The Prophet

37

THAT NIGHT ADAM WAITED until Kent called to tell him that the kids were in bed, and then he returned to the house to occupy his post.

“You haven’t heard anything from the police?” Kent said. “Still?”

“Not a word. You get any updates?”

“Not today. They don’t seem to be making much progress.”

Adam didn’t say anything to that. He was looking at the pictures in the living room and was amazed by how old Lisa was getting, how tall Andrew was. He never saw them. Lisa would remember him, but he wasn’t sure that his nephew would recognize him. Adam had visited the hospital when he was born, and come by on his first birthday with a gift, but never again. He looked at the photographs and thought that the kid was getting old enough to be some fun.

“They’re great kids,” Kent said.

“I’m sure they are.” He almost said I’d like to get to know them, but he stopped himself, turned away from the photos, glanced out at the street, and touched the butt of his gun as if to physically remind himself why he was there.

“You don’t need to stay awake all night,” Kent said. “Stay in the guest room if you’d like, or at least stretch out on the couch and get some—”

“I’m good.”

“Okay.” Kent hesitated, then said, “I watched the Angola game today.”

“What? Why?”

“Wanted to show Colin Mears. You know, last time the school won state, all that.”

“You’ll get it this year.”

“We’ll try.” Kent shook his head and said, “That was a hell of a game you played. That last drive… I mean, I remembered it, but watching it again was impressive.”

“All I did was open some gaps. Evan Emory did the running.”

“You opened craters. He could have done the walking, still would have scored.”

Adam shrugged. “How’s Mears?”

“Struggling.”

“I’m telling you, let him hit.”

“I know, I know.”

Kent seemed to regret having brought it up now, which wasn’t Adam’s goal, but he didn’t know what he was supposed to say about a twenty-two-year-old football game. He searched for something, some lighter memory from the pitch-black year that was 1989, the only year they had played together, and said, “You remember Tater?”

Kent smiled. “Tater Phillips? Yeah.”

Tater was a backup offensive lineman who had earned his nickname for an unfortunate resemblance, in shape and speed, to a potato.

“I’ll never forget the day Ward about killed him with the sled,” Adam said.

That brought a laugh from Kent, and Adam was smiling, too, couldn’t help it. Walter Ward had purchased a used tackling sled at an auction, which he then proudly set up in an open grassy area just outside the field—and at the top of a gentle hill. Featuring six angled tackling dummies connected through a steel frame, the sled was a massive piece of equipment, weighing hundreds of pounds. And mounted on wheels. Ward hadn’t experimented with his acquisition yet, confident that he understood all there was to understand about a tackling sled, but he did not understand the locking brakes. They’d run through a few rounds of hitting before the sled began its trembling slide. Ward’s first reaction when he realized it was going to roll down the hill was to tell everyone to get out of the way. It was about two seconds later, enough time to allow it to build a good head of steam, when he spotted Tater Phillips lumbering up the hill, late to practice after a trip to the trainer, his helmet on and head down.

“I thought I had heard Ward scream as loud as anyone could scream a hundred times before that,” Kent said. “But that was when he was angry. When he was scared? Wow, he hit a different level that time.”

Adam nodded. “It looked like some piece of farm machinery going at Tater. A combine or a thresher. Tater somehow oblivious to the whole thing.”

“Tater usually couldn’t get out of his stance in under three seconds, but I swear he covered fifty yards in three seconds when he finally saw it coming. He dodged it by an inch and then it wiped out the side of Byers’s truck. Always so lazy he insisted on parking it at the curb instead of the parking lot. He’s been in the lot ever since. I haven’t given him grief about that in years. I’ll need to do that tomorrow.”

“Give him my regards,” Adam said. They held the shared laugh for a few seconds longer, but then it was gone, and Adam was conscious of the holstered gun again, conscious of his job in this house. “All right, Franchise. Go to bed. I should be paying attention to the street.”

The street stayed empty. Clayton Sipes made no appearance. Rodney Bova did not leave his home. They were patient. That was fine. Adam could be patient, too. There was another word for his kind of patience—relentlessness.

They would break at some point. One of them. And he’d be there when they did.

The next day, while Adam sat in the office and watched a red dot, Chelsea went to prison to tell her husband that she was going to file for divorce. Before she left, she told Adam that she was going to let Travis Leonard keep the house.

“You’re the one who’s been paying the bills on it for years,” he said. “Why in the hell would you give up the house? It’s the only thing he’s got.”

“That’s why,” she said. She was dressed unusually formally, black pants and a long-sleeved white shirt, crisp and ironed, as if she felt a responsibility to look professional delivering the news. “He had two things. Me, and the house. I’m not taking them both from him.”

Adam gave that a slow nod, then said, “Where will you live?”

“It’ll take some time to get everything done, to move out. It will take some time. But when it’s done… we can talk about that, Adam. We’ve essentially lived together for a long time now. I’d miss that, wouldn’t you?”

“Of course. I was expecting you’d stay with me.”

She looked him in the eye. “Not at your house.”

“What?”

“I can’t live there,” she said, “and I think it’s time for you to consider moving on.”

He didn’t speak.

“You remember your sister, you think of her daily, you carry her with you,” she said. “That’s all good. Honorable, healthy. What you’ve created in that house is not healthy. Your brother is right about that. You’ve got felony charges to prove it.”

“Cops break into my home and I’m supposed to—”

“They did not break in, and you knew they would be there. Let me ask you this: Why did you really swing on that guy? Because he was in your home? Was that really the reason, Adam?”

It was not. It was because the son of a bitch had been in Marie’s room. Chelsea watched and waited and Adam looked away without answering.

“Okay,” she said softly. “These are things to think about. It’s time to move forward for me. I want to do it with you. But that’s going to require both of us being willing to move.”

She came around the desk, dropped to her knees, and sat with her hands on his waist and waited until he turned back to face her. Her dark eyes searched his, dancing as if she knew she needed to evade some of the things his eyes would show her to find the things that were true.

“Talk to Marie about it,” she said.

His throat tightened. He had never told her, had never told anyone about his conversations with his sister. Chelsea would never have overheard so much as a whisper of Marie’s name, and yet there was no doubt to her voice. She knew that he spoke to Marie, and she was not alarmed by this, or even surprised. The realization, and the way she’d just suggested he talk to her about this, crippled him. Before he’d chosen not to answer her; now he could not.

“Consider it,” she said. “Talk it out. But be fair to me on it, Adam. If you decide it isn’t the right thing for you, okay. I’ll stand by you. But give it fair consideration. I want us to be together, and that is not the right place. We need to find a new one, and make it ours.”

He nodded. She studied him, then rose, leaned over to kiss him, and left. He stared at the door for a time, shook his head, returned his attention to the computer screen, and pulled up his tracking program. The red dot that was Rodney Bova held steady.

He had not returned to the house since his arrest. Had planned to every day but found an excuse every day, and there was work to be done, searching for Sipes and guarding Kent’s house and trying to snag a few hours of sleep in the time between. This afternoon he found no police in sight, no media, no curious neighbors. He parked on the street and let himself in the side door, which opened into the kitchen. He’d had new appliances and countertops put in, replaced the floor tiles, but still it was the kitchen of his childhood; you couldn’t remodel that away. He could almost see his father at the table, the bottle of whiskey sitting between the two of them, could almost smell his mother’s Pall Mall smoke wafting out of the living room.

It was a warmer afternoon, maybe sixty degrees, and he cracked some windows and let the fall breeze fill the house. Paused at the bottom of the stairs and took a deep breath and then went up, knocked, and entered Marie’s room.

Nothing looked disturbed. Unless you knew where the stained-glass turtle belonged, you’d never have known it was gone. The police had been unusually respectful in their search, actually, although the cleanup probably improved substantially after Adam’s arrest, when they knew they were going to have to defend their conduct against his response in court. They’d swept up the broken glass. He wondered where it had gone. Probably into the trash somewhere. A shame, because he might have been able to put it back together. It would have taken time and care, but he might have been able to do it.

He lit the candles one at a time, then cracked this window, too—autumn was Marie’s favorite season, no surprise in a football-crazed family—and let the fresh air come in and stir the flames. Took his customary seat on the floor, back to the wall, and began to talk.

“I’m sorry I’ve been gone,” he said. “I’m so sorry they were here, and I’m sorry I’ve been gone. I wish it hadn’t happened in your room. I really do.”

His head was bowed and his eyes closed now.

“Let’s start off with good news, all right? Your little brother’s winning football games. They’re an awfully good team, Marie. They should get it done. There are some distractions that might be a problem, but I’m trying to help with that, and if anyone can focus through these sorts of distractions, it is your little brother. This week’s a big one. Saint Anthony’s. I’m scared for him against that team, but I’m also glad he drew them. I think he has to go through them if he’s going to get it. That’s part of it. He’s got to beat them. I think he will.”

He paused, covered his closed eyes with his bruised hand, and said, “Now for the bad news. There’s been some trouble with Kent. It’s nothing you need to worry about. I promise you that, Marie. I’m watching out for him. I will not let anything happen to him, or to Beth and Lisa and Andrew. I won’t. It’s a bad situation, but I’ll get it fixed. I can still get this one fixed.”

Her favorite candles had smelled of cinnamon, and the scent was heavy now, drifting toward him on the gentle breeze, and he felt as if she’d pushed it his way, trying to relax him. He stopped talking and breathed it in for a while.

“Chelsea wants me to move,” he said, and his voice was choked, so he cleared his throat and gave himself another minute. “She’s not pushing me on it, that’s not her way. She’s so patient, Marie. I wish you’d gotten to know her better. I think you’d have liked her. I really do. I think everyone would have liked her.”

Another pause, wiping a hand over his mouth, and then he said, “I think she might be right. I think it might be time to go. If you’re unhappy with that… I hope you find a way to let me know. But I think she’s right. It could be… could be a good thing for me. For us.”

He’d expected a greater sense of guilt and betrayal, but felt little of either. Felt clean, actually, far better than he had when he’d entered.

“We’ll see what happens,” he said. “This is what I’ll promise you, though: I’m not going anywhere until I’ve taken care of the things that I need to take care of. When I know I can leave Kent alone at night again, when I know I can make a call to Rachel’s mother, we will see what happens. But I will set that right first.”

He sat in silence for a moment, and then he blew out the candles, told her that he loved her and that he was sorry, and left the house. He needed some sleep before he returned to Kent’s, and, these days, he slept much better at Chelsea’s place.