Back Roads

by Tawni O'Dell

  “I want to make a phone call,” I think to say, and everybody looks at me like now I’m out of my mind.

  “We’re not done,” the sheriff says from where he’s sitting on the edge of his desk. “I want to go over some of this before you sign it, then you can make your call.”

  Amber doesn’t have good aim. That was why Callie got her brains blown out. Standing three feet away from her holding a gun with a high-powered telescopic sight and Amber missed her chest and shot her in the face.

  She apologized to me for that during the drive back to our house. She said she would have never done it on purpose. She knew Callie had a husband and kids and family and friends. She also promised me Callie didn’t have time to be scared.

  “I want to make it now,” I say.

  Bill, the deputy who belted me in the face earlier, makes another move for me and the sheriff yells at him to back off. The metal-topped table in front of me is covered with balled-up white Kleenex soaked in bright red blood.

  “All right,” the sheriff says, and looks at his watch. “You’ve been here two hours. Make your call.”

  He heaves his couch-smelling bulk off the desk, turns to spit tobacco in an old coffee can the way my grandpa used to spit out the lining of his black lungs, and picks up the phone cradled in a cheap-looking plastic console with a dozen square buttons running down the side of it, some of them flashing red.

  He comes over and drops it in front of me.

  “Can I have some privacy?” I ask.

  “No,” he says.

  “Doesn’t that violate my civil rights or something like that?”

  He picks up the receiver and stabs one of the buttons. “Probably,” he says.

  I take the phone from him, and he walks back to his desk. The other deputies yawn and stretch and go off in search of more coffee, except for Bill. He takes a seat a couple feet away and stares at me like he wants to break more than my nose. He must have known her. Maybe he stopped her for a speeding ticket once and they got to talking about Impressionists.

  I dial my number. It rings four times before Uncle Mike answers. He doesn’t sound happy to hear from me. I tell myself it’s just because I’m calling so late, but tears start rolling down my cheeks anyway.

  “I want to talk to Jody.”

  “Jody?” he says. “Jody’s in bed, asleep.”

  There aren’t any female deputies so the sheriff had to dig up a Laurel Falls policewoman to send out to talk to the girls. She told them they had to be put in a shelter overnight until temporary foster care could be worked out for them or they could stay with a relative. Amber called Uncle Mike.

  “Can you wake her up?”

  “No, I can’t,” he says tensely. “What are you doing calling here? Since when do the police let people call home from jail?”

  “You get one phone call.”

  “This is your one phone call?”

  “Yeah.”

  There’s a long silence.

  “Jesus, Harley,” he says, his voice all shaky like he might cry. “You might get the death penalty for this.”

  TRIED AS AN ADULT TRIED AS AN ADULT flashes in front of me like a failing bar sign.

  “I know.”

  “You get one phone call and you call a six-year-old little girl?”

  “Right.”

  More silence.

  “I’m sorry,” he says, his voice tightening up again. “I can’t wake her.”

  “What about Amber?”

  “Everyone’s asleep.”

  “Well,” I say slowly, staring at the neon-bright words, wondering when something’s going to finally appear there that won’t go away. “I just wanted to make sure she’s okay.”

  “She’s fine. As fine as she can be.” He pauses, then, “You can’t keep anything quiet in a small town. Not for a second. People are already driving up here, shouting and throwing things on the yard and it’s the middle of the night. Tomorrow should be pretty bad. We’re taking the girls back to our house first thing in the morning and getting them away from here.”

  “What about Elvis?”

  “I’m not taking your damn dog.”

  “You’ve got to take him,” I say. “Who’s going to feed him? If he starts roaming around looking for food, someone’s going to shoot him. Or he could get hit by a car.” My panic starts mounting. “He’s been a good dog. He deserves better.”

  “I don’t care what he deserves. He’s a dog. And I’m not taking him.”

  I start crying pretty hard. I don’t even care that the sheriff and Deputy Bill are thinking I’m a pussy for doing it.

  “You have to get Jody a fortune cookie and a paper umbrella every month,” I manage to tell him.

  Then I hang up.

  The sheriff comes back over, pushes the phone aside, and sits on the table close enough to me that I can see he’s got a small reddish-brown stain on the thigh of his gray law-enforcement pants. It could be blood but I’m willing to bet it’s salsa.

  I reach for one of my bloody tissues since I used up the box they gave me and blow my nose in it before I remember how bad my nose hurts. The pain makes me cry even harder. He’s got no sympathy for me. I don’t expect him to. He’s got heavy-lidded eyes that remind me of a dozing turtle.

  “You know much about guns, Harley?” he asks me.

  It’s the first time he’s used my name all night. Usually he calls me “son.”

  “Some,” I say.

  “I know you used to go hunting with your dad.”

  “Not much.”

  “Enough to know how to handle a gun,” he says. “Enough to know how to aim and shoot. Enough to know how powerful a .44 magnum carbine is and what kind of damage it can do at close range.”

  He gets up and starts walking. I’m glad. I don’t like the way he smells or looks. His belt and holster and cheap shoes creak as he paces.

  “My question to you is, Why didn’t you shoot her from a distance? You’ve got a nice scope on that Ruger. You don’t have to be a good shot with a scope like that. Just aim and pull the trigger.”

  I don’t say anything. He stops, stares at me for a moment, then starts pacing again.

  “You could’ve climbed one of those hills up behind the railroad tracks and shot her in her front yard while she was outside playing with her kids. Or you could’ve shot her right through all those windows on the front of their house.”

  He stops again.

  “You know her kids, right?” he asks me, even though he knows I do. “Her little girl is friends with that sister of yours you just called, right? It’s probably going to be hard for them to be friends from now on, huh?”

  I know what he’s doing; I just don’t understand why he’s doing it. Someone’s been killed and here I am admitting to it. He’s got a murder victim. He’s got a murderer. Why mess with that? No one questioned my mom’s story.

  My hands start shaking again. I sit on them.

  “Hell, if you had done it that way, you could’ve said it was a hunting accident and not gone to jail at all.” He starts walking and talking again. “It happens all the time. No one would have suspected anything because nobody knew what was going on between you two. Right? Nobody knew. I know her husband didn’t know.”

  “Did you tell him?” I ask, suddenly feeling queasy.

  One of the other deputies comes walking back with two steaming Styrofoam cups of coffee.

  “No,” the sheriff says, taking a cup from him. “I haven’t been out of this room since I found out myself. I talked to him after we recovered the body though, and he was stunned that we had you in custody. He said you liked his wife and that she was fond of you. She felt sorry for you. He said you had come by their house just a couple days ago all upset from visiting your mom in prison on your birthday, and she went out to your truck in the pouring rain and talked to you and made you feel better.”

  He takes a sip of his coffee.

  “Did she make you feel better, Harley?”

  I
stare at the bloody Kleenex. The smell from his coffee is making me feel sicker.

  “I guess she won’t be making you feel better anymore.”

  “Shut up,” I shout, surprised by my own words.

  I’m also surprised to find myself standing. This time Bill doesn’t come after me; the other one does.

  He’s the one who brought up the death penalty earlier. During my confession, I told them how beautiful she was and he pointed out how killing a beautiful woman, especially a mother of young kids, was the worst crime there was aside from killing the kids. He said I was going to fry for it even though he’s a cop so I’m sure he knows Pennsylvania uses lethal injection. What he means is I’ll be inoculated for it. I asked him if I’d still get the death penalty if she was fat and ugly, and he said I’d probably only get life. He’s also the guy who told me I watch too much TV when I called about my mom. I recognize his voice.

  He clamps a big hand on my shoulder and I wince the same way Amber did when I touched her shoulder tonight. When she took her clothes off, she had a bruise there. That Ruger packs a kick.

  “I want to go to jail,” I cry out to all of them.

  The deputy holding me looks over at the sheriff, who nods at him. He lets go.

  “I want to go now,” I say.

  “Okay, fair enough,” the sheriff agrees. “I’ve just got one more question for you, then you can sign your confession and we’ll put you in a cell here and a couple hours from now, when lawyers and judges start their days, we’ll get you to a real jail.”

  He tells me to sit down. I keep standing.

  “Why’d you kill her?” he asks.

  “Huh?”

  “Why’d you kill her?”

  I start feeling panicky again. I think about Elvis and how he’s going to think I’ve run out on him on purpose and how he’s going to spend the rest of his life thinking he’s a bad dog. I think about Jody and Esme and how the sheriff’s right; they can’t be friends anymore. I think about Amber and how she cried and cried when we were done because it wasn’t what she wanted after all and now she knows.

  “What do you mean?” I ask him.

  “From everything you’ve told me so far, I’d say you were in love with her. Now I’m not saying people don’t kill people they love. That happens around here almost as much as hunting accidents. But they usually have a pretty good reason for doing it.”

  I lick my lips.

  “I wanted to marry her,” I say.

  It isn’t a lie.

  “And . . . ?” he urges.

  “She wouldn’t leave her husband.”

  “So you killed her?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay.”

  He sits down on his desk again. He takes another drink of his coffee and places it next to his spit can.

  “Let me make sure I’ve got this straight one last time,” he says, and rubs at his chin like he’s an intellectual.

  “You’re supposed to be meeting her to get fucked and instead you show up with a gun you know can literally blow her head off, and you stand there, face to face with the woman you love, close enough to see the terror in her eyes, and you do it. You blow her head off. Instead of fucking her. That’s what you choose to do. Then you throw up beside her and fold her hands peacefully over her chest. You get in your truck, drive to the police station, turn yourself in, give us a nice neat confession, then call home to see how your dog and baby sister are doing. Is that about right?”

  My head aches. My face hurts. My scalp itches. My stomach is heaving. My hands are shaking. The blood is pounding so heavy in my ears, his final words are drowned out by the sound.

  “Here’s my only problem,” he goes on. “One of the people you’ve described is a cold-blooded, homicidal psychopath. The other is a decent, responsible kid who’s had a really shitty life. Can you explain to me how you can be both?”

  GROOVY rises up from his spit can like a genie coming out of his lamp. It spreads across the room in pink and purple cloud letters.

  “I have a split personality,” I tell him, licking my lips some more.

  “Is that why you see a shrink?”

  “Something like that.”

  Amber had been wearing watermelon Lip Smacker tonight. The stuff she’s worn since she was a kid. I could swear I still tasted it.

  “Then she can confirm this? I can ask her. What’s her name again? I’d like to talk to her anyway.”

  I only kissed her once, then I told her I couldn’t do it again. I couldn’t touch her either. She didn’t care. I put my hands in the dirt beneath her.

  “I want to go to jail now. You said I could.”

  “All right, Harley.”

  He brings me a three-page police report with tons of writing on it. At the very top is the TIME we started. He leans over with a pen and fills in the TIME we ended, then hands the pen to me. He flips to the last page.

  “Sign here,” he tells me.

  He’s looking at me differently than anyone’s looked at me all night. Not with hatred, outrage, or disgust. Not even with pity or frustration. He’s disappointed in me.

  I don’t like the guy but still I crave understanding from someone.

  I had to do it, I want to tell him. I had to give her that one shot at ecstasy. That’s what the dream was telling me.

  Too bad she didn’t get there, but I don’t think most people ever do. At least she got the desire out of her system and now she’s going to be okay. That’s why I don’t want her life getting fucked up by going to jail. She’s going to be okay now. I’m not, even though I’ve already blocked out most of it. I don’t remember anything except I know I didn’t EJACULATE.

  The problem with trying to forget about shit is you can’t. Time does not heal all wounds. I don’t know who was the first guy to say it does, but it couldn’t have been Confucius. He would’ve never said something so stupid.

  I sign. A confession’s a confession.

  The sheriff takes the pen from me, then says something kind of weird.

  “I’m sorry, son,” he tells me. “I know that you must have loved her.”

  I don’t bother telling him I still do. I’m not going to stop just because she killed someone.

  epilogue

  This place is not so bad. It has a great view. A bank calendar view. Miles and miles of soft green hills that look like they’d make a great bed if a giant came stumbling through the valley and needed a place to crash.

  The food could be better and so could the company, but I’m not very hungry or social these days so it doesn’t matter much. I haven’t been allowed to have visitors yet, but my new shrink says I should be able to see Jody soon. She’s the only person I want to see. Only because I want her to see that I’m okay.

  Betty wants to see me, but I don’t want to see her. I’m still mad at her for turning in Amber. I know she thought she was doing what was best for all of us but it wasn’t her place to make that decision. I had my reason for doing what I did.

  I told her this when I saw her in the police station the day after my arrest, and she said she knew I had my reason but it wasn’t a good one. I didn’t kill Callie Mercer. Choosing to sleep with me may have ultimately, unwittingly led to the circumstances that ended her life, but I did not pull the trigger.

  Then she said I would be cheating Amber by taking the blame for her crime. She took a human life. She took a mother from her children. A wife from her husband. A daughter from her parents. She needed to be punished if she was ever going to have CLOSURE.

  I have CLOSURE on my wall now. My new shrink told me to write down the words I see in the air. I have a ton of them taped up. We’re allowed to have tape in here. We don’t have to use tapioca.

  I have a ton of Jody’s fortunes taped up too. She sent me her whole FORJUNS envelope. Every time I look at one I picture her carefully pulling out the strip of paper as delicately as if she were straightening a fairy’s wings, and I feel a little better before I feel really shitty.


  She sent me a letter too. I’ve only been able to read it once, but I’m going to keep it forever because I know how much work she put into it. I’ve started a dozen letters back to her, and they all begin with how proud I am of her letter. I never get around to finishing them though. Hers says:

  DEAR HARLEY,

  HOW ARE YOU? I AM FIN. MISTY IS FIN TO.

  UNCLE MIKE LET ME BRING ALL MY DINUSORS TO HIS HOWS.

  HE SED I CAN GET A NU ONE FOR KRISMIS. I PRAY EVRY NIT FOR YOU AND AMBER AND ESMES MOMS SOWL.

  I HOPE YOU WILL CUM HOM SUN. I MISS MY LIF.

  YUR SISTER,

  JODY

  I still have Skip’s letter too. I keep it in my one drawer with some other stuff. They’re pretty good about letting you keep PERSONAL EFFECTS here as long as they fit in the drawer. Callie’s art book wouldn’t fit which is okay because I think it was only a loaner.

  I’ve got Mom’s Bible and her map in the drawer too, and Mom and Dad’s wedding picture. And the crocheted doll. They let me keep her because they don’t know what I use her for. I don’t think I’m ever going to want a live woman again.

  The only other thing in here is a card from Church. I know he picked it out himself because the front is a cartoon dog wearing a party hat shouting, “Congratulations.” The inside says, “Way to go! I knew you could do it!” I know his mom would have guided him in a different direction if they had shopped for a card together. I have a feeling Church’s mom doesn’t think I’m such a nice boy anymore.

  I’m not exactly sure what would have led her to that conclusion. Amber’s story made the eleven o’clock news, not mine. It turned out I wasn’t sent to jail for murder after all and the only reason I’m in here is because I started laughing when they told me Misty was the one who told the police Amber and I had an incestuous relationship. And I couldn’t stop laughing. Or maybe I was screaming. I don’t remember. The only thing I do remember is shitting myself. Shitting yourself in front of strangers and fucking your sister are two things you don’t ever forget.