by JF Freedman
Kate tossed the pad onto the table. “Okay, Tyler,” she said. “I’m not the D.A., and you’re not under oath now. Tell me the truth, as best you can remember it. Was the gate open or locked?”
He looked at her.
“As best you can remember it,” she repeated. “Not how Steven told you it was.”
Tyler stared at the floor. “I thought it was locked. But I can’t swear to it, either way.”
You won’t need to, Kate thought darkly as she walked back through the campus. Your ambivalence will be more than enough for the prosecution. And the jury.
The grounds were almost empty now. She could hear sixty thousand people in full roar as she passed by the stadium. Was a miracle happening in there, she wondered? There certainly weren’t any happening for her.
Two buffed-out men were sitting in the hotel lobby as Kate entered. They were dressed in identical dark-blue sweatpants, muscle-style T-shirts with a small Tucson FD logo on the left nipple, and black Air Jordans. Their hair was neatly cut, not quite military-short. One sported a trim mustache. They got up and approached Kate.
“Mrs. Blanchard?” the mustached one inquired politely.
She winced. I must really be showing my age these days, she thought. Maybe I need a new hair color. Or a better workout regimen. Or a total makeover.
“Yes, I’m Kate Blanchard,” she said, slightly wary.
“Todd Levine,” the man said, extending his hand. “This is Barry Harper. We’re the paramedics Steven McCoy worked under this summer. Our supervisor said you wanted to talk to us about Steven.”
That explained the look. Cops and firemen (and apparently paramedics, who were associated with firemen) still wore mustaches.
“Thanks for coming,” she told them. “I appreciate it.”
Except for the three of them and an inattentive clerk behind the check-in counter, the lobby was empty. Everyone’s at the game, she assumed. She noticed they both had beepers on their belts, so they were probably on call.
“I know you’re busy. This won’t take long,” she promised.
They sat on couches in a quiet corner. The paramedics gave her their names, addresses, and telephone numbers, which she jotted down in her notepad. “Okay,” she said, sitting back. Her notepad was balanced on a knee. “What can you tell me about Steven that I might not know and that would help his defense? I assume you have a positive attitude toward him,” she added, smiling.
“Absolutely,” said Levine, the one with the mustache. “He’s tops in our book.” He looked at Harper, who nodded in agreement.
“Fill me in,” she said to them. “Describe his duties on the job. What kind of training he had. His interactions with people.” She looked at her list of questions. “Any personal relationships he had with coworkers or others that you know about.”
According to Levine and Harper, Steven McCoy was a gold-plated Boy Scout. A red-blooded, fun-loving guy, to be sure, but a damn good man, a rock-solid friend you’d want covering your back in a bar fight, or more importantly, someone you wanted next to you in their line of work, where instant decisions about life and death could literally spring up in your face, often in hostile and dicey surroundings.
“He’s fearless,” Levine said in admiration. He had been Steven’s primary trainer, so he knew him better, particularly under pressure. “He’d charge into locations I wouldn’t set foot in without an armed cop escorting me. Steven wouldn’t hesitate—somebody was hurt, needed help, off he went.”
“He’s smart, that’s a big part of why he’s good,” Harper chimed in. “He knows his procedures cold. Picked everything up immediately, never had to be shown twice. He’s going to be a hell of an M.D. someday. I hope he goes into emergency room medicine, that’s his calling. High octane, lots of pressure.”
Levine had a worried look on his face. “Will this arrest prevent Steven from going to med school?” he asked Kate.
The question took her aback. They obviously didn’t know, or understand, the seriousness of Steven’s predicament. “Well, if he’s convicted, he won’t be going anywhere for the rest of his life,” she said.
“But he won’t be, will he?” Levine asked in disbelief. “You can’t believe he’s guilty…can you?”
“It doesn’t matter what I believe. I’m not going to be sitting on the jury.”
“Jesus!” Harper ejaculated. “How can this be? Is there any solid evidence against him, or is it mob hysteria?”
Kate looked at him quizzically. “Why would you think there’s hysteria about this?”
Harper looked at Levine, who shook his head—in anger or resignation, Kate couldn’t tell. “Never mind,” he told her. “It won’t matter.”
She started to ask why it wouldn’t matter, or what the it was he was referring to, but she decided to hold her fire. She could read body language well enough to know they wouldn’t tell her, if there actually was anything to tell.
They recounted some of Steven’s more courageous and colorful episodes from the summer. He had been a true stalwart, and a good friend. They were heartsick over this quagmire he had fallen into. And they were sure he was innocent.
Kate closed her notebook. “Thank you for your time, guys,” she said. “You’ve been very helpful. We may want you to testify as character witnesses, or write letters to the court on Steven’s behalf.”
They assured her they would be happy to do either, or both.
As she was about to say goodbye she remembered the last item on her list. “Before you go. One more question. Was Steven seeing anyone in particular that you knew about? A special girlfriend, or…” She hesitated. She didn’t want to start a rumor that could spread and become unmanageable and ugly. But not putting everything on the table wasn’t an option anymore.
“Or?” Levine prompted.
“Could Steven have been in a relationship he had to keep secret?”
“A secret relationship?” Levine repeated.
“One that could put the other person in a compromising position. Or Steven,” she added. “Like with a married woman.”
The two men exchanged what looked like significant glances.
“What did Steven say when you put that question to him?” Levine asked her.
“I haven’t.”
“You should,” Levine said. “Because it’s not our place to answer that. That’s Steven’s call. His alone.”
It was after six by the time Kate’s plane landed in Santa Barbara. She drove straight to Luke’s office.
“How did it go?” he asked, once she was settled in with a cold Bohemia.
“Steven McCoy is a prince. He’s trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, brave, clean, and reverent. Did I leave anything out?”
“I don’t know,” he answered, laughing. “I was never in the scouts. Maybe thrifty?”
“That didn’t come up.” She took a hit off her beer. Man, she needed that.
“You didn’t find any hidden bombs that could blow up in our face?”
She shook her head. “Actually, there were a couple.”
He hadn’t expected that answer. “What are they?”
“For openers, a part of what Tyler Woodruff is going to testify to.”
“The gate?”
She nodded. “His best recollection is that it was locked when they left that morning.”
“That’s his final answer? He’s going to testify to that?”
“He won’t testify either way. But when Alex or Elise ask him which he thought it was, he’s going to say he thought it was locked.”
“But it could have been open. That’s what’s in his deposition.”
“He’s going to say locked,” she rebutted stubbornly.
“I heat you,” he said in an aggravated tone of voice. “You don’t have to sound so goddamned gleeful about it.”
“Just stating the facts, counselor.”
That Tyler would testify that way wasn’t a surprise, but it was a disappointment.
Luke had hoped he would have changed his memory, but he hadn’t, so they would live with it. He would have to figure a way to dilute it, without discrediting Tyler, who was firmly on Steven’s side. “Okay, anything else?”
She told him about her meeting with the paramedics, and their reluctance to talk about Steven’s love life, which she had intuited they knew something about.
“A secret woman?” he asked, following up her supposition. “Even if there was one, I don’t know how we’d work it into our scenario.”
“Unless she was in Santa Barbara and they got together secretly.”
“You’ve brought that up before, but it doesn’t make sense. The boys were planning on spending the day together. They only split up because Tyler’s girlfriend showed up unexpectedly. Steven had no idea that was going to happen.”
“I know,” she said reluctantly.
“Then what is it? The other part of what you found out.”
“This is going to sound judgmental, but it really isn’t.” She paused. “One of the paramedics was gay. He wasn’t prancing around or anything, but he was definitely gay. The other one might have been, too. I don’t know. But I’m sure about the one.”
Luke hadn’t seen that bombshell coming at all. “Are you telling me Steven McCoy is gay?”
“Why couldn’t he be? It’s never come up, but we need to consider that possibility.”
Luke was dubious. “He’s supposed to be such a heat-seeking missile toward women,” he said.
“He’s hot, for sure,” Kate answered. “My daughter breaks out in a sweat when she’s around him. Other women do, too. Check out how Cindy Rebeck looks at him, the next time they’re in the same place. She can hardly keep her tongue in her mouth.”
“You just contradicted yourself,” he pointed out.
“Not at all. How many women fell all over themselves over Greg Louganis or Rock Hudson?”
“Rock Hudson was gay?” Luke exclaimed in shock. “Are none of my childhood heroes sacred?”
She ignored his sarcasm. “Steven could be one of those people who are sexually comfortable with both men and women.” She thought back to her meeting at the hotel. “I wouldn’t be shocked to find out that this particular paramedic and Steven were lovers this summer.”
Luke exhaled heavily. “What a mind fuck that would be.”
“I know.” She paused. “Are you going to ask him?”
Her question shook him off-stride, which rarely happened. “Ask Steven McCoy if he’s homosexual, or bisexual?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know,” he answered cautiously. “That could be a minefield. And I’m not sure it matters.”
“But it could,” she argued strongly. “What if the reason Steven has been vague about where he was that afternoon is because he was in a sexual relationship with a man?”
The accusation—or supposition, or possibility—hung heavy between them.
“You know what I don’t understand?” she continued. “If Steven is gay, or bisexual, why wouldn’t he admit it, especially if it could give him an alibi, which he desperately needs. There’s not that much stigma about being gay anymore.”
Luke shook his head in rebuttal. “There isn’t? Tell that to the Neanderthals who are pushing for a constitutional amendment against same-sex marriage.”
“That’s the religious right. I’m talking about normal people.”
Kate had strong feelings about this issue. She’d had a strict fundamentalist Church of God upbringing, which from early childhood had never appealed to her. Too narrow, too judgmental, too bleak. By the time she was thirteen she had quit going to church, and she had never looked back. Her daughters had been raised to be ethical and moral people. That was good enough for her. They didn’t need to go to church to know right from wrong.
“They are normal people,” Luke corrected her. “Anyway, that’s not what the problem would be for Steven.”
“What would it be, then?” she asked.
“Sports,” he answered emphatically. “Steven’s a first-class athlete, almost an All-American in volleyball. Sports is one of the most important parts of his life. In some fundamental ways, it defines him. And that is the one area in American life where homosexuality is still taboo.”
“What about Martina Navratilova?” Kate countered. “Billie Jean King? Babe Didrikson was one of the greatest athletes of the century.”
“They were women.”
As a former jock, he knew about this from the inside. Excepting figure skaters and gymnasts, being gay was unacceptable in the male sports world. “It’s easier for women, they’re more accepting, and their sexuality doesn’t define them like it does for men,” he explained.
“But there are out men athletes,” she persisted. “I’ve read about them.”
“Only after their playing days are over. And for every individual one who’s had the guts to come out, there are a hundred who haven’t. The pressure’s too great, there’s too much social stigma. He’d be ostracized from the people he’s closest to. Someday it’ll be easier, but it isn’t yet.”
She slumped in her chair. “That’s awful.”
“So was segregation. And that’s over now, at least officially.”
A disturbing thought came to her mind. “Do you think Tyler knows that Steven’s gay, or bi?”
Luke shook his head forcefully. “You’re jumping the gun, Kate. We have no knowledge that Steven is anything other than one hundred percent straight. Don’t jump slick with this,” he cautioned her. “It’s too explosive.”
Kate was a tangle of nerves as she drove home. Maybe she was wrong. Just because Steven had worked with gay men didn’t mean he was one.
It was the way the paramedics had reacted—Levine particularly—that had forced this feeling. There was something there, her instincts screamed that at her. And her gut was usually right.
She mentally added an item to her agenda: tomorrow, after she cleaned up her backload, she would put feelers out into Santa Barbara’s gay community. Maybe someone would remember Steven from that day.
Going down that road would be dangerous, particularly if Steven resisted, which she assumed he would, since he had never said anything about his sexuality that would prompt such a perception. She would have to be careful how she handled this, because it could blow up in their faces. But she felt she had to, even though she hated the idea of outing someone who was resisting it. But if that turned out to be their only choice, she would do it. She would lean on Luke to push Steven, until he had to consent. It might ruin his reputation, but it might also be the only way to save him.
24
“OKAY, PEOPLE, YOU’VE TORTURED this enough for one night. That’s a wrap.”
The voice—a campy parody of dramatic weariness—was that of Mr. Dolan, who was directing The Wizard of Oz, the high school’s fall/winter production. “Ten days till dress rehearsal and we’re still not polished in act one, let alone the rest of it,” he lamented. “To quote the bard, ‘I fear for the fate of the republic.’”
“Wasn’t it Abraham Lincoln who said that?” chirped one of the sophomore bit players. Everyone connected with the play, cast and crew, was on stage, awaiting instructions.
“This is drama, not U.S. history, Amos,” Dolan rebuked the cheeky offender. “And who gives a flying bagel? You guys have not gotten with the program, and time is fleeting.” He clapped his hands briskly. “I know tomorrow’s Saturday…”
A chorus of groans rose up as one voice.
“…but we need to tame this savage beast. I want to rehearse the poppy field scene tomorrow evening. I won’t keep you long, I promise. Now get out of here, you nuts.”
Outside, the kids started drifting away in small groups, heading for their cars and the street. Cassie Portsmouth, who was playing the Cowardly Lion, ran over to Sophia.
“Saturday night!” she bitched. “Can you believe that dork? What does he think, he owns us?”
Sophia laughed. “He does own us, unt
il the play’s over.”
“He doesn’t have to rub it in, though. Listen. Do you have an early curfew?”
Cassie was one of the kids Sophia had become friends with since she had started play rehearsal. Her social life had taken a strong uptick in the past month. She didn’t moan about her old life up north as much anymore.
“I don’t have a curfew,” Sophia told her. “If I’m going to be out late I check in with my mom, but she’s cool about it.” Her mother treated her like an adult, another reason she was feeling better about her new life.
“Cool,” Cassie said. “So you want to go to a party?”
“Where?”
“I.V. Some big party out at UCSB. There’ll be a bunch of neat guys.”
Meaning college boys instead of high school ones. Sophia wasn’t impressed with most of the boys in her class; none of her friends were. They were still boys. She and the other senior girls were women.
“Sure,” she replied. “I’m always up for a good party.”
As Cassie started to talk to some other kids, Sophia noticed Tina hovering on the fringes of the group. Tina smiled when their eyes met.
“Hey, Cassie,” Sophia called.
Cassie turned back to her.
“Can Tina come? We were going to hang out.”
This wasn’t true, but Sophia knew that Tina would appreciate being included. Unlike most of the Latinas in school, she was reaching out across ethnic boundaries for friends, Sophia being the main one so far. The two newcomers had been spending a lot of time together.
Cassie shrugged. “I guess.” In a lower voice, she cautioned Sophia, “There aren’t going to be many Chicanos. You think she’ll be okay with that?”
“I don’t think she cares,” Sophia answered, “but I’ll ask her.”
Tina was more than agreeable—the alternative was going home and watching television with her family. Maybe she would meet a nice Latino boy. She didn’t know any boys who went to college.
“I’ll say I’m going to be with you,” she told Sophia, as she dialed her number on Sophia’s cell phone. Tina’s mother had grudgingly accepted Tina’s relationship with Sophia, who was a serious girl and a hard studier (so Tina told her mother). “I just won’t tell them where.”