by Chris Mooney
It hadn’t always been that way. Back when he was a kid—and, when you got right down to it, it hadn’t been that long ago, right?—local bands would put on free concerts at the park during the summer. He played touch football there, and back then the worst thing you had to worry about was broken glass. One summer afternoon—the last summer with his mother, in fact—he had fallen on a jagged bottom piece of a beer bottle and cut his knee right open, the pain so bad he was sure shards of glass had made their way underneath his kneecap.
He couldn’t ride his bike home, so Bill and this wiry, buck-toothed spaz named Gerry Nitembalm helped him walk back to Mackenzie’s. Mr. Demarkis, a neighbor of Gerry’s, saw the bleeding gash on Mike’s knee and told him to get his butt in the backseat of the car, Bill hopping in along with him.
Because of his age,Mike needed a parent or legal guardian to sign a form authorizing the hospital to administer care. He called home for over half an hour and but his mother never picked up.
“She said she’d be home all day,” Mike told Bill.
“You’re going to have to call your dad.”
“Are you insane?”
“You want to sit here in pain all night?”
Bill called the garage, got Cadillac Jack on the phone and explained the situation. Lou showed up fifteen minutes later, his face flushed and getting darker by the second as he listened to Bill explain what had happened at the park, Bill stressing the word accident.
“How many times I told you not to play down there because of the glass?” Lou said. “You messed up that knee, that’s it. You won’t be playing Pop Warner in the fall.”
Bill said, “It was my fault, Mr. Sullivan. Mike didn’t want to go and I made him.”
“Get your butt on home, Billy,” Lou said.
Bill paused at the emergency room doors, turned around and mouthed the words “I’m sorry” to Mike before leaving.
Two hours later, his knee bandaged and stitched with staples, Mike leaned on his crutches and watched as Lou peeled off three one-hundred dollar bills from his money clip to settle up the hospital bill. When Mike hobbled outside the ER doors, Bill and his father were sitting on the stone stoop.
“Sully,” Mr.O’Malley said. “How’s the knee?”
Lou said, “Just some bad cuts. He’s goddamn lucky he didn’t ruin his knee.”
“Accidents happen,” Mr. O’Malley said, and then shifted his attention to Lou. “You remember those days, right, Lou? Like that summer you were horsing around in Salmon Brook Pond and you slipped and broke your wrist. You were sixteen, remember?”
Lou walked right by him without answering.
Mike sat in the backseat on the way home, Lou in the front, smoking, grinding his teeth. Mike tried to hold it together, tried to steer his mind away from what was going to happen the second they got home and felt his insides get all knotted up and turn to water.
Nothing happened—not to him, anyway. But when his mother stepped inside the door? He heard the screaming, the broken dishes and the cries for help behind his closed bedroom door, through the pillow he stuffed over his head. Lou was pissed off because his wife should have been the one down at the hospital—not him. At least that was what Mike had always believed that fight was about.
The pay phone at Mackenzie’s was still there, still near the dumpster, the phone one of those new Verizon models with a bright yellow receiver that would have gone nicely with Bill’s new Ford Escape. Mike stared at the phone, the memory from the hospital teetering in his mind, unsure of where it belonged now—that memory one of dozens.
I thought you came for the truth, Michael.
Lou’s words from their visit at the jail.
Mike got out of his truck and walked over to the pay phone, one hand reaching back for his wallet. The piece of paper with the phone numbers was wedged in against the slot holding a calling card he used for times when his cell phone crapped out. He picked up the receiver, hit zero for the operator.
“I want to make a call and charge it to my calling card,” Mike said after the operator came on.
“And the number you’d like to call, sir?”
“It’s in France,” Mike said. “Can you dial it for me?”
“Yes sir. Just provide me with the number.”
Try the home phone number first and work your way down. Mike recited the series of numbers, then his calling-card number, and the operator told him to hold on. A moment later,Mike heard the connection go through, heard the ring bring life to a phone in some house halfway around the world, Mike’s stomach clenching at the sound of it, a part of him wanting to hang up.
The phone on the other end picked up. “Allô,” the male voice said.
Mike’s breath caught in his throat.
“Allô.”
“Jean Paul Latiere.”
“C’est Jean Paul.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t speak French.”
“This is Jean Paul.”
“I’m calling you about Mary Sullivan.”
“I’m sorry, but I do not know—”
“My name is Michael Sullivan. I’m her son.”
A slight pause from the other end and Mike spoke into it, spoke quickly: “I have pictures of the two of you together in France. I know she moved out there to be with you. I know all about you, your connection to her.” The words were tripping over each other in their rush to get out. “All this time I’ve thought Lou—that was her husband. Lou Sullivan. I’m sure she talked about him. About what he did for a living.”
Trickles of silence as Mike drew in a breath, picturing Jean Paul dressed in a sharp suit and sitting in some fancy antique chair in his mansion or whatever they called them over there, Jean Paul debating whether or not he should answer the questions or find a polite way to hang up.
“I just have a few questions. Five minutes and I’ll let you get back to your life.”
“Jésus doux et merciful.”
“Look at it from my point of view,” Mike said. “You’d want to know, right?”
On the other end of the line Jean Paul sighed heavily against the receiver. “This is … I would rather not have this conversation.”
“I need to know,” Mike said, and tightened his grip on the receiver. “Please.”
It was a full minute before Jean Paul spoke.
“Francine Broux. Your mother changed her name. She was terrified of your father.”
“I know for a fact Lou flew over there and found her.”
“Yes.” A heavy sigh, then Jean Paul added, “I know all about it.”
“What happened?”
“He beat her. He broke her nose and two of her ribs.”
Mike propped his left arm against the top of the pay phone and leaned forward, rubbing his tongue against the top of his mouth, finding it dry.
“She had a very nice life here,” Jean Paul said. “I loved her very much.”
There was a hitch in Jean Paul’s voice that told Mike to hang up and run.
“It happened about a year ago,” Jean Paul said. “She woke up with chest pains. I rushed her to the hospital … I’m sorry.”
All this time his mother had been alive.
Mike felt the sting in his eyes and tried to blink it away. “I met you once, didn’t I? In Boston? I was with her, doing a Christmas tour in Beacon Hill, and she pretended to bump into you, introduced you as a friend of hers.”
A pause, then Jean Paul said, “Yes. That was me.”
“Only you didn’t plan on her showing up with me.”
Jean Paul didn’t say anything.
“So that night,” Mike said. “That was about, what, her trying to convince you to take me in?”
“Early on, I knew one thing about myself for sure: I knew I wasn’t parenting material. I’m very selfish. Very self-centered and self-absorbed.”
“She never had any intention of coming back for me, did she?”
Jean Paul didn’t answer.
“She made a point of telling me to mak
e sure Lou didn’t find out where she was hiding,” Mike said. “Only it didn’t matter whether or not he did. She had no intention of coming back. She dropped those letters in the mail, and when she didn’t come for me, she knew I’d blame Lou.”
“I didn’t agree with your mother’s choice.”
“But you don’t regret it either.”
“We were young,” Jean Paul offered. “When you’re young, you do foolish things. You don’t stop and think about the consequences. How you’ll have to live with them.”
“She ever regret her decision?”
“I can’t speak for your mother.”
“You just did.” Mike hung up and felt the St. Anthony medal, the one his mother had given him that night at the church, bounce against his chest.
CHAPTER 45
Mike was pulling out of MacKenzie’s parking lot when his cell phone rang.
“Last time I checked I didn’t have a partner,” Nancy said.
“You were busy today, so I thought I’d help out, get the ball moving,” Mike said.
“If I wanted help, I would have asked for it last night. You just don’t go barging in and—”
“Nancy, I’m warning you, I’m not in the mood.”
There was a sharp intake of air on the other end, then Nancy said, “Your message said she freaked out when you mentioned the abortions.”
“A little, yeah.”
“Give it to me word for word. Don’t leave anything out.”
For the next five minutes Mike explained what had happened with Terry.
“That’s a rather strong reaction,” Nancy said when he finished.
“The woman’s Catholic with a capital C. She wears a cross outside her shirt.”
“I’m Catholic.”
“But not with a capital C. Trust me, there’s a big difference.”
“I still wouldn’t rant like that in front of a stranger. What else?”
“I told you about her moving to Arizona.”
“Because of the fibromyalgia?”
“That’s part of it. I got the impression it’s more to do with her friend.”
“What’s the friend’s name?”
Mike thought about it for a moment.
“I don’t remember the name,” he said.
“Jesus Christ.”
“Who cares? She’s not a suspect, Nancy.”
“Hold up. Were you or were you not the person who last night asked me to dig?”
“Yes, I—”
“My job is to talk with people, ask them questions, look for holes in their stories. When things don’t add up—when something seems off—that’s when I dig deeper. Now, would you like me to do my job, or would you like to handle this yourself?”
“No,” Mike said, gritting his teeth. “I want you.”
“Okay then. Now, did Terry mention anything else about Jonah?”
“No. In fact, she made a point of emphasizing she didn’t know that side of him.”
“That’s what she said? Those were the words that came out of her mouth?”
“She said something like, ‘The side of him that hurt those girls and kept those items hidden under the floorboards of his bedroom—I didn’t know that part of him.’”
“She said the items were stored under the floorboards of his bedroom.”
“That’s what she said.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive.”
“That information hasn’t been in the papers or on TV.”
Mike hadn’t been following the news on TV or reading the papers. “So maybe she heard it from Merrick,” he said.
“Merrick wouldn’t go into that level of detail with her.”
“He did with me.”
“That’s different. He did it to convince you—” Nancy stopped herself.
“Convince me that it was over? Is that what you were going to say?”
“When was the last time she talked with Merrick?”
“I have no idea. You want me to go back and ask?”
“No, but since you’re so eager to play private eye, you keep an eye on her until I get there,” Nancy said. “Keep your ass parked in the truck and call me if she leaves the house. I don’t want her disappearing before I get a chance to talk with her. I’m heading back.”
CHAPTER 46
Mike found a curb spot about a block up from Terry Russell’s duplex, a spot under the shade of a tree that offered a good view of the nurse’s front door and porch. He tilted his seat back and lit a cigarette and smoked and watched Terry’s front porch and driveway. He saw himself at nine pedaling up the driveway on his new bike—a birthday gift from Lou, no less—and Mike tried to turn away from the memory and heard Lou calling him from the backyard and then saw Lou sitting on the back steps, Lou freshly showered and dressed in a clean white undershirt and a pair of jeans, not a crease on them.
“Take a load off, chief,” Lou said, and slapped the step next to him. “Me and you need to have a talk.”
It was a humid evening in July, the air thick with heat and the smell of fresh-cut grass and bark mulch. Mike sat down on the opposite end of the step, a good arm’s length between them—the space he needed in case he needed to run. Lou didn’t seem angry—at least not yet. At the moment his eyes were fixed on their neighbor, Ned King, on all fours and working on his garden, his tan shorts and the hard, peach-colored plastic of his artificial limb streaked with mud.
“A mine did that,” Lou said. “Stepped on it and blew his leg clean off. Now the poor son of a bitch is fighting cancer. Agent Orange. You’d think God might smile once in a while, give us a break.”
Louis Sullivan, Purple Heart recipient, shook his head and sighed, sad or angry, maybe a mix, Mike could never tell. His father’s moods, what made them fluctuate and erupt, were about as easy to predict as the New England weather.
“Your mother’s never coming back,” Lou said. “Not a week from now, not a year from now. She’s gone, understand?”
“Gone where?” Mike asked, but he already knew the answer.
The month after she left, a padded envelope addressed to Mike arrived at Bill’s address. Inside the envelope were a silver key chain and a note card. The next time I write, I’ll have an address where you can write me, his mother had written. Soon you’ll be with me here in Paris. Have faith, Michael. Remember to have faith, no matter how bad it gets. And remember to keep this quiet. I don’t have to remind you what your father would do to me if he found out where I was hiding.
Paris. His mother was living in Paris.
Lou took a pull from his beer bottle and when he was done,let the bottle hang between his legs. Mike paid close attention to Lou’s hands,waiting for them to clench up—the sure sign that a beating was on the way.
“It doesn’t matter where she went,” Lou said. “She left us. That’s what matters. And praying isn’t going to bring her home. God doesn’t give two shits about your problems. He doesn’t care that your leg got blown off from a mine or why your brother died in some shit war or why your mother ran away. He takes and keeps on taking because underneath it all, God’s a sadistic prick. Remember that next time you listen to Father Jack mouthing off about the great, divine plan He’s got for everyone.”
Mike toyed around with the idea of unleashing the truth on his father, imagining how it would hit him. But if Lou found out where she was hiding, Mike knew his father would hunt her down and kill her. Mike had heard the stories about how his father made people disappear. Not only that, he had witnessed his father’s anger firsthand. Those experiences were practically tattooed on his skin.
“You want to cry, go ahead and let it out. Ain’t nothing to be ashamed about. I cried when I found out my brother died in the war, and I cried when I buried my mother.” Lou searched his son’s eyes for a reaction.
“I’m okay.”
“You want to be a man about it. I respect that.” Lou gripped Mike’s neck and squeezed hard. Drops of sweat ran down Mike’s back. “Do
n’t worry, Michael. It’s gonna be okay. You’ll see.”
Mike asked if he could get going; he was supposed to meet Bill down at Buzzy’s. Lou nodded, and Mike bounded down the hallway to his room. As he passed by his father’s bedroom, the door partly open, he caught a bright metallic blink that made him stop.
On top of Lou’s opened suitcase was a camera—a real sweet one by the looks of it. What was Lou doing with a camera? And where had he been for the past four days?
Mike looked through Lou’s bedroom window. His father was still sitting on the porch steps. Mike stepped inside his father’s bedroom, and when he picked up the camera, he saw an envelope stuffed in the corner of the suitcase. Inside were plane tickets to Paris, only the name on the tickets was Thom Peterson—the same name on the passport, the one with a picture of Lou with a beard and a mustache.
Sitting in the truck, Mike thought back to that night in the church with his mother: Real bravery—true bravery—involves the spirit. Like having faith your life will turn out better when it looks like it won’t. Having faith—That’s real bravery, Michael. Always have faith, no matter how bad it looks. Don’t let your father or anyone else take that away from you.
The setup, followed by the first letter: And remember to keep this quiet. I don’t have to remind you what your father would do if he found out where I was hiding.
And now the second: I’m coming for you … I need you to keep being patient … Don’t let your father find this address … If your father finds out where I’m hiding—I don’t have to remind you what your father is capable of.
Mike pictured his mother dropping each of these letters off at a mailbox or whatever they called them over there in Paris—his mother knowing exactly what she was doing.