State of Grace

by Sandra Moran

  I had no choice but to follow.

  It was the beginning of our friendship and the first of many classes that we skipped together. Though his flamboyance scared me at first, over time I came to understand that Roger was, like me, making the best of an unhappy life. And, like me, he was hiding his true self. He gave the impression that he was worldly and experienced, but in fact, he, too, was from a small town—Shelby, North Carolina. Growing up gay, in the South, had proven to be a challenge—a “nightmare from which I am still recovering,” he said frequently. As he talked about his childhood, I began to understand why.

  Though he was from the South, Roger’s parents were originally from Des Moines, Iowa. His descriptions of them suggested a strange combination of Midwestern values and Southern sensibilities. His father was an insurance agent, a conservative Republican, and a card-carrying member of the NRA. His mother was a stay-at-home mom who used her spare time to craft the handwoven gift baskets that constituted the base of their part-time business—custom order Baskets o’ Bullets.

  “It’s nouveau-niche,” Roger laughed. “I don’t know how they come up with these ideas, but during the week, my mother weaves these baskets that they fill with cedar shavings and whatever bullets or gun supplies the person who’s receiving the basket needs.”

  When he told me about his parents’ part-time business, I laughed.

  “Oh, you’d be surprised at how popular they are. I mean, really, what do you get for the hunter or handgun owner who has everything? Bullets and cleaning supplies and accessories, of course.”

  The concept stemmed from his parents’ own love for firearms.

  “Oh, yeah,” Roger said. “They have, last I knew, twenty-three guns that range from rifles and handguns to antiques. My mother’s favorite is her Smith & Wesson double action Model 29 .44 caliber Magnum revolver. It was an anniversary gift from my father.”

  Coming from his mouth, the words Smith & Wesson double action Model 29 .44 caliber Magnum revolver sounded ridiculous.

  “I can’t believe you know so much about it.”

  “Honey,” he laid his hand on my arm. “How could I not? She only talked about it nonstop when Dad gave it to her. It’s just like the one Clint Eastwood used in the Dirty Harry movies. My brother is in love with it and already has asked to inherit it when she’s gone—which is fine because, even if I hadn’t been disowned when I came out to them, he still would have inherited all the guns. I don’t want anything to do with them.”

  Even though he said it with his usual aplomb, his smile was sad.

  “You were really disowned?”

  “I was.” He lifted his chin defiantly. “Lock, stock, and barrel, if you’ll pardon the expression. I think my folks always suspected I was gay, but when they walked in on me and my boyfriend one day, well . . . let’s just say they knew. And they didn’t like it—which is why I moved out after high school and haven’t been home since.”

  It was another similarity, because I hadn’t been home to Edenbridge since moving to Lincoln.

  “I moved to Des Moines to live with my mom’s mom.” He grinned. “You would have liked her. She was a pagan, worshiped Mother Earth and all that. Anyway, I started school there, met a guy, followed him here, blah blah blah. And now, four years later, I’m still here, single and finally getting back to school.”

  “What do you do for holidays?” I asked. His grandmother had, I knew, died the year before.

  “The same thing I do most of the time—get together with all my fag friends who have nowhere else to go, cook elaborate dinners, and get so drunk we don’t care that our families don’t want us.”

  Over time, I would learn firsthand just how much of this Roger did with his friends. And, it was on the heels of one of these nights after his friends had left that I confided to him that Grace spoke to me sometimes. We were lying on his living room floor, our heads on the throw pillows from the couch. Between us sat an open bottle of wine—our third. Miles Davis played on the stereo and I was well into the warm buzz of wine. I had been hearing Grace more and more frequently and drinking seemed the only way to drown her out.

  “Do you ever wonder if you’re crazy?”

  He was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling. “Only all the time. I think it’s part of the human experience—at least, for those of us who feel. It’s part of the package.”

  “I think I’m crazy sometimes,” I said impulsively and then added recklessly. “I hear a voice in my head—the voice of my friend who was murdered when we were kids. Once I even saw her.”

  I had his full attention now. Roger sat up and stared at me. He had changed into a silk dressing gown and pajama pants after the party. As he moved, the robe gaped open, exposing the smooth skin of his chest. I looked away, embarrassed.

  “You’ve never told me you had a friend who was murdered. In fact, you’ve never talked about your past. I was beginning to think you just dropped out of the sky.”

  “You don’t think it’s . . . weird?”

  “Which? That you never talk about your past, that you have a friend who was murdered, or that you hear voices?” He shrugged. “I don’t know. I’d have to hear more first.”

  “It’s not voices,” I clarified. “It’s just one voice. Grace’s.”

  I took a gulp of wine and began to tell the story, the words tumbling out of my mouth. As I spoke, I felt a huge weight being lifted along with the simultaneous desire to take them back.

  “I found her.” I could hear the slurred sloppiness of my words. “I lied to my mom about going to play at a friend’s house. And I snuck into the woods and I found her there. In front of the tree house. Naked. Dead.”

  Roger exhaled, and I realized he had been holding his breath. He leaned forward.

  “I ran to the town store and told them. They called the sheriff’s department and my mother. I don’t actually remember a lot of what happened next.”

  I took another swallow of wine. Although I was staring at the glass, my mind was a million miles away, seeing all over again Grace’s body and hearing the deafening silence of the clearing. I could tell I had had too much to drink. I worked hard to pronounce the words.

  “And since then, Grace has talked to me. It’s why I left Edenbridge—why I never go back. I’m vulnerable there. Grace knows it and she . . . you know.” I waved my hand around my head. “She haunts me. She warns me. It’s like she’s watching over me or something. I hear her in my head.”

  I swiveled my head to gaze blearily at Roger. He looked shocked.

  “Wow,” he said. “That beats having gun-collecting, ultra-conservative parents any day.”

  “Roger,” I said, irritated, “You missed the point. Do you think I’m crazy? For hearing her talk in my head? Do you think it’s her or is it just me wanting to think it’s her?”

  He was silent, considering how to answer. “Well, I guess I see it like this. There’s no reason why it couldn’t be her. I mean, there’s lots of things you can’t see or explain. Ghosts. UFOs. Psychics. I don’t see how this is any different.”

  I felt relief wash over me. Maybe I wasn’t crazy after all.

  “But, why you?” he asked. “I don’t mean that in a bad way, just . . . why you?”

  I shrugged. It was a question I had asked myself as well. “I don’t know. Maybe because I found her. Or . . . maybe it’s her job? I don’t know.” I hesitated and then plunged forward. “I think it’s because she thought I was her best friend. I mean, that’s what the boy in the woods told me.”

  Roger frowned. “What ‘boy’ in the woods?”

  “After she died,” I explained. “There was this boy. He was her friend, sort of. He said that they talked a lot—that she told him I was her favorite. So, maybe that’s why she chose me.”

  Roger took a measured sip of wine. Even intoxicated, his movements were deliberate and precise. “Did they catch the guy?” he asked. “The one who did it?”

  I shook my head. “No. And, I think that made it
even scarier . . . ’cause . . . there was part of me that thought he might come after me next, you know . . . ’cause I found her . . . or had clues or something.” I was silent, dreading the words I knew I was going to blurt out. “I feel like it was sort of my fault—what happened. I mean, maybe I could have done something. Maybe helped her. I knew things were bad for her at home, but I didn’t do anything. You know?” I looked up to see Roger nodding his head. “I didn’t help because . . . I guess I was scared I couldn’t help. And now, she’s punishing me or something. She protects me . . . sorta. Even though I didn’t protect her. And I feel her getting stronger.” I hung my head miserably. “I know that’s twisted and makes absolutely no sense, but maybe she would still be alive if I had, I don’t know, done something. Invited her to stay at my house that night. Told someone about Don Wan’s drawings.”

  Roger held up his hand for me to stop. “Who’s Don Juan?”

  “Sorry.” I held out my glass for more wine. Roger raised his eyebrows and poured about an inch into the glass. It wasn’t enough and I continued to hold the glass out for more. Finally, he sighed and poured another inch into the glass. Satisfied, I continued with the story. “Don Wan was this homeless guy. He had all these tattoos and he used to draw these pictures. One day we broke into this old abandoned house. We didn’t know he was staying there and we found these creepy drawings with his stuff. Of naked girls masturbating. A couple of them looked like Grace. Natalie was the only one who saw them, but she told me about it later. I was scared to tell my mom because we weren’t supposed to be in the house. I was selfish, I didn’t want to get in trouble.”

  “Natalie sent an anonymous note to the police, but they didn’t arrest him or anything.” I used my free hand to make air quotes. “‘Drawings don’t count.’”

  Roger held up his hand. I paused. “Who is Natalie?”

  “Natalie is—was—my best friend. Her dad was a sheriff.”

  “Ah,” Roger nodded. “I’ve never heard you talk about her.”

  “She’s still in Edenbridge,” I said. “Her mother has cancer. She quit school to take care of her. Anyway,” I rushed on, pretending I hadn’t noticed his hurt expression, “Natalie said he was one of the main suspects in Grace’s murder. I guess they questioned him, but he had an alibi, his wife or girlfriend—I forget which she was. But then he just disappeared.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He just got on his motorcycle one night and left town.” I frowned. “I still think he did it, though.” I swung my head drunkenly back and forth. “If only we had done . . . something.”

  Roger was silent for several seconds and when I finally looked up, his expression was a mixture of surprise and incredulity, as if I were a stranger. “Rebecca, you know this wasn’t your fault, don’t you?” He raised his eyebrows and waited for my response. When I didn’t reply, he sighed. “Have you considered talking to someone about this? A professional counselor? I think you have this out of perspective.”

  “Therapy is for people who are too weak to just pull themselves up and get on with life,” I spat, suddenly, unaccountably angry.

  “Please tell me you don’t really believe that,” Roger said. “Therapy doesn’t mean you’re weak. It’s not weak to talk about your feelings—to get help working through what happened. Jesus, Rebecca.”

  “You don’t understand, Roger,” I said angrily.

  His response was equally angry. “Maybe that’s because you never open up. The entire time we’ve known each other and this is the first time you’ve shared anything! What the fuck?”

  I laughed bitterly, gulped down my wine, and extended my glass for more.

  “Seriously,” Roger said as he filled both of our glasses. “You’re so closed off. And I guess I always knew it, but not to this extent. You had this crazy life-altering event and you don’t mention it until we’re drunk, two years after we met.”

  “Roger, please drop it. It’s just one of those things I don’t like to talk about.”

  “Yeah. Clearly.”

  “Hey, hey, hey,” I slurred. “Don’t get mad. I haven’t told anyone. No one.”

  He stared. “How can you keep all that inside? I don’t understand.”

  “Not a lot to understand, Roger,” I said, waving the hand that held my glass. Red wine sloshed onto the carpet. “There’s too much to just let some of it out. So I let none of it out.”

  Roger grimaced at the mess I’d made and reached out to grab my hand.

  “I think that’s enough wine for you. And I think you’re going to be staying here tonight. I’ll even give you the bed.”

  I smiled sloppily, no longer angry.

  “You’re my best friend in the whole world, Roger,” I said. “But listen—listen to me. Listen.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “You can’t tell anyone about what I told you. You can’t. I don’t want people to think I’m crazy. I’m tired of being the one who found the dead girl. I’m tired of that, you know?”

  “I won’t tell.” He tried to pull me to my feet. “Now, come on, let’s get you to bed.”

  “I let her down, Roger,” I continued as he led me down the hall to his bedroom. “I let her down when she needed me. She died because I didn’t tell what I knew. I was too selfish. My fault . . . it’s my fault.”

  The last thing I remember of that night was lying on Roger’s bed, the room spinning, and thinking that I deserved to feel this bad. It was part of my punishment for doing nothing.

  We never again really talked about Grace or the voice in my head. Occasionally, Roger would try to bring the subject up, but after several failed attempts he stopped asking. I knew he had questions, and there was a part of me that wanted to answer. But something inside me recognized that it was dangerous to let those thoughts and emotions out. In retrospect, maybe I should have.

  Chapter 14

  The night we got the call about Adelle, Roger was at our apartment for our Friday night get-together. As an added bonus, we had all agreed that this night, Roger was going to cut my hair. True to his promise, he was slowly but surely updating my style. My hair, he believed, was the final issue to be addressed and he had decided that after dinner, he and Adelle were going to work together to give me a new style.

  We were sitting in the living room waiting for Adelle to arrive. I was seated on the hand-me-down couch Adelle’s parents had given her and Roger was lounging in the oversized beanbag that came directly to the apartment from my dorm room. We were drinking margaritas.

  “So, tell me what you’re thinking,” I said and touched my ponytail.

  He grinned and shook his head. “Nope, it’s a surprise.” He heaved himself awkwardly up from the beanbag.

  “Come on, tell me,” I begged.

  “No.” He picked up his glass and raised it in my direction. “Want another?” He headed toward the kitchen.

  “Not yet,” I said as I licked the rock salt off the rim of the glass. “But don’t have too much because you’re not touching my hair if you’re anything less than sober.”

  His response was made unintelligible by the clink of ice cubes being dropped into his glass. I glanced at the clock on the mantle. Adelle was habitually late, but rarely more than fifteen minutes. She was now more than thirty-five minutes late. And there had been no telephone call, which was uncharacteristic.

  “Hey, Roger,” I yelled, “what time does the clock in there say?”

  “It’s . . . 7:35.”

  “Maybe we should call Adelle,” I said as he came back into the room. “She usually calls if she’s running late.”

  Grace’s voice murmured in my head, the words unintelligible.

  “Let’s give her another fifteen minutes,” Roger said. “Maybe she got hung up at work or she is over at Thomas’s.” He raised his eyebrows suggestively.

  Thomas was Adelle’s new boyfriend. We hadn’t met him, but from her accounts, he was “fine” even though he was a “corn-fed white boy.” They had met
as College Democrats. He was the exact opposite of the kind of guy we’d have expected Adelle to date.

  “He’s the type of guy that would freak my family out,” she said. “But he’s also very forward-thinking. He understands what I want to do. You know he wants to go teach in inner-city schools? He volunteers for Social Justice Now! He’s living the change he wants to see.”

  Just as we were about to start calling around in search of Adelle, the phone rang. I hurried to answer it. The voice was deep and masculine. “May I speak to Rebecca Holloway?”

  “This is she,” I said.

  “Hello, ma’am. This is Sergeant William Cosgrove from the university police department and I’m calling on behalf of Adelle Jackson. She was involved in an assault tonight and she asked that we call you.”

  I stared at the answering machine. The red Power and Ready lights glowed like two menacing eyes.

  “Adelle?” I said stupidly. “She assaulted someone?”

  “No, ma’am,” Sgt. Cosgrove said. “She was assaulted. While walking on campus. She was taken to the county hospital. She asked that we call you.”

  “Is she all right?”

  There was a pause before Cosgrove answered. “I’m sorry, I can’t answer that question directly. But what I can tell you is that she would probably like to see a friendly face. She asked that you come to the hospital.”

  “Of course,” I said. “What do we do when we get there? Do we ask for her or for you or . . .?”

  “Go to the front desk and tell them who you are and who you’re there to see. She’ll probably be in one of the triage rooms.”

  I thanked him and stood for a moment after he had hung up, receiver still pressed to my ear. The all too familiar knot in the pit of my stomach clenched. It was happening all over again, I thought. A friend attacked. Would it have happened if she hadn’t been on her way to see me? I felt the familiar sting of guilt—and something else. A prickling on the back of my neck. A soft murmur that I knew, without a doubt, was Grace. I closed my eyes and tried to will her away, but her whispers, still indistinct, became louder. So intent was I on Grace, I didn’t hear Roger come up behind me.