Critical Reaction

by Todd M Johnson

  Then Carolyn had stood up. In a voice both sweet and serious, she had, in less than fifteen minutes and without notes, painted her client with such nobility and tragic grandeur that Ryan expected the judges to rise for a standing ovation.

  An hour later, sitting with coffee at the campus Starbucks, he’d heard his name called in that voice again. It was Carolyn. She approached and congratulated him on his presentation. Taunting him, Ryan assured himself. Then she’d sat down as he responded tepidly, “You were great. You were the clear winner today.”

  She’d looked at him quizzically. “Who told you this was a competition?”

  The question was not unkind. Ryan looked at her a moment before responding. “Probably my father. And his father before him.”

  She laughed. Then, through the rising steam of her coffee, she pierced him with the same gaze that had accompanied her argument. “You were better prepared than I was, you know. Your closing had insights that never even occurred to me.”

  “Just a weak presentation,” Ryan finished.

  “No,” she said softly, brushing charitably past the self-pity that he instantly regretted. “No. But maybe you tried a little too hard to beat the judges into submission. Too much punching; too little wooing. I’m starting to think that this . . . this is seduction. Drawing people into the intimacy of your client’s loss. This case we argued, for example, was about a tragic accident that took a young life. The judge or jurors have to feel that reality. Knocking them around may get their attention, but you want them to want to help your client, to side with your client. That takes an embrace.”

  He’d never pursued a client or a cause harder than his pursuit of Carolyn those next two months until graduation. That summer, they’d married.

  Ryan stirred and looked around him. It had grown late. The unpacked boxes were now darker shadows in the already shadowy room. He shook his head. Those memories weren’t helping make a decision.

  He had to decide what to tell Emily about her friend Kieran Mullaney. He ought to just get it over with: tell her no, as he should have at lunch. Maybe tell her he was shying away from the body blows and the bloody noses of trial practice—the ache of the responsibility, the back-breaking hours preparing for trial, the injustice of certain attorneys, like that young one he saw in the courthouse today, succeeding.

  All the things that hadn’t seemed to trouble him before Carolyn’s cancer.

  But he couldn’t just say no to Emily now—not when she was reaching out for his help. It was better for their already distant relationship if he gave the appearance of considering the case. After all, he was still an advocate; he could manage this charade.

  Ryan pulled his cell out of his pocket and pressed her number. Voicemail answered. “Emily,” he said after the beep. “Give your friend Kieran a call. Set up a meeting. Tell him that I’m willing to come his direction—make it dinner so I can drive. But set it up on a day you can come along. I think it would be a good idea for you to be there.”

  Chapter 4

  SHERMAN, WASHINGTON

  The stethoscope was icy between Poppy’s shoulder blades. “Breathe,” Dr. Morgan said from behind him. He complied.

  The scope lifted mercifully from his back, and the doctor came around the table. “I can hear the thickness, Mr. Martin.” He stepped to a small corner desk and his laptop. “I’d say it’s a stubborn irritation from the chemicals you were exposed to last fall. Give it another month or so. In the meantime, I’ll send your pharmacy a prescription for something stronger to break it up. And something else for the cough.”

  Poppy bristled at hearing the same song, third verse. “You know,” he said, buttoning his shirt, “it’s been eight months. I’ve been back here five times already to see your partners since the explosion. If these meds don’t work, what’s the next step?”

  The doctor kept tapping on the keys. “Well, we’ll cross that bridge if we come to it.”

  “Do you think,” Poppy pushed, “that you might want to run some more tests? For radiation or other chemicals?”

  The doctor hit Enter with a flourish and turned to Poppy.

  “Mr. Martin, from the chart notes, it looks like you’ve discussed this every time you’ve been here. As my partners told you, the most accurate testing would have been soon after the explosion.” The doctor clicked again at the laptop, slipping on reading glasses and leaning in as he moved through the digital chart.

  “Here it is. I see that blood and urine tests that night were negative for any known significant chemical exposure. Then they did a whole body count for radiation exposure that came up negative.”

  The doctor looked up. “I’d be satisfied with the testing they did that night, Mr. Martin. Obviously, you got no serious dose of radiation, because you survived. Besides, I’m no specialist in the field, but I doubt there’s even a test out there to detect radiation exposure this long after the event.”

  “Um-hmm.” Poppy nodded impatiently. Yeah, he was sitting here, so it was obvious he didn’t get a terminal dose. But low doses could kill, too—over time.

  “You suppose at least you could just take some blood and urine, store it in case they decide it’s worth testing down the road?”

  The doctor looked over his glasses at Poppy. “Look, Mr. Martin, I really can’t do that. Your employer is Darter Security, a subcontractor to Covington Nuclear out at Hanford, right? And they placed you under Covington Nuclear’s self-insured health plan. I’m familiar with that plan. It’s a specialized one, with nuclear facilities employees in mind. It permits testing for radiation and chemical exposure—but only if there’s evidence you’ve been exposed to something to test.”

  The doctor offered a last perfunctory smile and a soft handshake before hurrying from the examination room. Poppy resisted crushing the smooth-skinned fingers—or tossing the desk chair after the man’s retreating white coat.

  Poppy was being treated like a whining kid. It was a wonder the doctor hadn’t offered a lollipop. What’d the guy think? Poppy had been around leaks out at Hanford his whole career—his dosimetry badge had gone red occasionally. A time or two he’d even gotten some mandatory time off to avoid excess accumulated exposure. Each time they’d tested and declared him “fine”—and he hadn’t complained or questioned them once. He knew there were more risks working at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation than the Sherman Public Works Department, and he’d always trusted his bosses at Hanford to tell him what was going on.

  Until now. This time was different, Poppy thought as he stepped into his shoes. It was different because he’d read the summary of Covington’s investigation report on the LB5 explosion in the newspaper. Not a word was mentioned about Lew’s shot being fired, the lights going out, the late take-cover sirens—even though he’d submitted all those things in his own after-event statement about that night. They hadn’t even interviewed him about what he’d put on that page—or answered his emails to Covington HQ.

  And now his cough and headaches wouldn’t go away.

  They could take that investigation report and shove it—like the doctor could shove his advice. He didn’t send his emails to whine or complain. He was taking the explosion seriously, like they always had at Hanford during his career. And he had a right to know what was in the cloud that night.

  Poppy slipped through the quiet lounge, barely acknowledging the receptionist’s “Have a nice day, Mr. Martin.” In the lot, he started his GMC Sierra and headed toward the highway leading to Hanford and his night shift.

  The pain and congestion weren’t easing up, and he didn’t have time to fill the new prescription before the night shift started in half an hour. If it wasn’t for the twenty days of leave he’d already taken since the explosion, he’d probably turn around and head home again today. But he’d rather bull through it than lie in bed, with pain knifing from behind his eyes and long coughs keeping Suzy awake. Besides, Dave Prior, his manager at PCL 237, was a good man. Dave would let him go home early again if things got too bad.<
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  Poppy passed the Keys Diner, where he and Lewis occasionally had breakfast after the night shift. It reminded him of the strangest part of the explosion: the disappearance of his young partner. Poppy’d never had the chance to hear Lew’s story of what happened at LB5 that night. He still didn’t know what Lew had seen on the east side of LB5—what he’d fired at or whether he’d hit a target. When Poppy’d recovered enough to return to his regular station at PCL 237, Dave told him that Lewis had gotten an immediate transfer after the explosion—and that he’d also requested confidentiality about where he’d gone.

  Maybe Lew did it ’cause he was worried his panic that night would get around. If that’s why Lew left, he didn’t know his older partner very well. Nobody but Poppy knew about Lew’s reaction that night. Nobody ever would.

  Of course, all this could’ve been cleared up if Poppy’d had a chance to ask Lew all his questions the night of the explosion. But the rest of that night was a blur of panicked gasps. Poppy remembered Lewis dragging him from the roof’s edge and helping him down the dusty air of the stairwell—then the two of them coming out again into the cool night in the front parking lot. There they’d laid him in the back of a van and raced into town to the hospital, while Poppy struggled to pull in enough air between coughing jags. The stars slipped past an open moon roof as Poppy fought down panic by focusing on the whir of tires, bumps on the road, and the whine of the racing engine. From up front, snatches of Lew’s rattled voice filtered back, talking to the stranger behind the wheel: “It happened just like that . . .”; “Felt like an earthquake . . .”; “Hope Poppy’s gonna be okay.” And one word Lew kept repeating: sabotage.

  In the ER, they’d slapped a mask over Poppy’s face until his breathing slowed and his weary chest muscles relaxed. By then, Suzy had arrived and Lew had disappeared—and his partner hadn’t returned to work since. It was all too strange.

  The night crew’s cars and trucks were already in their usual spots by the time Poppy pulled his truck into the lot of PCL 237. He parked where the guys always left him a spot, next to the front side entry. He stood for a moment beside the truck, coughing to clear his lungs until they ached and burned. Then he grabbed a water bottle from the cab, gulping half of it down.

  He rubbed a hand across his face to wipe away the cough tears and straightened himself up. He’d stow it all away again, like he did before every night’s work. There’d be no complaining on the job, despite what that doctor might think of him. He was a Hanford man, like his dad before him, and he had a shift to get through.

  But as Poppy trod the sidewalk to the glass doors, his last thoughts were the same as they’d been every night for the past several months.

  What had he swallowed out on that roof that night? And where on God’s green earth had his partner disappeared to?

  Chapter 5

  Emily looked out the passenger window of Kieran’s ancient Corolla as it bucked and creaked on the rutted dirt road. Her thoughts ran to the smell of boys’ cars—an amalgam of the scent of their skin, the leather of their shoes, their soaps and deodorants, gym bags stored in back seats, fast-food wrappers.

  This one was different. Absent were the loose MP3 wires and stray clothes, empty energy drink bottles and papers littering the back seat. There was a sense of order about this car past its prime. It spoke of someone less scattered, more centered and solid—qualities she’d liked about Kieran when they met.

  Still, there was a touch of isolation about Kieran, an echo of loneliness. Maybe it was the lawsuit; maybe it was the loss of his father. She didn’t recall that quality in Kieran years ago.

  An hour ago, he’d picked her up at the Winchester Inn, where she’d dropped her own car. It was the Sherman bed and breakfast where her dad had made reservations for the night. At Kieran’s suggestion, she’d come into town early to catch up before her father arrived for their dinner meeting.

  The past week, she’d thought a lot about her friendship with Kieran at college. It wasn’t hard to dredge up old feelings and recollections: Emily had only had two steady boyfriends since, and neither turned serious. Of course, she hadn’t actually dated Kieran. And those other boys were competing with the blur of law school and Emily’s first legal jobs.

  But that was all history anyway, and unimportant. She was there to get her father on board with Kieran’s lawsuit, not to start a romance. Besides, she wasn’t the same girl she’d been her junior year of college. She couldn’t imagine Kieran was the same boy.

  She looked at him again now, focused on the dusty road ahead. Thick blond hair almost reached broad shoulders, framing a face of quiet reserve. He seemed a little nervous, his expression reminding Emily of her mother’s early high school advice: “When it comes to girls, young men can imagine a thousand varieties of rejection. You’ve got to give them time.”

  Except Kieran hadn’t been quiet during the year they’d been friends at the University of Washington. Even suffering through the slow death of his father, Kieran had been outgoing, nearly an extrovert. It was, of course, a show, given what he was going through—it had to be. But Emily had still been drawn to his refusal to wear his pain on his sleeve—pain Emily understood so well with her own mother’s illness.

  “We’re almost there,” Kieran said.

  “Still won’t say where we’re going?”

  “Patience,” he said with a smile.

  At Kieran’s direction, she’d arrived at the B&B wearing jeans and a light shirt. He’d picked her up right on time and they’d driven northeast out of Sherman for almost an hour before turning onto this dirt road that took them over a hill and out of sight of the highway. Then they’d settled into the pattern of bumps and jolts for another half an hour, passing through a series of twisting canyons that splashed dust onto the sides of the Corolla like a summer storm of fine brown mist.

  At last they rolled through a gap into a small valley. A low ranch house waited directly ahead, fronted by a rose-bordered porch, with outbuildings bracketing either side. A truck and horse trailer were parked alongside the building nearest to Emily’s side of the car.

  “You kidnapping me?” Emily teased as he turned off the car.

  Kieran nodded. “Yeah. If he ever wants to see you alive, your dad has to take my case.”

  The dust was settling as she followed Kieran’s lead and opened her car door into the full heat of the day. This flat ground surveyed by the surrounding hills was vacant and sun bleached, though tall firs crowned the encircling slopes. There was another gap through the hills beyond the building to Emily’s right. From that direction, she heard the sound of a stream.

  A man stepped from the front door of the house and into the shadow of the porch. His skin was lined and sun worn, his hair pulled back in twin braids. He folded thickly veined forearms across his chest and appraised Emily from under the brim of a black hat with a yellow tassel hanging from the crown.

  She smiled and nodded. The man did neither in return. The disapproval in his stare froze Emily as Kieran crossed the dusty yard to the porch.

  He didn’t greet Kieran either, though his stare mercifully left Emily’s face. Kieran spoke in a low voice—too low for Emily to overhear. Still, several nods in her direction convinced Emily that they were talking about her, and that there was disagreement. She stood rooted to her spot until the man turned and disappeared back into the house.

  “Everything okay?” she asked as Kieran walked back.

  “Just a little misunderstanding,” he reassured her with a light smile. He walked to the Corolla and retrieved a tan cowboy hat from the back seat that he set on her head. “Follow me,” he said, steering her toward the nearer outbuilding.

  “His name is Ted Pollock,” Kieran said as they walked. “This is his ranch. He lives here with his wife and granddaughter.” Before she could ask anything more, they reached a side door in the building, which Kieran opened and passed through. Emily followed into the dim interior.

  From somewhere overhead came the w
hir of an air conditioner. Then Emily heard the clack of hooves on concrete, just as she caught the unmistakable musk of a stable of horses.

  “I remembered you liked to ride,” he said, leading her down a row between dozens of stalls.

  Emily smiled in the darkness.

  In the dusty light at the end of the row, Kieran gestured toward the last two stalls. “Got a preference?”

  Her eyes were adjusting now. In the closest stall was a youthful chestnut mare with a thin summer coat and a long mane and tail. Emily glanced to the adjacent stall, which held a larger, thick-necked bay stallion.

  It’d been half a dozen years since she’d ridden, and the stallion looked intimidating. “I’ll take the mare,” she answered.

  They tacked the horses together, then walked them out the rear of the barn, where Kieran gave her a leg up into the saddle. Then he led on the stallion, guiding them along a worn path through the gap in the surrounding hills.

  They crossed the narrow stream Emily had heard earlier. On the other side was a large corral holding several horses. They rode on by, moving toward open country.

  The early afternoon heat atop the horses would have been unbearable except for a softening breeze. Emily was glad she hadn’t chosen the stallion: the mare was headstrong and powerful enough. Not a trail horse, she thought. This was no dude ranch—not if these horses were typical.

  Kieran motioned her to come alongside. “So tell me everything you’ve been doing since I saw you last.”

  “Becoming a lawyer,” she said crisply.

  “Sounds boring.”

  She smiled. “Never a dull moment.”

  “Following in your dad’s footsteps?”

  “My mom’s,” she answered immediately, then changed the subject. “How do you know about this place?”

  Kieran shrugged. “I met Ted and his wife last winter after the explosion and they told me I could ride if I wanted to. I started coming here the last six months. It was a good escape—the exercise helps clear my lungs.”