“The Queen had a minstrel show back when your daddy was alive. I really looked forward to that.”
“Why on earth?”
“It was the only time I could count on seeing another black person in Winston.” Coretha turned. “I’ve had enough for the week. I’m leaving.”
“I’m going to be here a while. Lock me in.”
A stage-whisper sigh followed from Coretha.
Allison paid no attention. She had already re-immersed herself in Dunn’s trucking logs. The records didn’t show where he’d delivered the loads but they did show where he had picked them up and how many miles he had driven. During rehearsal she realized she could use fifth grade math to determine where the loads had gone.
She checked a bill of lading from the hospital and found the matching date in Dunn’s log book. Dunn had made the hospital pickup and then logged one hundred sixty-six miles to the delivery. The other hospital pickup logs showed the identical distance.
She studied the pickup logs from the auto salvage yard and from Mountaineer Mining Supply and found that the delivery distances for those loads also were identical for each trip—ninety-two miles and thirty-five miles respectively.
She switched on her computer and pulled up MapQuest. She found Columbus and zoomed in to street level. She adjusted the map so the hospital’s main building was dead in the middle. She zoomed out, creating a map with 200-mile radius, the hospital at the center. She clicked her mouse and her printer hummed into action.
She retrieved the green plastic compass she’d purchased on her way home from rehearsal. After spreading the compass to a tad over one hundred sixty miles on the map’s distance scale, she drew a circle with the hospital at the center.
She repeated the process for AA Auto Salvage and Mountaineer Mining Supply, using the mileage Dunn had driven from each location as the radius of each of the circles.
The circles came close to intersecting near the Ohio-West Virginia border. Allison studied the routes between Dunn’s pickup locations and the area where the circles almost overlapped. Adjusting her calculations for bends in the highways, she drew a circle on the map where the routes and distances came closest together—an area the size of a dime, in the hills just outside of Winston.
She noted the coordinates. The drop-off point for Dunn’s loads had to be within a few miles, assuming he’d kept accurate logs. She grabbed her IPhone, plotted a route to the coordinates and was surprised to see that she could travel most of the way on paved roads. In a few minutes, she was on the way in her Jeep.
Allison had often heard people describe the Recovery Metals facility in ways they could relate to. Instead of saying a building was five hundred thousand square feet, it was, “bigger than ten football fields.”
But as she stood beside her car and looked over the massive aluminum-sided structure at the heart of the operation, Allison realized even those everyday comparisons failed to convey the plant’s scale.
Except for a brick-faced area in the front that contained the executive offices, there were no windows in the eight-story building. Ten-foot diameter pipes topped by valves so huge they required two men to open ran in pairs along two sides of the structure, supplying fuel to the giant furnaces central to the facility’s mission.
A three hundred-foot smokestack towered over the scene. Visible from every point in town even at night with its two hypnotically blinking red lights, the smokestack was an icon for people in Winston. Particularly during Old Fashioned River Days, it appeared on tee shirts, lapel buttons and porch flags of many families who worked there.
Allison punched the Columbus hospital’s address into her phone and asked for the shortest route. One hundred sixty-miles, the device instantly told her. She did the same for AA Auto Supply and Mountaineer Mining. Ninety miles and thirty-five miles. She smiled. She’d hit the final calculation on the nose. No question about it, the plant was Dunn’s drop-off place.
She parked and walked to the entrance. A burly guard in a police-like uniform met her at the door.
“Do you have a pass?” he asked.
“I’m just here to ask personnel about a truck driver who delivered here.” Allison smiled. “I’m a physician.”
“I don’t care if you’re the Pope. You need a pass.”
Allison reddened. “How do I get one?”
The guard handed her the director of personnel’s business card. Submit a request in writing, he told her. “They’ll get back to you.”
Sure, she thought.
She went to the Recovery Metals website when she got back home. It made no mention of the plant handling radioactive material. The federal government’s Nuclear Regulatory Commission site confirmed what the radiation safety officer in Columbus had told her. There was no facility that handled high-level nuclear waste from most of the United States. The county landfill in Barnwell, South Carolina once processed low-level material but was closed except to three states. She was at another dead end.
She emailed the plant’s personnel director asking for an appointment to talk about Darryl Dunn. Perhaps there was something in his record that would shed some light on his activities and she reasoned that since Dunn was dead, she wouldn’t get an argument about violating his privacy.
Before bed, she curled up with Hippocrates and a glass of wine and examined her motives and feelings. She hadn’t planned to kiss Josh at the rehearsal, although, looking back, maybe it had been bound to happen. She couldn’t help noticing the way he looked at her sometimes. It pleased her to be desired, pleased her especially that she was desired by him.
The truth, she had to admit, was that the kiss happened because her feelings for Josh were growing. More than she’d realized. More than she wanted. And that made her care even more.
But he was so vulnerable. Was that the basis for his feelings—for her feelings—or was it something else?
And even if her feelings were real, what then? Did she even want a meaningful relationship? Relationships meant compromises and she liked being able to make all the decisions.
Beyond that, was she capable of a successful, meaningful relationship? So far, there was no evidence of that. She didn’t want to lead him on and end up compounding his hurt.
And what about Sharon?
She was dying to talk to him but that would have to wait until morning.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Friday night Josh dreamed he and Allison were having dinner at a restaurant while being waited on by his late wife Sharon. Patrons at other tables struggled to manage silverware with stubs for hands. A parade of one-legged people hobbled by outside, some lurching on crude prostheses, some on crutches, some hopping on single legs.
He awoke in a sweat and completely confused. He was elated, almost giddy, over the kiss from Allison. He’d found it exciting to be kissed by a woman again and Allison was very appealing. More than that, she was smart. He could tell she cared for Katie. And she viewed the world the same way he did.
But he hadn’t been prepared for the fact that his attraction was becoming more than physical. He was feeling guilty because of his devotion to Sharon. He wondered if it was even fair for him to be in any serious relationship when he knew in his heart it could never be the same. He’d started the flirting but now he felt like a dog chasing a car. Chasing Allison was irresistible but what would he ever do if he caught her?
Beyond that, he was disappointed in himself. Even though he felt he had journalistic justification not to print anything in the festival section about radioactive jewelry, he knew that in Atlanta, he would have written a story and the desk would have gone with it and the chips would have fallen where they might. Fallout wouldn’t have been an issue.
But things were different in Winston. Winston was his town and his actions could put his advertisers—his guileless friends and neighbors—in economic jeopardy. He envisioned pageants playing to empty
seats; brave locals knotted on a nearly deserted Main Street instead of meandering throngs of free-spending tourists. He thought of Woody Conroy, one of his biggest customers, whose store was already struggling against the big box stores and of the Hansons who kept Clayton’s Barbeque solvent only by putting every family member to work and by operating a mobile barbecue wagon which showed up at the plant at meal times. All because of an alarm based on pretty scant evidence. People would be angry. And rightfully so.
And angry with him and, by extension, the Winston News. And that would be the case even if his and Allison’s concerns were justified. What if there was no real threat? What if they were wrong? It happened. How would he explain the imperfections of reporting to a bankrupt Clayton Hanson?
Sale? He’d be lucky if he could give the paper away.
Still, his decision not to publish wasn’t sitting well. Winston was Katie’s home, Allison’s home. Thousands of people were about to arrive. Already, he’d felt like he’d failed them. He ached to call Allison but couldn’t decide what to say and abandoned the idea for fear of making a fool of himself.
He got out of bed and went to his computer. Maybe he couldn’t do a newspaper story but that wasn’t the only way to warn Winston. There was something he could do.
It didn’t take him long to come up with a one-pager he was happy with. “Jewelry Alert!” the 72-point headline on the flyer screamed. The 18-point body copy urged residents and vendors to purchase jewelry only from trusted sources and to seek medical help if jewelry they had purchased was causing a reaction.
It was 3 a.m. when he arrived at the Winston News, the lobby illuminated only by the glow of the soft drink machine. The new transom window was sparkly clean. He ran off two hundred copies of the flyer on the high-speed machine in the mail room, swiped strapping tape and a staple gun from circulation and left as quickly as he had come.
He finished just before dawn and drove to the high bluff. A mile upstream, the Ohio River floated gently through a wide curve, split obligingly for a narrow, wooded island and reunited in a great, wide flood. He had picked this spot for Sharon’s grave as much for himself as for her. He found it impossible to be here without being reminded of the cycle of life, the feeling of being part of something larger, a connection to immortality, whether it was the stunning sunsets over the river bend in winter, the unmistakable feeling that generations of humans from the dawn of time had watched this same sun set from this same place and maybe also buried their loved ones there.
That feeling of connectedness, of continuity made it easier for Josh to preserve his relationship with Sharon. In the same way that a tree falling in the forest makes a sound because someone is there to hear it and that a painting becomes art only when someone views it, he believed that relationships existed because of what people held in their heads. What is perceived is what exists. Death would not end their relationship—as long as he didn’t let it.
So every week he left flowers here and talked with Sharon. He always knew what she would say. He could hear her words, see her lips pursed in disapproval, feel her smile. She was still here for him and so he had come again. He had no flowers this morning, only a question. Head bent, Josh looked at the simple headstone and asked it: Sharon, what do I do?
And then it came to him. She had already given him the answer years ago, in their talk at the bench by the river.
Josh said he would always be true but Sharon stopped him, stretching a bony finger on a withered arm to hush his lips.
“Don’t bury your heart with my body,” she said. “Don’t forsake the living for the dead and stay married to a ghost.”
He lifted her hand and kissed it. Her veins traced blue highways on her parchment skin. “You are all I ever wanted and all I will ever need.”
Sharon stiffened. “We have a daughter. I need you—she needs you—to face life as a strong man open to new opportunity. You can’t wall yourself off from the world. It’s unfair to you and it’s unfair to Katie.” She withdrew her hand. Josh was surprised at her anger. “You’re a great dad. Katie worships you. But you can’t be a mother and father both.”
“Katie has a mother.”
“For now.”
“No, goddammit!” Josh howled.
Sharon slid her hand down to his and locked fingers. “You’ll have to let me go. Life’s for the living . . . and love. But you have to be there.”
Josh’s mind switched to an image from Sharon’s funeral—Katie in the front pew, a phalanx of her schoolmates and teammates filling row after row behind her, a children’s army of support. Kids and funerals, Josh mused. Maybe God’s way of telling us that life goes on.
He looked at Sharon’s gravestone. “I don’t want to lose you,” he whispered. He selected a perfectly preserved zinnia from one of his old bouquets and folded it into his shirt pocket, next to his heart.
The leaves of the nearby elms rustled. Josh felt a gentle breeze sweep across the bluff—Sharon reassuring him that she had heard him. She understood and was here—would always be here—for him, no matter what.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
JEWELRY ALERT! The words practically sprang off the flyer.
Allison slammed the Wagoneer into park and dashed across the intersection.
She couldn’t believe her eyes. Posters had blossomed all over town—on trees, utility polls, even in the window of the Java Joynt. Josh must have been up all night running them off and plastering them everywhere before dawn Saturday morning.
She was thrilled. The poster was perfect. Its warning to avoid buying jewelry from unknown sources and to seek treatment for unexplained skin rashes, infections or intestinal upsets was exactly right.
But the posters were more than a warning about jewelry, Allison knew. They were an apology to her, an incredible commitment, worth so much more than words.
Chapter Forty
Furbee delivered bad news when Josh arrived at the office Saturday morning, deadline day for the River Days section: the Friends of Chief Cornstalk ad still hadn’t shown up.
“Maybe we can buy more time,” Josh said. “I could have some pizza brought in.”
“You’re missing the point.” Furbee pointed to the parking lot where a half dozen cars and her own low-riding Lincoln waited. “That ad’s the only thing standing between the production crew and the rest of their weekend. We have to finish pre-press today if we want to get this delivered before the festival kick-off Wednesday. Make the deadline or forget about sending any of the advertisers a bill.
“There’s a solution for the Cornstalk ad,” Furbee pressed. “I’ve talked to some of the staff. We’d like to put a full-page ad in the section—something where people could contribute money to help pay for saving Katie’s leg. I’d like to help myself.”
Until then, Josh thought he had done a good job putting up a brave front—largely for Katie. He had learned when she was a toddler, as every parent learns, that if he laughed when she fell off the swing, she would laugh and that if he showed he was afraid, she would cry. So he had tried to be brave.
But with Katie absent, he found bravery difficult. Her being away now was too much like her being gone permanently. It was a constant reminder of a joyless future, a preview of a nightmare. It took a moment before he could speak. “I can’t tell you how much that means, but we can’t use the newspaper for my personal crusade.”
“It’s not for you, it’s for Katie. We’d be paying for it.”
He was tempted. But if he were perceived by his readers as using the pages of the Winston News for personal gain, the newspaper’s credibility would be compromised. It would be his newspaper promoting his family cause, not that it hadn’t been done regularly by the most famous of publishers from William Randolph Hearst to Rupert Murdoch. No, the only way he could use the newspaper to raise the money for Katie’s operation was to sell it, provided that was still an option. He felt terrible k
eeping the secret from Furbee. Her life was the Winston News.
“Sorry,” Josh said. “Use a regular house ad to sub for Cornstalk.”
“Please,” Furbee pleaded. “I want to do something. You’re the best boss a person could ever have. And you’ve kept me on when some people would have turned me out to pasture. We all know how much you love Katie. We want to do something to help her, to help you.”
Josh felt her need. You had to feel like you were doing something. His phone interrupted. It was Allison.
“Thanks for doing the flyers.”
“It was the right thing to do.”
“Yeah, it was. Josh, another thing. I apologize for being a little forward yesterday.”
Josh’s heart sank. Was she sorry she’d done it? “It’s . . . fine.”
“Good. Clinic closes at noon. How about we grab lunch at the diner and I’ll fill you in on my research?”
“Best offer I’ve had all day.”
Josh could see the posters piled outside the newspaper’s front door when he got to the empty lobby. There were dozens, maybe hundreds, tattered, torn at the staple holes, trailing remnants of strapping tape and pieces of twine. A gust of wind plastered a half-dozen against the glass door. It took ten minutes to scoop up all of them. Allison was already seated when he walked in and dropped the posters on the table in the diner.
“These were stacked outside the newspaper’s front door.”
She groaned. “They’ll all be gone before the festival even gets underway. No one will get the warning.”
“No worries. I printed up three hundred extra on neon green paper just in case. We’ll put them up the day the festival starts.”
Owner Pete Kokenes arrived to take their order. Allison folded her menu. “That’s crazy. I thought the posters would be appreciated.”
“Well, I can tell you they’re not appreciated here,” Kokenes volunteered. “One showed up in my window. I’d have torn it down myself if someone hadn’t gotten to it first. We don’t need that kind of crap, not this time of year.”
Fallout Page 19