The Homecoming

by Alan Russell

It was too late, though. Michael’s berserker had come out. That’s what Luke called it when his friend acted without regard for his own well-being. Stella’s disappearance had resulted in Mr. and Mrs. Pierce trying to keep him on a short leash. The berserker came out when Michael’s wild child rebelled against being bottled up for too long.

  Michael began taking fast breaths, getting psyched for the big leap.

  If Luke could wrestle him down, he might get him to listen to reason. But Michael was a big, strong kid. Luke would need to blindside him. He crouched down, readying to hit him low, but an instant before he could make his move, Michael started his sprint across the rock. Luke tried to stop him anyway. He went horizontal, reaching for Michael’s ankle, but he missed.

  “No!” he yelled, but Michael didn’t slow. Luke watched his best friend disappear over the edge of Dead Man’s Cliff.

  Luke got to his feet and ran until there was no more real estate. The Y-Girls were whooping it up sixty feet below. He scanned the blue water, waiting to see Michael’s head emerge, but it didn’t show itself.

  “Where’s Michael?” he screamed, his voice penetrating through the Y-Girls’ cheering.

  They stopped shouting and turned their attention to the ocean.

  “We saw him jump in,” Tiffany yelled.

  Luke kept looking for his friend. Shit, he thought. What if Michael had passed out? What if the water was too shallow and he was now paralyzed?

  He scanned the ocean one last time. Michael wasn’t to be seen. The Y-Girls were acting all concerned now, screaming, “Michael! Michael!”

  Without thinking about what he was doing, Luke backed up. It was important to get a good takeoff, he knew, because the last step was going to be a doozy. To clear the rocks below, he’d need to jump up and out.

  He ran forward. He was wearing sneakers, jeans, a polo shirt, and a hoodie—not exactly dressed for the water. As he pushed off, he took notice of how blue the sky was. The big storm that had hit the day before seemed to have blown away all the clouds and fog, and left a sparkling horizon.

  Too late, he thought about how he should be positioning himself and controlling his body. He tried to tuck his head close to his legs before he struck the water. It mostly worked; an onlooker would have thought he’d planned on doing a cannonball. His hard entry into the water drove him to the ocean’s floor. He felt as if he’d been slapped by a giant, wet hand. The body blow left him reeling, but the cold water was antidote enough to clear his head and get him moving. He kicked off from the ocean floor and propelled upward. When he broke the water’s surface, he started treading water and looking around.

  Because there wasn’t much of an ocean surge, visibility was good, but Michael wasn’t to be seen. Treading water quickly became a struggle; Luke’s jeans and clothing were weighing him down. He kicked off his sneakers, slipped out of his hoodie, loosened his belt, and pulled off his pants. He knew that surviving the jump was only the beginning. Most drowning deaths attributed to the Clam were a result of exhaustion. When the surge was strong, swimmers were thrown against the rocks. If you didn’t have enough strength to escape the water’s grip, you could die.

  “Michael!” yelled Luke.

  He turned in a circle while treading water, searching for any sign of movement or color. He saw a flash of bright orange in the kelp, but it was only a Garibaldi fish. There was no sign of his friend—nothing. But Michael had to be there somewhere. Luke tried to fight off his panic. The water temperature couldn’t be much more than sixty degrees; neither of them was wearing a wet suit. He could already feel the ocean’s cold grip squeezing his chest.

  “Michael!” he called again.

  From behind him he heard a gasp, and then the sound of a deep intake of air. Luke turned around. His feeling of overwhelming relief changed when he saw that Michael was laughing and looking all too pleased with himself.

  “You fucking asshole!” Luke shouted. “We both could have died.”

  “I love you, too, brother. You shouldn’t have come after me, but thanks for having my back.”

  Michael swam over and draped an arm across Luke’s shoulder and neck. Despite wanting to remain angry, Luke found himself returning the hug. On the rocks above them, they could hear the Y-Girls cheering.

  “What the hell were you doing underwater?” he asked.

  “I was thinking,” said Michael. “It was so peaceful and so beautiful, I almost didn’t come up. Almost like being up in the air looking at a clear horizon. But then I heard you calling.”

  “How could you have heard me underwater?”

  “I don’t know, but I did. Either that, or it was a mermaid.”

  “You’re fucking crazy.”

  “I’m not the one who jumped in the ocean with my clothes on.”

  “Speaking of which, you’re going to owe me for lost clothing and shoes. Now let’s get the hell out of here before we both start cramping up.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Eleanor sat next to the admiral and his wife, pretending to be absorbed by what the speaker was saying. She owed at least that much to her husband. Other congressmen’s spouses worked in tandem with their partners. They gave speeches, performed all sorts of civic duties, and put out their last name to the constituency. Eleanor was the opposite of a politician’s spouse; she was a recluse who rarely left her Del Mar home. This was Duncan’s second term in the House of Representatives, and she not only hadn’t moved to a Maryland suburb like so many spouses did; she rarely visited the Capitol itself. Eleanor claimed she didn’t want to disrupt their son’s life, but that was a convenient fiction. In the seven years since Stella had disappeared, she had remained afraid.

  Even having to go somewhere innocuous like the grocery store provoked an anxiety attack. When she left the house, she felt like someone with a terrible physical deformity. People often stared at her. Some didn’t want to get near her, as if her daughter’s disappearance was contagious, while others were overly bold and went so far as to approach her with questions.

  Duncan had somehow managed to make lemonade from hemlock, while Eleanor was still drinking the poison’s dregs. Michael had been the only thing keeping her going. He was her reason for getting up every morning. But now Michael was ready to fly the nest—literally. In June he would be joining the other plebes at the Air Force Academy.

  For years Duncan had been patient with her, but with Michael’s planned departure, her husband had finally had enough. He told her they needed to put their house on the market, and she needed to join him in the DC area. For the sake of maintaining residency in their district, they would buy a condo in the area, but it didn’t make sense to have homes on opposite sides of the country.

  Her husband was a good man. In his own way, Eleanor knew he grieved as much as she did. But he had found ways to sublimate his pain.

  Sublimate. Even thinking words like that bespoke too many years in therapy. And what good had it done her?

  She looked at Duncan up on the podium and admired the way he had aged. There was now gray in his hair, but it made him look distinguished, giving him the appearance of someone seasoned, someone to trust. His constituency apparently agreed. In the last election, he had received almost 80 percent of the vote. The next time around, the other party was talking about not even fielding a candidate against him. His district was a lock. But it was possible he would be seeking out greener pastures. There were those trying to draft him to run for governor, and still others who wanted him to be California’s next junior senator.

  The crowd laughed at something Duncan said. A little late, Eleanor joined in the laughter, not wanting to be caught without a smile. It hadn’t taken much effort on Duncan’s part to tap into the good spirits of this crowd. Their loved ones were coming home.

  For six months the aircraft carrier Lewis and Clark and its crew of almost five thousand had been on deployment. North Island’s Naval Air Station in Coronado was now welcoming its own home. The US Navy Band had been playing Sousa and othe
r upbeat tempos all morning. Balloons and colorful banners were everywhere. In one special pavilion, there were several dozen mothers holding newborns that their husbands had never seen. “Daddy’s coming,” they told their babies. “Daddy’s going to be here soon.”

  Many of those waiting hadn’t come empty-handed. There was an abundance of balloons, flowers, candy, and champagne. Colorful homemade signs screamed I LOVE YOU in all sorts of ways. The Navy League was making sure no one was going hungry—handing out doughnuts, pancakes, soft drinks, juice, and coffee.

  Duncan waited for the laughter to stop. “I’ll keep my comments brief today,” he said, “not because I want to, but because I’m told the Lewis and Clark will be docking within the hour.”

  He let the cheers of the crowd subside before continuing.

  “I’m not sure whether you are applauding the announced brevity of my remarks,” he said, “or the imminent return of our heroes.”

  The crowd cheered again. They had set up the grandstand in the open area off the Pier and Quay Street. Across the Bay was the downtown San Diego skyline. In the distance, eyes were tracking the approaching aircraft carrier as it was brought in by tugs. It was hard to miss the vessel. The ship was longer than three football fields and dwarfed everything around it.

  Duncan’s face turned somber, and his body language grew serious, thoughtful. The crowd quieted, waiting on his words.

  “I have a duty as a member of Congress to think about the path of our country. Trying to steer this huge ship called America is not an easy task. Everyone seems to have a different idea about the course we should be plotting, and there’s never a shortage of those trying to make themselves heard. But I have found a way to mute the noise and quell the distractions. When I want to look forward, what I do is look back. On a day like today, I am especially mindful of the sacrifices of our forefathers, because the more things change, the more they remain the same.”

  He pointed in the direction of the aircraft carrier. “Those in that ship know all about the need for sacrifice, just as you who are waiting for your loved ones have had to sacrifice as well.”

  Amazing how he never looks at his notes, thought Eleanor. Over the years she had been pressed into speaking on several occasions, but what she really did was read from index cards. Duncan was so confident, so assured, in front of a crowd. It was hard to believe he was the same man who one of the partners in his firm had once labeled “hopeless” as a trial lawyer. Stella’s loss had brought out a gift in him. His tireless work as a public servant was driven in large part by what had happened to his daughter.

  “Our country,” said Duncan, “was built on the foundation of those willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of freedom.

  “There were fifty-six signers of the Declaration of Independence. Those individuals knew that by signing, it could be tantamount to a death warrant. Their lives certainly would have been simpler, and easier, without making public such a declaration. What they did was like waving a red flag at the enemy. These were men who, for the most part, were well-off. But they were willing to lose all. They declared that a hangman’s noose was preferable to silken bonds. Above all things, they showed the world how much Americans value liberty.”

  He didn’t pontificate. He spoke in an intimate manner, almost as if he were talking to friends.

  “Then, as now, freedom exacts a price. Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter once wrote, ‘We have enjoyed so much freedom for so long that we are perhaps in danger of forgetting how much blood it cost to establish the Bill of Rights.’ The service of your loved ones shows that we have not forgotten the price paid by our forefathers, and the price that each generation must pay anew. For half a year, your loved ones have been away protecting our country. How many times did you wish someone else could have taken up that burden?

  “In his second inaugural address, Dwight D. Eisenhower said, ‘History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid.’ Because you, and those you love, have been willing to pay the heavy price that freedom exacts, our country has endured. My heartfelt gratitude goes out to those serving on the Lewis and Clark, and also to every one of you. May God bless you, your loved ones, and the United States of America.”

  His timing, as usual, was impeccable. It was almost as if the aircraft carrier was waiting for him to finish his speech. In the distance, the ship started blasting its horns, and the audience wildly responded to both the congressman and their loved ones who were finally coming home.

  Eleanor came to a stop at the entrance to their driveway. A FOR SALE sign was hanging from the security fencing. At the bottom of the sign were the words BY APPOINTMENT ONLY. She wondered if that would dissuade the curious.

  She punched in the security code, and the driveway gate slowly opened. The new owners would probably do away with all the bars, locks, and safety features, what the Realtor had referred to as “the penitentiary look.” But their Realtor had never lost a daughter to an intruder.

  From the car, Eleanor unlocked the mailbox and gathered the letters. Duncan’s speech hadn’t been the only thing to bring him back to California. Guy Wilkerson’s parole hearing was scheduled for that afternoon.

  Damn him to hell forever.

  Five years ago, against her husband’s wishes, Eleanor had visited Wilkerson at the California Men’s Colony, a medium-security prison in San Luis Obispo. Just the act of remembering that meeting made Eleanor shudder. Even thinking about Wilkerson meant embracing the toxic.

  Behind the glass partition, he smugly faced her, the little smile never leaving his face.

  “I am here because of my daughter,” she told him.

  “No,” he said, “I am here because of your daughter.”

  “What happened to her?” asked Eleanor.

  “I have chewed on that question for quite some time,” he said, his smirk growing. “It is a favorite bone of mine to pick.”

  “I need closure,” she pleaded.

  “We all need something. Getting it is another matter.”

  “If you know something—”

  “Oh, I know lots of things. Let me tell you a few of the things I know.”

  She tried to not listen, but he furiously whispered his polluted thoughts, his words surging up from the sewer he called a mind. Eleanor pulled the phone away from her ear; it stung as if she had been the target of a swarm of hornets.

  “What happened to my little girl?” she screamed.

  Everyone within earshot stopped talking. Her scream brought one of the guards over to her.

  “All you all right, ma’am?”

  She took a deep breath. This was her chance to learn things, maybe her only chance. She nodded, offering a weak smile, and then put the phone back up to her ear.

  “Do you know where she is?” asked Eleanor.

  “I have thought about what might have happened to her.” Wilkerson was so careful to use that word might. It spared him from implicating himself.

  And then he started offering his suppositions to Eleanor. She tried interrupting him, tried asking him questions, but he kept talking until she dropped the phone and fled from his twisted imaginings.

  Eleanor prayed they were just imaginings.

  That was why Duncan was at the Parole Board hearing today. Because there had been little in the way of physical evidence to connect Wilkerson to the abduction of their daughter, he had only been convicted of fondling two minors and possession of child pornography, along with violating the terms of his parole. Duncan’s presence might tip the scales toward keeping Wilkerson locked up.

  Eleanor was supposed to accompany Duncan to the hearing, but she had bowed out, telling him her agoraphobia had been acting up. He’d believed her, of course. It was a condition she had suffered from ever since Stella had disappeared. What she hadn’t told him was that there was an even more pressing reason for her absence. Duncan had put Stella’s disappearance behind him. Eleanor was now about to do the same thing in the only way she knew how.
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  The congressman’s driver pulled the car up to the reserved parking space. Duncan checked his watch. Only two. Good. There was an hour before the hearing. He’d taken a commuter flight from Lindbergh Field to LAX that had gotten him in early, but he would put the time remaining to good use. His chief of staff had arranged for the media to be waiting.

  This was Duncan’s second appearance at a parole-consideration hearing. He expected much the same show he had witnessed two years before—Wilkerson’s attorney trying to portray him as a model prisoner; the assistant DA insisting that his release would pose a threat to society.

  The bad news, Duncan thought, was that because of overcrowded prisons, it was increasingly easier to get parole in the Golden State. California’s nine-member parole board heard more than two thousand cases a year, and were under pressure to release nonviolent offenders. It was up to Duncan to show that Wilkerson wasn’t nonviolent, and continued to be a threat.

  Duncan was a law-and-order candidate, a badge he wore proudly. It was just a shame they hadn’t been able to sentence Wilkerson to more jail time from the onset. He’d received thirteen years, but that included the possibility of parole after four years served.

  If Duncan had his way, Wilkerson would serve every minute of his thirteen years. Duncan was still holding out hope that before Wilkerson’s release date, they would somehow be able to link him to Stella’s death. There was no statute of limitations for murder. Down the road he hoped Wilkerson would get the penalty he deserved—death. In the meantime, though, it was Duncan’s job to make sure he continued to rot in prison.

  The first reporter caught sight of him. “Congressman!”

  I’ll never forget you, Stella, he thought.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  It hadn’t been that long ago that Eleanor had walked fearlessly into unruly classrooms, like a ringmaster in control. Even before that, after graduating from college, she and two friends had ridden their bicycles across the country from coast to coast. Mountains hadn’t stopped her, and thunderstorms hadn’t slowed her. That was the person she once was.