“Hi, Wyatt,” he said. “Thanks for coming.”
“How did you know I was in Silver City?” Wyatt said.
“Direct and to the point-I’m getting the idea that’s your style,” Sonny said, his smile still there, just not as broad. “The answer is Bert told me.”
Meaning Greer must have told Bert, and therefore Greer had to have been up in her apartment the whole time he was outside at the buzzer. Was there another explanation? Not that Wyatt could see. “So what’s wrong with her?” he said.
“Not quite following you,” Sonny said.
“You told me something was wrong,” Wyatt began, then lowered his voice. “Something you couldn’t talk about on the phone.” He glanced at the CO. She was gazing off into space. Wyatt felt a moment of anger, directed at himself. Why had he lowered his voice? He wasn’t a criminal, had done nothing wrong, didn’t need to get stealthy in front of someone in a uniform.
Sonny turned to the CO, raised his voice. “All phone conversations are recorded, right, Taneeka?”
Taneeka nodded. “In and out.”
“Which is why it’s best not to discuss a lot of personal details on the phone,” Sonny said.
“I sure as hell wouldn’t,” said Taneeka. She unwrapped a stick of gum.
Sonny nodded, turned back to Wyatt. Wyatt felt lost, and stupid, too. “No need to feel stupid,” Sonny said, lowering his voice down to normal volume. “How can you be expected to know our little ways? The point-all according to Bert, of course-is that Greer got a bit upset when you ditched her someplace, never did get the precise details. Where was it, again?”
“Millerville,” Wyatt said. “And I didn’t ditch her. Is she okay?”
Sonny nodded. “As it turned out.”
“What does that mean?”
“Don’t have all the details,” Sonny said. “Something about hitchhiking and being picked up by the wrong kind of driver. Always a danger with a looker like Greer.” Looker? Wyatt didn’t like that, wasn’t sure why. “But she managed to extricate herself from the situation,” Sonny said, “no harm done.”
“I never meant anything like that to-she jumped, for God’s sake, and I looked all over for her and everything.”
“I’m sure you did-no need to blame yourself,” Sonny said. He waved his hand, as though dismissing the whole topic and asked, “What did you think of Millerville?”
Wyatt shrugged.
“Yeah-that’s the way I feel about the place myself.”
Wyatt laughed, couldn’t help it. Sonny laughed, too. They laughed together. Tears appeared in Sonny’s eyes.
Taneeka looked over. “Hey, Sonny, what’s the joke?”
Sonny wiped the corner of one eye with his sleeve. “Wouldn’t know where to begin,” he said.
“Uh-huh.” Taneeka nodded. Something in her tone and in that nod gave Wyatt the idea she respected Sonny, possibly even admired him. She went back to gazing into space and chewing her gum.
“I met this newspaper guy in Millerville,” Wyatt said. “An old guy-he covered the trial.”
“Why are you doing this?” Sonny’s voice had softened.
“Because there are so many questions.”
Wyatt waited for Sonny to ask what they were, but he did not. Instead his voice softened even more and he said, “I don’t want you asking them. I don’t want you getting into any of it.”
“Why not?”
Sonny sat back, folded his hands in his lap. “I’m content,” he said.
Wyatt glanced around the horrible room. “Content about what?”
“Content to take my punishment.”
Wyatt leaned forward. “Punishment for what? Esteban Dominguez testified he only saw two people-Pingree and Doc. Why didn’t you fight the charges?”
“I did fight,” Sonny said. “I pled not guilty.”
Their eyes met. “But you didn’t do a good job,” Wyatt said. For a brief moment, Sonny’s face changed, became thinner and harder. “Why did you take the stand?”
Sonny shook his head. “I’m telling you not to go there.”
“Why?” Who would help put themselves behind bars, or not do whatever they could to get out?
“I already explained.”
“But this newspaper guy thinks you might not have even been there. And Mr. Wertz said only an innocent man wants to take the stand.”
“That just proves his incompetence. This place is full of guys who took the stand and were guilty as sin.”
Taneeka cracked her gum.
“Were you there that night?” Wyatt said.
“Front and center.”
Wyatt couldn’t believe that. It felt wrong, if not completely then at least partly. “Was my-was Linda involved in any way?”
“I’ve answered that. Why do you keep asking?”
“Because Mr. Wertz-”
“I told you he’s a drunk.”
“-and the newspaper guy both said there might have been a fourth person, someone you were-”
Sonny held his hand up in the stop position. They gazed at each other. “Don’t look so angry,” Sonny said.
Wyatt hadn’t been aware of his anger, but it was there, all right. He tried to tamp it down. “I’m moving back home,” he said. “Back to East Canton.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“Yeah.” No baseball? It really wasn’t important; Wyatt could now see a life beyond baseball, not clearly, but a life that included interesting work, maybe the kind Mr. Rentner did. “But before I go, I just want to know the truth.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Wyatt said, “you’re my father.”
Sonny’s eyes closed and stayed closed for a moment or two. When he opened them, the expression had changed in a way that was hard to define: less guarded, maybe; and all the hardness was gone from his face. “Don’t think that way,” Sonny said. “I don’t deserve the name.”
“But it’s a fact anyway. Look at us.”
Sonny smiled slightly and shook his head. “For one thing, I’m not as smart as you. For another, that may be a fact, the DNA part, but other parts, all the missing ones, are more important.”
“Okay,” Wyatt said, “that’s what I want to know-the missing parts.”
Sonny gave him a long look. Was there admiration in it, even pride? Wyatt didn’t know-but whatever was in that look made him feel good. “That’s not what I meant by the missing parts,” Sonny said.
Wyatt could sense Sonny thinking, got the impression he was about to say more, and kept quiet. A silence fell over the visiting room, a comfortable sort of silence, like this was a cozy place and they were simply two guys long accustomed to each other’s company.
“The missing parts,” Sonny said. He glanced over at Taneeka. Her face was slack, like the face of a sleeper, although her eyes were open. “What do you want to know?”
“Who fired the gun?”
Sonny let out his breath, long and slow. “Art Pingree,” he said. “It was his gun, of course, this little snubnose twenty-two, but Art shouldn’t have been the one packing-just not reliable in a crisis.”
“Why didn’t you say it was him at the time?”
“I’d like to think it’s because I’m not a rat,” Sonny said. “And maybe that’s true. But it’s also true that Doc Vitti cut his deal first. The DA only takes one.”
“What happened to the gun?” Wyatt said.
“No idea.”
“Then why did you say you threw it in the woods?”
Sonny shook his head. “I don’t know. That whole part-my testimony-is just a fog now. Was then, too, to be honest.”
“What was the point of getting on the stand at all?” Wyatt said.
“It was pointless in retrospect. Back then, I thought…” His voice trailed off and he got a distant look in his eyes.
“What? What did you think?”
Sonny shrugged. That shrug of his-almost teenage-like, and Sonny had been hardly more than a teenager at the time of the trial.<
br />
“You weren’t even there, were you?” Wyatt said.
Sonny looked up, confused. “In court?”
“At thirty-two Cain Street.”
Sonny reached out as though to touch Wyatt’s knee, stopped with his hand inches away. “I was there, Wyatt. No getting around that.”
“I meant inside. You didn’t go in. You weren’t part of the home invasion.”
“It’s the same under the law. Let’s not go over that again.”
“Not if you went there to stop it,” Wyatt said. “Arrived too late, or something like that.” Sonny was watching him, mouth slightly open. “That’s the real story, isn’t it?”
“I wish it was.”
“You’re still protecting someone.”
Sonny gave him a long look. “Any idea what you’re going to do in life, after school and all that?”
“No.”
“Give it some thought. You’ve got the brains to go all the way in something.”
“No, I don’t.”
“You’re wrong about that,” Sonny said.
Wyatt waved that away, at the same time realizing the gesture was exactly like Sonny’s. “This is about filling in the missing parts,” he said. “Who are you protecting?”
“Nobody. I can’t make it any clearer. You’ve got all the missing parts, all that matter. I hope it helps.” He smiled. There was something sweet about Sonny’s smile, and maybe brave as well. “This has really been something,” he said, “getting to know you a bit. I can’t help thinking that if-”
Whatever Sonny couldn’t help thinking remained unspoken, because at that moment the visitors’ door opened and Greer walked in. She glanced at Wyatt and Sonny, then sat at the far end of Taneeka’s row. “Hey, Greer, how’s it goin’?” Taneeka said.
“Great,” said Greer. She took a book from her pocket, started reading. She looked great, completely undamaged except for a scab on her biggest knuckle.
The inmate door opened and a pale, heavy man entered. He was dressed in rumpled khaki, had a bandage over one eye. Greer jumped up. “Dad-what happened?”
The inmate approached her. Greer rushed forward and threw her arms around him.
“Hey!” Taneeka said.
Greer and her father separated.
“Hi, Greer,” Sonny said.
Greer turned to him. “What happened to my dad?” she called across the room.
Now Taneeka, too, was watching Sonny. “I actually don’t know,” he said.
“Was it that horrible man, Hector?” Greer said. “The one with Jesus on his face?”
“Couldn’t tell you,” Sonny said. But out of the corner of his eye, Wyatt had seen Greer’s dad flinch at the mention of Hector’s name.
“It was an accident,” Greer’s dad said. “In the shop.”
“You’re sure?” Greer said.
“Yeah. I’m fine.”
“Accidents happen all the time in the shop,” Sonny said. “Isn’t that true, Taneeka?”
“True enough,” said Taneeka.
“I’m fine,” Greer’s dad said again, not looking at anyone in particular, in fact gazing down at the floor, a cement floor painted the color of cement.
“Bert?” Sonny said, rising. “Like you to meet Wyatt. Wyatt, Bert Torrance.”
Bert looked up. “Heard a lot about you,” he said.
“Hi,” Wyatt said. He stood up, tried to think of some good follow-up. “I, uh, liked the batting cage.”
“Thanks,” Bert said.
Wyatt felt Greer’s glare at the same time.
“Come on, Dad,” she said. “Let’s sit down.”
They sat in the far corner, began to talk in low voices. The visitors’ door opened and more visitors entered, lots of them, maybe a dozen. More inmates came through the inmate door, and more COs. In less than a minute, it got pretty crowded. Taneeka sat up straight, plucked the gum from her mouth, and stuck it under the seat. Two women took the spots where Wyatt and Sonny had been sitting. Wyatt and Sonny moved toward the inmate door, stood near a CO with sergeant stripes on his sleeve.
“Looks like we’re in for one of those busy days,” Sonny said. “I’ll say good-bye.”
“There’s one more thing,” Wyatt said, keeping his voice down. Sonny leaned in to hear. “Why did Doc name you as the shooter?”
The sergeant’s eyes shifted toward them.
“Have to ask him,” Sonny said.
“I didn’t get the chance.”
Sonny went still. “You’re telling me you saw him?”
“In Millerville. Didn’t you know he was out?”
“I did,” Sonny said. “But Millerville? Why would he go back there?”
“Isn’t that where he’s from?”
“No. He came from Wichita originally.”
“Maybe it’s because of this girlfriend,” Wyatt said.
“What girlfriend?”
“It’s kind of strange,” Wyatt said. “I got the idea she might be married to someone else.”
“That wouldn’t stop Doc,” said Sonny. “More of an incentive, if anything. What makes you think she’s married?”
“I kind of followed him to her place. He parked far away and then must’ve snuck in the back. And later when I was talking to her, he came back, and she wasn’t happy about being out in public with him. She’s actually kind of a tough lady-I think she owns a bar.”
There was a pause. “A bar?”
“Good Time Charlene’s,” Wyatt said. “Her name’s Charlene Waters-I read it off her mailbox.”
Sonny swayed backward slightly, as though having a little trouble with his balance. He leaned against the wall. Beside him, the inmate door opened and more men in khaki came in. Voices rose all around them.
“Gonna have to clear some of these folks out of here,” the sergeant said. “Sonny? You about done?”
Sonny nodded, pushed himself off the wall. He left through the inmate door.
27
Wyatt sat in the parking lot at Sweetwater State Penitentiary. The parking lot lay in the shadow of the front wall, the wall facing the river. A dark rectangle of a shadow with a dappled margin at the end: that pretty topping was the razor wire. In the distance, a school bus was driving across the bridge; the river water looked black and viscous, almost like something solid and reptilian. Soon Wyatt would be crossing that bridge himself, then following the river road to the state highway, heading home. All that remained was saying good-bye to Greer in a way that closed things off as near to nicely as possible. Was it shameful to admit there were things you weren’t ready for? Yeah, probably.
The main public door of the prison opened and visitors walked out-almost all of them women and children, none of them talking. Greer was at the end. Some visitors moved toward their cars, none of the cars the kind anyone would want to own. The others, including Greer, headed for a waiting bus. Wyatt got out of the Mustang and approached her.
“Greer?”
She turned. “What do you want?” He noticed that the eyebrow ring was back in place.
“Is your apartment rent free?” he said. Not close to nice, not the kind of thing he’d had in mind to say at all, instead a nasty and mean dig he wanted to take back right away. Jealousy was new to him; he was jealous of Van, no doubt about it. He knew deep down he still wanted Greer, and wanted her all to himself.
“None of your fucking business,” she said.
What if Van was some sort of bad person, screwing up her life? Not his problem. “I’m going home,” he said.
“What are you waiting for? Have a good trip.”
The last two or three visitors climbed on the bus, maybe twenty or thirty feet away.
She wasn’t his problem and he was going home, so, yes, what was he waiting for? “Is your dad okay?” he said.
“What do you care?”
The bus sat there, engine running, door open.
“I care.”
“Bullshit. You just called me a whore.”
�
�I didn’t mean it that way.”
The bus door closed with a long sniffing sound.
If Greer noticed, she showed no sign. “What else could it mean?”
Their eyes met. Wyatt was reminded of other times that this meeting of eyes had happened, especially in bed with her, when he’d thought he’d seen deep inside. How weird that you could be so close to a person at one time and that at another she was almost a complete stranger. “I’m jealous, that’s all,” Wyatt said.
“Jealous? Jealous of who?”
“Who do you think? Van, of course.”
“You’re jealous of Van? That’s all over.”
“It is?”
The bus made a wide turn and drove out of the lot.
“Since I met you,” Greer said. “It was shaky to begin with. Then you came along.”
But Van had called her baby on the phone. “It’s over between you and him?”
“All but the shouting,” Greer said.
“What does that mean?”
“And he’s my landlord, true,” she went on, “but I paid rent every single month, just about.”
Silence. They gazed at each other. The look in Greer’s eyes changed, and something changed inside Wyatt, too, and all at once they were laughing. Her arms came up, and then they were embracing-laughing and holding on to each other in the shadow of the prison wall.
She spoke in his ear. “No matter what happens, we fit.”
Yeah, they did. Wyatt was about to say that, to agree with her, when he felt like someone was watching him and glanced up. A guard was looking down from one of the towers. “Let’s go,” he said.
They got into the Mustang. He could smell her. She smelled good.
“Where to?” she said.
Play it by ear. “Ever been to East Canton?” he said.
“Never wanted to.”
“But now?”
“Now?” she said. “I still don’t want to. But I’m willing to discuss it.”
“Okay,” Wyatt said. “How about coming back to East Canton with me?”
“I’m willing to discuss it, but not here.”
“Then where? Your, um, apartment?”
She laughed. “Let’s not push our luck.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning you only get so much luck in life,” Greer said. She pointed ahead. “Drive. Turn right after the bridge.”
Bullet Point Page 18