Idyll Hands

by Stephanie Gayle

  “You have trouble seeing, Chief?” Billy asked, eyes on the giant phone numbers.

  “Previous occupant,” I said. He flipped a light switch. “Lights off!” He flipped it again. “The light hurts my head.”

  “Oh, sorry. You got quite a bruise,” he said. While Wright murmured into the phone, Billy asked, “Did it really happen that way? You were practicing the crime, and you tripped?”

  “Yes.” I closed my eyes. The nausea had passed, but I felt shaky. Like I was on a boat. I wasn’t great on boats.

  “You can’t?” I heard Wright ask. “Are you sure? Okay… . Okay. No. I’ll figure it out.” He lowered his voice.

  “You need me to stay?” Billy asked.

  Oh, God. Matt couldn’t or wouldn’t come. Billy wanted to play nurse. I opened my eyes. He was gazing at me with pity. It made me itch. I hated pity.

  Wright picked up the phone and pulled a card from his wallet.

  “Who are you calling?” I called. My hoarse voice broke.

  “Let me get you some water.” Billy leapt up and headed for the kitchen cupboards. Wright kept his back to me. I couldn’t hear what he said. God help him if he was calling Mrs. Dunsmore. I’d go back to the hospital before I’d let her play nursemaid.

  Billy gave me a glass brimming with water and asked, “What’s with all the boxes?”

  I lifted my head. Did I have any evidence lying about? Interviews? “Just sorting through old stuff,” I said. “Spring cleaning. A little late.”

  “I hold onto stuff, too,” he said. “Mom calls me a pack rat, but what if I want some of that stuff someday to show to my kids, or it becomes valuable?” I pictured Billy surrounded by baseball cards and G.I. Joe figures. I closed my eyes.

  A hand shook my shoulder. “Hey, wake up.” It was Wright. He looked tired. His jaw was shadowed with a faint bruise. That’s right. Finny had hit him, earlier, in the office. I’d forgotten.

  “Where’s Billy?”

  “Sent him back to the station. I’ll hang here for a bit until my relief comes.”

  “Who?”

  He didn’t answer. “Those the other boxes?” he asked, pointing. I hadn’t given him all of Finny’s stuff on Susan. Only the pieces that seemed most relevant. I nodded. My head felt thick.

  “How many fingers am I holding up?”

  “Four.”

  “Fuck you,” he said.

  I smiled. It had been two, and I knew it was two, and he’d said “fuck you” like we were buddies, like I wasn’t his gay boss, whom he loathed.

  “Hey, was that true? What he said about your baby?” I asked.

  Wright’s face had a way of closing. It reminded me of watching bodega owners pull down the roller shutters over their stores at night, the distinctive sound that accompanied the motion. I heard that sound now, seeing his face change.

  “Yes.”

  “What are you going to do?” I asked. Raising a child with special needs was no joke. He already had two kids.

  His Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed. “Janice has decided to continue the pregnancy.”

  “And you?”

  He said, “I—”

  The sound of the door opening stopped him. We both looked to the kitchen, to see Damien Saunders enter, a leather duffel bag in hand. Was he going somewhere?

  “Damien?”

  “Looks like the patient is awake and alert,” he said.

  The patient. Me. He was coming to watch me. Wright walked to Damien. “Thanks,” he said. He’d called Damien? How’d he known? How had he guessed that Damien would come to watch over me?

  “I’ll let everyone know you’re okay,” Wright called. “Stay at home. Two days. I’ll tell Mrs. D. you’re not to be in the office before then.” He left.

  “Traitor,” I muttered.

  Damien dropped his duffel on the kitchen floor. “I like what you’ve done with the place.” He’d visited over a year ago. Had seen the house in its mostly original form.

  “It hasn’t changed much,” I protested.

  “Oh, I’d say it has.” He glanced at my recently refinished hardwood floor, but I had the sense he was discussing another topic altogether.

  “How are you feeling?” He leaned in to take a look at my eyes and to touch the wound on my head with his long fingers. He looked good and smelled like … mint.

  “Confused.”

  His face got alert and worried. “How?”

  I leaned forward, tugged at his jacket, and said, “like this,” before kissing him.

  CHIEF THOMAS LYNCH

  THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1999

  1730 HOURS

  Damien tasted of mint. He sighed low, in the back of his throat, as we kissed. Then he pulled away. “Wait.”

  “Why?”

  He stood up and stepped backward. Shook his head. He looked a little fuzzy, like I felt. “You’re in a relationship.”

  “An open relationship.”

  “Since when?” He grabbed my water glass and went to the kitchen. Refilled it and brought it back.

  “Since I found Matt with another guy.”

  “Oh.” He cleared off papers from the table, exposing the crack in the glass. “What happened?” He sounded pained. He owned the same table. It was a collector’s piece.

  “I might’ve smashed it.”

  “After you found Matt with another guy.” His words were wooden.

  “Yes.”

  He sighed and grabbed a kitchen chair. Brought it into the living room and sat opposite me. “I thought so. Look. Thomas, I like you, but I’m not going to be your weapon in this war.”

  “What war?”

  “The one you’re waging against Matthew Cisco.”

  “I’m not; we’re fine.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “I’m sorry, then.”

  “Sorry for what?”

  “Kissing you,” I said.

  “I’m not,” he said. His eyes were so blue. “But I’m sorry you did it because you’re angry at Matthew. If you ever kiss me again, I’d want you to do it because you want to kiss me.” He held up his hand to keep me from rebutting. “Let’s let it go, for now. How are you feeling?”

  “My stomach has stopped heaving. My head aches.”

  “They give you something for it?”

  I waved a prescription form that Wright had left beside me. “Need to get this filled.”

  “I’ll do it,” he said. “Pharmacy in the center of town?”

  I nodded. “Can you get it filled without me?”

  He stood. “I don’t want to leave you long, but do you need anything else? Food, drink?” He walked to the fridge and peered inside. “The answer is yes. Any requests?”

  “Morphine.”

  “Not one of the major food groups.” He grabbed his car keys and said, “I will be back in a half hour. If you get sick or feel ill, call 911. Do not be a hero and die of a head injury.” He left.

  My head ached. The throbbing made it hard to do anything. I tried TV, but it was too bright and loud. Eventually, I closed my eyes and then the throbbing stopped.

  “Tom. Tom.” I felt a tickle on my cheek, like a feather. Why was there a feather? “Wake up, Prince Charming. Or do you need a kiss?”

  “You said we couldn’t,” I murmured. I turned my head and opened my eyes and saw Matt. He knelt before me, his dark brows slashed downward.

  “I told you what?”

  “Nothing,” I said, pushing myself upright. “I was dreaming.”

  He peered at me. “How’d you get injured? Your colleague, Wright, was short on details.”

  “Bit of a scuffle in my office led to an accident. I tripped and hit my head on my desk.”

  “That massive thing?” he asked. “No wonder you had to get your skull checked out.”

  “I feel better.”

  “Right. Explains why you’re wincing. Sorry I couldn’t come right away. I was on duty, and then—”

  “It’s okay. I understand.”

  “I
was worried when I got that call,” he said.

  My head’s throb was back, and I felt like part of it was triggered by Matt. I had thought he wasn’t coming. I had kissed Damien. I had punched my glass table. I thought we were headed down a path that forked, and now? He was here, worried.

  The kitchen door opened. We both turned to see who was visiting. Damien untangled plastic bags in his hands “Hey, I didn’t know what you wanted to eat, so I got—” He looked up and stopped. “Oh. Sorry. I didn’t realize you had company.”

  “Hey,” Matt said.

  “I got your meds,” Damien said, handing me the small waxed paper bag from the pharmacy. “Do you need water?”

  “Got some,” I said, gesturing to the glass Billy had given me.

  An awkward silence fell, broken only by me ripping open the bag and rattling the pills in the bottle. After wrestling the childproof cap without success, Damien said, “Let me,” but Matt was faster. He grabbed the bottle from my hand and opened it. “How many?” he asked.

  “The instructions are on the label,” Damien said.

  “One,” Matt read. He handed me a single white capsule and rotated the pill bottle. “Don’t drink alcohol while taking this. Don’t operate heavy machinery.” He read in a robotic voice.

  I swallowed the pill with a mouthful of water. The capsule was large. It felt as if it was lodged behind my breastbone.

  “You okay?” Damien asked. He must’ve noticed my slight gag. I nodded.

  “Thanks for your help,” Matt said. “Think I can take it from here.”

  My eyes went to Damien. He’d gone rigid. His bright eyes sought mine. Whatever he saw there made him say, “Okay. Don’t let him sleep for more than an hour without waking him to check that’s he’s responsive. Ask him the date, the president, and what he last ate. Check his pupils.”

  “Got it.” Matt had his arms crossed.

  “Okay, then. Thomas, I hope you’re feeling better soon.”

  “Thanks for coming,” I said. He grabbed his duffel and was out the door. I heard the low rumble of his car start.

  “What the fuck!” Matt yelled. His shout made me recoil. My head still throbbed.

  “Shhhhh,” I said.

  “You invited him over?”

  “No, Lewis did.”

  “Lewis?”

  “Detective Wright. He was with me when I hit my head. He called you, but you couldn’t come so I guess he called Damien next.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because we’re friends.”

  “Friends?”

  “Are you jealous?” I still felt wobbly, but I stood. I didn’t like him looming over me. “You’ve got some nerve. I thought we weren’t exclusive.”

  “We’re not exclusive because you’re still two-thirds in the closet. Touching you in public is forbidden. Heaven forbid anyone know that their gay chief of police is actually, you know, gay.”

  “I sent you flowers at work. I introduced you to my family. I was, I am, trying to get over my public-affection thing, but I’ve never been that way. And how dare you criticize me after you fuck whoever you want and blow off dates?”

  “What dates?”

  “The batting cages.”

  “The batting cages? That’s helping you with homework, not a date.”

  My head throbbed. “Like teaching you poker isn’t a date, but I notice you didn’t seem to mind that.”

  “You think I’m stupid, that I didn’t know you’ve been talking on the phone to him? The other day? Claiming you were talking to Dix? You weren’t.”

  Fuck. He knew. “I should’ve told you the truth, but I was embarrassed. He’s been helping me, with relationship advice. He told me to order the flowers.” The second the words left my mouth, I knew they were wrong. “I wanted to do right, but I’m not good at this stuff.”

  “You talked about me to him.”

  “He’s my friend. I’m not exactly up to ears in them around here. You have family, you have tons of guys at work and the neighborhood.”

  “He isn’t your friend, Thomas. He wants to sleep with you. He’s been angling to do so ever since he met you.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “You’re even dumber than you look.”

  “Get out.” My whole life I’d been the dumb one of the family. He knew that. If he’d spent months analyzing hurtful things to say, he couldn’t have done better. “Now.”

  Matt assessed me. “Who’s gonna watch over you?” He hesitated, as if the question mattered.

  “Out. Now.”

  He slammed the door behind him. My skull juddered as if it, too, had been handled roughly. I collapsed back into the recliner, the chair rocking under my sudden weight shift. I cradled my brow on the heel of my palm and inhaled and exhaled.

  I had no one to check me for brain injury. Maybe it was knowing about Lewis’s baby, with its diagnosis, but I didn’t assume any longer that I would be okay, that something might not be wrong. I needed help, so I stumbled to the phone and dialed.

  “Suds.” The background noise made Nate difficult to hear.

  “Nate, it’s Thomas, Thomas Lynch. I need help.”

  DETECTIVE MICHAEL FINNEGAN

  FRIDAY, JUNE 25, 1999

  0945 HOURS

  Lewis gave me a twenty-yard stare, though he sat three feet from me. What had I done now? I popped another salted peanut in my mouth and considered not asking. Let him stew in his broth. But that wasn’t my way. “What’s up?” I asked.

  He didn’t shift his eyes my way. “Nothing,” he said in the exact tone each and every one of my three ex-wives used when I’d ask them that question. “Nothing” meant I was supposed to know the answer; that I wasn’t supposed to need to ask.

  “Cool.” Another peanut went into my mouth.

  His gaze drifted to me. “Why’d you have to go off, big guns blazing?”

  “Look, I apologized for throwing that punch.” Lew’s jawline was blue-purple with bruising. He hadn’t shaved today. He always shaved. He was hiding the bruise, from the others, forestalling their questions.

  “You should apologize to the chief,” he said.

  I set my plastic tube of peanuts down and said, “I’m not the one that sent his head into the desk.” Lewis’s stare could set the paperwork afire. “Fine, I might’ve provoked you, and I’ll apologize as soon as he’s back in the office.”

  “You could stop by his house.”

  “You want me to bring him flowers? When did you become his biggest fan? Wasn’t two days ago you were bitching about him and his memos.”

  “He’s a thousand times better than Stoughton ever was, and you know it. He didn’t give you grief when you showed up at our girl’s crime scene. And he isn’t going to tattle and suspend you or me for fighting in the office when you know he has every right.”

  I did know that. I’d thrown a punch back in Boston and gotten automatic suspension and a review. They made me talk to a shrink. There were forms in triplicate and whispers. Guys talking, speculating about what set me off. I could’ve told ’em. One of the cops tasked with finding my sister had referred to her as “a lost cause,” so I’d punched him. Didn’t think about it. My fist formed and met his face before I had a chance to evaluate the decision. I’m not proud, but I’m not ashamed either. It was a move that made me leave Boston, and I needed to leave because I was tired of seeing Susan in places where she wasn’t.

  “Detectives,” Billy said. He had three sheets of paper in his hand. Lewis perked up. Ever since Billy had nearly punched Hopkins over saying “retard,” the kid could do no wrong. Not this month, anyway. “I think I might’ve found some leads.”

  “Leads?” Lewis repeated. “As in multiple?”

  “Maybe. I called around to camera stores and photo-developer places. There was one in New London that seemed possible. It was two blocks from where Waverly lived.”

  “Still in business?” I asked.

  “Still run by the same guy. He remembered tha
t there was a man who came in pretty regular. He’d check out camera lenses. Didn’t often buy anything but he liked to talk shop. He sounded like he was the same age and build as Waverly.”

  “He give the owner a name?” Lewis asked.

  “Donald.”

  “Not his real name,” I said, “but the name he used in Salisbury.”

  Billy looked at his papers. “Yeah, so the place sold camera parts, but it also transferred film tapes to VHS.”

  Lewis and I exchanged a look. Film? What was this about film?

  “Owner says Donald was really interested in this service. Said he had old footage he’d shot on a Super 8 camera, and he’d like to have it transferred. But he didn’t want to hand over the reels.”

  “Why not?”

  Billy looked like we’d asked him the meaning of life, and he’d come up short. “I don’t know. I asked him, and he said Donald asked if he could learn how to do it himself. That he offered to help out at the store in exchange for training.”

  “Owner take him up on it?”

  “He did. Gave him a few lessons in exchange for moving some inventory and unloading supplies. Seems he’d thrown out his back that season and needed help. But then one day he comes in late on a weekend, after he’d closed the store, and he finds Donald in the darkroom, making prints. He was upset and asked how Donald had got in. Seems Donald had a spare key made off the original. Guy yelled at Donald. Donald apologized. Said he’d come in to transfer some film to VHS, and he was working on making prints as an anniversary present for his parents.”

  “His dead parents,” I said.

  “If it’s our Donald,” Lewis observed.

  “Right. Owner kicks him out and never sees Donald again,” Billy said.

  Damn. That abrupt ending took the wind out of my sails. “What, never?”

  “Nope. But he said Donald left a film behind.”

  “What’s it of?” Lewis asked.

  “Owner said it’s mostly footage of a girl.”

  “That it?” I asked.

  “Yup. He didn’t finish watching it, said it was pretty boring and not well shot.”

  “And he threw it out,” I said. Because of course he had. It would be too much to hope Donald aka Daniel Waverly had shot video of Elizabeth Gardner and this store owner still had it in his possession years later.