Dead on the Delta

by Stacey Jay

  Except it comes out more like “shuh uh,” since my tongue still lies thick and useless in my mouth and my lips are puffed to three times their normal size.

  Better than five times.

  Yes. Yes, it is. At this rate, I might not be checking out today. If I can just stay angry, I might be—

  “I requested this … assignment,” she says. “I thought if he saw you … were a failure … I thought … ”

  Anger achieved. I visualize my face smoothing, lips shrinking, eyes opening wide, then move on to my hands. I’ll need my fingers in good working condition to slap Stephanie across her stupid face.

  Except that I can’t slap her. Because I don’t go around slapping people who haven’t slapped me first, and because she’s pregnant. Pregnant. She’s having Hitch’s child and they will be connected forever, no matter what. The thought is so painful it makes me want to scream, summoning a fresh wave of anger and grief, banishing the knots from my stomach and the puff from my cheeks.

  “I’m … sorry.” Stephanie moans again, a mewl of pain that makes me hurt for her in spite of my anger. “It was a mistake.”

  “Shuh up,” I say again, words clearer this time. “You uh hurt. And bleeding.”

  “But I—”

  “Shuh up.” I’m pretty sure I’m going to live—at least until help arrives. It’s time to make sure Stephanie isn’t going to check out before I can use everything she’s told me to blackmail her into writing me a stellar review recommending a full pardon for my mistake out in the swamp.

  My hands reach through the darkness, finding the sleeve of her jacket and patting over to the shoulder where I think most of the blood is coming from. The second my fingertips smooth over the entry wound, I know she’s in trouble. I’m willing to bet serious cash the bullet’s gone into the pleural space surrounding her left lung, causing part of it to collapse. A doctor will need to listen with a stethoscope and maybe order an EKG to be sure, but I just … know what’s happened. I can almost see it, all the sad pink tissue straining to pull in breath despite the screwed state of the air pressure in her chest.

  Pneumothorax doesn’t have to be deadly, but it’s certainly a medical emergency. Depending on the severity of the collapse, she could suffer from hypoxemia—insufficient oxygen in the blood—within a few minutes. And if the oxygen levels get too low …

  “Tell him … I love him.” Stephanie sniffs, her voice rich with grief and the knowledge that she might not snap back from this. “Don’t tell him … I knew … about … the baby.”

  Well … there’s one question answered. Hitch doesn’t know. And if I don’t do something, he might not know until it’s too late for that baby to be anything but one more thing to cry about.

  “I’m not going to tell him. You’re going to tell him.” I place my hand over her chest, send out a quick prayer to that God I’m not sure I believe in, close my eyes, and think. Hard. As hard as I’ve ever thought.

  I think about my mother and father and the way they threw me away, even before Caroline’s death. I think about Grace and the adulthood she’ll never have, about Hitch’s brother and what he did when I still had a hint of “young and trusting” left inside me. I think of poor Deedee without a mother, and James and Libby and their arrogant assurance that they were worth more than the rest of us, and innocent Fernando who could have spent his life behind bars for a crime he didn’t commit.

  I think and I think and I send all the furies I’ve summoned into Stephanie’s lung, willing it to expand, to recover, to heal.

  But even as I do, a part of me can’t stop thinking about dead rabbits. About how much easier it would be to use this rage inside me for something else. Something evil.

  Twenty-seven

  Three and a half weeks later …

  September is a sweaty, sticky, summer month in the Deep South. Days creep by, the heat a drug that boils your brain and leaves you too spent to do anything not absolutely necessary to life.

  But September nights … The nights can be downright glorious.

  Cane and I linger under the shade tree where a few rare fireflies drift in and out of the gathering darkness. A late summer wind whips down the street, carrying the smell of magnolia, the screams of the neighborhood kids riding their bikes, and the songs of the Junkyard Kings, something bluesy about the women who’ve done them wrong. As if any of them has touched a woman in the past decade. But the song is nice. More than nice. It’s a lovely evening, one that will come damned close to perfect if Cane lets me convince him to stay.

  “Come on, you’re off duty in ten minutes.” I want to flick open the snaps at the top of his uniform shirt, but keep my hands at my sides. We’ve been out to dinner a few times since that day at Camellia Grove, but physically we’re on a “time out” until I decide things that are too big for me to decide right now. “I made a pitcher of mojitos, and Fern’s pouring three glasses.”

  “No. I don’t want to interrupt your girl talk.”

  “You won’t. We can girl-talk with you here. And Fern’s not mad at you anymore.”

  Cane grunts as if he doesn’t quite believe me. “That’s forgiving of him.”

  “He’s a forgiving guy. And he knows you were led astray.” I shift closer, nudging his hip with mine. “So stay. Have a drink on the porch.” I figure my best course of action is to get Cane drunk enough that he forgets about happily ever after and focuses on happy for now.

  So far, he’s having none of it.

  “I’ve gotta get to the shuttle,” Cane says. “I told Mama I’d head into Baton Rouge and grab a few things she can’t get here in town. You need anything while I’m there?”

  I shake my head. Screw Baton Rouge. I haven’t been there since the FCC—cough, Jin-Sang, the ass—suspended me for a month.

  Despite Stephanie’s recommendation that I be reinstated, I’m still on the not-fit-to-scoop-poop list. But whatever. It’s probably for the best. The bayou has been wild the past few weeks, with immune teams from Keesler raiding Breeze houses and collecting people from the swamp like crazy. Including Skanky, who I could barely keep from hugging when I saw her alive.

  But I didn’t hug her. And I didn’t confirm any of her nutsy stories about the invisible people really running her Breeze operation, either. Cane didn’t believe her, of course. No one did. Just like no one would believe me if I was stupid enough to open my mouth about Tucker and the Big Man. Everyone else thinks the Big Man is just a garden-variety bad guy.

  The footprints outside Grace’s window and the footprints of the man who attacked me were an exact match. I know now that the Big Man was probably watching over Grace, trying to keep her safe from her own family, but there’s no way I can tell the police that, either.

  Stephanie is the only other person who’s not seen the Big Man—Fernando dealt solely with Amity for his Breeze, and Amity isn’t doing much talking about invisible people or anything else from the camp at Keesler. I’d briefly considered e-mailing Stephanie about it, but decided it was best to let it go. She must have convinced herself there’s another explanation. Just like there’s another explanation for how her lung reestablished pressure by the time Hitch and the DPD broke into the big house and found us down in the basement. There’d certainly been nothing about invisible people or regenerative powers in her report, though she did mention seeing me swollen from an allergic reaction caused by Libby’s would-be killer shrimp muffins.

  An allergic reaction I don’t have anymore. I’ve had crawfish three times this week alone. It’s as yummy as it always smelled.

  “Maybe some frozen crawfish tails?” I ask, realizing I’m running low. “If you have room in your cooler.”

  “I’ve got room,” Cane says, brow furrowing in a way that makes me want to smooth my fingers across his scruffy head. I miss his head. I miss a lot of things about him. “But are you sure it’s smart to keep eating those things? What if your allergy comes back?”

  “It won’t.”

  “Seems dangerous to
me.”

  “What can I say? I’m wild and untamed.”

  Cane laughs and threads his fingers through mine. “Tell me about it.”

  And suddenly we’re not talking about crawfish anymore, we’re talking about us, but it’s … okay. There’s no anger in his voice, just that same patient, persistent affection. He’ll wait. At least for a little longer. Maybe a lot longer. When he leans down to kiss me, pressing those soft, full lips to mine, I can feel how deep his feelings run. Cane’s love is a still, quiet pool that I could dive into and maybe never touch bottom.

  As my lips move against his and my breath grows faster, I wonder if maybe I should jump, just dive in and trust that I can learn to be all the things he needs me to be.

  “Have a good night, Lee-lee,” he whispers, and presses one last kiss to my forehead.

  “You too,” I say, heart tugging in my chest as he slips into his cruiser. “Tell your mom ‘hi’ for me.”

  He smiles, his dark eyes sparkling in the fading light. “Will do. See you Sunday.”

  “Sunday.” I wave goodbye until he disappears down the street before turning back to the house. Fern slams out the screen door a second later, confirming that he’s been watching me and Cane, waiting for a good moment to interrupt. Still, he knows better than to say anything about Cane’s departure.

  “You sure you don’t have some Cuban in you?” he asks, swirling the icy drinks in his hand as he bounces down the porch steps. He doesn’t look too bummed that there’ll only be two drinking tonight. Maybe he hasn’t forgiven Cane as completely as he insists. “Because these are amazing.”

  Or maybe he’s just glad there will more mojitos for us.

  He hands me my drink and claims the hammock, leaving me the plastic folding chair. I flop into it just as another strong breeze sweeps through the front yard, making the leaves whisper. It really is a lovely evening, one of many I’ve had in the past few weeks filled with drawn-out sittin’ sessions in the yard with Fernando or Theresa and her sisters or Bernadette, who’s finally stopped listening at the window and joined the world. Since the afternoon I borrowed her car we’ve been driving in her convertible six or seven times.

  I find driving therapeutic and Bernadette unexpectedly charming. She’s no Marcy, but I enjoy her stories of Donaldsonville in its prime, of days when the river carried an endless stream of fascinating people to our town. In the time before the dam, and the poverty, and the crime, and the fairies.

  Always the fairies.

  They come to me almost every night now, filling my dreams with their strange language that—in my crazier moments—I swear I can understand. I do my best to ignore them. For now. I need time. To rest, to recover, to make sense of the impossible things that happened in the darkness beneath Camellia Grove.

  “This mojito tastes exactly like what Granny used to slip in my sippy cup.” Fern sighs and smacks his lips. “Exactly. You’re hiding a spic in that family tree of yours, I’d put money on it.”

  “Nope. No spic. Just Irish and more Irish and a couple of cousin-lovers way back.” I take a slow pull on my drink, relishing the perfect mix of lime and cane sugar. It is a damned fine mojito, if I do say so myself. I love the way the rum lurks beneath the rest of the drink, secretive and so easily underestimated until it swirls through your head with a sudden one-two punch.

  Ahh … sweet punch. So nice. So very nice. I’m so glad the only thing I’m good at quitting is quitting itself.

  I lasted a day and a half without liquor, until Hitch called from the hospital in New Orleans to assure me that Stephanie and the baby were going to be fine. He sounded so happy. So … complete. I decided I just had to help him celebrate with a shot or seven of Jack Daniel’s and a long cry in the shower. The next day, I bought some beer and other sundry supplies and continued with business as usual.

  “You know you can’t say that word, right? Only Hispanic people can reclaim that shit. You’re going to have to stick with reclaiming ‘slut,’ “ Fern says, but the joke falls flat.

  We’re still recovering from our brief falling-out after he was released from prison, when I wasn’t sure I could forgive him for the lies and the Breeze. In the end, I had no choice. With Marcy gone and Cane and I still on the fence while I decide if I’m ready to Commit, I’ve been in dire need of companionship.

  Besides, I’ve hardly been a slut lately. Aside from a few graphic dreams, I’ve been a nun. A lonely nun. A nun who’s realized the reason she can’t promise forever to the second man she ever loved is because she never really fell out of love with the first. Of course, it’s far too late to do anything about that. Too late to tell the truths I held back, too late to show Hitch I’m still the girl he thought I was … deep down.

  “Thinking about him?” Fern asks, humor leaving his tone.

  “No,” I lie.

  “Good, he’s not worth it.”

  We both know which “he” he’s talking about, and it isn’t the tall, dark, and handsome cop who just drove away. It’s the man with the fiancée and the baby due in February, who I’ll probably never see again now that Grace’s murder is solved and the Breeze houses near Donaldsonville dismantled.

  I know I should forget about him, pretend he’s dead and buried, but I can’t. He comes to me in my dreams, too—sometimes angry, sometimes laughing like we never lost each other. The happy Hitch dreams are the worst. Those are the ones that make me wake up in physical pain, aching all over for what could have been. Sometimes, on those nights, I reach for the phone and dial, needing to talk to Marcy so badly that I forget she’s not going to pick up.

  Marcy doesn’t seem to be coming back, despite the fact that no charges were filed and most people assume she’s away caring for a sick relative. That’s the story she fed Regina, the woman who took over for her at Blessed Hands. That’s also the story I fed Deedee when she ran away from Sweet Haven. She showed up at my place in the middle of the night last week, begging me to call Marcy and ask her if she’d adopt her.

  “Sorry, honey, I don’t have her number and her … aunt is really sick,” I said, hating the lie and the fact that I couldn’t listen to that voice inside that said maybe I could take care of Deedee … maybe just for a little while … until Marcy gets back …

  “Gotta take a piss. You want me to go for you?” Fern rolls off the hammock with one smooth movement, keeping his empty glass perfectly balanced in one hand.

  “No, but get me a refill on your way out.” I hand him my cup and squirm my bare feet deeper into the grass. It’s nice to have grass. I’m glad I let Bernadette convince me to lay sod.

  Now if I can keep it alive, we’ll see about other, larger, more delicate things, like a child whose mother’s death I feel responsible for, even though it wasn’t my fault. Really. At least not entirely.

  “More ice?”

  “No, just booze,” I say.

  Fern laughs and disappears into the house. The screen door smacks closed behind him, leaving me alone for the first time since I fetched my mail and the blue envelope with my name on it from my box. I didn’t want to open it in front of Cane or Fernando … just in case … in case it’s something more menacing than its innocuous color suggests.

  After a quick look over my shoulder, I pull the square from my back pocket and open it, my stomach knotting when I see what’s written inside.

  9. 12. 2. 3.

  That’s it. Just four numbers, separated by firm, black dots. It’s … weird. Ugh. I’ve had enough weird for one summer.

  Good thing it’s nearly fall. Another season, another reason, for makin’ weird.

  “That’s whoopee,” I say aloud.

  “Talking to yourself again?” a familiar voice asks, making my head snap up.

  There he is. The man I would have sworn I’d never see again, standing on the sidewalk in front of Bernadette’s. He’s snuck up on me, footsteps hidden by the sound of children’s laughter and the blues.

  “I’m good company.” I shrug, playing it cool, lik
e Hitch pops up from New Orleans for a visit all the time, like I’m not wishing he’d shown up a few minutes earlier when Cane was here. Of course, it wouldn’t have really mattered if he had. Hitch has a fiancée and a life. He wouldn’t be jealous that I might be on my way to having the same. The fact that I’m even thinking about jealousy is only a sign of my own patheticness.

  The thought makes my forehead wrinkle. “What are you doing here?”

  He sighs and runs a hand through his hair. No gel this time, just curls throwing a fuzz party all over his head. “That … is an excellent question.”

  “I’m full of them.” I stand, shoving the envelope in my back pocket, refusing to acknowledge the quickening of my heart.

  He hasn’t come here to tell me he’s left Stephanie and their unborn baby and rushed back to reclaim our long-dead-and-started-to-rot-and-stink love. There’s some other reason, some good reason that he’s standing here in a beat-up Barenaked Ladies T-shirt and a torn pair of jeans, looking so much like his old self that it’s all I can do not to give him a hug.

  “I’m here on business,” he finally says, the words sounding like a lie.

  “Hmm. Where’s your suit?”

  “Personal business.”

  “Oh … okay.” Oh. God. Could it … it can’t … but what if … what if …

  “Possibly illegal business,” he continues with a nervous grin. “That could get me fired. Or put in jail.”

  “Oh.” My foolish hopes crash and burn.

  “So I figured … since you still had some time before you head back to work … ” He shuffles closer, onto my new grass, until I can smell his Hitch smell. “I thought maybe you’d want to help.”

  “With the illegal business that could get you fired or put in jail?”

  “And you fired and put in jail, too. Of course.”