Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 152, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 924 & 925, September/October 2018

Window to the Soul by Scott Loring Sanders

Scott Loring Sanders is the author of two novels, The Hanging Woods and Gray Baby, the short-story collection Shooting Greek and Other Stories, and the essay collection/ memoir Surviving Jersey: Danger & Insanity in the Garden State. The latter, published in 2017, has been selected as a finalist in the Creative Nonfiction category for the CLMP Firecracker Award.

I once read that after the Manson murders, Sharon Tate’s father had to clean up the crime scene himself. There weren’t companies or crews who did that sort of thing back then, so it was up to him to mop up his daughter’s blood. Can you imagine? To be hunched over, on hands and knees with a bucket and sponge, wiping away the stains that had spilled from the sixteen stab wounds your pregnant daughter had endured? I wasn’t Homicide, but I’d been first responder to a few murders, and I don’t care what kind of police you are — seasoned Boston detective or a grunt from the sticks — seeing a bloody crime scene is always chilling.

I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t ever contemplated my daughter Aubrey’s final moments. Because as much as Ginny and I have tried to keep things normal for her, the idea is always there. Lingering. Fifteen years old, battling liver failure, the result of a rare bile-duct disease. Every week, we wait for a donor. Every week, we come up empty. And that pisses me off, because doctors have pretty much perfected liver transplants, where they could cut out part of mine, stick it in Aubrey, and within only a few weeks those suckers would somehow grow back to the exact size they needed to be, both of us right as rain. But my blood was wrong, Ginny’s was wrong, and it didn’t matter how pissed off I got, or how much Ginny wished for different circumstances, the fact is, you can’t screw with blood type.

So we’d had no choice but to sit around and wait while Aubrey, for the past year and a half, suffered pokes and prods and needles and meds when she should’ve been cheerleading or singing in school musicals or chasing boys. It crushed me to watch my baby girl withering away as we prayed for a match. Which is messed up in its own right, if you think about it. Nudging God to maybe kill a stranger so my daughter could live. But who wouldn’t feel the same way? Who wouldn’t occasionally hope for someone to drop dead so their child could be spared?

The driving was getting sketchy, treacherous. Even the old-timers who’d lived in New England for seventy, eighty, ninety years said it was the worst winter in memory. Nine feet of snow so far, and it wasn’t stopping. But as exhausting as the winter had been, sometimes just driving around in the elements helped me get lost for a while, took my mind off Aubrey’s struggles.

The problem with the spring storms, like this one, was that before the precip changed over to snow, often an invisible ice layer formed, slicking the roads. Which meant I’d be handling accident after accident this evening, well into the night.

I was on a rural, twisty road that eventually wound its way back into town. I wasn’t far from Walden Pond, figured I’d skirt it, do a loop, then drive the cruiser to the station in Concord proper. My radio was bound to start popping shortly, dispatch sending me to this accident or that one, but so far, things had been remarkably quiet. Fine by me, though I doubted my luck would last.

For us locals, who’d grown up near Walden Pond and first learned about Thoreau in kindergarten, it was sometimes impossible not to imagine him sitting in his little cabin out there by the water. Or walking along this snowy road, the landscape pretty much the same now as it was back then. Off in the distance, across an open meadow, several deer stood at the wood line, motionless, probably starving. I envisioned Henry David tromping along that wood’s edge, contemplating life, thinking about the world, maybe stopping near those deer and clearing a space, digging all the way down to the forest floor, enabling those poor animals to forage for a few acorns or other mast or whatever the hell they could snack on.

Those deer, that falling snow, were a rustic postcard that took my mind off Aubrey. Off Ginny and our marriage, the disease taking its toll on all of us. So it was nice, those deer. Like, if only for a moment, I’d traveled back to Thoreau’s time.

I don’t ever intentionally think about Aubrey’s demise, but sometimes dark thoughts pop in, uninvited. We might be eating pizza, or playing Monopoly, or just watching a show on Netflix. Doing what other dads and daughters take for granted. She might laugh at some stupid joke I crack, like, “Hey, Aubrey, what time’s my dentist appointment?”

And she looks at me, confused. “What? How the heck would I know that?”

I might then use my tongue to probe my molar, and in an exaggerated lisp deliver the punch line. Once I say it, she pauses, squints, thinking, figuring, trying to decipher my mumbled words — I think it’s at tooth-hurty — until, bam, it hits her, and she drops into uncontrollable laughter. I’m proud of myself, pleased I’ve made her giddy. At least temporarily. Then, straight out of left field, one of those evil visions jumps in, of her lying dead in the hospital, or worse, of me waking her for school but she doesn’t respond. She’s all yellow and cold and, just like that, snap-of-the-fingers-quick, it’s over. My little girl is gone. And there I am, destroyed, the same as Sharon Tate’s dad must’ve been, picking up my daughter, holding her across my arms like a load of firewood, telling God and the world and anyone else who’ll listen that they can go screw themselves. That no man should have to endure such pain.

Then Aubrey is right there, a hundred percent alive and reeling me back in, her light hair pulled effortlessly into a ponytail the way girls can do, like it’s a trait they’re all born with, her nose dappled with those same cute freckles that once drew me to her mother so strongly. Back when Ginny and I were young and naive and life seemed worth living. “Dad, yoohoo, you still there?” she says, waving her hand. “We gonna watch Napoleon Dynamite or not?” Then I’m back, say, “Yeah, sure,” and for the twentieth time, I watch that stupid, goofy movie, repeating every line with her, the two of us snuggled on the couch, giggling, sharing the super-soft Harvard blanket I bought for her when she was eleven, when we all still believed dreams could come true. So I share that blanket, and a bowl of cheddar Goldfish, and a bag of Clark Bar Bites (sometimes you have to break the doctor’s orders), and I realize in that very instant, when she brought me back to reality, that I couldn’t have been happier or more grateful. That if I were only allowed to pick one moment that I could keep forever, could hold onto for perpetuity, that this is the one, this is the one right here that I’d choose.

There are a million things standing in the way of a match. One of the biggest factors is the person’s size. The donor needs to be of a similar height and weight to the recipient. You can’t put the liver of a three-hundred-pound man, for example, into a petite teenage girl. A transplant isn’t as simple as, “Oh, you’re next on the list, here you go,” and then they pull a liver off the shelf and pop it in like a new set of wiper blades.

There are ups and downs. Calls from doctors saying, “We’ve got a potential match,” only to later be followed with no dice. Those ups and downs can be torturous. Case in point, a few months back we got the call we’d been waiting for. A young woman had fallen at Mount Monadnock, up in New Hampshire. She’d suffered devastating head injuries. We were told to drive Aubrey to Mass General ASAP. Which, again, is troubling — someone’s darkest time could potentially provide nothing but joy for you and your family.

Aubrey, always with a smile, tended to handle the stress better than her big, tough cop of a daddy. In this Mount Monadnock case, when the doctor came out, his strained face told me everything before he even opened his mouth: The transplant was a no-go. He was Asian but spoke perfect English. “Mr. and Mrs. Schmidt, I’m afraid we’re unable to perform the operation.” My heart, Ginny’s heart, they both plummeted. “An error occurred during the preservation phase. I’m afraid we’ve deemed the liver unsuitable. It would be too risky. I’m very sorry.”

What can I say to that? Go off on him? Yell and scream about his incompetence? Tell him I’d like to perform a preservation phase across his Chinese ass, which doesn’t even make any sense, but I’m angry. We finally had the pieces in place, the stars had aligned. “We’re all on the same team, Rob,” Ginny often reminds me when she senses I’m about to lose my shit with the doctors, probably close to embarrassing the both of us. “They want what’s best for ’Brey, same as we do.”

So that’s what’s tough. The uncertainty. The not knowing. That I could wake up, thinking we’ve had a good couple days, and then, boom, she could die that very morning. Or be saved, instead. I’m a cop, used to being in control. I solve problems. There’s nothing more gut wrenching than looking at my little girl lying in bed, her face sallow, her eyes weak, knowing she’s suffering, frightened, and yet there’s not a goddamn thing I can do about it. I can’t call in backup, can’t use my badge to garner extra favors, can’t flash my overheads to bypass all of the horseshit.

I was reliving that Harvard blanket, cheddar Goldfish, Clark-Bar-Bites-on-the-couch moment when I stopped my cruiser in the middle of the road, took out my phone, snapped a few pictures of those deer, all tranquil and unfazed. The snow was coming down heavy, those fat sorts of flakes you dreamed of as a kid, where you’d stick out your tongue, trying to collect a mouthful. I took a dozen shots, then drove off, figuring I better get back to town before the evening rush. I was destined to a night of distraught, sidelined drivers, indifferent tow-truck operators, and EMTs chock-full of caffeine and gallows humor.

I swiped through the photos as I drove, hoping to find a good one for Aubrey. As I scanned back and forth between the road and the pictures, my eyes locked on the final shot. There were two does, same as the others, but in this photo, almost melted into the background, ghostlike in the trees, was a buck, probably a six- or eight-point. His silhouette was vague but absolutely discernible. Aubrey loved nature, same as me, so I texted, “Hey Pumpkin, look what Daddy just saw.” I hit SEND and simultaneously felt the explosion as ripping, scraping metal screeched like a thousand fork tines across a thousand china plates. The air bag punched me in the face. The other vehicle careened off the road and into the field as my patrol car entered the first of countless spins — brakes useless, steering wheel useless, at the mercy of the boulder that abruptly stopped my cruiser.

Between the air bag and my reshaped hood, I couldn’t see jack shit. But once I realized I was only startled, not injured, my cop instincts kicked in. I got out, squinting beneath my hat brim, the snow hammering now. Twenty-five yards away, planted between two maples, was the small, mangled car. A Focus, maybe? A Jetta? Hard to say, but a vehicle that had no business on the road in these conditions. There was no movement from inside, which shot a red-hot flash straight through my brain.

I reached across my chest for the mike clipped to my jacket but then paused, thinking of that damn text I’d just sent Aubrey. My heart started rabbit-thumping. I unzipped my jacket halfway to get some air, felt the snowflakes dissolve against my blazing cheeks. If that driver was hurt bad... or worse... Jesus, it would all be on me. I held off radioing in, which contradicted two decades of training and experience. First rule — Police 101 — always call dispatch. I deliberately chose not to do that.

Instead, I trudged across the slick road, nearing the curve where the collision had happened, saw the tire tracks. Both sets. Tracks don’t lie, also Police 101. They spoke as clearly to me as someone whispering in my ear, saying, “You messed up big time, Rob.”

I’d been police for twenty years. And I’d been a good cop. A clean cop. Except once.

I’d been running radar near the Great Meadows Wildlife Refuge, a rural area and a perfect place to take a nap. Occasionally, someone set the detector off, teenagers usually, ripping down the long straightaway, trying to max out their speedometers. A year ago, a couple of black guys rolled by, only going five over, not even worth my while. But something was off. And I’m not racist, but did I suddenly find myself profiling? It’s possible. Two black guys in that area was unusual, for one thing, New York plates, for another, and they had that cornrowed hair, which, personally, I’d never fully trusted.

I pulled them over, called in the plates. Tags came back clean. When I approached the vehicle, the driver already had his license and registration in hand. He was polite, didn’t ask what he’d done wrong, kept his hands on the steering wheel where I could see them. He’d been well coached, had been through this routine before.

His license was clear, nothing outstanding, not even a parking ticket. “I got turned around, Officer,” he said. “Been at my cousin’s house in Jamaica Plain, was trying to get back to New York. I’m all ass-backwards out here.”

I returned his license, his paperwork, and then something self-congratulatory stirred in me. Like I felt good because I wasn’t going to give this black kid a ticket. White cop lets black kids go. It was all going in that direction until I spotted something poking from the center console. Just the tiniest comer of a plastic baggie, barely hanging out.

I was a cop. Had a cop’s eye. Was trained to scan an area, assess a situation. Didn’t even know I was doing it half the time. “What’s that?” I said. “That Ziploc there?”

What really changed the game was that neither the driver nor the passenger looked where I was pointing. They stared straight ahead. “Nothing,” said the driver, “just some snacks.” His tone had changed from polite to something else. It was subtle. Defensive, maybe?

“Can I see those snacks, then?”

“You got a warrant?” he said, the attitude fully shifting now. Everything had flipped.

Long story short, that Ziploc held a couple of eight balls. And along with it, a fat roll of rubber-banded twenties thick as a bat barrel. Aubrey was fourteen, had already been fighting for a year. The medical bills were overwhelming. Insurance covered some but not enough to make a dent. Her meds alone were starving us. Ginny wasn’t even working part-time anymore, staying home to care for Aubrey. We were stuck. Caught in a drain that never stopped swirling.

It all happened fast, like I was an expert in corruption. Sure, I’d let a few cute girls out of speeding tickets, hit my siren to get around traffic, but nothing like this. I stuffed that wad of bills into my drawers, letting it brush my ball sack, then tossed the bag of coke onto the driver’s lap. They both looked at me wide-eyed and slack-jawed. “What am I gonna do with it?” I said. “Now get your asses out of here. Go down a couple more miles, pick up Route Two. When you find Ninety-five, you drive the exact goddamn speed limit until you hit New York City. Got me?”

“Yes, sir,” they said in unison.

I walked away, thirty-six hundred dollars to the good. It kept us afloat a few more months.

I’d crossed the center line. It wasn’t even debatable. That little car hadn’t had a chance, not against my cruiser. I’d worked hundreds of accidents, so as I stared into the meadow, at that totaled car, I knew this outcome wouldn’t be good.

Panic was something I’d been trained to control, but I felt it worming its way in. So two quick breaths, a shake of the head, and I walked toward the vehicle. I still hadn’t radioed dispatch.

The little car’s entire front end was compressed and flattened. The front bumper was gone, no sign of it anywhere. The surroundings were oddly quiet, save for the kalump kalump of the windshield wipers, which continued to work perfectly.

I opened the door, causing a horrendous pop, metal grinding at the seam. A woman sat on the driver’s side, air bag deployed but her torso slumped over the console, her head and shoulders hovering above the passenger seat. Some song by the Chili Peppers sounded from the radio, which was the first thing I did, turn that goddamn thing off.

“Hey, can you hear me?” I said. Her long hair dangled like tassels, hiding her face. “My name’s Officer Schmidt. Concord Police. Can you hear me?”

Her lungs wheezed in a loud, annoying way, same as my old dog used to do when sleeping. But she was alive, fighting hard. I hadn’t killed her. She wore a pink winter jacket, one of those ribbed, puffy ones all the kids are wearing these days. Patagonia. Aubrey had begged for one. Expensive as hell, but that’s where a small part of that eightball money went.

I grabbed that pink jacket by the shoulder and pulled her upright, where she now sat more or less normally in the driver’s seat, nearly pinched by the air bag. And that’s when I realized she was just a kid, probably the same age as Aubrey, give or take. Christ, she might be a classmate. A friend, even. Her hair was stuck to a purple gash along her right jawline, which made sense when I glimpsed the passenger window. Cracked and bloody, traces of skin sticking to it.

She hadn’t been wearing her seat belt. She’d been shot to the other side, hit her head, then somehow bounced back into the driver’s seat. My assessment: serious head trauma, a punctured lung, broken ribs. She was alive, but if she was going to stay that way she needed immediate medical attention. Probably an airlift to Mass General. Problem was, no chopper would be flying in these conditions.

I stepped back from the girl and reached for my radio. I’d screwed up, was going to suffer severe consequences. This girl, Aubrey’s age, who’d done nothing wrong, might die. I looked across the top of the roof, out toward that gray field. A different set of deer stood motionless at the wood’s edge, a dozen of them, their heads cocked, watching my every move. As if judging me. But they were stupid goddamn deer. Who the hell were they gonna tell? I released my radio, still didn’t call in.

I had a buddy, Jimmy, who worked Homicide in Boston. We’d been in the academy together, still met up twice a year for beers — talk shop, shoot the shit. Jimmy once told me something interesting, something I’d never forgotten. “In Russia,” he’d said as we sat in a bar in Allston, drinking heavily and staring at college girls, “homicide detectives, they got this superstition, right? They claim that the face of a murderer is captured in the victim’s eyes.”

“What do you mean?” I said, ogling one young lady in particular, who was throwing darts with her friends and wearing a BU T-shirt so tight it seemed impossible.

“Since the murderer’s face is the last thing the vic sees, it lingers on the surface like a snapshot. All you gotta do is look into their eyes and, voilà, you’ll have your murderer.”

“Ha, you ever tried it?” The girl’s first two darts bounced off the board and landed on the floor, the third hit double-twenty somehow. She gave a little jump, clapped her hands like a cheerleader.

“Are you kidding?” said Jimmy. “Of course, with every stiff I get. Never seen shit, but hell, can’t hurt, right?”

I was pretty drunk, listening to Jimmy, watching that girl bend over like a magical fantasy as she gathered her stray darts, but somehow I found myself thinking only of Sharon Tate. If that superstition were indeed true, imagine what her dead eyes could’ve shown those investigators. Images that, no doubt, would’ve made the toughest of them rethink their occupation — a bunch of blood-soaked kids, high on weed and acid and God knows what, thrilled with their darkness. Actually enjoying what they were doing.

I leaned back into the car, the girl still unconscious, laboring for breath. Shit everywhere. Gum wrappers, Dunkin’ cups, loose change, a spilled container of Tic Tacs. Located her purse, wedged beneath the passenger seat. Unzipped it, found her phone right away, then, sitting among lipstick tubes and pens and a blush brush, the thing I was after: her driver’s license. And stamped into the bottom comer, what I was hoping for: a bright red heart with DONOR printed across it.

I waved that hard piece of plastic, tapping it against my palm. Thinking, contemplating, mapping things out. Her name was Samantha, sixteen years old, lived here in Concord. Almost certainly a schoolmate of Aubrey’s, maybe a year ahead. Same age, same size, organ donor. No way to discern blood type. I tapped that license, keeping time with the kalump kalump of those wipers, with her heavy gurgling. Crazy shit started flying through my head. I knew how to get her blood type. Maybe.

I held her phone at the edges like a deck of cards, pressed the HOME button with my knuckle. The screen was locked, Touch ID required. But that didn’t matter to me. What mattered was the “Emergency” tab in the bottom left corner. I knuckled that, which led to the “Medical ID” tab, in bright red lettering.

One of the public-safety programs that we police officers take part in is going around to schools, talking to kids about basic safety measures. One of the first things discussed is the importance of filling in the Medical ID form on their phones. If there’s ever an accident, emergency personnel can access that info without a pass code. We urge all students to do it.

I tapped “Medical ID” and held my breath. There it was, each line filled out: Medical Conditions — asthma. Allergies & Reactions — penicillin. And so on, until Blood Type — B+. Exactly the same as Aubrey’s. Ginny and I had always joked with her about it — how her blood type was the same as her outlook on life — Be Positive.

Even crazier shit started swirling in my mind, like mystical smoke spilling from a cauldron. Oh, Jesus, what exactly was I doing? What the hell was I thinking?

Samantha had on cotton gloves, the ones where every finger is a different color. I peeled them off, tossed them into the backseat. I grabbed her limp wrist with my free hand and used her pointer finger to press the Touch ID. The screen instantly unlocked. I inhaled deeply, then exhaled, steadying myself. Still using her finger like a stylus, I pressed the “Messages” app. Her last text had been to someone named Bbear. It didn’t matter, Bbear would work fine. I made Samantha text, “Hey snowing hard.” Then I hovered her slender finger over SEND. If I pressed it, I knew what was coming next. I’d be crossing the Rubicon, no turning back. Was I really prepared for that? My life, my wife, my job, my daughter? Kalump kalump. My daughter. I pushed Samantha’s finger to the screen, heard whoop like the soft hoot of an owl. The text had been sent.

Timing was everything now. Coroners these days were amazingly accurate, could get a reliable T.O.D down to the minute, give or take a few. Not that it would be much of an issue in this case, long as I was smart, covered my tracks. Samantha’s knit scarf was nestled loosely around her neck. Her organs had to be preserved quickly. A minute had passed. I waited one more. Samantha’s death rattle continued, in and out, in and out. It sounded painful. Her phone chirped, probably Bbear replying. It was.

Be careful, said Bbear.

Perfect. I used her finger again, punched in OK Ill be ba and then looked at the time: 4:51. I tossed her phone onto the floorboard, not hitting SEND. 4:51 would be the point of impact. Texting and driving, a parent’s worst nightmare — the very first thing we taught in that public-safety presentation, even before we made them fill out the Medical ID form. I unraveled her scarf, wrapped each end around my hands like boxer’s tape, gave it a little double snap as if testing its strength. I was all business now, focused, alert, assessing the situation, establishing order.

I covered her mouth and nostrils. I knew enough not to press too hard. I wouldn’t need to, anyway. She was close, this was just speeding up the inevitable. I applied pressure firmly, evenly. The wheezing was muffled now, things starting to slow. I held on, gave it another sixty count. Then, right there at the end, right as the wheezing subsided and I was about to let up, she opened her eyes. They were bugged, looking straight into mine. I pressed harder as I turned my head away, adrenaline pulsing. Strength rippled down my biceps, into my forearms, into every finger and tendon. Her lids dropped, not sealing completely, semi-open like a creepy yard-sale baby doll. I finally stopped, released pressure. It was over, but her eyes haunted me.

I grabbed my radio, called Laura at dispatch, feigning urgency and panic. “This is Thirty-three, Dispatch. I’ve got a Department MVA. Need a PS out here immediately.”

“Did you say Department Accident, Thirty-three?”

“Roger that. Need a patrol supervisor. Got a girl crossed into my lane out here on Baker Bridge Road. Head-on. She appears critical. She might make it, but EMS needs to hurry. Over.”

I pulled Samantha out and pressed her firmly into the snow, packing her in the same way I might ice down a sixer of Bud. To preserve those vital organs. Then I halfheartedly started CPR, just enough so it would all look straight to the coroner. I wanted my DNA everywhere. I made sure my saliva drizzled her lips, pressed my mouth tight to hers to explain any odd bruising. Which was freaky and unsettling, my lips touching her dead ones. A girl my daughter’s age.

My department didn’t wear body cams, no dash cam in my cruiser, so no issues there. I’d covered my tracks. Then a shot of absolute dread shortened my breath. Yes, I’d covered my tracks, but not the literal ones. My tire tracks back up on the road. They were filling in a little, but there was no way in hell they’d be covered by the time my boys got on scene. One of my buddies would be the PS, would run the investigation. Tire tracks would be the first thing he noticed.

But it was such a shit show, conditions deteriorating by the second, that I’d have to hope whoever showed up, he wouldn’t overthink it. Hell, I’d worked with all these guys for twenty years. They’d have no reason to doubt my statement. I was a good cop. A clean cop. But tracks didn’t lie. I’d crossed way over center, and even a rookie wouldn’t miss that. For the first time, I considered what I’d just done. Considered that poor girl. Her parents. That I could go to prison.

But then something happened. It was like God wanted to save my ass, wanted Aubrey to live. The orange swirling lights through the dusk, the clinking of snow chains, the scraping of that blade over asphalt. I ran toward the road just as the snowplow halted. He jumped out, came around to meet me. “Holy shit, you okay, Officer?”

“Get your ass back in that truck,” I yelled. “I need this road cleared double-time. I got a girl barely hanging on over there. Ambulance is gonna need the road wide open, you got me? Don’t miss a single snowflake. Plow the shit out of this thing.”

“Yes, sir,” said the guy, not more than a kid, really, his John Deere ball cap tight to his head. His boots scrambled and slid through the wet snow as he raced around the front. He jumped in, set that plow in motion, and scraped away my tracks. Scraped away the evidence. Scraped away everything.

It was Mike McGill who showed up first, one of my oldest buddies. He asked the basics, I gave the answers he needed to hear. The EMTs arrived, loaded Samantha up. I wanted to tell those EMTs to keep her packed in ice. No mistakes in the preservation phase. Obviously, I said nothing.

Mike drove me back toward the station, chattering away, and I guess I answered whatever he asked. But I didn’t hear him. Instead, as I pressed my forehead to the cold window and stared out at the night, all I saw was my own vague reflection. I tried to lock eyes and stare myself down but found it impossible. Or maybe not impossible. Maybe I was just too chickenshit. Too much of a coward to face myself, to face what I’d just done.

And then there was Samantha, her eyes popping open, over and over on repeat. I wondered if my image was stamped across her pupils: dual shots of me holding her scarf, snuffing out her life.

What would her father see when he looked into his daughter’s eyes for the final time, before the casket closed and she was set in the ground? Would he see love? Innocence? Pure kindness, knowing his unselfish daughter had donated her body so others could live? Probably all of the above, and that would make him immensely proud, I’m sure. But what if he saw me instead? The hero cop who tried to save her, who gave her mouth-to-mouth? The cop who would sit in the front row at his daughter’s funeral, who would offer his sincere condolences as he shook the man’s hand, looking him dead in the eye and saying, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

And if things worked out, if Samantha was a viable match? What then? We’d obviously have to accept the liver. There was no turning back now. We couldn’t tell the doctors, “No, we’ll wait for another one.” Which meant, from that moment on, if a transplant was successful, every time I saw Aubrey’s smiling face — so full of life and possibility, so full of future, so “be positive” — I’d be reminded of Samantha. Or more accurately, reminded of what I’d done to her. Which in turn meant I could never look at my sweet baby girl the same way. My love for her, which was the most real and pure thing I’d ever known, would be tarnished. Tainted.

I’d only seriously prayed once in my entire life. About a year ago. I’d asked God to please find a match for Aubrey. It had been an odd feeling, like I really had no business asking since I’d never once prayed before. I’d never spent time in church or thought about religion or God or anything else. Maybe on a few occasions when I’d been stoned as a teenager, talking with friends about the afterlife, but that was about it. So I’d felt guilty praying, like I was trying to get something for free.

But now, as Mike McGill took a quick right and rolled the car into Dunkin’ for a coffee, I closed my eyes, shutting out the pink glow of the store, and silently prayed for only the second time ever. Something told me I shouldn’t beat around the bush, just be flat-out honest. And so I said it, direct and to the point. Please, God, don’t let it be a match. Make there be a problem. Make it not work.

Then I stepped out of the car, zipped my jacket tight to my throat, and put on my game face. I walked inside, forced a smile at Judy, who’d been working there for as long as I’d been on the force. A woman I’d seen nearly every day for the past twenty years, who was almost as familiar to me as Aubrey was. As Ginny was. “Can I get a large, Jude? Black. I think it’s gonna be a long night.”

“Sure thing, Rob. You want a lid?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Yeah, a lid would be good.”