He stayed hidden in the bush. He knew a lot about camouflage. They would not see him.
He remembered the night eight years ago when the two men had died—the sudden gun blasts, the sounds of the shovels ripping into the earth, the grunts from the deep dig. He’d even debated telling the authorities what happened—all of it.
Anonymously, of course.
But in the end he couldn’t risk it. No man, Jeremiah knew, was meant for a cage, though some could live through it. Jeremiah could not. He’d had a cousin named Perry who’d been serving eight years in a federal penitentiary. Perry was locked in a tiny cell for twenty-three hours a day. One morning, Perry tried to kill himself by running headfirst into the cement wall.
That would be Jeremiah.
So he kept his mouth shut and did nothing. For eight years anyway.
But he thought about that night a lot. He thought about the young woman in the nude. He thought about the men in wait. He thought about the scuffle near the car. He thought about the sickening, wet sound of wood against exposed flesh. He thought about the man left to die.
And he thought about the lies. The lies, most of all, haunted him.
12
By the time I returned to the clinic, the waiting room was packed with the sniffing and impatient. A television replayed a video of The Little Mermaid, automatically rewinding at the end and starting over, the color frayed and faded from overuse. After my hours with the FBI, my mind sympathized with the tape. I kept rehashing Carlson’s words—he was definitely the lead guy—trying to figure out what he was really after, but all that did was make the picture murkier and more surreal. It also gave me a whopping headache.
“Yo, Doc.”
Tyrese Barton hopped up. He was wearing butt-plunge baggy pants and what looked like an oversized varsity jacket, all done by some designer I never heard of but soon would.
“Hi, Tyrese,” I said.
Tyrese gave me a complicated handshake, which was a bit like a dance routine where he leads and I follow. He and Latisha had a six-year-old son they called TJ. TJ was a hemophiliac. He was also blind. I met him after he was rushed in as an infant and Tyrese was seconds away from being arrested. Tyrese claimed I saved his son’s life on that day. That was hyperbole.
But maybe I did save Tyrese.
He thought that made us friends—like he was this lion and I was some mouse who pulled a thorn from his paw. He was wrong.
Tyrese and Latisha were never married, but he was one of the few fathers I saw in here. He finished shaking my hands and slipped me two Ben Franklins as though I were a maître d’ at Le Cirque.
He gave me the eye. “You take good care of my boy now.”
“Right.”
“You the best, Doc.” He handed me his business card, which had no name, no address, no job title. Just a cell phone number. “You need anything, you call.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said.
Still with the eye. “Anything, Doc.”
“Right.”
I pocketed the bills. We’ve been going through this same routine for six years now. I knew a lot of drug dealers from working here; I knew none who survived six years.
I didn’t keep the money, of course. I gave it to Linda for her charity. Legally debatable, I knew, but the way I figured it, better the money went to charity than to a drug dealer. I had no idea how much money Tyrese had. He always had a new car, though—he favored BMWs with tinted windows—and his kid’s wardrobe was worth more than anything that inhabited my closet. But, alas, the child’s mother was on Medicaid, so the visits were free.
Maddening, I know.
Tyrese’s cell phone sounded something hip-hop.
“Got to take this, Doc. Bidness.”
“Right,” I said again.
I do get angry sometimes. Who wouldn’t? But through that haze, there are real children here. They hurt. I don’t claim that all children are wonderful. They are not. I sometimes treat ones that I know—know—will amount to no good. But children are, if nothing else, helpless. They are weak and defenseless. Believe me, I’ve seen examples that would alter your definition of human beings.
So I concentrate on the children.
I was supposed to work only until noon, but to make up for my FBI detour, I saw patients until three. Naturally, I’d been thinking about the interrogation all day. Those pictures of Elizabeth, battered and defeated, kept popping through my brain like the most grotesque sort of strobe light.
Who would know about those pictures?
The answer, when I took the time to think about it, was somewhat obvious. I leaned forward and picked up the phone. I hadn’t dialed this number in years, but I still remembered it.
“Schayes Photography,” a woman answered.
“Hi, Rebecca.”
“Son of a gun. How are you, Beck?”
“Good. How about yourself?”
“Not bad. Busy as all hell.”
“You work too hard.”
“Not anymore. I got married last year.”
“I know. I’m sorry I couldn’t make it.”
“Bull.”
“Yeah. But congrats anyway.”
“So what’s up?”
“I need to ask you a question,” I said.
“Uh-huh.”
“About the car accident.”
I hear a tinny echo. Then silence.
“Do you remember the car accident? The one before Elizabeth was killed?”
Rebecca Schayes, my wife’s closest friend, did not reply.
I cleared my throat. “Who was driving?”
“What?” She did not say that into the phone. “Okay, hold on.” Then back at me: “Look, Beck, something just came up here. Can I call you back in a little while?”
“Rebecca—”
But the line was dead.
Here is the truth about tragedy: It’s good for the soul.
The fact is, I’m a better person because of the deaths. If every cloud has a silver lining, this one is admittedly pretty flimsy. But there it is. That doesn’t mean it’s worth it or an even trade or anything like that, but I know I’m a better man than I used to be. I have a finer sense of what’s important. I have a keener understanding of people’s pain.
There was a time—it’s laughable now—when I used to worry about what clubs I belonged to, what car I drove, what college degree I stuck on my wall—all that status crap. I wanted to be a surgeon because that wowed people. I wanted to impress so-called friends. I wanted to be a big man.
Like I said, laughable.
Some might argue that my self-improvement is simply a question of maturity. In part, true. And much of the change is due to the fact I am now on my own. Elizabeth and I were a couple, a single entity. She was so good that I could afford to be not so good, as though her goodness raised us both, was a cosmic equalizer.