by Lisa Unger
“Tell me everything, Rain,” he said. “The whole story.”
It started back in the woods, a million years ago. Three children, all victims of a terrible man, all destroyed by what they encountered, a young girl losing her life. And now here they were again, but this time three children were saved. A winding path, a shadowy one, that led them both here together.
Yes, it was a long story. One she knew that she could never fully tell to anyone, not even her husband, even now, as much as she wanted to. That it was this more than anything that bound her to Hank; the truth that only they knew.
FORTY-FOUR
He loves you, I can see that, Lara. What I guess I didn’t quite realize—or maybe I just didn’t want to see it—is that you love him, too. I thought he was just the man you chose because there was no place in a normal life for the relationship we share, for the person that I have become. But, no. It’s more than that. I see it—his tenderness and strength, your admiration and love, your desire to be a better person for him, his desire to take care of you—in spite of yourself.
“She was never going to love you,” says Tess. “You must have known that. Even all those years ago.”
She’s right, of course. She always is.
It was your tenth birthday party and we were playing hide-and-seek in your huge backyard. There had been a piñata, and the grass was littered with candy, a red balloon had escaped the bouquet and was trapped in the tree high above the ground. The day was warm, almost hot—and we’d had too much cake and soda. All the other party guests were gone. And it was just the three of us. Tess was “it.” You and I hid behind the great oak, with Tess looking for us on the other side, far from where she needed to be.
I had a little velvet box in my pocket. My mother had helped me choose your gift. A red crystal heart. I thought it was an extravagant gesture of my love. It cost ten dollars, a fortune, and the deep red, the way it glinted, it seemed like a precious gem.
Maybe it was the sugar rush, or how pretty you were in your dress, or the way the sun was setting and everything was summer golden. We were so close, shoulder to shoulder, the way we sat just now. I leaned in and kissed you, too quick, too hard, as awkward as any ten-year-old boy. You tasted like frosting.
You stared at me a moment, confused, I could tell. Embarrassed. Feeling foolish, I handed you the box. You opened it and smiled.
“Where are you guys?” Tess called out, whiny. “I’m tired. I’m going inside.”
She always did that, got bored with the games and left. Remember?
Then you laughed, not mean, not cruel. Just with surprise, and the funniness of it all. It was sweet, a kind of nervous giggle. And I laughed, too—partially to save face. But mainly because even then I could see how awkward and silly love was, how vulnerable we all are, how unsure. We laughed awhile. I loved you so much that it didn’t even matter whether you loved me back or not. Still doesn’t.
“Thank you,” you said, looking at the heart. “It’s pretty.”
There was no other kiss.
“You guys! Where are you?”
“Here!” you yelled. And I could tell that you were eager to run away.
I lingered a moment, burning with embarrassment and disappointment.
Then finally I followed you inside, where we all collapsed on your big couch, and your parents let us watch television—which they never did. Star Wars on the DVD player, the old one—with Han Solo and Chewy, and young Princess Leia.
And, yeah, Tess was right.
I knew even then that we would never be together. And that we always would be. You left it, the box with the heart in it, under the tree when you went inside. I took it and shoved it in my pocket. Kept it, all these years, until I left it for you to find again.
Inside, that other side of me, he is quieter than he has ever been.
How can he be angry at you, Rain?
You saved us. After all this time, you came back for us.
“You’re such a man-baby,” Tess says. “It was never her job to save you.”
No, it’s never our job to save anyone. It can’t be. At the end of the day, we must all save ourselves.
I watch as they roll Billy on his stretcher toward the ambulance, and I walk over to stand beside him. He’s so tiny, just the slightest bump beneath the white sheets, his eyes wide with fear. As I draw close he reaches for my hand and I take it.
“Will you come with me?” he asks.
He’s engaged, still looking for help. This is a very good sign; it bodes well for his recovery. I glance back at you, but you’re with Greg. He is wiping tears from your eyes, and you are looking up at him as if he’s the sun and the moon. There’s an energy around you both, a swirl—you’re a family, with a child—whole, growing, with a life ahead of you.
I know that I couldn’t have given you any of that. I am not the man your husband is.
“Of course,” I tell Billy. And he closes his eyes.
Agent Brower comes up behind me.
“Dr. Reams.” Her voice is sharp, official.
I wonder if she’s going to arrest me, and part of me thinks maybe she should.
The things I have done, they’re wrong. They are as evil as any crime ever committed, as arrogant and psychopathic. I have allowed my pain to turn me, part of me, into a monster. If she takes out her cuffs, I’ll offer her my wrists. I may not need to be jailed, but he certainly does.
We move away from Billy, who is being attended to by the EMTs.
“When I was a teenager,” she says and stops. She holds my eyes.
“Five minutes ago,” I joke.
She doesn’t smile but looks down at the ground. I know what she is about to tell me. I’ve done my research on Agent Brower. I wondered what drove her and dug around until I found out.
“When I was a teenager outside Boston, my younger brother was abducted and murdered by the Boston Boogeyman.”
Her voice is low.
“He and I—we had it pretty rough,” she says. “We suffered—various abuses, physical, psychological. My mother—she wasn’t well. My dad had a drug problem. My brother got addicted to meth, ran away a few times. One time, he didn’t come back.”
“I’m so sorry,” I say. I see the tension in her shoulders, the color drained from her face.
“Horrible things happened to my brother,” she says. “And it changed me. Changed the way I saw the world and the people in it.”
I want to apologize again but opt for silence instead.
“When Smith went free,” she goes on, “I thought I wouldn’t survive it, the injustice of it. It made me sick inside. I think—that’s why I went into law enforcement.”
“I understand that,” I answer. “It makes perfect sense. You wanted to fight on the side of right.”
The paramedics are about to lift Billy into the waiting ambulance. He’s watching me, and I nod to him. I won’t break my promise.
“When the Boogeyman was killed,” she goes on. “I was already at Quantico. I know what they say, that there’s no true justice. That even when evil is punished, it doesn’t undo the things that have been done. Only forgiveness can salve the wound.”
“But?”
“I was glad that someone killed him,” she says. Her voice has grown softer. “I was glad that the world was free of him and that he’d never hurt anyone else. I was relieved.”
I let her words float, drop a comforting hand on her arm. She’s small but muscular, an intense energy coming off her in waves.
“I know just how you feel, Agent Brower.”
She pulls away from me gently, moves back. She nods toward the ambulance, acknowledging that I have to go with the boy.
“Sometimes the wrong thing is the right thing,” she says.
I climb in beside Billy.
“Sometimes that’s true,” I say to
her.
As the doors close, Agent Brower and I lock eyes past my reflection in the glass. Her face is grim, her eyes green and clear. Sometimes it is true. But not always. I want to tell her about the toll it takes to do the wrong thing for the right reasons. But that’s a line I don’t think I should cross. I watch her grow smaller and smaller until she disappears.
Three children. A boy and two girls. We saved them tonight, Lara. Billy reaches for my hand and I take it in mine.
What if Kreskey hadn’t found you in the woods that day? What if he hadn’t taken me and Tess? What if I had left when I had the chance, not gone back for her? What if “he,” that raging beast inside me, had never been born?
Would we have been here tonight? Would three other children have been lost instead of us?
There are so many questions that have no answers. Acceptance of these mysteries is the only way to peace. I’m finding my way. I hope you are, too, Lara.
SIX MONTHS LATER
FORTY-FIVE
In the end, the hero finds his way home.
After the trials have been faced, the demons bested, the hero returns and is welcomed into the arms of his love. Sexist, of course. Facile, definitely. There are no happy endings really. We just choose where we stop telling the story.
But am I a hero? Or am I villain? Do I deserve a happy ending?
I don’t know the answer to that. But as Beth cooks in my kitchen—a savory chicken marsala—and we drink from a bottle of wine I’ve opened, listening to a band she favors, The Civil Wars, a peace has settled over me. For the first time in my adult life, I feel a sense of home.
Beth. Her body is lush; her hair—these glorious dark locks that are silky and thick in my hands. Her laugh never fails to make me laugh. Her eyes are expansive as sky, filled with wisdom and kindness. My feelings for her—it is not like what I felt for you, Lara. It’s not young, impulsive, not grasping and clinging. It’s not a passion that consumes like a wildfire, burning everything else to the ground. No, this is a love that lets other things grow, that breathes life, gives room. It allows for expansion.
“Sounds to me like you’re in grown-up love,” says Tess from over by the window.
“I am.”
“What’s that?” Beth asks, turning from the stove to look at me.
“Nothing,” I answer. “I was going to say—I am happy. Happy you’re here.”
Tess offers a little chuckle. “Well, good for you.”
Today, she is as she was that morning. A skinny kid with thick glasses and pigtails. I see her less and less. Which is a shame. Because she has been with me so long. I miss her humor, her unflinching honesty, her unconditional love. “It’s about time.”
Beth turns, wipes her hands on the apron at her waist—a thing she does that I find pleasantly old-fashioned. “Me, too.”
Her smile wavers a little.
“I’m nervous,” she admits.
I find this surprising. Dr. Beth Reynolds is a clinical psychiatrist, a researcher, a writer who has published in major journals. She is a speaker, a caring doctor with a searing intellect, deep intuition, a powerful aura of authority. I’ve not yet seen her nervous.
“Rain Winter—she’s famous, first of all. Maybe more so, she’s iconic in your life,” says Beth.
“She’s just a friend,” I answer, though this is not quite the truth.
“One who shares the most complicated part of your past.”
“But that’s the past,” I answer. “Isn’t that what you always tell me? This is now.”
“Right.”
Beth is the only person who knows about him. She has spoken to him, calmed him. She has accepted him as part of who I am. She has worked with me to help him integrate—I need his strength, his power. He needs my calm, the things I’ve learned as an adult and a doctor. We are no longer split as we were. Not entirely. But two parts of the same whole. He is not a beast in a cage.
Beth even knows about Tess. There are significant pieces of my history that I have not, cannot, share with her. And she knows better than to pry, because she is, above all her other sterling qualities as woman and physician, very wise. But I have shared those two with her, because really—it’s me, isn’t it? And Beth is the first person I’ve wanted to share all the parts of myself with. Everything. Most things.
When the buzzer rings, I open the gate. Then, after you’ve made your way up the drive, I watch as you emerge from your car, gather your things.
Today, you’ll conduct our final interview for your story, our story.
The parts of it we’re willing and able to tell.
Agent Brower’s case has gone cold. The utter lack of real evidence means that connecting me to the murders of Eugene Kreskey, the Boston Boogeyman and Steve Markham is impossible. Which, of course, I knew. Yes, it’s true that I was somewhere in proximity to each murder—either I lived there or was visiting for a lecture. But that is merely circumstantial, nothing on which to build an investigation, let alone prosecute a case.
Our presence on the property of Tom and Wendy Walters leading to the discovery of Billy Martin, Michele Racine and Olivia Grady is strange to say the least. Still there’s a clear chain of circumstance, accompanied by some unstable reasoning on both our parts, for how we both found ourselves there. And who can argue with the results? Three children saved—because of the tip of a troubled young girl, the dedication of her doctor, and his friend—victims of violence themselves.
The disappearance of my pack—my kill bag, as it were—is somewhat unsettling. I have not located it. But it’s gone; it’s obvious that someone took it. It has been six months since that night. I have a niggling suspicion that the bag is going to turn up. And I have a pretty good idea who might have taken it.
Meanwhile, Lara, there won’t be any more letters, or visits to your neighborhood. I won’t be eavesdropping on your monitors. Often.
Just enough.
So that I can make sure you’re safe.
We have spent hours together over the last few months, as you and Gillian have interviewed me for your serial radio show, which will begin airing next month. The buzz is tremendous. I think it’s going to be a huge success for you.
We have talked about our shared horror, the loss of our dear friend, the shattering nature of trauma—yours and mine, my journey to wholeness (sort of). How I have worked to save children brutalized as we were. We have used my knowledge to analyze the type of serial killer—if it is in fact that—who acts as a vigilante, delivering a form of justice where there was none.
We’ve talked about the question at the heart of our story. If what happened to us had not happened, what would have become of Billy, Michele and Olivia? Was there a balance to the universe after all? A divine plan? Were we its instruments?
That your story has no end. That there’s a mystery at its center that will go unsolved—Who is the Nightjar? Will he strike again?—matters not at all. This story is not about the ending, is it, Lara? It is not about who killed Kreskey, Markham and Smith. There are others, too, but I have kept that to myself.
It’s about the players, their journey, how they begin, how they evolve, and the point at which their stories cease to be told. There is always another monster to be slain, another trial to be overcome. There is always another chapter.
I can’t promise he’ll behave. But I can say that he’s as quiet as he’s ever been.
So, let’s just say, for now, we will end our story here.
You stand and collect yourself at the door, preparing yourself for our final interview. When you step inside, you will meet the woman I plan to marry, in the home where she and I hope to raise children of our own. Or give a home to children who need one, a place where they will be nurtured and loved. Or maybe we’ll do both. I am in close contact with Billy, Michele and Olivia. They are my patients, my work with them pro bono. They are all in
good foster homes, their families in therapy. I am optimistic that they—all of them runaways who fell victim to Tom and Wendy Walters—will find their way home. And, if not, I won’t leave them to face their demons alone.
“Hi,” you say, bringing the cool air in the door with you.
We embrace in the foyer. It’s always a little awkward.
The energy between us, Lara, isn’t easy; we are not just old friends.
But our conversations now are pleasant enough. When the microphone turns off, we all laugh sometimes, talk about our lives, our work. I know Greg will be happy when these interviews draw to a close; he doesn’t like or trust me—and who can blame him? But he respects you. He understands that we have shared an ugly past that binds us. Close to your friends, right? Closer to your enemies.
Lara, you and I are like comrades in arms. We’ve done and seen things that wouldn’t make any sense off the battlefield. We’ve seen the very worst in each other. And the best. We’ve seen all the gloom this world has to offer us. But we know the light now, too.
You and Beth exchange warm greetings, even a hug. The way you smile at her, and she at you, I could tell the two of you would be friends—under other circumstances. She invites you to stay for dinner when we are done. But you beg off.
“My family is waiting for me,” you say. “But thank you. Another time.”
Unlikely.
We climb the stairs to my office and close the door. It’s my favorite time of day in here, late afternoon. The light is golden, washing surfaces, glinting in your hair.
“I just have a few more questions,” you say, setting up the digital recorder on the table between us. “We won’t be long.”
“Why are you doing this?” I ask.
I’ve been wanting to talk about it, but this is our first conversation without Gillian present. You look up at me, dropping the hand that hovered over the record button back into your lap. Your wedding ring picks up the light.