by D. R. Mather
“Listen, about Cindy, we all loved her, we all still do; she was kind of the heart of a lot of us here, that’s why I was so happy to hear that she’s doing so well,” explained Billy. Michelle shook her head to agree.
“Before I ask, how’s your job going?”
“Well, I got promoted to head of sales, but the damn import shit is killing us. The shop had to do some cutbacks. I was spared, but I had to take a cut in my commissions to keep my place there.”
“I’m sorry to hear that Billy, I really am, but you’re sticking it out right? No more, (Kevin mimed tilting a bottle to his mouth), right?”
Michelle cut Billy’s answer off, “Kevin, I don’t want to even know what you did to him, but I can promise you this, he hasn’t had one single drop since you did it. For that, I think I have to thank you as much as he does. He’s once again the Billy I fell in love with and I’m pleased to have that back.”
Kevin put his hand on top of Michelle’s, “If Billy didn’t have it in him, there would have been nothing I could have done to help, believe me on this.”
Michelle looked at Kevin, “If that’s the way you want to leave it, I’ll accept that, but trust me, I know better.”
Kevin slid his hand off of hers and smiled. He knew for a fact she knew better, so it was best to let it go.
“So moving on… Billy, would you like to visit Cindy and Roland?”
“REALLY?”
Kevin laughed a little at the excitement in Billy’s voice, “Yeah, really.”
Billy turned to Michelle, “I can’t, my wife is pregnant, what if something were to happen?”
Kevin smiled, “Don’t worry, nothing will happen.”
Kevin got up and went over to Brandon, who was coloring at the table.
“Hi little guy, what are you drawing?”
Brandon looked up at the big man and said, “Its Mountains with snow and a big, big house, with lots of people inside.”
He held the picture up to Kevin. True, with a four year old it wasn’t going to look like a masterpiece, but Kevin still noticed a long curvy driveway and a big pool in the back. There was a circle scribbled on both the left and right sides of the pool, and Brandon had drawn a line to connect the two circles, straight across the pool. Something slammed into Kevin’s head as soon as he saw it. He thought;
‘Little Brandon just showed me something I’d had no idea even existed. We can take the journey to the ‘beings’ at the Inn if the amulet can’t be there. Like now, where I have half and Judy has half.’
“Wow that sure is a pretty picture Brandon.” He rubbed Brandon’s head and turned back to the adults, “Michelle, when are you due?”
“Oh not for a few months yet, why?”
“I think you all could make the trip just fine. That is, if you’re interested?”
“But what about my job Kevin?”
“I’ll take care of that right now if you’d like?”
Kevin asked for Billy’s boss’s home number.
“Yeah, I have it for emergencies.” He got it and gave it to Kevin. Kevin saw a phone on the far wall of the small kitchen and went to it. Not three minutes later and Kevin was in front of them again.
“You’re all set. You have a week off, no problems.” Kevin gave them both a big smile then sat back down, “Now, for what I need you to do…” Kevin took out his wallet…
***
Around 8 a.m., a large moving truck pulled into the apartment complex where Cindy used to live. Billy was behind the wheel, Michelle was on the passenger side and you could see the very top of a small head in the center. When the truck stopped, Kevin came over to Billy’s side. He saw Michelle wave and returned one of his own.
“As I suspected, all of Cindy’s things are in storage,” said Kevin. “Everything here has been settled, I covered all of Cindy’s costs with the manager and he gave me the key to the storage unit. Do you know ‘Rick and Sons’ storage over on Belding Street?”
“Know it, I use it too.”
“Good, that makes things easier. What say we go get Cindy her things back?”
“Sounds great Kevin, just follow behind me, I’ll get you right to it.”
“Sounds good. It’s unit number 2305, met you there.” Kevin ran to his car. Within a minute, they were on the road. Twenty minutes later and they were both standing in front of the unit.
Kevin looked sad, “Everything Cindy owned in her life fits in here?”
“Yeah,” Billy said, “life just sucks doesn’t it?”
Both of them stood in front of a five foot by ten foot storage garage. Kevin opened it and there represented the entire history of both Cindy and Roland. Forty five minutes later and Billy was ready to go.
“You have the directions, right?”
“Yup, I have them right here,” and Billy held them up.
Kevin smacked the fender of the truck and yelled out, “Then move ‘em out,” in a bad John Wayne voice.
Billy took off and headed to Colorado. Kevin got in the Mustang and drove over to Billy and Michelle’s bank. They hadn’t seen him take the deposit slip from the check book that had been sitting on the kitchen counter. Kevin walked in to the bank and went over to where the pens sat at a station.
“Now for the mystery to solve itself,” Kevin thought as he stood there with Billy’s deposit slip and his wallet in his hand.
He didn’t expect it to be empty, that much he knew, but he didn’t expect to see what was there either. There was money, only, it was moving faster than blazes like a dealer flipping the deck of cards from one hand to the other, or as if he had his finger on the edge of a large book and was speed flipping the page edges with his thumb.
’Well, this is new,’ he thought to himself.
“Hey, I don’t understand,” he said under his breath. Kevin began guessing, “You want me to just reach in and grab?” The money kept flipping. “Ok, you want me to say an amount?” The money kept flipping. “Look, if you want me to pay them with a check out of my own account you’re going to have a problem, because I don’t have an account.” The money stopped. On the side of a one dollar bill was a check. Kevin took it out and the dollar bill went away. “Cheap bastards,” Kevin whispered under his breath. “Couldn’t even let me have a buck to my name huh?” Kevin looked at the check, ‘First Unity Holdings.’ It had an address of 25436 Wall St, New York, New York. ‘Huh, I’m playing with the big boys now?’ Kevin thought and started to write. “But what?” he thought. He started to write ten thousand and found the pen wouldn’t work. “Crap.” He grabbed and went through ten pens before he figured it out; “wrong amount?”
A half hour later and security was starting to get really nervous. Finally Kevin figured it out; it was actually far from being cheap. He walked up to a teller and handed her the check and Billy’s deposit slip. The check had ‘for deposit only’ written on it. The teller looked at it and asked if he could excuse her for a second. She left, and then came back with the bank manager.
“Hello sir, this is quite an amount. You’ll understand if we need to clear it from its original bank?”
“No problem,” Kevin said.
The manager made it easy; he walked over to Kevin instead of walking behind the teller’s booth. Kevin put his hand on the man’s shoulder and said “I’ll just wait here.”
Ten minutes later and Kevin was walking to his car, away from the bank, leaving Billy and Michelle Three hundred thousand dollars richer. He whistled a tune and a baseball bat couldn’t have knocked the smile off of his face.
Chapter Twenty-One
When Beth and Cindy turned the corner into the garage, Judy was on the ground, curled in a ball. She was crying hysterically. By the time they both reached her, they were both crying as well. Beth got to her first.
“Judy, baby, come on honey,” she was on the floor with Judy. Cindy got down to the floor eventually; it just took a little longer. Beth was rubbing Judy’s back but Cindy was having none of it, she reached and grabbed Judy u
p and into her arms. Now they were locked as one single unit. All of them were crying, Judy the hardest.
“He…he…he’s…nev…ver….coming…coming…back!” Judy could no longer talk again.
Beth heard this, “Oh baby, of course he is!”
Judy could only shake her head in a ‘no’ motion.
“Yes he is,” Cindy said, “of course he is honey.”
Through a lot of trying, Judy finally managed to get out, “No….I’ve….I…I’ve lost him…forever…” And it all started again.
It took Cindy and Beth over forty minutes to get Judy standing up again. “Come inside Honey, its cold out here and we aren’t dressed for it.”
They finally got Judy up to the front doors and everyone else was waiting. Judy turned to the driveway and saw tire tracks. Kevin’s tire tracks. A tiny mew came out of her and she collapsed at the door. Will, Alex and Roland all caught her together before she hit the ground.
When Judy came around, Barb was sitting on the edge of the sofa where she’d been lying; she was holding Judy’s hand. Judy had a compress on her head. Will came up and knelt right in front of her face.
”Did you know you even cry in your sleep fireball?” he asked.
Judy reached out and pulled him to her; she hugged him so tight that he could barely catch his breath.
“Tell me he’s coming back Will.”
“Oh he’s coming back if I have to hunt him down and drag him back sweetheart, that I promise you.”
Alex and Roland stepped up behind Will. Alex said,” If we all have to drag him back.”
Beth, Cindy, Marie and April all pulled chairs up close to Judy, and now that Judy has come around some, she could see this.
“You guys are my real family.”
She hugged Will again and began weeping, but she seemed to have it under better control.
***
Kevin felt a shutter rush through him. He turned to his left and grabbed the phone. Half a minute later, Will was on the other end.
“Man Am I glad to hear your voice Kevin. We had a hell of a time with our little fireball yesterday.”
Kevin sat straight up, “WHY, WHAT HAPPENED?”
Will told him everything that had happened with Judy after Kevin had left the yard.
“Oh shit, I knew she was upset but I didn’t think it would be that bad. Is she okay now?”
“She’s in the kitchen with Barb right now, but it seems dark around here Kevin. Judy doesn’t smile anymore; it puts a dark cloud over the whole house.”
“Put her on the phone Will, please.”
“Well, I don’t know, it’s just going to get her all started again, maybe we sh….”
”WILL….put…her …on…the…phone.”
Will put the phone down and went to get Judy.
Judy was a blur as she left the kitchen and all the way to the desk phone. She almost accidentally hung it up while she was grabbing for it.
“KEVIN! OH GOD KEVIIN!”
“Hi sweetheart, are you being a good girl for me?”
At that moment Judy couldn’t talk, she was too busy giggling her ass off at just hearing his voice.
“Baby, can I get your attention for a minute?” Kevin asked. He had to wait a while for Judy to calm down enough to even answer.
“I miss you so much Kev, when are you coming home?”
That word, home. He had been so far from one for so long that it sounded strange yet comforting.
“Soon honey, real soon. Listen, I want you to tell Cindy and Roland to be expecting a few guests in two days.”
“Ok sure, I can do that. Do you know how much I love you Kevin?”
“I think I’m beginning to learn.”
The rest of the phone conversation was more on the private side, and best left that way. By the time Judy had hung up, everyone in the house was listening from behind her. Judy hung up, spun around and had a huge smile on her face. “Hi guys!” she said. Then she headed off to the kitchen, skipping. The sun came out at the Inn again.
***
Kevin sat against the back of his bed, “I hate to have to use that on Judy, but I had to help her. She fell for me like a brick wall and I’m all she really has.” He turned off the light, hugged his ‘Judy’ pillow, and then fell asleep…
The official police report cleared Kevin in the deaths of his family. The perpetrators were never captured; the case eventually went to the cold case file. Nothing significant in the way of evidence surfaced other than the expected things. Without a link to a known felon though, this didn’t help.
Kevin sat in his living room. His relatives had been kind enough to come in and remove any evidence of the children from his new living area, sofa, kitchen and bathroom. Everything else sat behind locked bedroom doors. They had even took out his dresser and other needed items from his room and put them in the living room as well. All of this was done because Kevin had asked them to do it. He’d decided that even after a month he still couldn’t manage to go into the rooms, so the favor was asked. Kevin had found a new wife and family now; it sat in a bottle of whiskey, rum, gin or whatever else he could find. Kevin was having big problems with the complex he was building; even his men were starting to complain to him. Plans were not going forward, materials were not being ordered. Everything pretty much came to a dead stop in Kevin’s life, as nothing mattered.
Today was what Kevin called a ‘banner Kevin’ day. He had lost the contract to build the new complex. After a very long and heated argument, Kevin told them all to go to hell and said that they could just get someone else. He’d already had quite a bit to drink before the meeting even started. Kevin now had to go find his men at the site and lay them off. He wasn’t so drunk that he didn’t give a shit about that, he did, he just couldn’t seem to stop the spinning in his head. The savings were going fast; he had a small insurance policy for Mary, but as a small business owner, he never had quite enough to cover everyone. What he got from the policy was enough to bury all three of them. Kevin asked if Mary could be buried with her babies still safe inside her. There was no argument. As is normal with most relatives and casual friends, for the first few weeks the house was seldom empty. But time changes things, doesn’t it? Eventually, if you’re asked enough times if you’re okay, it just becomes so much easier to say yes than to have to keep reliving it all over again. This was how Kevin handled it. He was constantly being asked how he was doing and eventually he just started to say, “I’m hanging in there.”
They had all gone now, like the classic ghost town of the old west. Kevin sat alone on his sofa, drinking the rest of his life into oblivion. On an especially great Monday, his mortgage company called and asked when they could expect a mortgage payment. Kevin hadn’t paid it in three months by this time. He told them he could send one out the next day; only, there wasn’t even enough money to cover that. Kevin went into a rage after he had hung up. He grabbed empty bottles of booze that were sitting on his coffee table, put several holes in the walls, and caused the entire room to become a broken glass danger zone. He went into the kitchen and grabbed a snack cake and ate it. That was what Kevin was living on now. The last thing to be cooked on his stove was months ago. Given enough time, eventually you lose. Kevin lost alright; he lost everything and even spent six months in jail to boot. Six months after the tragedy, the sheriff was knocking on his door with orders to evict from the kind folks at ‘Bunker Hill Mortgage’. When the sheriff handed Kevin the court order, Kevin punched him in the mouth. When he got out of jail six months later, all Kevin had left was his work van: everything else had gone. Every memory of his family was sold at auction to the highest bidder. For the next six months or so, Kevin just put his van anywhere he could find to park it. He now spent most of his time taking handouts from the local grocery store. He figured out you needed to be smart though, you couldn’t have the cops catch you or the store. Most of the time Kevin managed to collect enough for a small amount of food and booze. Every once in a while he sobered
himself up, went into a public bathroom, washed his clothes in the sink, and headed out to find a day labor job in the trades. Day labor was popular in his native New Hampshire, so Kevin eventually headed south to the Boston area. When he’d sobered and cleaned himself up enough to get hired as day labor, he’d at least clear his head enough to go and put gas in the van, that way he wouldn’t spend the money on booze first. He even sobered up for four days once, as one job lasted four days instead of the usual one. That helped clear up a problem the mighty ‘know everything engineers’ were having with load distribution and a particular mini mall. He was face-to-face with four engineers who kept arguing over the requirements of a column that Kevin told them was going to collapse in the first year. Finally, after a heated two hour debate, Kevin’s math proved to be right. People would have been killed for sure, as that column was one of the main ones for the mall’s center structure. Kevin estimated it would have gone down with the first three feet of snow that sat on it. At the end of the day, Kevin was walking to his van, the day’s cash in hand, when he heard someone call out to him. He spun around and one of the older engineers was running towards him; the one who had been agreeing with Kevin.
“Kevin, I’m sorry about all of that, those assholes don’t know what the hell they’re doing if it isn’t posted in a book first for them to read.”
“Hey, don’t worry about it. I was only glad I could help.” Kevin began to turn but the man took his arm and turned him back around, grabbed his hand and lifted it palm up.
“Here, I took up a little collection from the guys around the site.”
Kevin looked down at what the man had in his hand, then up at the man’s face, then back down, then back up, “Oh no, I can’t take that, those guys earn every penny of it, I couldn’t.” He started to turn again and got pulled back around.
“You listen and hear me nice and clear. You don’t remember me, but I remember you. I was on an engineering staff a few years ago up in Manchester, New Hampshire. We designed a job and you had to correct many of our mistakes. Yeah, I remember you Kevin and you had the young ones shitting in their shoes some days. I don’t know what happened to you because I came down here shortly after the last job you worked on for us, but I can see it was pretty disastrous.”