Charlie was sure police had found something to identify him—either a vehicle ID number or his name on at least one of the unburned papers that littered the lot after the bombing. If not, something else was at work, something strange—although weirdness had become normal, from his point of view. Perhaps the No Cops rule was not only divinely inspired, but also had a corollary, since the police didn’t have him, either.
Then came another leak that wasn’t so comforting. According to an article Charlie read while sitting by the front window in La Patisserie one Tuesday morning, someone had left the scene of the bombing on a yellow mountain bike and changed out of bloody clothes under a bridge a mile from the crime scene. While reading this, Charlie experienced a cold, hard feeling surging from his groin to his throat. When he finished the article, he rose slowly from his chair and backed out the rear door into the building’s garage, whistling drily as he went.
* * *
This seemed like an ugly thing to do, but Charlie did it: He bought a can of black enamel, took his bike out on the balcony/fire escape, and spray painted it against a plastic dropcloth. Even before it dried, he knew he’d have to do more. People in the neighborhood had seen him riding a yellow bike, and a scratch would reveal its true color. Also, police would have tread prints. He needed to get rid of it.
Thursday afternoon was bright and chilly. Charlie rode his bike to Garnett Station and wheeled it onto a northbound train. He got off at Tenth Street and left the bike outside, unlocked, after wiping off his prints. Then he slipped on his backpack and jogged over to a bike shop on Monroe Drive. He bought a new blue hybrid with slightly knobby tires and twenty-four speeds. It was so not yellow.
Charlie surprised himself by pedaling toward his old haunts in Virginia Highlands rather than back downtown. Despite an urge to see Jean, he pedaled onward, waving as he passed Bay Street Coffeehouse just in case his favorite barista was looking out the window. He pumped up Bayard Terrace and stopped at Kathleen’s house. He carried the bike up the porch steps and leaned it gingerly against the wobbly railing. (He’d always meant to fix that.) Floorboards creaked as he stepped to the door and knocked. A pudgy, middle-aged white woman peered out suspiciously from the window. “I’m Charlie Sherman,” he announced.
She shook her head.
“Yes, I am!” he insisted. “A friend of Kathleen’s. I used to live here. I edited a book for her. Is she home?” He tried to speak with gentle confidence, but he was afraid he came across as desperate, loud, and strange.
The woman disappeared, leaving him to think that Angela had placed her mother in a rest home and rented out the house. As he turned to go, the door swung open and Kathleen stood with open arms, her blue eyes sparkling. “They came this morning!” she said, advancing on him and hugging him fiercely.
“Who came?” he asked, his arms pinned to his sides.
“The books!”
“The books?” His eyes grew wide and his face lit up. “So soon?”
“Seemed like forever to me.”
The woman appeared behind her. “Now Mrs. Talton, you can’t just—”
“Shush, Betty.” Kathleen pulled Charlie in the door. “Where have you been? Betty, make some tea, please. This is my writer! The one I told you about! My, what a wonderful day!”
Instead of making tea, Betty made a phone call. Meanwhile, Kathleen bent over a box on the living room floor and pulled out a hardcover of Flight from Forsyth: Ethnic Cleansing in America. Beaming, she handed it to Charlie, her eyes filling with tears of joy. He admired the glossy black-and-white jacket’s stark line art: silhouetted nightriders outside a cabin. The title’s bold letters had ghostly trails of ink, suggesting motion. Charlie’s name was on the cover, below Talton’s, as coauthor. A beautiful book, albeit one covering an ugly subject. Charlie read the dedication aloud: “To Kathleen, who made everything possible.”
He flipped through the book and glanced at the index, checking an entry on Governor Brown to see that it matched the page. It did. He sighed in relief. He had worried about the index, since he couldn’t remember anything about the damned thing except that he’d compiled it in anger.
“We did a great thing, didn’t we?” Kathleen said.
“We did indeed.” He flipped the book over and glanced inside the back flap at his picture below Thurwood’s. Ouch. He wished he had that one back. He rather liked being incognito these days. Would his newfound fame be his downfall? He suspected that he’d be navigating some treacherous waters soon.
In the kitchen, Betty talked to Angela on the phone. Meanwhile, Kathleen stared lovingly at Thurwood’s photo. “Did they say anything about how handsome he was?”
Charlie was touched by her love for the man. “I’m sure they were jealous.”
“I’ll bet they were,” she said, nodding emphatically.
Charlie gazed at the white back cover, which contained several blurbs in red ink from eminent historians, who praised the work effusively. Charlie felt a pang of conscience for compromising their academic integrity with his divinely inspired literary derring-do. But everything happened according to a plan. (That was his story, and he was sticking to it.)
Kathleen narrowed her eyes. “You got all the money, didn’t you?” He nodded. After a moment’s pause, she said, “Well, there was no guarantee there would be any. Everyone got what they wanted. I’m just glad it’s done.” She grabbed the book and kissed Thurwood’s picture, then closed it and hugged it to her chest. “We did it, sweetheart!” She turned to Charlie. “So how do you feel?”
“This is one of my better days.” He gave her a smile both weary and triumphant. “It’s all good.”
“I want to see Thurwood. Can you take me?”
Before Charlie could answer, Betty handed him the cordless phone.
“What are you up to?” Angela spoke in her most demanding voice.
“I came by to see your mother. Is that permitted?”
A pause. “I suppose, since you’re there already. Took me by surprise. There are warrants, plural, for your arrest. Family feud, I gather.”
“They’re BS. ‘Git offen my property,’ mainly.”
“I bet you get that a lot,” she said. “So you’ve taken care of them?”
Silence.
“I’ll take that as a ‘No.’ You’re a train wreck, you know. I don’t suppose I should blame you for everything, though,” Angela said, her tone softening. “Tell me. Did they find what they were looking for that night?”
“No, they most certainly did not.”
“Mom doesn’t remember. What were they looking for?”
“The first time, someone took your father’s notes. Uh, tried to, that is. The next time, they were looking for something else I was working on.” He paused. “I’m sorry. I never meant to put your mother in danger. Things happened fast that day.”
“A lot of excitement, I’ll say that. She still talks about her ‘great adventure.’ Funny. When you were there, she was happier than she’d been since Dad died. She spent twenty years moping around, then you come along and she thinks she’s on a holy quest. Now, she just babbles a lot.”
“She’s not babbling now.”
“No? She’s been going downhill fast, but maybe she’ll be on her best behavior around you. She thinks you’re some kind of angel. She’s been asking for you. In a way, I’m glad you came by. But you can’t have your job back.”
Charlie chuckled. “You’ll be happy to know my replacement is very protective.”
“Good. So, congratulations on the book. How does it look?”
“Great. Thanks.”
Kathleen tugged on his jacket sleeve. “You need to take me to see Thurwood.”
“Kathleen wants to see Thurwood,” Charlie told Angela. “I don’t have my van. I biked over.”
“Use her car. I’ve got a class to teach right now. Stick around. I’ll come by later. I’ve been staying there lately.”
“So all is forgiven?” Charlie asked.
“M
ost of it.”
After Charlie hung up, he announced, “Angela’s not so bad.”
Kathleen cleared her throat and looked away. Betty rolled her eyes.
“Ah. So it’s not just me,” Charlie said.
This time, Betty cleared her throat and looked away, while Kathleen rolled her eyes.
“All right! All right! Let’s go see Thurwood,” Charlie said.
He locked his bike to the porch. When Kathleen came out in a black coat, Betty announced she was leaving for the day. Kathleen told Charlie, “Angela sleeps here now so that I won’t run away.”
“Good. Cause you’re hard to catch when you build up a head of steam.”
She laughed at his tease and playfully swatted his arm. Charlie helped her down the steps. In the sunlight, she looked terribly pale. She paused on the way to the car to catch her breath. In the cemetery, Charlie parked on the grass underneath the spreading, bare-limbed oak that served as Kathleen’s navigational marker. Thirty paces to the east lay Thurwood’s headstone. Kathleen leaned on Charlie as they walked to the grave. Once there, she stared at her name carved in granite beside Thurwood’s. She leaned over and spoke as if she were waking her husband from a nap. “Sweetheart, it’s me. I brought the young man. Didn’t I tell you we’d get it done? Didn’t I do well? Look at this!” She held the book over the grave so the headstone could see. “I know it took awhile. Please forgive me. But it’s all right now. It’s all right, sweetie. All the people who’ve read it think it’s wonderful. This is how you live on. I am so proud of you. I hope you’re proud of me.” She laid the book atop his grave. “You can feel it better this way.”
She turned to Charlie. “Do you have anything to say?”
He stepped forward. “It’s been an honor to work on your book, sir. I believe it will do very well.” He thought for a moment. “If you see John Riggins, give him my best.”
Kathleen touched Charlie’s arm and confided, “Sometimes I think you’re my son. But I know that you’re not.” She took a moment before she spoke again. “I never got over Gary’s death. Thurwood’s, I could accept. His days were cut short, but he lived a full life. But Gary. Oh, Gary.”
She walked over to her son’s grave. Charlie gave her some space.
When she returned, she said, “Should we leave the book with Thurwood? He might like that.”
“It would get wet,” Charlie said. “I bet he’d like it if we gave it to Georgia State’s library.”
“Wonderful idea!” She picked up the book and took his arm. As they walked back to the car, a crow circled overhead. “My life is complete now,” she said. “There’s nothing left for me to do.”
“I’m impressed. Not many people can say that.”
“Although I wish they’d caught the man who hit Thurwood on the head. That caused his death, you know. But that was long ago. Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord,” she murmured.
Charlie was glad to see she’d finally accepted what had happened to Thurwood. It made him feel a little less guilty about keeping Momo’s identity a secret from her (although he did devote a chapter in American Monster to that debacle up at Varmintville on the Fourth of July).
When they returned to Bayard Terrace, Angela was there, and she was in a surprisingly good mood. They ate dinner at Gamille’s on North Highland, Charlie’s treat. The women drank wine, and by the end of the evening, Charlie had purchased Kathleen’s ancient Volvo for $1,000. He left with five copies of Flight from Forsyth and his bike in the trunk. A very good day, all in all. On the way home, he drove by the Tenth Street Station and saw, with a nod of approval, that his old bike was gone.
* * *
Two days later, Charlie was working at the computer when he got a phone call from Angela. “Mom died in her sleep last night,” she said.
Charlie was stunned. “Oh God. I … that’s terrible.” Even as he spoke, he knew that her time had come. After all, she was eighty-three, and her life was, by her own admission, complete. “What happened?”
“She died in her sleep. It was peaceful, I think. She was so happy after the books came. I think she wanted to be with Dad. Does that sound weird?” She sniffled and started to sob.
“No, not at all.” Charlie thought of her dreams of Thurwood and suspected she wasn’t alone when she died. “I wish she had lived to see the book succeed, though.”
“At least she saw the book completed.”
“Yes. She finished the drill.”
“It would be nice if you said a few words at the funeral.”
“I’d be honored.”
* * *
The service was held at the Unitarian Church in Northeast Atlanta. A small crowd attended: a sister, nieces, neighbors, colleagues of Thurwood. Angela sat with her current partner, Sandra Hughes, the African-American attorney who had drafted the current contract on Flight from Forsyth.
Afterward, a small procession traveled to the cemetery. Feeling both empty and full, Charlie stood at the edge of the crowd as the casket was lowered into the ground. When the graveside service was over, he drifted away and sat in the Volvo. He’d passed on the chance to eat one last meal at Bayard Terrace because he had something else in mind.
After the other mourners had driven off, two black men with shovels filled in the grave and tamped down the dirt. When they left, there was just Charlie, the sunset, the rising wind, dead folks all around, and an almost imperceptible shadow behind the caretaker’s shed. He’d expected Trouble to show up, but when a bus passed by on the highway without stopping, Charlie figured the trickster wasn’t coming. That was for the best. After all, fistfights at funerals were a varmint thing. And while Charlie liked to think he was above that sort of behavior, he wasn’t sure what he’d do when he saw Trouble face to face.
He exited the Volvo and tiptoed across the grass, carrying a copy of Flight. He stood before their graves: Thurwood’s carpeted with fescue, Kathleen’s covered with the dirt of the newly dead. A patch of sod and a few chisel blows to date her tombstone, and she’d be set for eternity. Ignoring his own recent advice, he kneeled and placed the open book face-down between them, so they could share again. “Goodbye, friends,” he said. “Don’t know that I’ll be back. But you live on, both of you.” He struck his chest with his fist as he backed away.
Charlie returned to the car weighed down by the knowledge of how fleeting and few his friendships had been. He decided to reestablish contact with Minerva. It was wrong to be on the outs with her. Eventually, she’d understand that what he’d done was necessary—though he hoped she hadn’t yet found out what exactly that had entailed.
It turned out to be an awkward meeting. When he came to her house that evening, Minerva stood at the door and didn’t invite him in. She shook her head when he asked about Takira and Demetrious. Either she was unwilling to talk about them or reluctant to speak to him. Maybe both. But Charlie figured Demetrious hadn’t told her about the blood test. Otherwise, she would have slammed the door in his face. He handed her an autographed copy of Flight, then told her he had finished American Monster. “Flight from Forsyth is going on sale on MLK Day,” Charlie said.
“There’s something wrong with trying to make money that way,” Minerva declared.
He turned and left without saying another word.
Chapter Nineteen
Charlie woke early on MLK Day and checked Amazon.com. Still no sales. None! What was wrong with people? Or maybe it was him. Bad karma. Or bad marketing? He needed to get busy and generate some buzz—line up signings, schedule interviews, get media coverage. At least he’d managed to sell an article about Forsyth County’s inglorious history to Atlanta Week. Now to plot his next move. Maybe he’d finally write that Brimmer article, the one that had been so rudely interrupted by his eviction from Thornbriar. But how could he be both a celebrity and elusive, even invisible?
He slipped on his duster and walked to the end of the hall, clomped down two flights of stairs, and stepped out onto the sidewalk. He lingered for a moment
to savor the winter air, gazing northward at downtown Atlanta’s looming skyline. Even though it was slate gray overhead, Charlie slipped on his shades, being a wanted man with no book sales to his credit. He turned and walked toward the bakery with his hands in his pockets. A loud noise drew his attention. He turned to see a southbound MARTA bus speeding down Castlegate toward him, engine roaring, going airborne for an instant when it hit a bump. “Whoa dude, slow down,” he muttered.
Meanwhile, a white Chevy pickup pulled from a parking space on the south side of the bakery and rolled slowly toward him from the other direction. Charlie passed the garage entrance and heard someone shout, “Hey, nigger lover!” He looked up as a blue Toyota pulled from a parking space in front of the bakery, moving directly into the truck’s path. As the pickup swerved into the opposing lane to avoid the car, Charlie faced a man in a ski mask pointing a shotgun out the truck window at him.
Then, mayhem and carnage: In an instant, the gun fired, the speeding bus plowed into the truck, and the shooter hurtled through the windshield. All this was accompanied by an ear-splitting cacophony of gunshot, shattering glass, and crashing metal. Wounded, Charlie stumbled backward into the void that had once been the bakery’s front window. Flailing his arms, he crashed into a display case, landing atop a German chocolate cake and smashing it flat. He thrashed wildly in the mixture of broken glass and baked goods. Meanwhile, terror-stricken customers screamed and dove under tables.
Bolts of pain shot through Charlie’s jaw, giving him a terrible, ear-splitting headache. Dazed, bewildered, and bleeding—his face seemed afire—he struggled to comprehend what had happened. An automobile door slammed, and he thought: They’re coming to finish me off.
Struggling to his feet, he pulled himself through the broken window onto the sidewalk, slashing his right hand in the process. “FUCK!” he screamed as he whirled around, looking for an attacker who wasn’t there. His mouth tasted—and felt—like hell. There was a bloody hole in his left cheek near his jaw, the exit wound from the buckshot pellet that had shattered a molar just above the gum line. He’d been hit by two other pellets. One had glanced off his left cheekbone and ripped off a chunk from the bottom of his earlobe; the other had grazed him above the left shoulder blade. The gashes on his right palm, right thigh, and right forearm he’d received from the window glass were bleeding more heavily than the gunshot wounds.
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