This Dark Road to Mercy: A Novel

by Cash, Wiley

  “And when did you leave?” He looked surprised that I’d asked him that, but I’d never had the chance to ask him before, and I didn’t know for sure if I’d ever have this chance again.

  “I don’t know,” he finally said. “I don’t know when the first time was. I think I did a lot of leaving during those years when you were growing up.”

  “There’s a lot I don’t remember about you,” I said. “Same with Ruby. She was little when you finally left for good.”

  “I know,” he said. “But it’s probably a good thing that y’all don’t remember much about me. I’d forget it all myself if I could. I did a lot of things I’m not proud of, but all that’s behind me. Behind us.”

  “But what about the money?”

  “What money?”

  “The money under the bed.”

  “What are you talking about?” he asked.

  “I found it today,” I said.

  “Okay.”

  “Is it his?”

  “Whose?”

  “The guy looking for you. The guy who came to my school.”

  “No,” Wade said, sighing. “It’s not his. I don’t know why he’s out there looking for me, but we don’t need to worry about him. I’ve already told you that. And I’ve also told you that we have to start trusting each other. You shouldn’t have been going through my stuff.”

  “I can’t trust you,” I said. “Because that money’s not yours, is it?” I knew it wasn’t, that it couldn’t be. He seemed ashamed to have to answer that question, and I could tell he was thinking of what to say.

  “I asked you to tell me the truth about calling Marcus last night,” he said, “so I guess I’d better tell you the truth too, right?”

  “Right.”

  “It’s not my money,” he said, “but I took it anyway. I don’t think it even belongs to who I took it from. I don’t know whose it is.”

  “Why’d you take it?”

  He looked past me at Ruby where she slept, and then he reached out and took my hands into his. “Easter, I’ve only ever wanted two things in my whole life. The first was to play baseball, and I was good at it—real good—but I screwed up. I did stupid stuff and I didn’t work hard enough, or maybe I didn’t want it bad enough. I don’t know what happened, but something got in the way.”

  “Did we get in the way?”

  He squeezed my hands a little. “No, not at all. You and your sister are the second thing I want, something I never thought I’d have. When y’all were born, my dream changed, and I wanted to be a good dad, but I screwed that up too.” He let go of my hands and leaned back in his chair. “And then here comes this money,” he said, closing his eyes like he was picturing it. “When I took it I thought that at least one of those dreams could still come true.” He opened his eyes and looked at me. “My dream is here. It’s you. You and Ruby. I just want a normal life, a normal house, a normal family.”

  I wanted to tell him that I’d always dreamed of having the exact same thing.

  A few minutes later I got back into bed and pulled the covers over me. I looked over at Wade where he still sat in the chair. “When are you going to sleep?” I asked.

  “Soon,” he said. “Any minute now.”

  I laid back and closed my eyes, and before I knew it I was asleep. In the morning, when I woke up, Ruby was asleep beside me. Wade was still sitting in that chair. He’d turned it away from us to face the window, but he was still there.

  Brady Weller

  C H A P T E R 18

  I was a divorced father with almost no relationship with my teenage daughter, and I’d been forced to resign from my job after more than twenty years on the police force. But I never felt like I’d hit rock bottom until the first time I owed money to a guy named Roc. He was a pretty reliable informant back when I was on the force, and I still leaned on him from time to time whenever I had to deal with a deadbeat I figured he’d know. He worked as a fry cook at a dive restaurant called the Fish House. His real name was Pete, and he was an overweight white guy in his midforties who wore black skullcaps and spoke in hip-hop slang and chewed on Philly blunts. If you let it, it could really bother you to owe money to somebody like that.

  I’d been wrong about McGwire going homerless Tuesday night—he’d actually hit two—and now $250 of my hard-earned money would be finding its way into the dirty kitchen of the Fish House and right into Roc’s greasy hands.

  The Fish House sat by some abandoned railroad tracks on the edge of downtown. I pulled into the parking lot a little before 9 A.M. The place was only open for lunch between 10 A.M. and 2 P.M., and the parking lot was empty except for a few old cars on the far corner of the lot by the broken sidewalk.

  Just as I stepped out of my car, the kitchen’s side door flew open and slammed against the outside wall. Roc, wearing black sunglasses and his black skullcap and oversize white T-shirt, dragged a trash can from the kitchen toward a set of Dumpsters beside the restaurant. He stopped pulling the trash can and fished a lighter from one pocket of his sagging blue jeans and a cigar from the other. He lit it and went back to dragging the trash can across the pavement. He looked up and smiled when he heard me close my car door.

  “Oh, snap,” he said. “What up, playa?”

  “Nothing,” I said. “What up with you?” I walked up to him and he shook my hand and pulled me into one of those half hugs guys like to share when they pretend to be “homies.” I felt the grease on his fingers where they wrapped around mine, and when he turned my hand loose I put it in my pocket and wiped my fingers on the lining. I looked down at the trash can. “You need a hand?”

  “Hells yeah,” he said.

  He took one handle and I took the other, and then we half dragged, half carried the trash can to the Dumpster, where we heaved it up, tipped it over, and poured the garbage inside.

  “You watch the Cardinals Tuesday night?” he asked.

  “No,” I said. “It’s bad luck, but looks like it didn’t matter. I know what McGwire did off Hernández.”

  “He did it off Pall too,” he said.

  “I know,” I said, “but I only owe you for Hernández.”

  “Damn,” he said. “I thought I’d try anyway.”

  I pulled a bank envelope from my back pocket and counted out the bills and handed them over.

  “My man,” he said, smiling. He counted the money quickly, and then he pulled a wad of bills wrapped with a rubber band from one of his front pockets. He unwound the rubber band and shuffled through the bills like he’d already marked out a spot for the money I’d just given him.

  “You’re killing me,” I said. “I’m down, like, what—four hundred dollars?”

  “More like four-fifty,” he said, smiling, still thumbing through the bills. “But I ain’t mad at you, baby.” He fitted the new bills into the spots where they must’ve belonged, and then he started counting all the money in the roll. A guy like Roc always knows exactly how much money he has on him at any given time, but he also wants you to see just how much money there is, how much money one could make running a small gambling empire in west Gastonia out of the Fish House’s dirty kitchen.

  “Can I ask you something?” I said.

  “Shoot.”

  “You ever run numbers on the Gastonia Rangers back in the day?” He stopped counting his money and looked at me over his sunglasses.

  “Why?”

  “Just want to drop a name on you,” I said. “See if it means anything.” He stared at me for a second, and then he went back to counting his money.

  “Go ahead,” he said, smiling. “Anything for my best customer.”

  “Do you remember a guy who played for them about ten years ago named Wade Chesterfield?”

  He stopped counting the money and put his head back and forced out a loud, fake laugh. “Hell yeah, I do,” he said. “Rowdy? You needed a game fixed, you called Rowdy.”

  “Rowdy?”

  “Hell yeah,” he said again. “That’s what they called him.�
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  “Why?” I asked.

  He wrapped the rubber band around the wad of cash and dropped it back into his pocket. “Because,” he said, “when that dude couldn’t pitch no more they made him play the mascot: Rowdy. You know, man, the damn Ranger—Rowdy the Ranger. After he got the yips, that’s all they’d ever let his ass do, and he’d do it just to keep getting paid, to stay around the game. But damn, when he was playing—he could fix it for you. Old Wade Chesterfield.” He laughed again.

  “The yips?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “The yips. He plunked this guy in the face one time, and the dude just lost it and charged the mound. Beat. Wade. Down. It was bad; nobody could stop him. Dude just went insane. After that, Wade couldn’t throw a strike to save his life, whether he had a batter or not. He didn’t last long after that.” He spit onto the cement and rubbed it in with the toe of his boot. “Why you asking about him?”

  “Because he kidnapped his two daughters from a foster home on Monday night,” I said. “I’m looking for them.”

  “Damn,” he said, like he was impressed. “I never thought ol’ Wade had something like that in him.” He sighed and looked down into the empty trash can, and then he looked up at me. “You know, Wade played with Sosa before Sammy got called up to Texas.”

  I’d completely forgotten that Sosa ever played in Gastonia, but I nodded my head at Roc like I remembered it well.

  “Good thing Sammy got out of here when he did,” he said. “He’s got old teammates snatching up they kids, and him out there chasing Maris with Big Mac.” He shook his head like it was the most profound thing he’d ever thought, much less said.

  “Do me a favor,” I said. “Let me know if you hear anything about Wade Chesterfield.”

  “Some birdies sing for they supper,” he said, rubbing his fingers together and smiling.

  “We can do it that way,” I said. “But only if there’s any songs worth listening to.”

  He smiled and took a drag off his cigar. “You want to put something on Sammy getting number fifty-seven against the Pirates Friday night?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “No use pressing my bad luck.”

  “All right,” he said. We shook hands and I faked my way through a long, awkward handshake that ended with us bumping fists. “Holler at your boy if you change your mind.”

  “You bet,” I said, not catching my own pun. Roc laughed.

  I turned and walked back to my car while listening to him slowly dragging that empty trash can across the lot back toward the restaurant. When I reached the car, I turned around and saw him looking at me from the open kitchen door like he’d been waiting on me to change my mind.

  “What are the odds against Sosa homering Friday night and Saturday night?” I asked.

  Roc smiled. “You serious?”

  “I am.”

  “Hold up,” he said. He fished a small notebook from his back pocket and flipped through it; he found what he was searching for and looked back up at me. “They’re bad,” he said. “Real bad. But I can make it sweet for you. Want to say twenty to one? That’s pretty sweet.”

  “That is pretty sweet,” I said, even though I knew I should’ve been back inside my car and pulling out of the parking lot by now. “Put me down for a hundred,” I said.

  “That’s it?” he said. “Come on, playa.”

  “That’s it,” I said. “And let me know if you hear anything about anything.”

  He nodded his head, flicked the tip of his cigar, and opened the kitchen door. Rap music blared from inside. The door slammed shut and swallowed the music. The only noise was the sound of me jingling the keys in my empty pocket.

  C H A P T E R 19

  The first Thursday night of the month was my one night with Jessica. Whenever I picked her up from her mother and stepfather’s house, I always pulled into the circular driveway in front of the white-brick mansion and gave the horn a quick “I’m here” beep. I’d only been inside the house once, years ago, when it had been raining and I’d carried an umbrella up the steps and knocked on the front door. Dean had answered. I’d only stood inside the front door and waited for Jessica to come down, but from what I could see, the house’s interior matched its exterior. The foyer was floored in white marble, and a wide, wooden staircase curved up to the second floor. Over Dean’s shoulder was what must’ve been the kitchen, and beyond that a living room. Darkened rooms sat on either side of us, and all I remember is seeing more marble floors and white pillars and thinking that Tina was hidden away somewhere that I couldn’t see, counting her blessings that she was married to Dean and not to me.

  Tonight, Jessica was already waiting outside when I pulled up. She looked taller, older, and thinner every time I saw her. She had her mother’s soft face and my blond hair, and she wore it long and wavy like a girl who might be showing off her hair in a shampoo commercial. I put the car in park, left it running, and opened my door to step out and give her a hug, but she’d already opened the passenger’s-side door and climbed in before I could even get both feet out. I closed my door and looked over at her just as she clicked her seat belt.

  “Hey,” I said, leaning over to give her an awkward hug, noting that she only put one arm around my neck.

  “Hey,” she said. She smiled, and then she turned around and tossed her purse into the backseat.

  Chili’s was crowded and noisy as usual, and Jessica and I stood outside, waiting for a table. It wouldn’t be dark for another half hour, and the night was humid even though there was something in the air that said it was more fall than summer.

  “I drove past the school yesterday,” I said. “It looks like they’re hosting a college fair Saturday night. You going?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “I think Mom’s taking me.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Good. Because I was going to say I could take you if you wanted the company, but if she’s already going, then good.”

  It was quiet for a second, and I looked around at all the other people and families who were talking and laughing, and I wondered what they could be talking about with their kids.

  “I’m still leaning toward Peace,” Jessica finally said. “They have a good English major, and the classes are small. I know you’re not wild about it, but it’s where I want to go.”

  “It’s not that I’m not wild about it,” I said. “I’m sure it’s a great school. It’s just really expensive. But NC State, UNC-Charlotte—shoot, my tax dollars are already going there, right?”

  “Yeah, Dad,” she said. “You’ve said that before. You don’t have to worry about it; Mom and Dean are paying for school.”

  “And you’ve said that before, and I’ve told you that I’m going to help,” I said. “It’s my job. I’m still your dad. I just want you to consider all of your options. That’s all.”

  “Sure,” she said.

  The pager the hostess had given me vibrated in my hand, and Jessica heard it and looked down and saw that it was glowing. She turned and walked inside, and I followed.

  Once we were seated a waitress came by and dropped off some menus, and a few minutes later she returned with our drinks. I studied my menu even though I already knew what both of us would order: the black-and-blue burger for me and the Cajun chicken pasta for Jessica.

  I looked up and saw that the waitress was standing at our table, pen and pad in hand. “Are y’all ready?” she asked. I looked at Jessica, and she nodded.

  “I think so,” I said. “I’m going to have the black-and-blue burger, medium please, and she’ll have the—”

  “Grilled chicken salad with just oil and vinegar,” Jessica said. “No croutons, please.”

  “Are y’all good with water?” the waitress asked.

  “I am,” Jessica said.

  “Me too,” I said. The waitress smiled and walked toward the table behind me. I heard her ask them the same questions she’d just asked us.

  “Grilled chicken salad?” I said. “That’s new.”

  “I
’m trying to eat better,” Jessica said. “Trying to be healthier.”

  “Is that going to be enough?” I asked. “You want to get an appetizer or something?”

  “No,” she said. “I’m not very hungry.”

  The waitress brought our food a few minutes later, and while we ate I tried to think of things to ask Jessica about school or college or about other things she was interested in. “English major,” I said. “So, what’s your favorite book?”

  She’d stabbed a piece of grilled chicken with her fork, and she held it in midair and stared at it like she was thinking long and hard about my question. “I don’t know,” she said. “I have a lot of favorites: The Catcher in the Rye, To Kill a Mockingbird.”

  “What’s The Catcher in the Rye about?”

  She popped the chicken into her mouth and sat her fork down while she chewed. Then she took a sip of water. “I don’t know,” she said. “It’s hard to explain. It’s not really about anything. The narrator is this kid who’s going home from boarding school for Christmas break, and he just kind of tells the reader about it.”

  “And that’s it?” I asked.

  “Pretty much,” she said.

  “It doesn’t sound like a very interesting book. What makes you like it so much?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I guess I just understand where he’s coming from. I understand how he feels.”

  “How does he feel?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. Alone?”

  “Do you feel that way?”

  “No. Not really.” She sighed loud enough for me to hear it. “So,” she said, “what’s been up with you?”