by Tim Downs
“Only one more shot?” Wes said. “We need more time.”
“What have you guys been doing here? I gave you one little job.”
“Hey—you try writing a book in less than a week.”
“Guys, it’s like a children’s book. How hard can it be?”
“We need to think of anything else we want in the book,” Wes said. “C’mon, everybody, we need to pool our thoughts here.”
“That should be shallow water,” Kemp mumbled.
Tino put a hand on Kemp’s shoulder. “The man said everybody—that means you too, Bobby.”
Kemp begrudgingly dragged up an armchair and joined the others around the easel.
Wes rubbed his hands together as if he were warming himself in front of a fire. “All right, who’s got something? Anything at all—just toss it out.”
Biederman raised his hand.
“We’re not in kindergarten, Biederman. Just talk.”
“People are always living in the past,” he said. “You know, regrets and misgivings and all. ‘I could have done this better; I should have done that instead.’ I say, forget about it.”
“Forget about it?”
“It’s a waste of time and energy. What good does it do?”
“What if the regret involves someone else? You know—‘I shouldn’t have done that to my wife’ or something.”
“Forget about it—I guarantee you she’s trying to. What good does it do to keep bringing it up all the time? It’s like picking at a scab. Every time I try to apologize to my wife it only makes things worse—so forget about it.”
“You know, that’s not bad,” Tino said. “What does it really mean to forgive someone? It basically means you forget what they did to you.”
“Exactly,” Biederman said. “So the angel says, ‘Speed things up—forget about it now.’”
Wes jotted it on the easel with a felt-tip marker. “Okay—what else?”
“I’ve got something,” Kemp said.
“Good—go for it.”
“You’re not as good as you can be, but you’ve never done anything bad.”
“How’s that again?”
“Take ‘dishonesty,’ for example—what does that word really mean? It means you failed to be honest, that’s all. Evil doesn’t really exist—it’s just a lack of something good. Dishonesty is a lack of honesty; impatience is a lack of patience. So what are you really doing when you’re being dishonest? Nothing—you just could have been more honest, that’s all. Since evil doesn’t exist, you’ve never really done anything bad—you just could have been more good.”
“I like that,” Biederman said. “It’s positive. It’s upbeat.”
“I told you, this is child’s play.”
“We’re not done yet, smart guy. What else have you got?”
“How about this: Look at the next guy in line.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nobody’s happy the way they are; everybody wants to be like somebody else, but they end up picking unattainable role models. A two-hundred-pound woman thinks, ‘I want to look like Liv Hayden!’ Fat chance of that. What’s she looking at Liv Hayden for? A two-hundred-pound woman should be looking at a hundred-and-ninety-pound woman and thinking, ‘I want to be like her.’ See the idea? Imagine everybody in the world in one long line, and everybody’s standing next to somebody who’s just a little bit better off than they are. That way all they have to do is look at the next guy in line.”
Wes took notes as fast as he could. “This is good stuff. Keep going.”
“How about this,” Biederman volunteered. “It should have been you.”
“Go on.”
“We said the universe wants to give you every good thing, right? Only sometimes the other guy gets the good thing and you end up with squat. So what went wrong? The universe missed, that’s all—it should have been you. It’s like you take your kid to a ball game ’cause you want him to catch a foul ball, so you buy seats on the third baseline—only the batter is a leftie and he keeps pulling it down the first baseline. Hey, it’s not your fault—you were in the right spot. The universe just missed, that’s all.”
Kemp rolled his eyes while Wes scribbled away.
“Here’s another one,” Biederman continued. “Always bring your glove to the game. The ball won’t land in your lap; you’ve got to grab it away from some other guy’s kid, and you’re not gonna do that with your bare hands. Always bring your glove to the game, and the bigger the better—a first baseman’s mitt if you’ve got one.”
“I have season tickets with the Orioles,” Tino said. “One time a foul ball hit me right between the eyes. What went wrong? Why did the ball hit me instead of the guy sitting beside me? I forgot to duck, that’s all, and he remembered. There’s a principle for you: Don’t forget to duck. What happens when things go wrong in your life? The universe wasn’t trying to hit you; it was probably trying to hit the guy beside you—you just forgot to duck.”
“Can we get off of baseball?” Kemp groaned.
“What’s wrong with baseball? Baseball is a metaphor for life.”
“Oh, please.”
The four men kept brainstorming until lunchtime and then decided to take a ‘working lunch’—which meant that they worked at eating while pretending to think. The break didn’t really hurt their momentum; none of them were used to doing serious thinking on a Saturday morning anyway and by lunchtime the ideas had slowed to a trickle. Loading their bellies with deli meat and potato chips didn’t help matters, and the coffee was no longer strong enough to counteract the transfer of blood from their brains to their stomachs. Tino stared out the window, mesmerized by the cars passing by on Santa Monica Boulevard. Biederman had downed a Reuben with extra sauerkraut and within fifteen minutes he was stretched out on the sofa sound asleep—until Wes shook him awake and reminded him of the time. The abrupt rousing did nothing to improve Biederman’s disposition, but that didn’t really matter either; tempers were already short and patience had long ago worn thin.
The four men sat staring at the easel, saying nothing.
“What else?” Wes asked.
Kemp glared at him. “Is that your contribution to this process—sitting there asking ‘What else?’ while the rest of us do all the thinking?”
“At least I’m saying something. What’s the last idea you came up with?”
“Let me think. Wait, I remember now—this whole thing was my idea.”
Biederman interrupted. “You know, there’s an old saying: ‘In hell, it’s always two o’clock.’”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Tino asked.
“It means we’re tired and we won’t get anywhere ripping out each other’s throats, as enjoyable as that might sound right now. Has anybody got anything else? Any ideas at all? Bits, pieces—we’ll take anything you got.”
Nothing.
“I think the last suggestion was, ‘Cleanliness is next to godliness.’”
“That’s not what I meant,” Wes muttered. “It just came out that way.”
“Can anybody do better than the Cub Scout motto? Because if we can’t, we’re obviously done here.”
Nobody had anything.
“Then it’s up to the angel,” Biederman said, looking at Kemp. “Let’s get some notes together so Kemp can get going.”
Kemp leaned over to Tino and whispered. “I need to talk to you—in private.”
They stepped out onto the balcony and Kemp pulled the sliding glass door shut behind them. “I’ve got a problem,” he said.
“And why should this concern me?”
“Because it’s your problem too.”
“I’m listening.”
“Hayden’s neurologist is a guy named Smithson. I think he might be on to us—at least he might be soon.”
“You told me that wasn’t possible. You said there would be no evidence.”
“There shouldn’t be—I mean, there isn’t. He’s just guessing, really—but he’s getting
suspicious and he says he’s going to start asking questions.”
“About what?”
“About me. Last night Smithson told me he’s going to put in a call to Johns Hopkins on Monday. He’ll hear back from them in a couple of days—and when he does he’ll know they don’t have any record of a Kemp McAvoy there. How long will it be before Hopkins connects me with Bobby Foscoe? Then Smithson will blow the whistle for sure.”
Tino said nothing.
“Well?”
“Why are you telling me this? Why aren’t you including our other partners in this discussion?”
“C’mon, Tino, this is your line of work, not ours.”
“I’m in the loan business, Bobby.”
“And you have to protect your investments, right? Well, this one’s about to go up in smoke—unless we do something first.”
Tino studied him for a moment. “I’m faced with a difficult decision,” he said. “I have a sizable investment in you, Bobby, but at some point the risks of an investment outweigh the rewards. I have a feeling I should walk away from this.”
“If you do, you’ll never get your money back. That’s half a million you can kiss good-bye.”
“True—but dealing with a problem like yours adds considerable risk. Why should I assume that risk?”
“For money—more money.”
Tino paused. “How much more money are we talking about?”
“I don’t know. I suppose maybe I could—”
“Another half million,” Tino said. “That would make an even million you owe me—a nice round number.”
Kemp looked stunned. “I—I need to think it over.”
“No, you don’t—we don’t have time. Besides, you’re in no position to bargain.”
Kemp swallowed hard. “Okay—another half a million. When will you—you know . . .”
“Never mind. Just forget about it. You’ve got more important things to worry about—like paying me. And Bobby—that’s something you don’t want to forget.”
23
Kemp looked at the clock—it was nearly 3:30 a.m. He had dared to go an extra thirty minutes because he knew this was the angel’s final opportunity to converse with his earthly apprentice—his last chance to convey anything to Liv Hayden that he wanted her to remember later on. This was the final installment in the “message from beyond.” Tomorrow UCLA would begin to taper off the propofol and slowly bring her out of her coma and back to a fully conscious state—back to planet Earth.
He rolled the examination light into place and looked down at Hayden. It suddenly dawned on him that this would be his last face-to-face encounter with her. Granted, the conversations had been slightly one-sided—but he still felt that the two of them had somehow grown closer from the experience and he was going to miss these late night tête-à-têtes. Kemp bent a little closer and studied Hayden’s face. Man, that is one good-looking woman. Most of the bruising around her eyes was already gone and her skin had more color in it; the day nurse had even brushed the tangles from her hair.
Sure, she was good-looking—but hey, he hadn’t exactly hit every ugly branch falling out of a tree himself. That was another thing they had in common: sex appeal—the kind that sometimes attracted the wrong kind of people. But whose fault was that? You don’t blame honey because it draws ants. As Kemp looked at her, he began to realize how many other traits they shared: intelligence, talent, ambition, drive, and that mystical combination of intangible qualities that made them both stand head and shoulders above their contemporaries.
The thought made him feel a little sad. She was so close—he could reach out and touch her face if he wanted to—and yet it was as if there was a sheet of glass between them, keeping them apart. Life was so unfair. Two truly compatible souls, isolated from each other by random fate into two separate worlds. What were the chances that they would ever meet again once she left the hospital? Even if they passed on the street, he knew he would be just another pretty face to her—how could she ever recognize all their commonalities with just a passing glance? Of all the men that she could choose from, how would she know the magic she could share with Kemp McAvoy? How would she know . . .
. . . unless I tell her.
He quickly checked the notes one last time to make sure he had covered everything that Wes and Biederman and Tino had written. Kemp looked at his watch. Yes—he still had a few minutes to spare.
“I think that’s enough business for tonight,” he said to Hayden. “Let’s talk about something a little more down-to-earth now, shall we? Let’s talk about love.”
The expression on Hayden’s face never changed.
“I know you haven’t had the best of luck in that area,” Kemp said. “How many husbands has it been now? Four? Five? I wouldn’t blame you if you’re feeling a little discouraged about love right about now—maybe even hopeless. Don’t give up, Liv—I’m going to tell you a secret that will change the rest of your life.
“You’re going to wake up from your coma tomorrow. You’re going to leave this hospital and return to your normal life—but your life will never be normal again, Liv. You’ve been entrusted with a life-changing message, and with great privilege comes great responsibility. It’s your job to spread that message to the world. But I know you’re only human, Liv. You’re not just a messenger; you’re a woman, and you have needs. You need a companion—a soul mate—someone who understands a woman like you, someone who appreciates the finer things in life just like you do.
“You know what I’m telling you is true. You’ve been searching for this man all your life, but you haven’t found him yet. Who can blame you? There are almost seven billion people on your planet; what are the odds of finding the one man whose heart truly resonates with yours? Because of your human limitations you are forced to live in one time and one place, and that makes the task almost impossible—but I don’t share those limitations, Liv. I am a cosmic being; I transcend all time and space, and I can see your entire world at once. I can see every man on your planet, and I have found the man you have been searching for all your life. He is your perfect soul mate; your heart’s deepest desire; your one true love. I know who this man is—and I’m going to send him to you.
“I’m going to describe him to you so that you’ll recognize him when you see him. He is very handsome, as you would expect. You could probably recognize him by his looks alone, but just to make sure there are no mistakes I’ll give you something more—a ‘password’ you might call it, a way for you to know it’s him and no one else. When he finds you and approaches you for the first time, he will look deep into your eyes and say these words: ‘I don’t believe in accidents—do you?’ Remember those words, Liv. Burn them into your memory, because that is how you will know your one true love.”
Leah woke unexpectedly and sat up on the sofa. For a moment she didn’t remember where she was; it was her fifth night sleeping in the nurses’ break room, but the shadows still looked strange and unfamiliar. She felt a little frightened, though she didn’t want to admit it to herself, and she knew that if she lay back down she wouldn’t be able to fall back to sleep right away. She hated the idea of just lying there in the dark, staring at the shadows and listening to the unfamiliar sounds—so she threw back the flap on her sleeping bag and felt around on the floor for her slippers.
She looked at the door and saw light flooding in underneath. The light made a long, thin line, like the glowsticks she carried when she trick-or-treated on Halloween. She wondered if anyone would be in the hallway at this time of night, or if everyone would be in their rooms fast asleep; the light seemed to invite her to take a look. She remembered her mother’s strict instructions not to leave the break room again—but it was only a look, and surely her mom didn’t expect her to sit there in the dark all night long.
She walked to the door and opened it. Light flooded into the room; she squinted and covered her face with both hands. When her eyes had adjusted she looked down the hallway to the left—there was no one in s
ight, and though the doors were all open most of the rooms were dark. She looked down the hallway to the right; those rooms were all dark too—except for one room at the very end of the hall. That door was closed—and light seemed to be pouring out from under it.
Why was that door closed? What was causing the light? She had to know, though she wasn’t sure why.
She padded down the hallway toward the room; her slippers made almost no sound on the hard linoleum floor. When she reached the room she put her ear against the door—nothing. She twisted the knob and pushed the door open just enough to peek inside.
The room was filled with a light so brilliant and blinding that it washed the color out of everything in it. The walls, the draperies, even the woman lying faceup on the bed with her eyes half open—everything was a pale whitish-yellow. The light was so intense that it should have hurt her eyes and burned her face, but it didn’t. She stared directly into the light without even blinking—and she had the strangest sensation that the light was looking back.
24
Natalie sat on the park bench and watched Leah dangling from the ancient playground equipment. The jungle gym was the same kind Natalie had played on when she was a little girl—not the molded plastic monstrosities found in more affluent areas, but a simple, stark birdcage of thick plumber’s pipe painted green and showing bare metal wherever a child’s hands had eventually worn through. Natalie actually preferred the old playground because it gave her a sense of security and continuity with the past, and those were qualities in short supply these days. She wished the park was in a better neighborhood, but at least it was easy walking distance from the house, and so it was their regular recreational destination every Sunday afternoon.
Three sides of the park were surrounded by chain-link fence, and the fourth was a salmon-colored cinder-block wall covered in cryptic spray-painted messages. The territorial claims of the local gangs seemed to be everywhere in L.A.—on every boxcar and overpass and retaining wall. They had become so familiar that to children they were nothing more than decorative artwork, but to grown-ups they served as a reminder that the possibility of violence was never far away. Natalie never looked away from Leah for more than a few seconds at a time, and she kept a wary eye on every childless adult in the park. That’s why she had read the same paragraph of her People magazine four times—and that’s why she spotted Matt while he was still fifty yards away.