I should have known. An itch afflicts natives who leave this place. Live elsewhere, as I learned to my dismay in college, and an uneasy sensation nags, as though you went to bed forgetting to brush your teeth. Suddenly wide awake in the dead of the night, you sit up, slap your forehead and say, Oh, yeah, I forgot something today. I forgot to go home, to go back to Miami.
Her number didn’t answer. If she’d been reading the newspaper, I wondered why Amy hadn’t called me. I hoped no other reporter had found her first.
I checked the time. I only had fifteen minutes to meet Consuela Morales.
No wonder R. J.’s fury had made Consuela cower. She stood less than five feet tall, petite and solemn with huge spaniel eyes. We talked in her room, a sparsely furnished cubicle with a private entrance, surely smaller than some closets in the big house where she now worked. She would not like her current employers to know of this, she said. There was no trouble here. It was an excellent position.
She had been afraid but had testified despite threats, pleas, and even offers of money and lifelong employment from Eunice Jordan. She testified for Miss Kaithlin, she said, an angel who had helped the rest of her family emigrate from Guatemala, sponsored them herself, and found them jobs. It had been difficult to work for the couple. They loved each other passionately, their housekeeper said solemnly. They fought. Always. It grew worse and worse, until she was afraid R. J. would kill Miss Kaithlin. Though she had detailed his rages for the police and lawyers, no one ever probed into what triggered his anger. The prosecutor didn’t need to and the defense didn’t want more on the record about R. J.’s bad temper.
Consuela’s English was not good then; it wasn’t now. But one thing she understood. Always, when they fought, it was for the same reason.
R. J. would shout, demand, and curse. He even wept. Always the same thing: “¿Dónde está mi hijo? I want my son!”
“They had no children,” I said.
“I know.” Consuela shrugged and rolled her dark eyes, as though the peculiarities of her employers were not her business.
“You’re sure that’s what he was saying?”
She was. Kaithlin often called her mother during arguments, she said. R. J. would shout. Sometimes they struggled over the phone. “He very mad,” she said in English.
She had never seen Kaithlin pregnant, never saw a child or even a child’s photo.
The medical examiner said that Kaithlin had given birth. But if she and R. J. had had a baby, where was it?
Back at the office, I called R. J. He wasn’t home, and Eunice was “unavailable.”
I dialed Amy Salazar. This time she answered. “You’re the former Amy Hastings,” I announced flatly, giving her no opportunity to deny it. “I need to talk to you about Kaithlin Warren.” Then I identified myself.
“How did you find me?” She sounded soft and girlish, though she had to be at least thirty-six or thirty-seven.
“It wasn’t easy.”
“What about Kaithlin?”
“I guess you’re aware of the story about her recent death and R. J.’s release.”
“Yes, but you’re all wrong,” she said cheerfully.
“Kaithlin isn’t dead. She wasn’t dead then. She isn’t dead now.”
“What do you mean?” I gasped.
“I don’t like to talk on the telephone,” she said slowly.
“I’ll come out there,” I said. “Right now.”
She lived in Coconut Grove, a historic Miami suburb of small houses, big trees, and narrow streets named Avocado, Loquat, and Kumquat. The address was difficult to find: a cottage scarcely visible from the street, dwarfed by towering oak and poinciana trees. It looked dark, but luminous eyes watched from the porch as I carefully picked my way along a fern-lined path. Several cats retreated into the anthuriums as I approached the wooden steps. Clove and cinnamon scents from night-flowering plants perfumed the air, and water splashed against stone somewhere nearby. The interior light was so dim that I shivered, hoping she was still there.
Her almost musical voice responded to my knock. “It’s Britt Montero,” I called, and she opened the door.
She was barefoot despite the chill, her hair and clothes loose and flowing. White candles burned as she ushered me into the living room, where wind chimes and planters hung from the ceiling. The furniture was wicker and the floor Dade County pine. The flickering candlelight glinted off a crystal suspended from a ribbon around her pale throat.
“Is the power out?” I asked.
“Oh, no.” She laughed and switched on a brass lamp in the corner. “I prefer to meditate by candlelight.”
I sat on a canary-yellow sofa and declined her offer of a fruit drink. She sat in a wicker rocker opposite me. She was thin, with a wide, generous mouth and thick dark eyelashes.
“You startled me when you said that Kaithlin isn’t dead.”
“Of course she isn’t,” she murmured confidently, her smile benevolent. “There is no death, only change.”
I stared, not sure whether to laugh or cry. “If it is only change,” I said, “you must admit, it’s a pretty drastic one.” What I had hoped was a major break in the story was nothing but new-age babble.
“The soul never dies,” she said serenely. “Kaithlin lives on in spirit.” She gazed around the room. “I feel her presence often.”
“So do I,” I said, surprising myself, emotions mixed. “I wish she could tell us what happened, enlighten us about her last ten years. Did you ever hear from her in all that time? In real life? Did you know she was still alive on this plane?”
“No.” She looked hurt. “When I testified at the trial I believed every word I told them. I believed she was in spirit. I felt like I’d lost a true sister.”
“Were you and she always close?”
“We met in kindergarten.” She smiled. “Miss Peters’s class. We had a fight the first day and wound up in a hair-pulling match. I can’t remember why, but Miss Peters had to pull us apart. We were both crying and in trouble. From that moment on we were inseparable. Like, I was her shadow. Kaithlin led, I followed. I was totally shy and backward. I adored her. She was smarter, ran faster, and told better jokes than anybody else in school.
“We shared all our secrets. We were always together,” she added, twirling a lock of her long hair, “until she met R. J.”
She suddenly bounded over to join me on the couch, tucking her bare feet beneath her, skirt billowing. She had bounced up so abruptly that the chair she vacated continued to rock, as though occupied by an agitated ghost.
“We were sixteen,” she said softly, eyes aglow. “From the moment their eyes met, it was all fire, passion, and excitement. It was the most romantic thing we’d ever experienced. First love for her, and on his part, I think, a rediscovery of innocence. She wasn’t allowed to date, but we had done a little experimenting with boys our own age. R. J. was different. Like, he kept coaxing and teasing her. On their first date, when she was supposed to be studying at my house, he drank too much—so she walked out and took a bus home. He didn’t see her go, didn’t even know her phone number. He showed up, furious, the next time she worked at the store. But she was good, God, she was good. Like, she turned it around so he was furious at himself.” She leaned on one elbow, hand in her hair, eyes dreamy. “From that moment on, he was hooked; he had to have her. Kaithlin knew how to get what she wanted. She wanted R. J. and she got him.”
“I thought she and her mother were very close.”
“Nah.” Amy frowned and plucked at her skirt. “I think Kaithlin was a change-of-life baby or something. Her mother was, like, older, strict, some kind of religious nut, absolutely dumpy and old-fashioned. Kaithlin had to wear all these positively stupid, freaking clothes the woman sewed. She never fit in with the rich kids at school until she started to mature. Then everybody wanted to hang with her.
“I was in the wedding, you know.” Amy’s expressive eyes darkened. “She and R. J. were so blissed out, despite everything el
se that had happened.”
“Where did it go wrong?”
“They were definitely soulmates,” she responded vaguely. “So high on each other, like birds mating in flight. The sort of relationship that’s made in heaven but can’t survive on earth. Like, there must have been a shitload of bad karma to work out. Kaithlin said it would take them both to hell—and it did.”
“What about the baby?” I asked.
She stirred, eyes uneasy. “It was the baby,” she acknowledged, in a whisper. “It was all about the damn baby.
“A couple months before her seventeenth birthday, Kaithlin was late, afraid she was pregnant. Turned out she was right. She trusted him, but R. J. freaked at the news, said the baby probably wasn’t his. I mean, Kaithlin was under age, still in high school. He didn’t want anybody, especially his parents, to know. He backed off, dumped her. She didn’t want her mother to know, they’d already been fighting because of R. J., but there’s no way to keep a pregnancy secret for long. When her mom went to see R. J., he called Kaithlin a lying tramp and walked away.”
Myrna Lewis’s words about “sins only God can forgive” made sense now.
“What happened then?” I asked.
“Officially”—she shrugged—“Kaithlin missed a semester to take care of her sick mother. She had the baby but only saw him once, the day he was born. Her mother wouldn’t let her keep him. She arranged a private adoption.
“Once the baby was out of the picture, R. J. started calling, trying to see her. He wouldn’t stay away. Her mom threatened to have him arrested and Kaithlin committed to juvenile hall as incorrigible. It got really ugly. It was like Kaithlin was in prison, with her mother the warden. The day she turned eighteen, she and R. J. started to date openly and she went back to work at Jordan’s. Her mother couldn’t stop her then, though she tried.
“You almost had to feel sorry for the woman. It was like trying to stop a whirlwind with your bare hands.” Amy hugged her knees, face awash in memories.
“When did R. J. decide he wanted the baby back?”
“He didn’t get on that kick until years later, after they were married. Like, his parents were hot for a grandson. It meant a lot of money to R. J. He was impatient, always wanted everything right now, couldn’t figure out why Kaithlin didn’t get pregnant.” Amy smirked. “She didn’t trust him yet. I mean, she’d seen him in action the first time. She wanted a solid marriage first, to know he’d hang in and be a decent father. She wanted to keep working, build a career, until he was ready. She never told him she was on the pill.
“But when Kaithlin didn’t get pregnant, R. J. decided to take their baby back. He had the money and all to do it. But Kaithlin’s mother refused to tell them any details about the adoption. R. J. went nuts, accused Kaithlin of knowing where the boy was and deliberately keeping him from his son, all kinds of shit like that. Poor Kaithlin knew nothing. She was a kid. Like, all she did was sign the paper her mother put in front of her.”
“A mess,” I said.
“Sure was.” Amy nodded slowly. “Her mom hated R. J. Guess it was her chance for payback, big time. R. J. hated her too. He was vindictive; it was all he thought about. Kaithlin got caught in the cross fire, all that hostility, negative energy, all those bad vibes.” Amy hunched her shoulders and shivered as she stared into the empty stone fireplace.
“Trapped between the two people she loved most,” I said.
“Right. They made her miserable. Like, her only joy was her job. She loved it. She was so good at it, she had a way with people, and it was her escape from a husband and a mother who wanted to kill each other.” She glanced up, eyes bright. “You know what I mean? Like, she threw herself into work to escape the pain in her personal life.”
Oh, I knew.
“What finally brought it all to a head?”
“She found out R. J. was seeing that Suarez woman. A real slut. We even followed them one night in my car, saw them together. God only knows what else he did. He had it all, the cars, the boats, the plane. Nothing was enough. There were rumors, even in the newspaper, about missing money at Jordan’s. Kaithlin suspected R. J. and some accountant friend he’d hired. But she knew in the end she’d be blamed. His parents would defend him. They always had, you know. He was blood; they always found somebody else to blame when he fouled up.”
I nodded, imagining how Kaithlin felt. She’d lost her relationship with her mother, she’d lost her baby, and she was on the verge of losing her marriage and her career.
“The day before she went to Daytona,” Amy was saying, “she said she had to make it work. I told her to bail. Like, the world is full of men. But she wanted to persuade R. J. and her mom to see a shrink with her. She’d tried before, but they’d both refused. She didn’t like failure. When R. J. asked her to go away for the weekend, she went, to do whatever she had to to make it work.”
“You knew her best,” I said. “During that last call to you, from the motel, was she really frightened?”
“I offered to drive to damn Daytona to get her, and I didn’t even have a decent car at the time,” Amy blurted, voice rising. “I would’ve rented one, or hailed a goddamn cab. That’s how sure I was that he was out of control and she needed help.
“See”—she leaned forward, eyes plaintive—“we were always there for each other. Kaithlin would have done the same for me. That’s the great thing about her. Like, she never forgot her friends, never forgot her roots, always reached out to the underdog, always wanted to help other women. So what I want to know is, How could she just run off like that, never even call me to say she was okay? I was her best friend our whole lives.” Tears skidded down her pale cheeks.
“You knew her so well,” I said. “Where would she go?”
Amy wiped her eyes and lifted her shoulders. “She never talked about going anyplace else. Miami was home. She grew up here. All I know is she wanted to stay here and live a normal happy life.”
“Don’t we all?” I said sadly.
“I made a lot of mistakes,” Amy said earnestly, tears still flowing, “and moved around a lot. But I’m enlightened, I finally found nirvana, the bliss I was seeking, right back where I started. Like, it was waiting here for me all along.”
“I’m glad.”
I was grateful that someone was happy and content with her life.
“Your husband lives here too?” I said, as she saw me to the door. “His name is Salazar?”
“No.” She looked vaguely troubled. “I think he’s still in San Jose. I have a restraining order.”
12
I drove away on streets as dark and shadowy as the past. The woman I had so identified with was dead. I had seen her corpse. Why had I been so elated when for a moment Amy led me to believe that Kaithlin might still be alive? Utter madness or wishful thinking? At least I’d learned one of her secrets. Perhaps now the others would follow. If I could understand her and her demons, perhaps I could understand myself.
Miami’s population, huge and uncountable, is swollen by tourists, fugitives, and undocumented illegal aliens. Yet Kaithlin and I had to have crossed paths many times. When we were growing up, those of us born and raised here, who lived in Miami year round, had not yet become lost in vast urban sprawl and dense downtown development. People our age frequented the same movie theaters, shopping centers, and skating rinks. I had shopped at Jordan’s, a local institution, and my mother worked there. I nearly joined her one year for a summer job, opting instead to intern at a small weekly, on the recommendation of my journalism teacher.
Kaithlin and I had surely seen each other, perhaps even spoken. We shared so much in common; both fatherless, raised under difficult circumstances by working mothers, we were both conflicted by love and work. But how could she walk away from family, friends, and career and simply disappear? Could I do that? I wondered.
Instead of taking the downtown exit, I accelerated, driving north to the old apartment house in North Miami, hoping she wasn’t asleep.
“Mrs. Lewis,” I said into the squawk box, when she answered the bell, “it’s Britt, from the News. I need to see you for a moment.”
She wore a tatty bathrobe and slippers, her thinning hair in plastic curlers.
“Did you bring back the picture?” she asked, blinking.
“No, sorry. It’s on my desk. I’ll mail it when I get back to the office.”
I answered the question in her eyes.
“I’m here to ask you about Kaithlin’s baby.”
She grimaced and limped to the stove to light the burner under the ever-present teakettle. “What about him?” she asked brusquely.
“You knew?”
“Of course. I was Reva’s best friend.”
“You didn’t tell me when we talked.”
“I didn’t know you knew.”
Was everybody in Miami suddenly practicing Don’t ask, don’t tell?
“I wish you had said something,” I told her, exasperated.
She faced me, the burnt-out match still clutched between arthritic fingers. “Reva asked me not to tell anyone.”
“But she’s dead; so is Kaithlin.”
She looked startled. “Death doesn’t mean you don’t keep a secret. A promise is a promise.”
“But that information might have some bearing on the case,” I protested.
“It doesn’t.”
“How do you know?” I said.
“It was too long ago,” she said, with a wave of derision. “It couldn’t.”
“Knowledge is power,” I countered. “It helps to have all the facts.”
“Helps who? Your newspaper?” she challenged.
“When I was young, journalism was all about the five double-yews: Where, When, Why, What, and Who. Today it’s about the gees: Garbage and Gossip.”
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