by Hester Young
I shrug. “No. But it doesn’t change anything, either. Donna was an addict who left my dad raising a kid alone. I don’t really feel a connection to her.”
“What she did to you was inexcusable,” Pam says. “But she was just a kid herself back then, Charlotte. It took a lot of years, but she cleaned herself up. Got sober.” She watches me inhale my slice of pizza, then thrusts another at me. “Donna had a lot of regrets. I told her ages ago she needed to make her peace with you, but . . . she was ashamed.”
“Okay.” What am I supposed to say? I don’t need any secondhand apologies on my mother’s behalf, don’t need Pam’s good intentions pressing on old bruises, yet telling her to lay off seems cold. The so-called love of her life was just murdered. I don’t like the way she’s looking at me, though. Desperate. Probing. Like she wants something.
“The memorial’s on Friday,” Pam says. “I’ve already made the arrangements, but if you want to speak or maybe suggest a reading—”
“I didn’t even know the woman.” My words come out more forceful than I intended, and something flickers in Pam’s face, a bright light of hope burning out. My guilt is immediate. “I’m sorry. It must be a terrible loss for you. But honestly, I’m just here on the off chance I can help my niece.”
“You mean Micky.”
“That’s right.”
“I’ve been wondering what would happen to her. Poor kid.” She shoves more pizza at me and then pours me a glass of water for good measure. A transparent attempt to make me stay longer, but I don’t object. “Are you taking Micky, then?”
“I’m not sure that I can. It’s complicated.”
“Yeah, I get that.” She watches me drink, and I can see her planning, considering her angle. This isn’t all about healing the past, I realize. Pam’s got an agenda.
Sure enough, she leans across the table, a ball of intensity and purpose. Her eyes are so dark they nearly blend with her pupils. “There’s something I want you to know about your mom.”
“What’s that?” I shouldn’t have come. Not alone, not without Noah as a buffer.
“The Tucson Homicide Division is handling Donna and Jasmine’s death like a drug-related crime.”
I try not to roll my eyes, but seriously? Does she think I’ll find this information surprising? “Yes, I heard that.”
“I was on the force for thirty-five years, Charlotte. I’ve worked a lot of cases. More important, I knew Donna.” She shakes her head. “It wasn’t drug related.”
“She had a history of substance-abuse issues,” I say, wondering if this fact somehow escaped Pam.
“She’d been clean for thirteen years.” Pam continues leaning forward in her chair, jaw set, and I can imagine how relentless she’d be in an interrogation. “And even if she’d relapsed, Donna’s thing was always junk, not roofies.”
“Roofies?”
“Flunitrazepam. Also known as Rohypnol.” She gives me a long look. “That’s what they found in Jasmine’s apartment.”
“Rohypnol?” I stop chewing. “You mean the date-rape drug? Why on earth would that—”
“There are people who use it for recreational purposes,” Pam explains. “Dumb people. Gets you doing stupid shit you won’t remember the next day. Believe me, Donna wouldn’t have messed with that crap.”
“Okay,” I say. “Well, they were at Jasmine’s place, weren’t they? So the drugs were Jasmine’s.”
“No. Jasmine partied, but not like that. Her boyfriend was a cop. She was a trashy little thing, don’t get me wrong, but she stayed out of trouble.”
I raise my eyebrows at this candid description of Micky’s mother. Whatever grief Pam feels for her girlfriend’s loss, she seems wholly unaffected by Jasmine’s death.
“Before I called you today, I spoke with the medical examiner’s office. I know a few people over there.” Pam peers at me. “You know what the toxicology results were?”
“I’m guessing you’ll tell me.”
“Neither Jasmine nor Donna had anything unusual in their blood at their time of death. No drugs. Not even alcohol.”
“So they were selling. It happens.” I rack my brain for a plausible excuse to leave. Somewhere I have to be, something I have to do.
“I’ve been over Donna’s financials with a fine-toothed comb,” Pam states. “She didn’t have any unexplained sources of income, anything that would indicate extra cash flow. And Jasmine was on goddamned food stamps. She didn’t even have a car. Had to take the bus everywhere.”
“Then what are you suggesting?” All this misplaced passion exhausts me. “If this wasn’t drug-related, what was it? And why was there Rohypnol on the scene?”
“I don’t know. But I want to find out.”
“I hope you find what you’re looking for, I really do. But I’ve got no horse in this race, Pam.”
“I need your help.”
I stand up. “Sorry. You can handle this on your—”
“No,” she says hotly. “I can’t. Don’t you get it? You’re a relative. I’m nothing. Legally, I’m nothing.”
She doesn’t have to say, Because I’m gay. I know what she’s getting at.
“You can apply pressure to the team working the case,” she urges. “That’s the only way things get done. If there’s no one there fighting for a victim, they’ll expend their resources elsewhere.”
I hold up a hand. “This is your battle, not mine. Anyway, you’re the one with law-enforcement connections.”
“Which is why I’m not the person to push this.” Her voice lowers as she realizes that students at a nearby table are staring at us. “Look, I know these guys on the force. They’re not bad guys, but they’re conservative. Really conservative. We never talked about my personal life, and now suddenly it’s part of the investigation, getting thrown in their faces. Please. It’d be better coming from you.”
“I’m sorry, but I have to go.” I make my way to the door, no longer bothering with good manners.
Pam grabs a couple bills from her wallet, tosses them on the table, and hurries after me. “Think about Micky,” she says, blinking away the sudden rush of sunshine. “You leave now, she’ll go through her whole life never knowing what happened to her mom.”
I fold my arms across my chest. “Never bothered me any.”
And with that, I’m gone.
• • •
BACK IN OUR HOTEL ROOM, I find Noah looking at Tucson real estate listings on his laptop. He looks up, guilty, and quickly closes out the window.
“I’m not makin’ any decisions without you,” he says. “I promise.”
I’ve already moved past my earlier hissy fit. “It’s fine. It’s good for us to have options.” I kick off my shoes and peel back the heavy duvet. I want a nap now, not a fight.
He crawls into bed next to me, kisses my ear. Smiles as I luxuriate in the cool sheets. “How’d your meetin’ with Lieutenant Soto go?”
“Interesting.” I laugh drily. “Very interesting.” I fill him in on Pam’s relationship with my mom and all her wild conspiracy theories.
Noah listens, chin in hand. “You think she’s right?” he asks.
“Right about what?”
“That Donna and Jasmine weren’t killed for drugs.”
I yawn. “What does it matter? They’re dead, aren’t they?”
“Okay,” he says. “I just . . . I mean, you don’t think it affects Micky one way or another?”
“Whether it was a drug lord or just some psycho? I don’t see the difference. Either way, Micky woke up and found what she found. And she’s gotta live with it.”
“Yeah.” He shudders. “So did this Pam lady tell you anything about Micky’s mom, or what happened to the dad?”
“She said Jasmine was trashy. I didn’t ask about Micky’s father.”
“We gotta find
that guy,” he mutters. “I want to know who this kid came from, if there’s a health history we should know about. I want to make sure he’s not going to crop up in the future and try to get access to her.” Noah rolls onto his stomach. “Next time you see Pam, you gotta ask.”
I stuff a pillow between my knees, trying to ease the weight on my hips. “There won’t be a next time. Did you hear anything I just said?” I do a quick recap. “The woman is conducting some crazy behind-the-scenes murder investigation and trying to recruit me. She’s clearly nuts.”
He chuckles. “Yeah, you involved in an unofficial murder investigation? Where would she get a fool idea like that?”
I ignore his smirk. “I don’t want to get caught up in these people and their drama, okay? Not my monkeys, not my circus. Donna DeRossi is dead, and so’s her daughter. There’s no need to resurrect them.”
“Donna’s a part of Micky’s past, whether we like it or not,” Noah says. “And from what you’re sayin’, so’s Pam. Now, I’m not suggestin’ you two run around playin’ detective.” His eyes narrow as if he perceives some actual danger of Pam and I forming a female investigative duo. “But you can’t just throw Pam to the wayside ’cause hearin’ about your mom makes you uncomfortable. If you can’t handle who Micky is and where she came from, then we’re not the right home for her.”
I press my face to the mattress and say the thing he doesn’t want to hear. “Maybe we’re not the right home for her.”
Noah’s head jerks sharply in my direction. “You really think you could live with that? Handin’ her over to someone else?”
“Someone like Vonda? Yeah. I do.”
I can’t explain it to him, how badly I want to walk away, to pack up the car and hightail it back to Texas. Even living in Sidalie seems easier than taking on that grave and dark-eyed little creature with her big questions and excess baggage. A child who knew my mother in a way that I never did and never will. A child who, however frozen her emotions may now appear, will one day need to mourn her losses. Will need to feel.
It’s the feelings that I fear.
Noah watches me, his face clouded with silent disapproval. “Just get to know the kid before you decide it’s a no-go, would you?” he asks. “Get to know her world. That means talkin’ to Vonda and Pam and anyone else we find. Even if you can’t be Micky’s mom, you can still be her auntie. She needs any family she can get.”
“Fine.” He’s giving me an out. I can meet him halfway. I let out the breath I didn’t realize I was holding and reach for my phone. Scroll through the list of recent incoming calls. Hope that I am truly the good person he believes me to be. “If you think it’s such a big deal . . . I’ll call Pam.”
• • •
WATER. CONCRETE. Tiles, blue and yellow. I know this place by now.
The water is falling again, gathering around the drain. In my belly, my chest, the agony of lead tunneling through flesh.
Blood. So much blood, flowing, swirling, pooling. And the baby isn’t moving.
Gone, I think as I sink slowly to my knees. She’s gone.
“Charlie?” Someone’s calling my name. “Charlie, honey, you okay?”
Hands grasp me by the shoulders, pulling me out of this place. I hear shrieking, so shrill and terrible I cover my ears. But they are my screams, I realize. I’m screaming, and I can’t stop.
One image replaces another in a single, rapid blink as Noah shakes me from my vision. I’m in the darkness of our hotel room, hunched over on all fours. Safe, in a pile of rumpled sheets. I close my mouth abruptly and the shrieking ceases. But Noah’s brought me back too fast. For a few seconds everything is moving, my waking world as unsteady as my dream.
He switches on the bedside light and studies me with alarm. “Babe?”
I don’t speak, just wait for the room to settle. A few slow breaths, and my queasiness subsides. The room becomes familiar again: thick bedding, orange curtains, our open suitcase spilling clothes and toiletries.
Noah leans toward me, wide-eyed, and I see a look of fear so raw, so helpless, that I wonder if he saw what I saw: the gunshot, the drain, the water turning red. But no, I realize. It’s me scaring him. Always me.
“You all right?” he asks.
I struggle to sit up. “I think so.”
“Were you asleep?”
“Sort of.”
“Your eyes were wide open,” he tells me. “You screamed and grabbed your belly. I thought—” He falters. “I thought somethin’ was wrong with the baby.”
“It was the dream,” I murmur.
He places a protective hand on my stomach, the panic on his face quickly absorbed by a look of determination. “It’s not gonna happen,” he says. “We won’t let it.”
“I can’t lose another child,” I whisper. “Keegan’s hardly been gone a year. I can’t do it again.”
“It’ll be okay.” He touches his lips to my forehead, strokes my head. “It’s only another six weeks, right? You can just—start takin’ baths instead of showers.”
I stare down at my round belly. Suddenly the air-conditioning feels so cold. “I don’t know. I don’t know if I can change the outcome.”
“Shhh.” He wraps his arms around me, pulling me as snug against his chest as one can pull a woman seven and a half months pregnant.
This is all the comfort he can offer. His touch. His crushing warmth.
I let him hold me. Feel his chest rise and fall, feel his fingers work their way through my hair. He doesn’t turn out the light, and I’m grateful. For the remainder of the night, I drift in and out against him. His body is solid, something I can count on, and his skin smells like man, not just any man, but mine.
Inside of me, our daughter stretches and kicks, rolls and dances. You’ll be here soon, I tell her. And I pray that it’s the truth.
Six
Pam’s condo lies nestled in a relatively new development in northeast Tucson. The community is sprawling and well-groomed, tidy adobe-style homes set against what a real estate agent might describe as charming mountain views. Beside me, Noah delivers running commentary about the area’s potential, still investigating the possibility of our moving.
“Kid friendly,” he says when we drive by a swimming pool full of school-age children. “I checked online, and the schools around here are pretty decent.”
He’s getting ahead of himself again, but I barely notice. As I turn down Paseo de Sed and park in front of Pam’s unit, all I can think is, My mother lived here.
Pam was gracious, eager even, when I called yesterday. Come by, she said, almost begging, and despite my instinctive desire to avoid her—her desperation, her misplaced crusade, her history with a woman I want to forget—I’m here. Noah was right. These are the pieces of Micky’s past, and if I can’t handle them, I have no business in this child’s life.
We follow the brick walkway to a small, neat home pretty much identical to all the others.
“Mediterranean fan palms,” Noah observes as he waits for Pam to answer the door. He can’t get enough of the trees out here. “Look, I think that’s a guajillo. And those are palo verdes, you see that bark?”
Pam appears wearing a white T-shirt and black sweatpants cut off at the knee, her hair looking a little wild. She holds a phone to her ear, frowning as she hashes out details of tomorrow’s memorial service. “I just spoke to the funeral home yesterday,” she says, beckoning Noah and me into her living room. “No flowers. A donation to Sonora Hope, that’s what Donna would’ve wanted.” She pauses for a moment, listening. “No, no. Hell no. Not the whole Catholic shebang. I told the funeral director, let’s keep it simple.” Pam quickly wraps up her call and then stares at us, a bit disoriented. “So many decisions,” she says. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
One look at her rumpled clothes and bloodshot eyes, and I regret my uncharitable behavior at Din
o’s. I resolve to be more compassionate today, however uncomfortable I find myself.
“You must be Lieutenant Soto,” Noah says, realizing no one’s going to introduce him. “I’m Noah Palmer. So sorry for your loss, ma’am.”
“Call me Pam.” She looks a bit dazed, and I wonder if she regrets inviting us over. “Let me—show you the house, I guess.”
She leads us through a modest two-bedroom that is clean and comfortable, decorated in warm, eye-catching colors: peach, lime, sunflower. Houseplants hang from the ceiling, occupy end tables, and dominate corners with lush green leaves. I spot brightly painted handicrafts throughout—plates, bowls, ceramic coasters, ornaments, what looks like an altar to the Virgin Mary—all distinctly Mexican in style. Pam must be Mexican American. I wonder how long her family has been in the United States.
“This place is really lovely,” I say. “It feels—cheerful.”
“Your mom did it,” Pam tells me, her lip looking a little wobbly. “She loved decorating.” All of her fire and self-possession at lunch yesterday have been replaced with a despondent vagueness, as if the reality of Donna’s death has finally hit her. I remember how it was after Keegan died, all the people dropping in, my grandmother and Rae walking me through the practical details of life when I was too paralyzed to attend to them myself. I wonder about Pam’s empty home. Where are her friends? Her family?
Maybe it’s a good thing we came by.
“I’m glad you called,” Pam says. “I came on too strong yesterday, I’m sorry.”
I shake my head. “I think I was . . . taking frustrations out on you that I meant for Donna.”
“Is that her?” Noah has wandered into the hallway and stands studying a framed eight-by-ten. “Is that Donna?”
Pam glances in his direction. “Yeah, that’s her.”
Noah motions for me to join him, which I reluctantly do. I’ve seen hundreds of old photos of my mother, but nothing current. Nothing taken after she left me, in fact. In my mind, Donna has remained a self-absorbed, frizzy-haired girl in bell-bottoms, just twenty years old. To see her on this wall, suddenly in her late fifties, is oddly shocking.