Denial

6

I pulled into the driveway of Flo Zink’s house on a street off Siesta Drive before you get to the bridge to Siesta Key.

My leg hurt. My shoulder ached. I was thirsty.

The SUV was in the driveway. Before I knocked, I could hear guitars and singing beyond the door. This meant that either Adele was out somewhere with the baby or the baby was not taking a nap. The sound system and the pumping of country-and-western music played several decibels too loud were turned off when Adele’s baby was sleeping.

Flo, glass of amber liquid in her right hand, opened the door and smiled at me. Flo is a short, solid woman in her late sixties. She used to wear too much makeup. Now she wears a little. She used to dress in flashy Western shirts, jeans and cowboy boots. She still does.

The music was loud behind her, but nowhere near as loud as when I had first met her. I must have looked at the drink in her hand. She did too.

“Pure, zero-proof Diet Dr Pepper,” she said.

I looked at the drink, saw the bubbles and nodded. I had pulled some strings, very thin strings, to get Flo’s driver’s license back. Adele was a few days away from turning sixteen. She would be able to drive on her own then, but until she could do it legally, she needed a licensed driver in the car. That was Flo.

“Quiz, my sad Italian friend,” Flo said, stepping back to let me in. “What Cole Porter song did Roy Rogers make famous?”

“‘Don’t Fence Me In,’” I said.

The song was playing throughout the house. I didn’t recognize Rogers’s voice, but I recognized the song.

“You are a clever son of a bitch,” she said. “What are you drinking?”

“Diet Dr Pepper will be fine,” I said.

“You know where the kitchen is.”

She closed the front door behind me. I limped in and she said, “What’s wrong with your leg?”

“Bumped into something.”

“Let me take a look. Sit down and drop your pants,” she said, motioning toward one of the living room chairs.

“I’m fine,” I said.

“And I’m Nicole Kidman. Sit. Drop ‘em or roll’em up.”

I sat and rolled up my pants leg. Flo looked down at it. Roy Rogers sang about gazing at the moon.

She looked down at my leg.

“Knee’s a little swollen,” she said. “Nothing too bad.”

She patted me on the shoulder. I winced.

“What’s wrong up there?”

“Bumped into something else,” I said.

“You are one injury-begging sad sack or a liar,” she said.

“Adele home?” I said, rolling down my pants leg, getting up, about to head for the kitchen, just left of the front door off the living room.

“Sit back down. I’ll get it,” said Flo, holding up her glass and heading toward the kitchen and calling back, “She’s home. I’ll get her after I bring your drink.”

Behind us Roy Rogers sang about starry skies and wanting lots of land.

I didn’t want lots of land. I wanted to get back to my small box of a room behind my office. And I could do without starry skies. I liked small enclosed spaces. I hated lying on my back outdoors at night. It made my head swirl. I had felt a little of this before Catherine died. Since she was gone, it had gotten more defined. I welcomed it.

Flo didn’t have to get Adele. Adele came down the hallway to the living room, baby in her arms. Adele smiled at me. No, actually, it was a grin. Catherine, five months old, thin blonde hair, was thoughtfully chewing on her mother’s hair.

“Mr. F,” Adele said. “Want to hold her?”

“No thanks,” I said.

Flo came back in the room, handed me a cold glass of Diet Dr Pepper, touched Adele’s face, kissed the baby’s forehead and scurried off down the hall.

I didn’t want a baby’s life literally in my hands. I don’t trust fate and I know if there is a God or gods, devils or demons, they can play games a certified sociopath might admire.

Flo came back with a colorful Indian blanket and rolled it out on the living room floor. Adele loosened the baby’s grip on her hair and placed Catherine on the blanket on her stomach, facing us. The baby lifted her head unsteadily, hands pushing against the rug, and looked at me. Our eyes met.

“Lew,” said Flo. “Lew.”

The thought had crept up on me. My wife, Catherine, and I might have had a baby like the one who was looking up at me if a hit-and-run driver on Lake Shore Drive in Chicago hadn’t killed her four years ago.

“Yes,” I said.

“You all right?” asked Adele, coming to my side. Roy Rogers had stopped and Johnny Cash was singing about killing a man in Reno as I rejoined the living.

Adele was about my height, blonde, clear-skinned and definitely pretty. She had lost the touch of baby fat shortly after I first met her.

“How’s school?” I asked.

Catherine rolled over onto her back.

“Straight A’s, arts editor of the paper,” Flo said.

Catherine rolled onto her stomach, heading toward the edge of the rug. As she rolled again, Adele stepped over and put her back in the center of the rug. Flo picked up a red plastic baby toy that looked like a ball with handles and placed it in front of the baby.

“How’s life treating you, Mr. F?” Adele said.

I knew how life had treated Adele. Her father had sold her to a local pimp when she was thirteen. Her father had murdered her mother. Adele had gotten into an affair with the married son of a famous man when she was fifteen, who had taken her in. Result: Catherine was named for my wife. Catherine’s father was serving a life term for murder. And yet there was Adele smiling, finishing high school, and writing award-winning stories that were sure to get her an invitation to major universities.

“Fine,” I said.

“He’s been bumping into things,” said Flo.

Johnny Cash was finished. The Sons of the Pioneers were now singing “Cool Water.”

I drank some Diet Dr Pepper and watched Catherine suck on one of the handles of the circle.

“You know a boy named Kyle McClory?” I asked as Adele sat cross-legged on the rug next to the baby.

“Knew,” Adele said. “He got killed about a week ago. Hit-and-run.”

“How well did you know him?” I asked.

“Hardly,” she said. “He was a freshman. Two years apart in age. Two decades apart in life school. He was a kid. You trying to find the driver, right?”

“Yes. I’m working for his mother.”

“Wait, wait,” said Flo. “How’s knowing about the boy going to help you find some hit-and-run drunk?”

“He thinks maybe Kyle was murdered, right, Mr. F.?” Adele was smiling, her hand gently rubbing the back of the baby, who was totally absorbed with the difficult choice between which handles of the toy she was going to put in her mouth.

“It’s possible,” I said. “What about Yolanda Root? Kyle’s sister.”

Adele looked up and said, “Half sister. She wants no part of Doc McClory or his name. He wants no part of her. Probably the only thing they ever agreed on. Her, I can tell you a whole lot about. What are you thinking, Mr. F? Someone ran down her kid brother to get back at Yolanda or something?”

“I don’t know.”

And I didn’t

Flo had sat on the sofa, diet drink in hand, watching the baby.

“Yolanda’s two years older than me,” Adele said. “She just graduated. No, I take that back. She wasn’t graduated. She was ushered out after an extra year to make up the courses she had flunked. Haven’t really been in touch with her much since they handed her the diploma and probably asked her not to come back for reunions.”

Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers sang about someone who was a devil and not a man.

“Yolanda was trouble?” I said.

“Name it,” said Adele, gently rubbing her forehead against the top of the baby’s head. “Drugs, maybe even a little low-level dealing, men, boys, maybe even girls. She tried to come on to me back when I was with… you know. But she wasn’t good at it. She was just playing bad girl. You know? Diamond in her tongue, triple rings in one ear and makeup that said put up or shut up. This Goth is watching you. Tolstoy said you play a role long enough, you start becoming the character.”

“That’s what happened to Yolanda?”

Adele nodded.

“Possibility,” I said. “You think maybe someone might try to get back at her by going after her brother? Or maybe she got Kyle into something?”

“No,” she said. “She liked the kid, wanted to protect him, be big sister, which didn’t play well being who she was. Haven’t talked to Yola in, I don’t know, maybe a year.”

“Andrew Goines?”

“Who?”

“Friend of Kyle,” I said.

She shook her head. The name meant nothing to her.

At the door, Flo handed me what looked like a candy bar.

“PowerBar,” she said. “Super-high protein.”

I put it in my pocket.

“Thanks.”

“You don’t need an excuse, Lewis,” she said.

“Excuse?”

“For dropping in just to see Adele and the baby and, if I can flatter my old ass, to see me. You didn’t really need what you got from Adele. Lots of better ways you could have got it.”

“Yes,” I said. “I do need an excuse.”

She put a firm hand on my right arm and said, “Fooling God?” she said. “If he sees you getting too close to someone, he may play another one of his tricks on you?”

That wasn’t quite it, but it was close enough.

“Here,” she said, handing me something in a small white tube. “Rub it on your knee and shoulder. Hell, rub it on your ass if you’ve a mind to.”

“Thanks,” I said, putting the tube in my pocket.

“Happy trails,” she said and closed the door after me.

I made some turns, a right onto Webber, a left at Beneva, a U-turn and up to Bee Ridge to be sure no one was following me.

Maybe the guy who had tried to run me down had a life outside the one related to trying to kill me. Maybe he had a job, a family, places he was expected. Maybe he just went after me on his lunch hour. Then again, maybe not.

I drove back down Beneva, stopped at Shaner’s and picked up a pair of large pizzas, one with double onions and one with mushrooms and double sausage.

It was past seven. I drove to Sally’s apartment in the Alhambra. I took off my Cubs cap, tucked it into my back pocket and pushed the button. Susan opened the door.

Sally’s daughter was eleven, wore glasses, was dark like her mother, and spoke her mind, which at this moment told her to call over her shoulder, “Mr. Smiley Face is here.”

Michael appeared, tall, gangly, a head of curly hair and blue eyes, which he definitely got from his father.

“I thought we were going out,” Susan said.

“Something came up.”

“At least he comes bearing gifts,” Michael said.

“Mushroom and double sausage,” I said, holding out the pizzas.

Michael took both pizza boxes and with a hand on his sister’s shoulder, stepped back to let me in.

Sally came out of the tiny kitchen just off the dining room area. She had changed into a loose-fitting green dress. Michael and Susan had both boxes open on the dining room table and were reaching for pizza slices.

“You’re late,” Sally said quietly.

“Someone tried to kill me,” I said, low enough so the kids couldn’t hear me.

“Well,” she said. “I just got here a few minutes ago myself and I don’t have as good an excuse as you.”

“I’m not making a joke,” I said.

“I know,” said Sally with a sigh. “What’s it about?”

“Kyle McClory,” I said.

“Tell me about it later,” she said, touching my cheek. “I’ll get drinks out of the fridge. You grab some plates and napkins.”

I had plenty of time. I had almost seven hours before I had to pick up Ames to break into the Seaside Assisted Living Facility.

There was no point in asking Michael if he knew Kyle McClory. They were the same age, but a culture and school apart. Michael went to Riverview. Kyle had gone to Sarasota High. The schools were ten minutes, endless space and a meaningless rivalry apart.

After the pizza was gone and crumbs cleared away, Susan said she wanted to play a card game called B.S. Sally said she was tired. I said I didn’t want to learn anything new. Michael said he would play if Susan did the after-dinner cleaning up by herself. She agreed.

“Please,” Susan said, looking first at Sally and then at me. “I’ll teach you. It’s real easy.”

Sally said, “Well…”

“I beseech, supplicate, implore and plead,” Susan said.

I couldn’t resist the display of vocabulary.

We played three games. I won two of them. Susan finally said, “I can’t tell when you’re lying. You always look the same.”

“I’ll try to be more obvious when I lie,” I said. “Look for twitches, eye movement, finger movements, scratches.”

“You have those?” Michael asked.

“No,” I said. “Tone of voice helps.”

“You always talk the same,” Susan said.

She put her cards down and stepped in front of me. There was determination in her eyes.

“Susan,” Sally said with what may have been a gentle warning.

“I said I’d do it,” Susan said, meeting my eyes.

“Do it,” said Michael.

Susan reached over with both hands and began to tickle me under my arms. I forced a smile; at least I thought it was a smile.

“You’re not ticklish,” Susan said after about fifteen seconds of trying.

“No,” I said.

Susan stepped back.

“You are strange,” she said.

I shrugged.

Michael collected the cards and put them away and went to the bedroom to watch the end of an Orlando Magic game. Susan hung around a few minutes longer and then followed her brother.

When they were gone, Sally got up from the table, saying, “Who tried to kill you?”

I told her about the threatening telephone call and the car that almost hit me in the parking lot at the mall.

“I’m not going to say it,” she said.

“What?”

“That you have to do a better job of taking care of yourself,” she said, moving into the kitchen.

“You just said it.”

“Let’s call it a night. I’ve got a report to write,” she said. “In addition to which, I’m tired and cranky.”

“I’ve got something to do too,” I said, rising.

“Besides going to your room and watching an old movie?”

“Yes. I’m going to a friend’s house and we’re going to bake a pineapple upside-down cake,” I said.

“No.”

“I was lying.”

“I could tell,” she said.

“How?”

“You looked me in the eye and said it without blinking or smiling. Besides, I can’t come up with an image of you in a kitchen at night mixing batter.”

“I don’t think you want to know what I’m going to do,” I said.

“Help somebody,” she said. “That’s what you do.”

“It’s what you do too,” I said.

We were moving toward the front door in the living room.

“We’re a match made in heaven,” she said and kissed me. “Put your arms around me and mean it,” she added, her face inches from mine.

I could feel her breath, smell her hair. Her eyes were large and brown and moist and maybe a little tired. I kissed her back. She opened her mouth, arms around my neck. I felt her breasts warm against me. I told myself not to think of my dead wife. I failed but it didn’t stop me from holding Sally and letting the kiss stay warm.

She gently removed her arms, patted my cheek and stepped back, smiling at me.

I opened my mouth to speak but she cut me off with, “Nothing to say, Lewis. Nothing to explain or talk about. It’s okay.”

She opened the door and I stepped out into the cool darkness. Standing on the landing, I told her more about my day, the person who tried to run me down, about Dorothy Cgnozic. Sally listened, nodded a few times while I talked. I kept it short, very short, and I didn’t mention that Ames and I were going to break into the Seaside Assisted Living Facility in a few hours.

“Forty-six eleven Tenth,” she said, starting to close the door.

“Forty-six eleven Tenth,” I repeated.

“That’s where Yolanda Root is staying.”

She closed the door.

I watched the parking lot as I moved down the stairs. Nothing moved but the leaves on the bushes from a gentle breeze.

I drove back to the DQ parking lot, checking my rearview mirror for anyone who might be following me.

The DQ was a few minutes from closing. I got to the window in time to order a large black coffee. The thin black girl behind the counter, Teresa, was working two jobs. Teresa was nineteen. She had two children under six years old. During the day she worked in the bakery section of the Publix on Fruitville and in the evening she was behind the counter at the DQ. Her mother watched the kids.

“Want a Blizzard?” she asked, wiping her hands on a white towel. “On me. You’re my last customer as a night counter girl. Dave promoted me to day manager.”

“Publix?”

“They’ll have to get along without me,” she said with a smile, showing white, slightly large teeth. “Raise makes up for it and I can see my kids at night, have dinner with them.”

“I need the coffee to stay awake,” I said.

“Okay, the coffee’s on me,” she said.

“I accept,” I said. “Congratulations.”

“Two sugars and cream?” she said. “Right?”

I always took three sugars, but I said, “Right.” She got the coffee and handed it to me. I toasted her with it.

“Did he find you?” she asked.

“Who?”

“Man who was looking for you,” she said. “Looked like he was coming down from a bad high, you know? Shaky, nervous-like.”

“What’s he look like?”

“Bigger than you, older than you, one of those little beards, real white.”

“The man or the beard?” I asked.

“Both,” she said.

“When did he come by?”

“Few hours ago, maybe.”

“Did you see his car?”

“Didn’t notice,” she said. “Got to finish cleaning up.” I went to the steps of the two-story office building at the back of the parking lot. I held the coffee cup in my left hand and fished for my keys with my right hand.

I looked back as I went up the concrete steps. There were two cars in the DQ parking lot, Teresa’s 1986 Toyota and mine. No cars were parked across Washington. Traffic moved by. It never stopped, but around eleven each night it slowed down to a rumble of trucks and a swish of cars going over the speed limit.

The phone began to ring before I could turn on the lights. I hit the switch, kicked the door closed, pocketed my keys and took my coffee to the desk.

“Yes,” I said, picking up the phone.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

It was the same man who had threatened to kill me and I was reasonably sure he was the one who had talked to Teresa. He sounded about five levels above nervous.

“For what?”

“Trying to run you down,” he said. “I’ve been telling myself that I just wanted to frighten you, but if you hadn’t jumped out of the way, I might have killed you. Are you all right?”

“Nothing broken. Nothing bleeding. Come on up and we’ll talk about it,” I said, moving to the window and taking a sip of coffee. He couldn’t be far.

“No,” he said. “I’m sorry but I really do have to stop you. Please just stop, let me punish myself. Seneca was right when he said, ‘Every guilty person is his own hangman.’”

“You going to try again to kill me?”

“You’re not going to stop trying to find me, are you?” he asked.

“No,” I said.

“Then… I’m really sorry. I’ve got to get home now.”

He hung up. I turned off the office light after I hit the switch in the back room where I lived, kicked off my shoes, turned on the television and the VCR and inserted a tape before sitting on the bed, where I hit the button on the remote.

Stagecoach came on. It was dubbed in Spanish. I don’t speak Spanish. Julio at the video store down the street had sold it to me for three dollars. I hadn’t known it was in Spanish until a few seconds ago. I’m sure Julio hadn’t either.

I watched Andy Devine and George Bancroft jabbering at each other in voices that weren’t theirs. The guy who dubbed John Wayne tried to mimic the Duke, but didn’t come close. I turned off the sound and kept watching. I knew almost every word of the movie.

As I watched, I followed the instructions on the tube I had taken out of my pocket and rubbed the white cream on my knee and shoulder. It went from cold to warm, tingly electric. It seemed to be working.

When the Plummer brothers were dead and John Wayne and Claire Trevor had ridden off in the buckboard, I put in a tape of The Woman on the Beach. Joan Bennett spoke English. I finished my now room-temperature coffee.

When the clock said it was time, I turned off the VCR and the lights and dropped the empty coffee cup in the garbage. After a quick stop in the washroom halfway down the walkway outside my office, I went to my car and drove to the Texas Bar amp; Grille to pick up Ames and commit a felony.