning her for months?” Asks Kelsea.
“Do you really think that anybody will give a damn?” “She’s the one who sent Nikki into that setup and got her killed!”
The girls move across the hall to a locked door. Shayla pops the cover to the keypad and rips the red wire clean out.
“Just like magic,” Shayla says.
The girls enter the room full of Grandma’s most lucrative scores and make their way to the Picasso on the far wall.
“Hello, twenty million dollars.” Kelsea sings.
“Ten, million,” Corrects Shayla.
“I still think we should just sell it ourselves and get all the money,” says Kelsea.
“You know what that FBI dude said; If we don’t split it with him, he will turn us in and then we’ll get nothing,” says Shayla.
“Fucking thief,” says Kelsea.
Both girls break out in laughter.
Shayla disconnects a hidden security wire installed in the sconce above the Picasso and removes the painting from the wall. Kelsea removes the painting from the gold -plated frame and puts in the replica. Both girls jump at a crash near- by.
“What the fuck was that noise,” Says Shayla.
“You don’t think?” Kelsea asks. “No, She couldn’t, could she?”
“Go check it out,” Barks Shayla.
Kelsea moves to the old woman’s door and peers inside. The woman lays motionless. Kelsea returns to Shayla.
“I don’t know, but let’s get the hell out of here. I’m getting creeped out.”
The girls hang the painting on the wall and Shayla reconnects the security. They leave the room.
“You wanna have one last look?” asks Shayla.
“I don’t know.” “What if she wakes up and sees us?” says Kelsea.
“Really, what’s she going to do?”
The girls stand at the foot of the four-poster bed.
“Dude, I don’t think she’s breathing,” Says Kelsea.
“Oh, shit, she’s not,” Says Shayla.
The girls look at one another simultaneously, smile and high five.
“Take that you old bitch,” Says Kelsea.
“That’s for Nikki,” Shayla says.
Shayla wipes a tear that has made its way down her face.
“What’s that?” Kelsea says.
“What?” Asks Shayla.
“That,” says Kelsea
Kelsea points to a piece of paper on the bedside table next to a picture of Shayla, Kelsea and three other teenage girls all wearing Capella Family Reunion t- shirts. Both girls shuffle to the bedside table. Shayla picks up the stationary paper and reads…
“Have a nice flight, Love Grandma.”
Shayla leans in to feel the old woman’s neck just as she lets out her final breath. The girls scream and run out of the room.
New York actor, director, and emerging fiction writer, Judson Blake, has been published internationally in many journals, and his full-length play, Perversion, ran for five weeks in the West Village. Two of his stories were selected for the 2019 American Emerging Writers Series. Two others have appeared in Don Webb’s Bewildering Stories. His work has also appeared in: The Literary Yard Freedom Fiction Literary Periodical The Loch Raven Review Ariel Chart Adelaide Literary Magazine. No. 27 August Issue Whistling Shade Fall/Winter 2019 issue His stories have been showcased at Fiction On The Web, a British website. |
The North Window
“There’s a man in that house,” said the child. His face dipped as he spoke. His voice was mewling. Sheila Tamm stepped back to look around the fir trees. It was a house she knew well. She turned back to the child.
“That’s not so odd,” she said and then wondered if she might be wrong. It was the house of Coleen, who had a dog Sheila sometimes cared for. An aging solitary, Coleen had never married.
The child squinted under the blinding angle of the sun. So softly she could barely hear, he hummed a song as if he knew she was thinking of something else. Then he stopped without any reason.
“There’s a man in that house.”
Awkwardly, without waiting for a reply, the child struggled over a pile of silt-encrusted masonry and disappeared in the dark that led to some secret back yard where, his clumsy manner said, grownups should never go.
Sheila thought little of it till the next morning at the café. She felt a strange atmosphere of energy among people who usually were swamped in their boredom. Some warily watched others and hardly listened to those few who talked eagerly.
“His face was half in the sand,” Jeremy pronounced hardly nodding at Sheila’s arrival. He repeated it as a skewed kind of boast.
“But Denton,” said Jeremy. “What he done? Heh? I wake him up. He’s telling me there’s a reward out and he’s got a picture of the wanted man, he said. But I gotta tell him five times. ‘Cause I looked over and what is that? There was something in the surf next to the piling. Wouldn’t nobody notice, the way the sand was shifted. Around them piles, know what I mean? But Denton just went and told the police, eh? And now they all talk like they know it all, like they were there, but I’m the one that found him. I was right there. Just a shoulder above the water, that’s all I seen. Because of the tide, you know. It’s the tide that done it.”
Without asking Sheila pieced out some details: a body had been found with clothing badly torn. There were bruises on the face and neck. The hands had been cut off.
Some nodded knowingly at that. Ron even made a joke:
“Now why is a guy with no hands going out for a swim? Middle of the night like that. Don’t make no sense.”
Ron in his talkative way went on to assure them that the man, whoever it was, had to be a stranger. No one from our town was so important that his identity had to be concealed.
It was about that time when Denton did come in. He was a short sallow man who nodded at everyone and asked how they were doing without waiting for reply. His manner was ponderous and commanded an oblique aura of silence as he took his place, ordered his coffee and carefully read every line of the paper as if it were scripture. Jeremy shrunk to silence and looked at the others expecting they would say something. Denton was respected in his way, because of his stolid mannerism of indifference. Today he was brisque with a more officious air than usual. The others too, Ron and Jeremy, Alice and Bobby R, even Titus, turned bashful attention as Denton nodded about the story Jeremy told. Tawmy, a hulking and sombre loner, hung back at his table and scraped his plate. Sheila stayed in the background only catching parts of what was said. Most of these people lived on the edge but were all the more vehement about their opinions. When they weren’t talking about movie stars or hospital stories it was hard to separate sense from pointless emotion.
“It’s the guy? That guy?”
“They don’t know. They gotta see.”
“But there was a reward you said.”
“Did I say that?”
Swelled up with imminent business that couldn’t wait, Denton soon stalked out. Others drifted away. Some had work. As Sheila was leaving she saw Tawmy still sitting in back, playing with a dried up scone. She knew he had quit driving the bus, he never explained why.
Sheila went to visit her sister who was at home with her six-month old. Katy already knew about the incident. She bent low to examine a diaper as if people found in the surf were a great oddity, like carpentry tools, tax forms and the strange labels on food. She suggested watching some TV and Sheila did for a moment holding the baby, tracing over her little nubby fingers. But she didn’t want to stay. She had sometime that day to get to her online course in textile design. She placed the pre-toddler back in the stroller and went to the agency that handled her dog walking.
Valerie was there, a tall angular woman who had been walking Coleen’s dog for the last week.
“Here, you’ll need this,” Valerie said. She held out a ring of keys.
“It’s usually open. She’s always there.”
Valerie looked perplexed.
“Sometimes she’s asleep, Sheila. Even if not she doesn’t always want to walk to the front so you should have it.”
Sheila took it thinking Valerie was right only Sheila had those keys already.
“She’s changed,” Valerie said in her jaunty you’ll-find-out tone while she watched Sheila over the coffee.
“Oh? How so?”
“Well, I guess like, well… She reads these old scrapbooks. For hours I mean. It’s weird. I had to fish them out of a trunk in the cellar. You’ll see when you go. It’s... I can’t explain.”
With a kind of dotty vagueness Valerie turned away and hefted her satchel. She seemed slightly dismissive and glad to be finished with Coleen.
After other tours later that day Sheila approached Coleen’s and remembered the strange remark of the child. The dark house rose before her planted in the ground as solidly as the heavy trees around it. The construction had always reminded her of a fruitcake, with mottled baubles and filigreed art some carpenter had prided in. It was a large gray and white affair set among ragged trees and surrounding bushes that trailed into a garden in back. The second story and the one above rose from foliage that was proud and overgrown. In the clear above the highest floor was a broad cupola with windows facing in all directions, particularly south toward the sea. It had often struck Sheila that the cupola might have been designed for a fisherman’s wife so she could sit and watch from it, waiting for a glimpse of returning ships. Now in the glinting afternoon light the cupola arose as a lonely outpost where Sheila imagined you would feel alone even if you weren’t, as if the architect long ago had wanted to cast a mood of quietly designed solitude. Sheila had only once gone up there.
She talked often with Coleen who would make pots of tea and talk about the neighbors, some of whom didn’t live there anymore. The old woman was one of three sisters, all spinsters and well to do, who grew up together and resolved when young never to part. They had kept their word. But when at last her sisters passed away Coleen, the last Ms. Tasmin, had the house to herself with no one to share. Then she had got a dog and three cats. After a time she grew tired of walking the dog so she hired Sheila through the agency. Valmont was a mindless hound who slavered at the door of the fridge, watched eagerly as his mistress fixed her dinner and waited till she gave him some. But Valmont was never survivor material like the cats. One autumn after a hamburger feast he fell into a deep slumber and died. One of the cats approached, cautiously sniffed the corpse, looked wonderingly at its owner, and fled. Valmont was buried in the garden out back beneath a roughly hewn stone. After that the cats ruled the house as much as Coleen who, unlike them, avoided climbing stairs.
Loneliness returned and finally, with Sheila’s encouragement, Coleen acquired a second dog, a spotted almost Fox Terrier she named Jean Baptiste, whom the cats distrusted and kept at a scornful distance. A lovable mutt from puppyhood, Jean Baptiste was passionate and fawned on his mistress. He watched her moods. He would politely lie down when she seemed sad, then perk up sprightly and eager when she was not. He needed more walks than Valmont. Coleen hired Sheila to do the daily or twice daily walk and complained of arthritis brought on, she said, by proximity to the sea. She always offered tea when Sheila came back and they would sometimes chat for an hour or more, about the strange sayings of the neighbors or about what Coleen had seen on television.
There had been a time when they first met when Coleen had made a remark that struck Sheila:
“But you have to know, spinsterhood is greatly underrated, I mean by some people. If you have means, my dear, well, you’ll see how much simpler life can be. It’s quite a successful alternative, believe me. And allows you more freedom and integrity than... the other thing.”
“Really?”
“Well the squabbles, the money fights, the million things men don’t understand.... oh, dear, you see it everywhere you go.”
“Men don’t understand a lot,” Shiela agreed just to say something.
Coleen had examples from among her friends, some of whom visited and told her stories. What kind? Well, they always had trouble. Complaints. She bent over the china on the table with a sweet private smile. This mild little maneuver ended having a cold effect on Sheila that day: she came away from the encounter in a sadly thoughtful vein. As she walked down the quiet street Sheila felt infused with the flux of a far-off antique frame of mind. She imagined strange vistas where the woman’s thoughts might go, of mythical dark terrain, of thick forests and rocky cliffs, long ago lands of threaded out dreams, of quiet scenarios where Coleen only wanted to be alone; she so loved her solitude.
Sheila remembered all that as she came down the street. She expected to have to go in, but Coleen was in the yard. She held up a cutting to greet Sheila. She was dressed in a patterned dress that gathered at the waist and was stained now with the wet of watering plants. She glanced shyly as Sheila came near.
“Oh, love. You’ve been away. Away so long.”
“Well, only a week.”
“Is it only a week? It seems so...”
“I’m back now,” said Sheila. “What did I miss?”
“Nothing.... oh, no. Just these, how they grow. Nothing.”
Coleen went back to a clump of cutting flowers. They chatted about inconsequential matters while their bodies warmed in the sun.
“But you heard about the murder,” Sheila said after a pause.
“The what?”
Coleen had not heard.
“It’ll be in the paper. A man was found dead. No one knows who it is.”
Coleen paused and stared. Then after a moment she seemed to awaken to the social need to respond.
“Oh, Sheila, we live so far away here from the real troubles of the world. Crime... well, it is so awful. Terrible thing that it would happen right where we live. But I suppose some things, well, they have to happen some place.”
“Yes, not a mile away. In the surf.”
Sheila explained. Coleen was deferential and held her shears before the cutting of her roses. She became very still, then laid some stalks on the porch. It was a strange occurrence no doubt. A body in the ocean, you say? Right here? And it’s a mystery? Well. But who could decide about gangs and shady people? Coleen never went out at night. Her regard softened as she looked around at her friend. She sighed. She clipped. She took a break to examine the moisture on the petals.
“Come in. Come in. Jean Baptiste is waiting for you.”
Sheila went in and collected Jean Baptiste, tail vibrating with anticipation. She cooed melodically and the dog yelped as a challenge.
“Oh, when you come back,” Coleen muttered, rummaging in her purse. She held out a wad of dollars.
“Pick me up a little something, won’t you? On your way. If it’s no trouble. You know. If it’s ....you know, .... no trouble.”
“No trouble at all,” Sheila said.
In the days that followed Ron said some strange faces showed up in town. They were federal agents, he claimed, but the others doubted that. Ron laughed at the “new cops”. He snidely suggested they would find nothing, tripping over themselves just to hold onto their cushy jobs. But a week later the strange faces disappeared and the police admitted they had no leads.
That evening in the cafe Sheila was tired of working on her laptop. She, Titus and Alice sat together. Ron in the booth across extemporized to them and whoever else was available. Tawmy showed up and sat with Ron.
“So show it,” said Ron.
Tawmy pulled the photograph from his pocket and tossed in on the table.
“But you don’t know how he got it.”
“No and he ain’t talking, is he?”
“You got a funny way of making friends.”
“Can I see it?” Sheila asked. They passed it over. It was a casual picture of a man in military uniform. His face was thin and weathered in a kindly way.
“So that’s the man they found?”
“Police would know.”
Sheila passed back the picture. Tawmy backed in his chair.
“I ain’t talking to no po-lice.”
“They say a foreigner. Or maybe Mafia. Fee-eh!”
“With money? Smackheads. Don’t know nothing. Say anything get a hit. Dribbling out. Make him show you his arm.”
“I don’t care. Denton got money.”
“He said,” Alice sneared.
Ron leaned back with his arm on a chair.
“Sounds like nothing,” he said. “Denton said he knew people who wanted to find this guy. Said he had connections. But that was before the guy actually had the discourtesy to show up dead. Ha! What’re they going to find? Didn’t happen here, I keep saying. Someplace else, not here. They don’t even know the next of kin. They say. After all this time? That right, Tawmy?”
Tawmy wouldn’t turn around.
At a lapse in the conversation Sheila saw Tawmy was bored. She cocked her chin at him and they left together.
“Help me get some wine,” she said out on the street. He fell in beside her. They had never talked enough to be friends but over time and familiarity they had become acquaintances who accepted each other. They went to High Spirits where she got another of Coleen’s “you knows” and a cheap bottle of wine.
“Where to?”
“By the water?”
“That where Jeremy stays?”
“Nah. He likes the park.”
“Show me.”
With his clodish lack of curiosity Tawmy walked with her to the park and across. One corner that ordinarily would have been popular was piled with left over construction materials. Tawmy pointed there. Between two twisted sycamores Jeremy had rolled up a bundle. He would sleep there that night. He was not resentful like many homeless. His resignation seemed sad to her since she knew that the man, bent and silent most of the time, was more intelligent than the way he lived. And now apparently he struck a strange figure, the cheated bringer of news. Sheila sat on a stump and gave them wine in plastic cups.
“So, Jer. What happened at Hanlon’s?”
“Ask Tawmy. He knows. Don’tcha?”
“I done nothing that didn’t have to get done.”
Jeremy giggled.
“He cold-cocked Denton. I’s glad to see it. That sonofabitch, he had it coming with his arrogant ass.”
“He’s going on about his network, he calls it,” said Tawmy. “They know you got a record, they go for that, they know you see things and you’ll tell ‘em. They don’t give money for that. So Denton invents a lot of stuff and they go for that. Now he’s a big shot, in’ he? Tell ya, looks at me cross-eyed I’ll fix the other side of his face for him.”
“Well, Sheila, you ain’t seen him in the cafe recently, have you? He had money he promised me. I ain’t seen none. But I found him, that man in the surf. Yeah, well, I’ll tell ya, Sheila, they said it wasn’t the man. But you know why they said that? So they wouldn’t have to pay me my reward. And don’t you see, there he was got hisself killed. Don’t that prove it? But do they want to pay me my money? ‘Cuz I’m somebody they can cheat. That money was mine. I found him. Denton said five hundred dollars. Heh! So I should get it, stands to reason. But I won’t press my case. Got a record, it don’t pay.”
He sipped some wine and gazed into the shadowy light through the trees. Tawmy slunk back where he sat, almost asleep.
“What about this?” Sheila said. She fished the picture out of Tawmy’s open pocket. Jeremy went over to the streetlight and looked at it.
“So that’s the man in the surf? The one with no hands?”
“Aww….” Jeremy squinted. He took a strained moment to focus. “Naw. That ain’t him.”
“You only saw half his face,” Tawmy said, waking up.
“I saw enough. Naw, this picture’s not a young man. Ain’t him. I’d swear to that.”
The next day Coleen was blyth as before. The last ‘little something’ Sheila brought was mostly gone. The two women sat in the screened back porch where Coleen had her lounge chair. Cushions and bits of fabric hung loose and became castaways in random corners. Jean Baptiste, after his afternoon walk, panted from side to side in communion with his mistress. Coleen sipped her tea. She talked of the lilac hedges, how they needed trimming and how she might get a neighbor with a electric trimmer to do it.
Her voice drifted off and Sheila had the feeling that the afternoon air, more than the drink, was taking over. The sky was going yellow and white with stillness that declined and stayed to prolong the afternoon. With no warning Coleen’s arm swung down from the chair. The dog stared and waited for her to move again.
Sheila checked to be sure Coleen was all right. It was a strange gesture but maybe not if the woman merely fell asleep. Sheila lapsed and started thinking she would leave. But the garden so green and empty held a peaceful countenance in its shadows and Sheila waited. After a moment Jean Baptist came over and sniffed the dangling arm. He barked. With a nervous spin the dog perked up and capered around the stretched-out chair. He whined, tilted his head and looked at Sheila, expecting her to understand. Sheila only watched. The dog pranced again. Then he growled. Sheila wondered: what would words add that the eyes of Jean Baptiste could not convey? He looked out in the yard and a high whine came out.
Sheila reclined in the cool of the soft day and watched the mystic whirl of trees in their high-up wind. The dog circled around Coleen’s chair again. He raced underneath and poked up on the other side, then turned for Sheila to see. Sheila did not see. The dog raced around again. Did he think Coleen had died? It would not be worth waking her up to calm Jean Baptist. To Sheila it was obvious: now the woman was asleep, her dog, sick with boredom and affection, had no choice but to act but act out what? Why, the woman’s dreams of course. But, she reflected on a whim, would the dog want to be drawn down that sad and reminiscent path? He was only a dog, with a dog’s feelings which humans only aped. And so to Sheila he might be an emissary for a woman’s dreams, with a deeper feel of her adventure and longing.
The dog would not quiet. As he became more agitated Jean Baptiste made his circles wider. He scurried around the porch, constrained by the worn railing with its peeled paint. He nagged at a scrap of blanket fallen from Coleen’s couch. He scraped his paws on the outdoor rug.
“Stop it,” Sheila snapped.
She knew the dog understood from her sharp tone. He came up short. He paused, one paw raised. Then, as if on a new promenade, he bounded off the porch and into the yard. He stopped and looked back at Sheila, holding a paw as if she should take it and promenade with him. But Sheila only sat where she was. The dog moped and looked back. He barked and then barked more loudly. Then he raced in a circle. Then further into the garden beyond the hedge. He turned and looked at her. He barked. Sheila got up and followed Jean Baptiste who, out of some dog intelligence seemed to know where he was going.
Jean Baptiste saw her get up, barked his welcome and ran in another circle. Then he ran before her into a part of the garden that no one tended, where the brush was too entangled to allow an idle stroll. In a corner under an overgrowth, he pawed at the ground. He kept pawing and pawing. It was not Valmont’s grave; Sheila had been shown that reverent ground. The ground here was heavy, enmeshed with stones and Jean Baptiste’s paws only scratched the rough dirt. Sheila’s curiosity was piqued by now. She got a spade and plunged it in where the dog and started. The dog stood back and watched, prancing in helpless desire to help. The garden tool bit into something soft. She lifted a clod and exposed the purple skin of two dirty severed hands.
Sheila stepped back onto the clear grass. She leaned on the spade and paused in thought. Her gaze wandered back at the enclosed porch which seemed darker now with its sleeper and her wearied secrets. Slowly her gaze went up toward the higher floors by the pines swaying in irregular wind. Finally her eye reached the cupola made especially white now by the sun. In the whiteness of the window there she saw an indistinct face. It held in the haze of the glass and then, slowly, it faded from her vision. Sheila waited where she was.
The matter seemed to require her to flee, even to break off her visits to Coleen, even never see the woman again, or her dog. She looked down at Jean Baptiste, who now was panting and staring up open mouthed. In a deferential air, he dipped his nose and gave a sniff to the uncovered grave. He circled the undergrowth beneath the mottled spruce, thoughtfully licked at the dusty air and plopped down to cool his belly on the ground.
In the rainbow roulette of her own ideas, Sheila decided none of the slots was right. She wouldn’t go to the police, that would only make things worse. Fleeing would not work, she would only hate herself afterwards. Now the blasting sunlight seemed a hidden cast of gloom that held the shadowy form on the porch with heavy presence more secret in its persistence than a corpse. With leggy deliberation she spaded in what she had found and covered it like it had been before. She stopped and looked up again at the cupola. The face was there again, so indistinct she could not say if it was a man or woman, young or old. Then it faded as it had before.
With hurried steps Sheila retreated the length of the garden, slid past Coleen’s sleeping form and intruded into the quiet house. The person, whoever it was, would know she was there. From that high up she could be seen if she ran. The person would watch, would wait and be cautious. But she knew without thinking that something somewhere would be forced out by her mere patience, by simply not moving from where she was. She made herself some tea, took it into the parlor by the stairway, sat down on the chintz sofa and waited.
It was several minutes before a sound came. Creaks on the boards were hesitant. One of the cats sat on a step and stared up with that has-to-be-a-ghost look. A footstep came on the landing and then waited. It would have to be a big decision, she imagined. A metal object sailed down and bounced on the stair. The cat, with an ape-like squeal, leapt in flight. The object was a gun, a heavy automatic which Sheila retrieved and stuffed beneath a cushion. Soon the figure appeared. The man leaned down to see if she was really there. He descended into full view. He was limping and one arm right down to the fingers was wrapped in torn strips of cloth. He gave sidelong glances to see if she was alone.
“I... I had to... what you saw,” he said. His voice was choking. “Please believe me. Did you… call the police?”
“No.”
“Please believe me. That person... he came… to kill… He almost did. I hope... you’ll see... that I’m telling the truth.”
They watched each other, each forming a silent estimate of why the other was there. He was a weathered man she saw, with a face deeply lined around eyes that seemed strangely open and staring. It was the man in the picture. His frame was one that, when young, would have been athletic. Now his tailored shirt above the bandaged arm seemed slightly too large, too carefully pressed for the leathern sinews underneath. His free arm was large and deeply veined. After a tired pause he limped to the nearest chair and reclined with a loud sigh. She absorbed his few words however they came out. Without guessing or divination she knew that it was true.
The man lowered his face for a long silence. “It could have gone the other way.”
He was still.
“You needn’t be concerned about me,” Sheila said. “I won’t involve anyone. It would make Coleen’s life worse. And also because I just don’t care. It’s none of my business and I don’t want another death just because one person died. Even if you stay here. Even if you stay for a very long time. In this house. With her. With your....”
“Yes, what would you call it?” he interrupted. “Affair? Hanger on? Intruder in the attic?”
“Hm.”
She spoke with her distant tone as if a smoke of trust arose from a veiled thurible and passed between them. He won’t kill me, Sheila thought and told him how she came there. And he knows I won’t harm him. He’s tired of being wary.
“You stay up there. You haven’t been down here much.”
“At night. Only then. When we’re alone.”
He paused and they both suddenly laughed. This skewed fawning of domesticity struck them both as absurd. His glance openly twinkled at her.
“If you don’t mind my asking: Why does an intelligent woman walk dogs?”
Sheila laughed.
“Why not? They’re more honest than people.”
He assented with a liquid smile. His eyes held gray lines embedded among thin vermillion crevices. She noted his heavy veined hand, made for powerful gripping, for some powerful fight, the grind of a contest it had lately won.
“Let me make you some tea.”
Sheila looked out on Coleen who was asleep and would go on sleeping. Jean-Baptiste, after his frenzy, was sprawled beneath her couch. Sheila returned to the parlor and let the man talk. He began very slowly, as if it was a meditation he had been over in his solitude. He needed no hint from her, for she saw that he wanted to say things he couldn’t say ordinarily. It was her silence and being strangers that freed him. He was emotionally worn out with a shield of secrecy so implacable that whatever had decided him to break out of it must have persisted and grown to intolerable force.
“I belong to a world you can’t leave,” he said. “Hit men, they call some of us. Though I don’t kill. Have you heard of that? You become one of theirs and they make it very comfortable for you to stay. But then they make it very hard. Hard to leave.”
“Is that what you did? Leave?”
“I tried. I told the wrong things to the wrong people.”
He sank to the thoughtfulness of one standing over a grave. He was not editing his thoughts so much as letting them flow before him, unrelenting but postponed for the moment till he could come back and plant them on the coffee table over the patterned rug beneath her feet.
“Those are the ones you hear about,” he said. “They don’t want you to know anything, you I mean, the people out here. If someone from inside chooses to speak, it’s compromised, thrown in doubt, demeaned beneath even answering. That’s the first layer. That’s rare enough. Then, if it is trotted out, if someone takes it seriously, well then you get a human peccadillo story, something that can be explained, something the media like to get excited about if only for a moment. That’s all human. The guilty person becomes redeemed, at least in the eyes of the public. Those who matter. Because after that, if you aren’t one of the sweet ones, it’s different. If you can’t be redeemed, then, you know what happens? A special change occurs. A special process intervenes. Because I’ve done... some unpleasant things. But I know. I know about worse and they know I told… will tell what I know. Then old friends cut short their conversations, meetings become strained in a different way, a curtain falls, you enter a darkness no one ever sees beyond. That’s really being alone.”
She watched him quietly and listened as his words went on and became softer and his breathing became somnolent. His features relaxed, for by now, simply by her just sitting there silently, tolerating him with her tea, a little stream had opened and the rocky ledge of so much silent rage fell out between them. The shelf of sordid acts he had done or seen, irrational hate he had breathed in and made into the moral path of his life, he would let that lie on the table now.
“My,” said Sheila, “A hit man come in from the cold. So this is your safe house. Correct me if I’m using the wrong words.”
“The words are right. But this place isn’t safe.”
“So why come here?”
He took a moment to reply.
“I thought it was safe. I thought Parkady didn’t know. In fact he didn’t. He just had a general idea.”
“That’s the man in the water?”
“No. Parkady sent that man. He wouldn’t do it himself.”
“But someone wanted to find him.”
He raised a finger in negation.
“No, no. To find me. Protect, that’s another of their nice words. They know your history, you see. They learn everything about you and then they categorize it and form it so they can predict what you’ll do. Even what you’ll do… if you leave. So it’s like letters you write in prison; they have all the addresses you might flee to, all the people you know who might help you hide. So where could I go that they wouldn’t know about? I’d be a stranger everywhere else, a stranger easy to pick off. I’d have to go someplace that I know but they have no record of. And where would that be? For me there was just… this one. Because it was before they would know. It was too distant, too short an encounter. There was nothing for them to remember.”
“Ah. Well. But she remembered.”
He gave a nervous smile. He winced from the pain in his arm. His gaze drifted away.
The story came out in pieces then. Part of it was real and part Sheila saw had the cast of dream a young woman might form herself and cast to the man and back again. Would it repeat and be always the same? Or would time embellish it with unexpected turns? And here was the hallway of a secret lover, dark and final but meant somehow to appear. He allowed that there had even been a scene in the garden, the very place where Sheila had stood. And after that there had been voiceless nights and softly locked doors. And after that perhaps other sounds, clashes or denials beneath silence. Then like a change in the weather: a new sad dirge of letters gone unanswered, of silent or broken off phone calls, things she only thought she saw, bunches of wet flowers laid out on a table at evening. Could that be what made her file through the old clippings? As his meager story went on, it seemed a stretched-out refuse, a thing one would store in a scrap book and never look at unless one was alone.
The man saw her still gaze. He expected some silent judgement.
“It’s not a pleasant story. Not much of a romance.”
“She thinks it is, I believe.”
“She wouldn’t tell you.”
“Then you’ll leave? Then you’ll run off?”
“No. I can’t. Not now. Besides...” He held his arm to brake the pain. “It’s infected.”
It was more than infected. He should have been to a doctor. Out of pride or some other helpless conceit he had not shown it to Coleen. The wound, once it was unwrapped, was hideous, and gave off a nauseating smell. Lesser cuts would require time but the big wounds were suppurating brown and yellow liquid. There was discoloration further up where the skin was waxy to the touch.
“You’ll lose that arm.”
“Maybe. You have an ax?”
“It’s clearly gangrenous,” Sheila muttered, packing for the door. “Go upstairs. I’ll get you some things.”
She returned that evening after Coleen had actually gone to bed. She brought peroxide, povidone iodine and nail polish remover, all poured in wherever it looked like they might help. She brought scissors to cut away dead flesh, tape and acrylic glue where the wounds could be closed. When it was done she left in the night while the whole house was asleep.
In the days that followed Sheila and the man formed an unspoken pact. They joined at night and excluded Coleen. Then the man and Coleen found time in the evening when Sheila was gone. In the afternoons she and Coleen never mentioned the man. Where before there had been a dance of shadows now there formed a triangle where each pairing ignored the one left out. Twice a day Sheila came as usual for Jean Baptiste. Her chats with Coleen were shorter but not different on the surface, yet they had a cast of cordial deceit in Sheila’s thoughts. Without coaxing Coleen hauled out the old scrapbook Valerie had dug up and Sheila looked it over till it got boring. There was nothing there about the man upstairs. And why bring him up?
Over the days and nights it became a kind of moving séance with the odd person always a denied presence, the ghost that was not there. Sheila saw that she herself could be that ghost when the other two dwelt in closeness without her, their peculiar closeness made richer by the thrill of deception, of preserving the ghost in the silence of the walls, the framed pictures, the bric-a-brac lovingly stored. In this three-cornered carousel the many-tiered house was the great conspirator, for it knew how each hid from the others.
Their charade suited the sensitivities of everyone. No two could face the third and the third was well off being denied. What the man and Coleen had together Sheila was grateful not to see. At moments when Coleen was asleep and again late in the night, Sheila went up to the cupola where the man had made his bed. She unwrapped and wrapped the wound each day. Step by step she learned what worked and what was best to avoid. Their encounters by half light became a ritual that needed little talk and no explaining. Over time a kind of weather change developed in the house. The cats acted differently on different floors, sensitive to odors and the strange emanations coming from humans who moved in humans’ impenetrable ways. The triple disalliance gained naturalness with the bond of secrecy, like a plant that became beautiful only in the dark.
After a week the infection ceased growing. A few days more and it became obvious the arm would heal, though he would never regain feeling in that hand.
The situation in town had resolved back to boredom and anyone who had been inquiring about the murder retreated to official warrens somewhere or went on other errands. In the papers the identity of the dead was revealed as an unemployed government worker, a person of no consequence and, as Ron had predicted, not someone from around town. Sheila went on with her own tasks; her nightly visits to the upper floor became an experiment in the laboratory of her diligence. Finally she asked him:
“So. Will you stay? It might be safe.”
He shook his head. Silence on other fronts meant nothing.
“Parkady has other eyes. I’ll have to slip off, if I can.”
“Well, you’re resourceful. You might make it.”
He nodded with a frown of fighting off an unwelcome thought.
“Yes. With your help.”
“Oh?” Sheila lapsed and waited for a moment. “How’s that?”
“You have to buy a plane ticket. A short hop on a local charter plane at the edge of town. To anyplace. They won’t check if you get two. For you and your father, say. I’ll say you changed your mind. Then I’ll be out of the circle. It’s been a while. They may not know.”
It was another phrase in their song of connivance, Sheila reflected, or of trust. The whole pattern that had grown up in the house had strung a curtain around each of them, as implacable as the white cupola where she had first seen him. Now it would be ripped away. Without more thought she agreed to do it.
They set a time. It would be a morning flight. Two of the cats roused as Sheila went up the stair. Jean Baptiste was nowhere to be seen. Sheila mounted to the room and handed him the envelope.
“He flies at dawn. Nothing at night. It’s a hundred miles but it might be what you need.”
The man thanked her. There was more in his look than in anything he wanted to say. Their eyes met directly for a second and then Sheila walked out. Above all things she hated farewells.
At the corner the next day the child leaned in a crouch kneading a stick in muddy dirt. He had a hose that wouldn’t reach and he was building dykes to channel water for a nearby tree.
“Well, you were right,” she called to him.
“About what?” His eyes went everywhere as if he couldn’t find her face.
“You told me there was a man in that house.”
He returned to kneading the mud with his stick. It was a task of abiding weight.
“No, I didn’t.”
He went back to daubing in the mud.
When they met Coleen was distraught. She explained to Sheila how it had taken hours for her to realize something was amiss.
“We had our togetherness,” she said. “When you weren’t here. I... did you know? I should have told you. But I couldn’t tell you. But there was a man. Well, I always kept it even from… the others. Why, he returned. It’s been all these years. But now.... And... he’s been up there for .... so long.... it’s natural for us now. I didn’t know he wanted to go out, but we all have to get out sometimes, don’t we? But he’ll be back. Yes.”
Her eyes wandered distractedly over the patterned rug. She awakened Jean Baptiste, who was sprawled out near her feet.
“He won’t be back,” said Sheila. Her gaze said all she knew. It wouldn’t sink in whatever she said so there was no harm in being blunt. Coleen stared, her face going deeper into a smoky trance.
“Oh, no, no.... yes, he will,” she said. Her voice sang in tones used for verses somewhere else. “Because you see, it wasn’t just an ordinary thing. No. It wasn’t. It was something special, something that happens, well… why, only once, once ever, I think. Isn’t that extraordinary? So that’s what’s so important, you see. That he came. That he came back.”
Sheila watched till the old woman turned her eyes directly in force.
“Yes, he came back,” she cried. “He came back.”
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ABBY PARK
ALEXANDER SLOTKIN
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ANTONIA SCHUSTER
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BEN PYLE
CASEY MONAHAN
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KRISTY GHERLONE
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LOIS GREENE STONE
LORD MCCONNEHEAD III
MAHALA SPILLERS
MATEJ PURG
MEHREEN AHMED
MICHAEL BYRNE
MUHAMMAD NASRULLAH KHAN
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SAM EVANS
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