Hello, Little Sparrow

by Jordan Jones

  I looked at the clock. “It’s been ten minutes.”

  “Whatever,” he said. “I just want you to come back, man. I can’t bounce things off him like I can you. There’s no back and forth. No Socratic questioning. There’s nothing.”

  Welker was known for having very little personality, but had decent instincts as a detective. His claim to fame was his propensity to find evidence at scenes no one else could. He helped out the DA and assistant DA more times than not, and it makes LT Anderson and the Commissioner look like they know what they’re doing in the public eye.

  “Look,” he continued. “All I’m saying is that I need you to still be available to me. I don’t care if I have to meet you here. I need to be able to go over stuff with you. That’s all.”

  I looked down at the coffee table, my hand raised straight up in the air. I wanted to change the subject because the crossroads of my life were becoming more and more present, and each direction would only cause more regret than the others.

  “Was LT mad? About the crime scene?” I took a breath and exhaled.

  “What? No, not really. I think you puking on live television made him feel sympathetic to you for the embarrassment and getting stabbed, and sympathetic for me for having to work with you.”

  “Shut up,” I said, giving a smile at the PT. She was well aware of the incident at Burnley’s house. I’m sure everyone in town was. “He didn’t reprimand us or anything?”

  “You saw him in the hospital. He’s good, man. But, I think you probably know; we can’t be getting drunk on work nights anymore…especially with this psycho on the loose.”

  “You got that right.”

  The PT looked uncomfortable and gently let down my arm. She packed up her kit and left the cabin without saying much. My shoulder throbbed a bit, so I took half a Vicodin.

  “I’ll buy one for five bucks,” Abraham said.

  “This was an undercover sting operation,” I said in a sarcastic monotone voice. “You’ve entered a sting cabin. Put your hands where I can see them.”

  “Here you go, Daddy,” Katherine said, setting a plate in front of me. I nodded and continued with Abraham.

  “I’m at a point in my life after this incident where I’m not sure what I want my next step to be,” I said. “I mean, I just got stabbed through the shoulder while investigating a case about this guy. I have a lot to think through.”

  “That’s good!” he exclaimed. “You should be motivated to find this guy. Let’s get you involved a little bit with the case now so you’re still fresh when you come back.”

  “You’re not listening to me, Deangelo,” I said, raising my voice a little. “I don’t know if I want to go back.”

  “What are we talking about here, man? Are we talking about police work? Or, are we talking about something completely different?”

  The blood pulsated through my veins. I couldn’t make some of the wrongs right; I knew that, but I could at least try. Vivian would never take me back, but I could at least show her I was a good man. Katherine may never love me like she once did, but I can still show her I was a good father.

  “You have to go back,” he said. “We were short on resources as it was.” He stood up from the chair and stepped towards the door. “Besides, I’m afraid if you don’t come back, we’ll never catch this guy.”

  He fished out a folded up piece of paper from his coat pocket and tossed it onto the couch.

  “This was another letter from our boy,” he said, wrapping his scarf around his neck. “It was left under the placemat of your car. LT Anderson wanted me to make a copy and bring it up here for you to see. Let me know what you think.” He stepped out of the cabin and walked briskly to his unmarked car.

  “What is that?” Katherine said. A look of worry and confusion crossed her face as she stepped into the living area. The piece of paper sat still next to me on the couch. I was almost waiting for it to come alive and read itself.

  “This is evidence,” I said. “It’s still an active case, so I’ll need to go over this alone.”

  “Does that have to do with what happened to your shoulder?” she asked. She was still unaware her father was tracking a serial killer.

  “Yeah, something like that,” I responded, then I unfolded the paper.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Hello, Little Sparrow,

  The lilies have sprung today…and, although they’re not native to our part of the world, they sure seem happy to be here. Who am I to judge one’s happiness? Who am I to change one’s happiness into an abyss of stagnation…guilt…confusion…and innocence? The latter your truest form. Your dandy demeanor and frantic frolic across the yard helps me get through the most trying of days. My muscles ache and grown any time I try to stand, making me think they are one with the bed. What impostors are these?

  Where did they come from?

  The doctor said the remedy is working well and that my body will ache, yes, but there was a certain sadness in his eyes. I knew he would only tell me what I wanted to hear.

  What is “going well” if it didn’t mean the total eradication of my illness? I’ve called it my own for the past few days now; I guess it helps me accept my fate. I only hope it allows you to accept yours, Little Sparrow.

  Ah, what am I saying?

  You must glide, Sparrow. You must go on with your life. Though your young body can handle the excruciation of what this world will muster, your feeble mind cannot.

  The sweetest of sweet.

  I am obsessed with thinking about you, Little Sparrow. I hear your voice in the meadows, screaming, yelling, laughing and I dare not look.

  I couldn’t even think it.

  To look would mean to remember you, as you are…when all I want is to remember you as you were. A Sweet innocent Sparrow, gliding its wings through a forever-blue sky in search of its next adventure.

  Fly, fly, fly.

  You have fallen to the ground and have hit it hard. It’s disrupted your life more than you could ever imagine. More than I ever imagine.

  In fact, I can’t stand the sight of you because I don’t want to imagine.

  What has the ground done to you, Little One? You are dirty, yes, but what more has the moldy ground done?

  You have become something I wish I could’ve changed. If I could have taken your place, I would have a thousand times over again. I have been there before, and I dare not go back. My aches and stabbing pains are enough for me to battle with now.

  They cause me every bit as much contempt as the ground causes you. All we can really do is get up and fly again.

  What do you say?

  I’ll stand on this bed and spread my wings as far as they go, only to float into the deep blue. The deep blue is all I can see out of my window from this angle, but it’s all I need.

  Just the deep blue and the laughter of a dangerous facade. One that will have to cover up the wounds of a hundred stings. I wish the bees would buzz away.

  Your ground and my aches present themselves in the same way: hated and angry. Do away with him, Little Sparrow. Let the anger guide you throughout your own universe into what it will take to see him take his last breath.

  Also, the other Little One needs to be protected at all cost. His potential is unfathomable. Both of you are incredible.

  But the monster…

  I don’t care what happens to him, to be honest. I used to.

  Those were different times; these are not.

  Oh, how I would love to lie in the grass.

  Chapter Twenty

  Tick tock.

  The clock on the wall was the loudest thing in the room and that included the woman carrying the baby, nuzzled and sleeping deep in her arms.

  Brooks wanted to see the baby’s face, but the mother was busy rocking it gently into a dark abyss called sleep. Brooks was also tired after the long drive it took him to get to the prison.

  The waiting room was full of anxiety; people paced in circles, even when the correctional officers t
old them to sit. But, not Brooks. He sat quietly staring at the stained tiled floor, waiting for his turn to enter the visiting booth.

  The room wasn’t made to be comforting; it was made to invoke anxiety. It was made to make the visitors dread coming to see loved ones. Brooks thought the woman with the baby was there to see her boyfriend who was in for God-knew-what.

  What a life.

  The baby’s first experience with Daddy would be behind an inch of plexiglass over a corded telephone. Brooks felt for the child as he always did. He wanted to take the child out of the prison and let it free in a field so it can make its own way. The current state of affair in its life would be no better than that.

  Brooks chuckled at the idea of a baby working a full-time job to make ends meet. His mind was in no shortage of jokes at the baby’s expense. He stretched his neck out and his gaze met the woman’s in an awkward moment.

  He smiled and nodded and she reciprocated, though her’s was much more forced. Brooks even wore his good button-up for the occasion. The last time he visited Angela, the officers treated him poorly, and he didn’t like the feeling he felt after leaving.

  This time he didn’t like the feeling he felt, but it was mainly due to being surrounded by law enforcement and he’d killed two people and stabbed another.

  I should probably keep that to myself, Brooks thought, laughing internally.

  A man with his out-of-control son was positioned across the room from Brooks. The child was kicking and screaming, shouting: “I don’t want to see him anymore! I’m tired of this! I just want to go home!”

  Brooks cocked his head to the side. He knew his thinking was starting to get irrational, especially when interpreting what others were saying, but this boy struck him.

  What he said seemed sincere.

  His uncle was probably bringing him in to see his abusive father who was arrested for physically abusing him. Brooks was sure he was right. There was almost no other reason why he’d be acting that way.

  The child’s voice finally drowned out the ticking of the clock, which hung above the main office reception desk, though Brooks knew it, was still there…just keeping time.

  Time was all Brooks had. He worked, yes, but as long as the plants were thriving at Fasten Biofuels, his job was complete.

  But, it wasn’t. Far from it. He knew Madison would once again rise from the ashes and demand he take action again. She’s been nice up to this point, but she was a little more menacing with Geoff Burnley. She would demand her Phoenix take the most gruesome action.

  He was OK with it. “Just tell me when,” he said under his breath. The man to his left looked up from a magazine, raised his eyebrows, and went back to reading about muscle cars.

  “Visiting room is now open,” an officer boomed from across the waiting area. The stripes on his shoulder indicated some kind of leadership position, so Brooks knew he had to keep a straight head. “Please sit down at the phone with the number corresponding with the paper you were given upon entry.”

  Thirteen. Lucky.

  Brooks took a seat on the steal stool that was screwed into the concrete floor. His cousin Angela sat down across from him, her deep blue eyes cut right through the plexiglass and into his soul. She had dark brown hair, which he swore was much darker than before. Her orange jumpsuit read: Property of Maine State Corrections across the front, and Brooks assumed, the back.

  Her face wasn’t nearly as skinny has he remembered it when he last visited nearly a year ago. The meth tore an avenue through her mouth, causing major gaps between visible teeth, though the sores were gone, and leaving only residual scars from years of use.

  She smiled and picked up the phone.

  “Good morning, Cuz,” she boasted from the other line of the phone. Even her voice sounded different…more…defined and controlled than before.

  “You look good,” Brooks replied.

  “Thank you. They’re taking good care of me in here. As I told you in the letters, this has been a great experience for me.”

  “Looks like it.”

  The awkward pause was only enhanced by the manic conversation happening right beside them, both parties grew louder and they were reminded by an officer to keep the noise down.

  “How have you been?” She asked.

  “I’ve been fine. Working, eating, sleeping, and working.”

  “Living the dream, I see,” she quipped. Brooks wanted to telepathically tell her what he’d done. She was one of the few people who would understand, though everyone should have.

  “Something like that. So, you’re getting out of here soon, huh?”

  “Yes!” She exclaimed. “I’m clean now, and they’re setting me up in a rehab facility upstate near the Canadian border. I’ll live there for a year and then I’ll be able to find my own place again.”

  “That’s exciting news,” Brooks said. He forced his facial expression to match her emotion. He’d found it difficult since his time at the bridge to convey any real since of excitement.

  “It is!”

  Brooks was happy for his cousin and wanted to see her succeed. She was one of the few family members he had left, possibly even the only one he knew about. She had messed up working with the wrong people, but he was happy to allow her to have another chance.

  “Look, Angela. I’m happy you’re getting out,” Brooks started. “I’m glad you have this plan. I need to know something, and I thought I’d bring it here to talk to you about it, because I may not ever see you again.”

  “What do you mean, Cuz?” She said, looking confused. “We’re the only family each other’s got right now. Of course we’re going to be in each other’s lives from here on out.”

  Brooks felt his fist begin to clench involuntarily. He felt the presence of something greater in him had just entered the door of the prison. He wanted whatever it was to blast through the doors of his soul and make itself known.

  He knew who it was. And, he ignored Angela’s statements.

  “I want to talk about what Dad and Uncle Samuel did,” Brooks said, his voice very monotone and without empathy.

  She sat back in her seat and narrowed her brows. Her voice rose to meet the coldness of his heart. “Why would you want to talk about them for?”

  “There are shaky timelines. We were young. I’m trying something out and I want to see if it’s working.”

  Angela’s face turned pink from the embarrassment. “I don’t know what you’re doing Brooks, but I don’t like it. It’s not funny. I told you after all those years of dealin’ with that stuff, I don’t want to talk about it no longer.”

  Brooks remained calm and did not match her. He scooted to the edge of his seat and spoke directly into the phone. “I need to know how many victims there were altogether so I know how much this penance will cost me.”

  Angela placed a phone a few inches farther from her face.

  “What are you saying?” She asked.

  “If you make me say it here, you won’t like the response you get. Long-term. Short-term. Any of it. Just tell me.” Tears started to stream down the sides of Brooks’ face through the corners of his eyes. “I need to know.”

  “What? Victims? How many?”

  “How many children were abused by our fathers, Angie?” Brooks screamed through the receiver, leaving no doubt in either of their minds as to why he was there. The entire waiting area grew quiet and Brooks could feel all the eyes on him.

  A correctional officer tapped Brooks on the shoulder and all Brooks could see was his cousin screaming and kicking the plexiglass and being picked up by a host of officers. It all appeared in slow motion to Brooks, who was also being led out through the door, which he arrived. The tears turned into blood and he felt the Phoenix begin to rise within him again.

  The officers were talking quietly with him in the halls that led to the waiting area, but all he could think of was the insurmountable number of victims his father and uncle perpetrated.

  An officer gave him a letter sta
ting that he was no longer welcome to the prison for ninety days and he’d have to return with a signed certificate of completion for anger management, though his cousin was getting out in less than a month.

  Brooks sat in his car, laid the seat down, and stared up at the ceiling dome light while he flicked it on and off. Seeing Angie behind the plexiglass and seeing her reaction to a question she should be asking herself brought him the most validation he’d felt since arriving at William Henson’s backdoor.

  Angela was supposed to be the only other one in the planet who understood the struggles Brooks dealt with, though she only chastised him and screamed at him. He was doing this partially for her, and she couldn’t see it. Brooks needed the information from Angela, but she was unwilling to give it up.

  He wanted to remember.

  She wanted to forget.

  Brooks felt sorry for her. He only witnessed what she had gone through all those years ago, and she had to live that moment as many times as she could handle. The pressure put on her to forget those memories left a void in her life three years prior to when she started using meth.

  But, through all the trauma and abuse she experienced, she wasn’t honing it like Brooks was. She was forgetting. He was remembering.

  She wanted the predators to live their lives without repercussions. She didn’t want the police who investigated those crimes to be held accountable for their incompetence. Angela didn’t want the actions of our fathers to carry any sort of weight in her life. They were fine to her, and no retribution was needed.

  Brooks needed to take action quickly, as his mind was racing again. Angela was conforming to their narrative that it wasn’t so bad.

  Nothing should be done.

  All is well.

  For the first time ever, Brooks thought he was alone. No one else could possibly see the world through the same lens.

  No one, other than Madison. She was far on the other side and couldn’t be reached all the time. Brooks needed the guidance, but couldn’t always find it. It was five days since he killed Geoff Burnley, and Madison had finally made her presence felt in the prison.