Bullet Point

18

More visitors came in, plus three inmates. It got a little noisier. Sonny Racine leaned forward so he wouldn’t have to raise his voice. “How’s Linda?”

“Good,” Wyatt said, but the mention of his mother’s name suddenly took him back to Hilltop Breeze: Your mom was involved?

“What’s wrong?” Sonny said. “She’s not having difficulties?”

“No.”

“Is she sick?” Sonny said.

“No, nothing like that.”

“Money problems?”

“No.”

“What does she do?”

“Works in an insurance office.”

“Married?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s the guy like?”

Wyatt shrugged. “I’ve got a half sister-Cameron, but we call her Cammy.”

“You get along with the guy all right?”

“No complaints.”

“So what’s wrong?” Sonny said. “I got the feeling you had some kind of bad thought back there.”

Wyatt shook his head, and as he did his gaze passed over the little groupings, Hector’s and the others, all giving off waves on tension, unhappiness, even desperation, and nobody touching anybody else. “It’s only,” he said, “that you seem kind of happy.”

Sonny’s face changed, didn’t become hard, just unreadable and still. “Is that a crime?” he said.

“No. Sorry. I didn’t mean…”

“Go on.”

Wyatt took a deep breath. What was the point of coming into this horrible place and not asking the big questions? He plunged ahead. “I never expected you’d be happy.”

“Wouldn’t push that too far, the happiness thing,” Sonny said. “I’m happy to see you, of course, but we’re still waiting for a day at the beach in here.”

“Yeah, but, um, speaking of crimes, any innocent person in here would be…” Wyatt searched for the word, couldn’t find it.

“Beside himself?” Sonny said.

“Yeah.”

Sonny was watching him carefully. “You’re getting at something, I can sense it,” he said. “Problem is these visiting sessions have a time limit.” He smiled; a nice smile, with the eyes joining in, no longer probing. And even as he spoke, the CO with the dreads was glancing at her watch.

Wyatt made himself look Sonny right in the eye; that had to be the way to deliver information that might be unpleasant. “The thing is, we saw Mr. Wertz. Me and Greer, I mean.”

Sonny sat back. “Morrie Wertz is still around? Hasn’t drunk himself to death by now?”

“He’s at Hillside Breeze.”

“What’s that?”

“A nursing home behind the hospital.”

“In Silver City?”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t know Silver City.”

Wyatt thought about that. Sweetwater State Penitentiary was across the river but still within the town limit, so Sonny had actually been living in Silver City for seventeen years.

“What were you seeing old Morrie about?” Sonny said. “Not legal advice, I hope.”

“Greer told me that everyone in here thinks you’re innocent,” Wyatt said. “That’s why.”

Sonny smiled, shook his head. “And every one of them also thinks he’s innocent, too. They really wind up believing that, all of them.”

“No, but-”

Sonny raised his voice, not a lot, but it carried across the room, and all the other conversations went silent and the COs suddenly looked wide-awake. “Hey, Hector,” he said. “You innocent?”

Hector looked up, the light from the overhead fluorescent strips shining bright on his Jesus-on-the-cross tattoo. “Hundred percent.”

A few people laughed, including the CO with the dreads; a few people, but none of the visitors. Conversations started up again. Sonny turned to Wyatt, the smile not quite gone from his face. Wyatt found himself reddening, not so much from awkwardness or embarrassment-although there was some of that-but more from anger.

“So what are you saying?” he said. “You’re guilty? You did it?” The biggest question of all.

It didn’t seem to throw Sonny the slightest bit. “A jury of my peers said so.”

“But I’m asking you.”

“I know, and you have every right,” Sonny said. “What did Wertz say?”

“He thinks you were innocent,” Wyatt said. “That you were protecting someone else.”

Sonny lowered his voice. “Like who?”

“He didn’t say,” said Wyatt. “But-but was it Mom? My mother, I mean. Linda.”

“Did Wertz say that?”

“No, but I couldn’t think of-”

“Because if he did, he must be demented. A woman like Linda could never be involved in anything like that. Out of the question.”

Out of the question: the exact same expression that had risen up in Wyatt’s mind when Greer suggested the possibility. “So why did you get up on the stand when he told you not to?”

“He went into that?” Sonny said. “Funny how some people’s grudges stay strong when there’s almost nothing left of the rest of them-seen that more than once in here.”

“His grudge is because he thinks you blew the case?”

“Exactly. But it was pretty clear to me at the time that I had a drunk for a lawyer-and the person blowing the case was him.”

“What happened on the stand?”

For an instant, Sonny’s face twisted up, as though he’d tasted something bad. “The DA made a fool of me. Which is what DAs can do to a kid, guilty or innocent.”

The CO with the dreads checked her watch again, rose, and said, “Time’s up.”

Everyone started getting to their feet. “Which one were you?” Wyatt said.

“Guilty or innocent?” said Sonny. “It’s not that simple.”

“Let’s move it, people,” said another CO.

Wyatt talked fast. “But you didn’t pull the trigger, did you?”

“Makes no difference under the law.”

“But did you or not?”

Sonny gazed at Wyatt. Wyatt could feel him thinking.

“Hey, Racine!” called the big CO, the one who’d brought Hector in. All the inmates were lined up at the inmate door, all the visitors at the visitors’ door.

Sonny rose. “Thanks for coming,” he said. “Don’t worry about me, whatever you do.” He gave Wyatt a little wave and joined the line. The inmates filed out and the door closed. From somewhere in the walls came a deep clanging sound, and then softer ones, fading away.

Greer was up early in the morning. Wyatt smelled coffee, opened his eyes.

“You awake?” she called from the kitchen, somehow knowing.

Wyatt sat up, suddenly very awake. He felt different today, different in a way that disoriented him for a moment or two before he realized what this feeling was. Wyatt felt older, more solid, somehow. Could that happen overnight? Being older seemed to be a physical feeling, hard to describe even to himself. Did becoming an adult, a man, just mean accepting one day that that was what you were, and getting on with life?

“Hey, Mister Deep Thoughts,” Greer said. She stood at the bedroom door, all dressed, a steaming mug of coffee in her hand.

He turned to her. She looked great, skin clear and glowing, eyes bright.

“Come here,” he said.

“You want coffee?”

“Soon.”

“Not too soon, I hope.”

Not too soon after that, they were at the kitchen table. Granola with banana slices on top, coffee. Whatever Greer put on the table was always so good.

“Now comes Mister Hungry,” she said.

Wyatt laughed, finished off his granola, plus half of hers.

“Know what we should do this weekend?” she said. He waited to hear. “Take a drive over to Millerville.”

Wyatt wiped his mouth on the paper napkin. “How about today?”

She shook her head. “School day.”

He rose. “Today.”

“Mister Bossman?” she said. “He’s new.”

Millerville was about four hundred miles away, the apex of a stubby triangle with the East Canton-to-Silver City line forming the base. They stopped for gas in a tiny flatland town at the halfway point, the wind blowing scraps of paper across the road.

“See if this works,” Greer said, pulling out a credit card.

Wyatt glanced at it: a corporate Visa card for Torrance Amusements.

“Maybe they haven’t blocked it yet,” Greer said.

Wyatt gave it back, went inside, and handed over a twenty. He returned to the car and was pumping gas, hunched against the wind, when his phone rang. He dug it out of his pocket, checked the number: his mom. He almost didn’t answer.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Wyatt,” she said, her voice unsteady with emotion, “this can’t go on.”

He straightened. “I love you, Mom. You and Cammy. But I’m ready to be out on my own.”

“What are you talking about? You’re sixteen.”

“I’ll be seventeen soon. And I’m ready.”

“You’re not ready. And even if you were, it doesn’t matter. You can’t leave home without my permission until you’re eighteen in this state-I checked with a lawyer.”

“Then give me your permission, Mom.”

“Absolutely not. I want you home today.”

“I just can’t,” Wyatt said. Inside the car, Greer had her earphones on, was nodding her head slightly to some beat, eyes front.

“Is this about Rusty?” Linda said. “Are you punishing me or something? I’ve been going to this website on blended families, and they say that often happens in cases like-”

“Aw, Mom, I’d never think about you like that. You haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Then what? Is it that girl? I wish you’d waited…you know, before, um, an intimate relationship, and I know it must be exciting, but there’ll be other girls.”

Not like this. That was Wyatt’s thought. He kept it to himself.

“Wyatt? Are you still there?”

“Yeah.”

“You know how hard it would be for me to come down there. I can’t miss work, not in this economy.”

“Why would you want to come down here?”

“To get you. Didn’t I just explain? You don’t have my permission.”

“Sorry, Mom. Please don’t worry about me. I’m fine.”

“And I’m sorry, too, Wyatt, but it’s not your call. In the eyes of the law, you’re a runaway. I have the right to notify the police.”

“You wouldn’t do that.”

“Don’t test me. I want you home tonight.”

“Come on, Mom. I’m no runaway. I-”

She hung up. The pump hit the twenty-dollar mark and shut off. Wyatt tucked his phone into his pocket and replaced the nozzle. Greer turned and blew him a kiss through the window.