Child of My Winter

by Andrew Lanh

  I grinned to myself: Five children who obeyed like robots.

  I sipped tea while the women talked of the wilted bok choy they’d purchased at A Dong last week.

  I waited.

  A half hour later Grandma and I sat by ourselves in the little-used living room on a plastic-covered sofa. Framed family photos hung on the wall: Hank and his siblings in various celebratory moments of school history—grade school awards, high school medals, college. One of Hank on the day he was sworn in as a Connecticut State Trooper, his face glowing. Next to him, Grandma clutched his arm affectionately, looking up into his face.

  For a moment Grandma watched my face.

  “That boy is not a murderer.”

  “I know.”

  Her voice a whisper. “I know that you know. But I watched him all night, l listened to him. He could never kill a living thing. Not a bird or anything that lives.”

  “I know.”

  “You must help him.”

  “I’m trying to.”

  “But he will not help you.”

  “Grandma, that’s what is driving me nuts. He won’t talk of his trouble with the professor. He has tons of secrets. He says he had nothing to do with the murder, and I believe him, but then he stops—like I should accept that. That the world should accept that.”

  “Because he is telling you the truth. Why should he explain?”

  I smiled. “For one, the police have a different slant on things.”

  She waved her hand, dismissing the idea. “Foolish, they are.”

  “They have to find the murderer.”

  Her voice rose. “Then they are walking the wrong path.” She waited a second and then said slowly, “He wants to tell you something.”

  That startled me. “How do you know that?”

  “The fact that he sat at supper with us. That he likes you. Likes Hank.”

  “Everybody likes Hank.”

  “A murderer would not be chatting on the phone with a state cop. Night after night.”

  I agreed. “That is a little strange.” But I added, “Unless he’s a sociopath—gets his kicks…”

  She stopped me. “Nonsense. Not that boy.”

  “I know.”

  She waved a cautious finger in the air. “He’s not ready yet because he doesn’t know he needs to. I know why. Look at his—courtly manners. The bowing. The respect. Such an Old-Country boy who doesn’t understand that Vietnam holds him to the ground, doesn’t let him breathe. He’s a prisoner of the past. He’s a prisoner in that house that does not understand the living Buddha. He lives with his mother in a cell. It is because of her that he is quiet.”

  I sat up. “You could tell all that from dinner talk?”

  “Of course. Obvious. A boy locked into his family’s past. His mother has given him nothing but shame and guilt and—and now obedience. No one else. Not his brothers who ignore him. No, his mother.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “He hates his life, but he will do anything to make his mother love him.”

  “It’s not working.”

  “What else does he have? Living in a house that doesn’t talk. He’s alone.” An unfunny smile. “Until he has the five children who will be Americans and not listen to him.”

  “And an obedient Old Country wife.”

  She swung her head back and forth and grinned. “She will bean his head with a wok.”

  I laughed. “So where does this leave me?”

  But Grandma was distracted, her face scrunched up. “I worry because there is no Buddha in that house. That awful story of the McDonald’s”—she pronounced the English word as “Madonell”—“cheeseburger at the foot of Buddha.”

  “I’m sorry. Offensive, I know.”

  “I am not offended by it.”

  “Then what? Dustin found it funny.”

  “It isn’t funny. That boy lives in the shadow of a Buddha that has closed his eyes.”

  “Anyway, Grandma, It was just…”

  She held up her hand. “This is about a cheeseburger, but it is not about a cheeseburger.” To my puzzled expression she said, “I will not sleep tonight.”

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Darijo Delic was shot the next afternoon.

  I’d left my apartment, headed into Hartford, stopping at my office to say hello to Jimmy, but then spent three or four hours lost in the musty cubicles at the Connecticut State Library on Capital. Absorbing research that tickled the antiquarian in me, I supposed, as I delved into family bloodlines that collided and turned and led to contemporary swindle among the less loyal and more greedy millennials who traced their lineage back to Thomas Hooker. Fascinating, the avarice of those who were already comfortably rich. My iPhone was switched off, of course, wi-fi also silenced in the quiet rooms. Shelter from the social media frenzy surrounding us, but welcome respite—a peaceable kingdom where no one could get at me. Although my fingers twitched for at least one tweet or email blast.

  My wish granted—outside, walking into wispy snow and heavy twilight, my phone pinged, the Facebook alert on my laptop sang a song, and I knew I’d reentered the world. Hank tweeted and texted and left voice messages. Liz did the same. Even Jimmy, Luddite extraordinaire, left a halting voice mail. But they all alerted me to the same nightmare:

  Darijo, shot.

  Darijo Delic had been shot as he stood on the terrace of his family restaurant in Little Bosnia, the hapless young man sneaking a cigarette. A passing car hesitated, a window flew open, two shots rang out. One struck the poor boy.

  “He’s all right,” Hank told me when I reached him as he came off duty. “Winged in the left shoulder. A bullet lodged in his flesh.”

  “In the hospital?”

  “Home now. Cops all over the place. State cops, too. The whole nine yards. Finishing up now.”

  “Jesus Christ,” I said into the phone.

  “My sentiment exactly.”

  “Do you think…?” I began.

  “What do you think? Okay, I got the go-ahead to head there from my supervisor, especially since I’ve already talked to the kid. The family is terrified. So…you and me.”

  “When?”

  “Now. Head there now.”

  ***

  A state police cruiser was parked in front of Sarajevo Café, Hank in uniform sitting behind the wheel. He stepped out as I pulled behind him.

  Yellow police tape circled the front of the restaurant, the front terrace pitch-black. A lone Hartford cop car sat nearby, the officer behind the wheel nodding at Hank and pointing to the second floor of the brick building. Although the restaurant was closed—the CLOSED sign I’d seen earlier—and another sign taped to a window—ZATVOREN. I assumed it said the same thing in Bosnian. But the second floor, the family residence, was ablaze with light, the shades pulled up so that blocks of brilliant yellow dotted the upper story. Snowflakes drifted across the windows.

  The cop rolled down his window. A young Hispanic officer, nametag LOPEZ, with a crooked smile and a hint of a moustache over his upper lip. “Good luck, man. They’re not happy.”

  “No reason to be,” I told him.

  “Detectives just left. They weren’t happy either.”

  “Don’t blame them,” Hank said.

  “I’m not happy,” he said, smiling.

  “You’re in a warm car,” Hank said.

  “Then I guess I should be happy.” He waved us off.

  I pressed the doorbell at the side of the building. No answer. Again. Finally someone peeked out of the upstairs window, a young girl who spotted Hank when he stepped back. A buzzer clicked.

  A light switched on suddenly at the top of a dark, narrow staircase, and I was surprised to see Darijo standing there, his shadowy body silhouetted against the brightness. Hank bounded ahead, though I stepped carefu
lly, holding onto a wobbly rail that seemed ready to give.

  Darijo was smiling. “I’m all right, gang.” He backed up. “Come in. The cops said you’d be coming.”

  His left arm was in a sling, his shoulder bandaged. When he moved away, he winced, though he tried to smile. He motioned us to a sofa as he eased himself carefully into a recliner.

  His mother and father sat in straight-backed chairs next to each other, facing us, in a solemn formation, their set faces reminded me perversely of Grant Wood’s classic American Gothic. Balkan Gothic, with shrouded dark eyes, fearful.

  “My parents don’t want you here,” Darijo said, smiling and glancing at them. “They think you brought on this…this shooting.”

  That surprised me. “How?”

  Another quick glance their way as his father sighed. “You bring the talk of death with you. I mean, talking of Professor Winslow. Of Dustin Trang. I told them it’s all nonsense but…you know.” He shrugged.

  “I do know,” I agreed. “And I understand.” I turned to his parents who’d not taken their eyes off Hank and me. “My apologies for the intrusion but it’s important.”

  His father held up his hand and said something to his son in Bosnian. The boy nodded, then shook his head with a wistful smile. “He offers his hospitality to you. Some tea perhaps.” Then he grinned. “Even though he told me your presence scares him.”

  “We won’t take long,” Hank said.

  “Authorities,” Darijo said. “Cops.” He pointed to Hank’s uniform. “Echoes of disaster in the homeland.”

  “I understand,” I repeated. “But there’s a chance this could relate to Dustin.”

  Darijo spoke quickly. “No, it doesn’t.” He drew in his breath. “I think you’re wrong.”

  We paused as his sister scurried in from the kitchen, balancing a tray. Small teacups with crescents. A tiny urn. Slices of poppy-seed and walnut rolls. Darijo’s mother nodded to us, and in a high-pitched, nervous voice said something in Bosnian.

  “Eat,” Darijo said to us. “Drink.” Then he lowered his voice, confidential. “You have to. It’s being polite.”

  We did, though Hank seemed to enjoy the sweet rolls more than he should, stuffing one after the other into his mouth. I read his lips as he faced me: Damn good stuff. Put some in your pocket for later.

  I ignored him. “Why do you say it doesn’t relate to Dustin?”

  His father grunted, so I waited. The old man muttered something and pointed at Hank, who was unfortunately stuffing his mouth with another roll.

  “My father says good men love good food.”

  Hank managed to blurt out thanks, poppy seeds collecting at the corner of his lips.

  “The cops think it was a random shot,” Darijo went on. “In this neighborhood there’s a lot of shooting. Wild West in Hartford. Guns go off all the time. Drug battles, turf wars down at the corner. Los Solidos gang against the Soul Brothers. You learn to live with it.”

  “But you were shot.” I pointed to his bandaged shoulder.

  “I know, I know.” He paused, glanced at his mother and father whose faces had taken on another level of panic. “But the first shot went wild. I heard it.”

  “Two shots?” From Hank, swallowing.

  “Tell us what happened,” I prompted.

  He sat back, wincing as he shifted in the seat. “The dinner crowd was gone, I go out for a cigarette like I always do. I like to stand on the terrace over the street, watching the cars whiz by, the folks going by. Christmas—folks a little drunk. Freezing, but after my shift in the hot restaurant…it’s invigorating. Anyway, I’m standing there and I see a car hesitating, an old crate, a backfire I think, but the sign on the building next door goes ping. I realize it’s a shot. Nervous, I back up and at that moment I hear another shot and I jerk back, my shoulder stinging, blood on my palm. I toppled onto the terrace.”

  “Then?”

  “I dunno. I blanked out.” A sheepish grin. “Next thing I know I’m in an ambulance on the way to Hartford Hospital. And here I am. Alive.”

  “Thank God,” I said.

  “So I think it was an accident.”

  Hank didn’t buy it, his tongue in his cheek. He said to Darijo, “That’s what the cops told you?”

  “Their guess. The detective said I was—unlucky. A city with lots of shooting, killings every night, they said I was lucky to be alive. Innocent bystanders get whacked all the time. Standing on the sidewalk—shot dead. Caught between rival gangs. Last week an old lady taking in her mail. A few blocks from here.”

  His father was grumbling. In halting English he said to me, “The gunfire. Here. America.” He stood up, his hands fluttering as his head swiveled back and forth, a panicked look in his eyes. “My son.”

  Darijo said something in Bosnian, reassuring from his tone, but his father wasn’t happy—he rocked back and forth. Darijo’s mother stood and placed her hand on her husband’s forearm, and he bent his head down. She whispered something, and he offered her a thin smile. When she smiled at me, I realized Darijo had her eyes: large, deep-set, coal-black.

  Darijo watched his parents. “I don’t want my parents to worry,” he whispered, faking a smile. “I want them safe.”

  “So do I,” I said, “but that safety involves you, Darijo.”

  He shrugged off my remarks. “I’m okay. I told you. A chance shooting. Random. I…”

  “I don’t care,” Hank interjected.

  Darijo’s father’s voice carried a trace of anger as he said something I couldn’t grasp, a mixture of English and Bosnian.

  “What?” I asked Darijo.

  Awful sadness in his voice. “He says they came for peace. To America. In his nightmares he hears gunfire. His old village. Now—here—an American movie. Bang bang.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “Time to go,” Hank whispered.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  Darijo shrugged that off. “You gotta do your job.” Then, following us to the door, he said, “Tell Dustin I said hello. Life has got real painful for him, right?”

  I nodded. “He’s in a lot of trouble.”

  “He didn’t do that.”

  “So he says. Over and over.” Frustration in my voice.

  “Maybe you’re not asking him the right way.”

  “What does that mean?” Hank asked.

  “I don’t know what it means, but I always felt that Dustin was desperate to talk. But something was holding him back. He was afraid of—I don’t know—betraying somebody?”

  “A secret?”

  “But what?” From Hank, hurriedly.

  Darijo smiled. “He always pulled back at the last moment. It was hard to be with Dustin, you know. He’s like a…wound coil. Sometimes that scared me.”

  His father said something to him, a flash of anger, and Darijo nodded. A gentle voice as he said something back. Then to us, “Goodnight.”

  “You know, Dustin can use a friend, Darijo.”

  “Yeah, that’s true. But somebody’s got to convince him of that.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t think he trusts that people will like him.”

  “Do you?”

  He ran his hand through his hair and scratched an ear. He made a hurtful sound as his bandaged shoulder twitched. “I don’t know. To be honest, I just don’t know.”

  ***

  At midnight my phone rang. Hank’s voice sounded faraway. A rush of sounds behind him: raised voices, phones ringing, even high-pitched laughter, the clack of computer keys, someone complaining about a snow squall on I-84.

  “You working?”

  “I’m at Troop H barracks. Stopped in.” He drew in his breath. “Listen, Rick. Forensics just spotlighted the bullet taken from Darijo’s shoulder.”

  “That’s fast.” />
  “Hey, modern science.” Another deep intake of breath. “Listen. It’s from the same gun that killed Ben Winslow.”

  My heart raced. “I had a gut feeling.”

  His mouth was close to the phone. “The same goddamn gun, Rick. You know what this means?”

  “Yeah, Hank. Ben’s murder is somehow connected with Dustin Trang.”

  “Bingo.”

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Liz took a sip from the glass of pinot grigio. “It’s a simple question. Maybe a comment. You and Hank concluded that the shooting of Ben and that Bosnian boy means Dustin is involved. I don’t follow that logic.”

  We were sitting at Zeke’s. The war room, Hank termed it. Yesterday’s shooting of Darijo had jump-started a chain reaction of e-mails, tweets, Instagram, Facebook alerts, Hank on Snapchat with other cops, and an old-fashioned telephone call from Jimmy suggesting an early dinner at Zeke’s. “Somebody gotta talk some sense about this madness.”

  Leaving my apartment, I’d bumped into Gracie sweeping snow off the front steps, and I invited her. “Jimmy’s idea,” I’d said, and her harrumph suggested the old man couldn’t possibly have an original idea—but who knew? Stranger things had happened. “You haven’t see him in—what?—a day?” I’d added, stoking the fires of their unacknowledged flirtation with each other.

  We’d joined Liz and Hank, already seated at a back table, Liz sipping her favorite white wine while Hank, in civilian clothes, toyed with the wet label on his bottle of Sam Adams. Liz repeated her doubt about Dustin’s involvement simply because Darijo had been wounded by the same gun that killed Ben. “I was just telling Hank what I thought,” she told me, “and I was amazed that his stoic expression suggested he doubted my words.”

  Hank groaned. “Help me, Rick.”

  Again she took a small sip of wine. “The dangers of your two-man tag-team testateronic play.”

  “How you talk!” Jimmy mumbled, coming up to the table and pulling out a chair. He struggled out of his lumberjack winter coat and dropped his gloves into his lap.

  “All I’m saying…” Liz protested.