Long Drive Home

by Will Allison

  I put five dollars on the table. My voice cracked when I spoke. “She wants you to close the case,” I said. “She wants it to be over.”

  Rizzo whistled. “How noble of you. How lucky she is to have you on her side.”

  He opened his wallet, but instead of taking the money, he brought out a photo and held it up. Juwan at around Sara’s age, blue sweater vest over a white oxford, missing a front tooth just like she was. A school picture. I could imagine Rizzo calling Tawana, encouraging her to sue, offering his full cooperation. I glanced away, but still he held it there, trying to make me look, until finally he reached over, tucked it into my shirt pocket, and patted my chest.

  I got up, not caring if he followed me out. I would have run if I’d had to. But he just swiveled to let me by.

  “Like I was saying, though,” he said, toasting me again, “nice job saving that kid. Merry Christmas to you and yours.”

  Outside, I started to throw the photo in the trash but stopped when I noticed handwriting on the back—Juwan’s name, in a child’s overly deliberate script. It had probably been intended for a classmate, just as Sara and her friends swapped school pictures. Wishing I’d left it on the table, I slid it back into my pocket and tried to forget about him, but there was no escaping what Rizzo had said. I walked away from the bar feeling as if I were under a spotlight. It followed me down the street to the apartment building, around back to the parking lot. It shone into my car as I headed toward Derek’s. It beat down on me as I opened two warm cans of beer from the console, one after the other, and drank them as fast as I could, trying to keep my mind blank. With every breath I took, I could feel the photo in my pocket. I remember wishing I could show Derek and make him understand he’d been part of a chain of events that had led to a boy’s death. Why should he get to go through life not knowing? But of course he wouldn’t have given a shit, wouldn’t have seen the connection. To him it would have been meaningless talk.

  When I got to his house, I did what I should have done in the first place. I called the police. I told them a man had threatened me with a gun and gave them his address. I figured they could make more trouble for him than I ever might hope to, and now that I was apart from Liz and Sara, I no longer cared if he found out who I was and where I lived.

  They were there in no time, five or six cars with their lights and sirens going. I was waiting on the sidewalk in front of the house. Derek appeared at the window, next to the Christmas tree.

  “That guy right there,” I said to the first two officers I saw.

  As Derek came out onto the porch, both of them drew their guns and shouted for him to stop where he was and put his hands on his head. Other officers were taking up positions behind their cars.

  “What the hell’s going on?” Derek said, raising his hands. “This is my house.”

  They brought him out onto the sidewalk and began patting him down. He was wearing his usual track suit, this one Nike, red with white stripes.

  “That’s the guy you should be frisking,” he said, looking over at me.

  A couple of officers took our IDs, then asked what was going on. I told them what had happened on Thomas Boulevard. They were confused. They wanted to know why I was reporting it now, after all this time.

  I said I hadn’t gotten his license plate number. “But then tonight, I was driving by, and I saw his truck in the driveway. I recognized the four wheels in back.”

  “Lying bitch,” Derek said. “He’s out here every night. Just sits over there in his car.”

  By now, the other officers had put away their guns and were standing around watching. The two officers questioning us exchanged a look. They asked Derek if what I was saying was true.

  “I don’t know nothing about no gun,” he said. “But yeah, we had a little run-in. Guy gave me the finger. I go over to see what for and he tells me he was flipping off some cop.”

  The taller cop cut me a smirk.

  “Do you own a handgun, Mr. Dye?” the other one said.

  He shook his head. “Like I said, I don’t know nothing about no gun.”

  “Search his truck,” I said, surer than ever the gun wasn’t legal.

  Derek smiled, took out his keys, and pressed a button. The Suburban’s lights flashed. “Be my guest.”

  But they wouldn’t do it—no warrant, no probable cause. They were ready for this to be over. I’d called them out for nothing.

  “How about his car?” Derek said. “I’m thinking our man here has had a few. Might have a bottle in there.”

  The officers had had enough, though. One went to answer the radio in his car while the other handed back our licenses. He apologized to Derek for disturbing him on Christmas Eve and thanked him for his cooperation. Then he told me 911 was strictly for emergencies and that I was lucky not to be getting a citation.

  “Now get out of here,” he said. “Vacate the premises.”

  I crossed the street. The other officer was still in his car, filling out paperwork. The rest were leaving or gone. I stopped short when I got a look at his profile, but it was a moment or two before it dawned on me why he seemed familiar. For all I knew, he was the same officer who’d run the light on Thomas Boulevard. Not likely, to be sure, but the possibility unnerved me. He glanced up from his clipboard and cracked the window.

  “What?”

  * * *

  I drove around until the police were gone, pounding another beer, then parked in front of Derek’s house and headed up the walk. I was counting on his still not having the gun on him. He opened the door before I could knock.

  “Get the fuck out of here, motherfucker,” he said.

  I swung as hard as I could, with my good arm. Even with two good arms, I wouldn’t have had a chance against him, but I didn’t care. All that mattered was hitting him. I missed his nose and got his mouth instead—his teeth. It felt like I’d put my fist into a grinder. I didn’t have time to swing again. He hit me square in the jaw, once. The porch sprang up, slamming into my body. Everything began to spin. I fully intended to hit him again, but I was barely onto my hands and knees, reaching for a plastic chair for balance, when he kicked me in the ribs. That knocked the wind out of me. I fell off the porch, got hung up in some shrubs, then collapsed onto the snow-covered grass, desperate for even the smallest breath of air. I couldn’t see him anymore, but I could hear him coming down the steps—taking his time, it seemed. The world had become a vacuum. I gasped for air again and gagged on a mouthful of blood. Then I heard his girlfriend shouting for him to stop. He was standing over me now.

  “Dude must have a death wish.” He touched a finger to the blood at the corner of his mouth, then took out his phone and called the police. He told them he’d been attacked, for no reason, by a stranger at his home. I wanted to say bullshit, I had reasons, but my jaw was numb. After a few tries, I got my feet under me again. He was still on the phone.

  “Honey,” his girlfriend said. “He’s right behind you.”

  I meant to hit him as he was turning around, but all I managed was a handful of velour and a shove. It was like trying to shove a refrigerator. He brushed my hand away and let me fall. This time being on the ground was all right. The snow felt good against my face. Derek pulled his foot back like he was going to kick me again, then laughed. I just lay there, wondering as I had so many times before if Juwan ever knew what hit him.

  Riding in the ambulance, it began to sink in, what could have happened to me back at his house. Imagining Sara and Liz getting the news, I slammed my head against the gurney again and again until the medics strapped me down and threatened to give me a tranquilizer. In the emergency room, at St. Barnabas, they put me on painkillers, bandaged my knuckles, stanched the bleeding in my mouth, and gave me a towel to help with the drooling. I was in and out the whole time. The X-rays showed a broken hand, fractured lower jaw, cracked ribs. Even with the medicine, my chest felt like it was full of hot coals that flared with every breath.

  They called Liz, though I had
asked them not to. She got there a little after midnight. I was still in the ER, propped up in bed. I looked away as she came in, not wanting to see the expression on her face when she saw mine.

  “Jesus, Glen,” she said. “Are you okay?”

  It was hard to speak without moving my jaw. “I’ll be fine. I got beat up.”

  “Beat up? By who? I thought you were in a wreck.” She sat down next to the bed and pressed my hand between hers.

  “Tell you later,” I said. “I’m okay. Go home.”

  She wanted to know more, but I didn’t know where to start, and the medicine was making me drowsy. She went to find a doctor. I drifted off. A little later, she woke me to say they’d be transferring me to the ICU. They wanted to run more tests and keep me under observation. Internal injuries were a possibility. It was almost 2 a.m. She said she’d come back in a few hours, after Sara finished opening her presents.

  “She’ll want to see you.”

  “Not like this,” I said. “Not on Christmas.”

  “Then what should I tell her?”

  “Tell her the truth.” It came out sounding like truce. “Tell her I got beat up.”

  “I’ll tell her you fell down the stairs.”

  The orthopedist who fitted my splint later that morning said I had what was known as a boxer’s fracture, a break at the base of the small finger, on my left hand. “But ‘brawler’s fracture’ is more like it,” he said. “Boxers take precautions.”

  “Where’s my wedding band?”

  “Your hand was too swollen. It was either cut the ring or lose the finger.”

  The splint encased my pinkie and ring finger, leaving the others free. He told me my hand would be almost as good as new in twelve weeks. Same for my ribs, if not sooner, but in the meantime there was nothing he could do for them; they had to heal on their own. There was no orthodontist around to examine my jaw—not on Christmas—but my teeth still lined up, which he said was a good sign. Probably I could get by without screws and plates, though I might need my jaw wired shut for a few weeks, and then something called arch bars. He referred me to an oral surgeon. He wrote a prescription for more painkillers. He set my wedding band on the bedside table and said he hoped I liked soup and smoothies, because that’s what I’d be eating for the next month.

  Liz arrived as he was leaving, bundled up, wearing a knotty red scarf Sara had knitted with Helen’s help. She looked worn out. She’d brought a sweatshirt and some old jeans of mine from the house so I wouldn’t have to wear the clothes I’d arrived in, which were caked with dirt and dried blood.

  “How was Christmas?” I said.

  “Sara cried when I wouldn’t let her come. She says you should use the elevator from now on. Did you know there’s a police officer here?”

  He’d been waiting in the hall while I was with the doctor. Now he knocked and introduced himself as Sergeant Miller. I recognized him from Derek’s, not the officer I might have flipped off but the other one. He said he needed to get my side of things for the incident report. I didn’t want Liz knowing what had happened, but I couldn’t very well ask her to leave, so I told him it hurt to talk. “Call you tomorrow?”

  He said he hadn’t come all that way for nothing. “So let’s get this over with.”

  My jaw was so swollen, I could actually see it. I checked with my free fingers to make sure I wasn’t drooling, then proceeded to confirm what he already knew, that after they’d left, I had returned to the house and assaulted Derek.

  “Wait a minute,” Liz said. “You assaulted him?”

  Miller said I was lucky. Derek wasn’t pressing charges, provided I kept my distance. “He says you’ve been stalking him. Watching his house at night.”

  Liz put a hand on my thigh. “Let’s stop right here and call your lawyer.”

  “His girlfriend corroborated his statement,” Miller said.

  “He threatened me with a gun,” I said, moving my mouth as little as possible. “He should be locked up.”

  “All due respect,” Miller said, “so should you.” Having gotten what he needed, he stood to go. “The impound lot’s closed today, but you can pick your car up tomorrow.”

  Liz waited until he was gone, then pulled a chair alongside the bed. “A gun?” she said. “What is wrong with you, Glen? What are you doing?”

  I looked over at my wedding band, which was now shaped like the letter C, and began to explain that I’d been involved in a road rage incident. The other guy—this guy—had flown off the handle, accosted me, flashed a pistol.

  “I’d have told you,” I said, “but I didn’t want to upset you.”

  “Too late for that.”

  She got up and stood at the window with her arms crossed. The snow was coming down again. The scrape of a plow reached us from across the parking lot. I tried to sit up, but my ribs wouldn’t let me.

  “Anyway, I was out for a drive last night and happened to see his truck. I called the police, but they didn’t do anything.”

  “So naturally you attacked him.”

  “He’s not going to sue me. I didn’t do enough damage.” There was fury in her eyes when she turned around. “You think I care about that?” She said I was lucky I wasn’t paralyzed, or brain damaged—lucky just to be alive. “You have a family, remember? Do you ever stop to think about us?”

  I reached out to touch her, but she drew back. She said she felt like she only ever got half the story from me anymore. When and where, for instance, did all of this happen? Why exactly did the guy fly off the handle? What did I mean “flashed a pistol”? And what was I doing driving around Montclair on Christmas Eve?

  “It’s the same with the accident,” she said. “Always dribs and drabs. After I saw Tawana the other day? Sara told me what happened outside the lawyer’s office. So as far as I can tell, you almost got into not one but two accidents with Juwan, but for some reason you didn’t want anybody to know.”

  I stared at my chest and concentrated on taking shallow breaths. I couldn’t bring myself to call Sara a liar again. “I didn’t want the police to think I might have been trying to get back at him.”

  She thought this over, biting her lip. “Okay. That makes sense. Don’t give them a motive. I can see that. But how am I supposed to be on your side if you won’t tell me these things in the first place?”

  She was right. And sooner or later she was going to find out more.

  “Also,” I said, “with the gun—Sara was in the car. It happened on the way home from school, on the day of the accident.”

  In a few minutes, Liz would help me get dressed and drive me back to the apartment. On the way, I’d consider telling her that the prosecutor had decided not to charge me. But in the end, I wouldn’t bring it up. We’d ride in silence. Snow would blow across the road in gusts, covering the lane lines. She’d pull into the handicapped space at the back of the building so I wouldn’t have far to walk and tell me to call her if I needed anything. I’d lean over to kiss her, in spite of the pain, and then she’d reach across the seat and pull the door shut.

  For now, though, we were still together in that hospital room, and I was still holding out hope that she’d take me back. But her expression had changed. She was looking at me like she didn’t know who I was anymore. I assume she was imagining what might have happened to Sara if that gun had gone off, and I assume she was thinking, correctly, that the whole thing must have somehow been my fault, or else why hadn’t I been more forthcoming to begin with? The problem, of course, was that every time I opened my mouth to tell her something, I only ended up revealing how much I’d been hiding.

  “Should I come back?”

  The attending physician was standing in the doorway with a clipboard to his chest. Liz turned to the window. I went ahead and invited him in, asking what exactly I had to do in order to go home.

  Two days later, I was back at St. Barnabas, having my jaw wired shut. For five weeks I ate from a blender and talked through my teeth, all the while debating whe
ther to go ahead and tell Liz everything once and for all. I didn’t think it would get me home any sooner, but I was afraid that if I didn’t come clean, we might be done for. Things hadn’t been the same between us since the hospital. She didn’t have to say anything; I could see it in her eyes every afternoon when I dropped Sara off, moving like a broken old man. You have a family, remember? Do you ever stop to think about us?

  At the end of January, my splint came off just as the first W2s were rolling in. The next three months were a welcome blur of work, ten- and twelve- and then fourteen-hour days that left time for little else except sleep and afternoons with Sara. I wouldn’t say I was able to put my troubles out of mind, not even for a little while, but the nonstop emails and meetings and filings made it easier to get through the days.

  By the time I came up for air, toward the end of April, I’d realized what a bad idea confessing to Liz would be. The moment for that had long since passed; honesty for honesty’s sake wasn’t going to win me any points at that late date. I could no more undo lying to her than I could undo the accident itself, and telling the truth now would only confirm her darkest suspicions—not just about how much I’d kept from her but also about my judgment. She’d never be able to forgive Juwan’s death, and in her eyes that wouldn’t even be the worst of it—it would always be secondary to the danger I’d put Sara in by cutting the wheel on purpose.

  Another idea had occurred to me, though, one that seemed to have the potential to solve at least some of our problems: What if we went ahead with a divorce, and then I moved home? We’d live together as an unmarried couple. Since we’d officially be divorced, she wouldn’t have to worry about a lawsuit. It was that simple. And who would even know? I didn’t see why we’d have to go into the details with Sara or anybody else; we’d just say we were getting back together.

  The prospect of a divorce still turned my stomach, but it was nothing compared to the prospect of more time apart. That winter and spring, in addition to the distance between me and Liz, I’d started to feel Sara slipping away. We’d go out to a diner for a busted-jaw special, mashed potatoes and milkshakes, and she’d make it through the whole meal without any of the sadness she’d shown before Christmas. She no longer clung to me when I dropped her off each night. She’d stopped asking when I was coming home. Our arrangement was starting to seem normal to her.