by Nicole Baart
“Not that far as the crow flies,” Deputy Mullen said. “It’s just under a mile and a half on foot from where his car was found to where his body was found.”
The conversation was starting to feel circular. They had gone over this again and again, but Jess needed to hear him explain it one more time. “What makes you think his death was an accident?”
Deputy Mullen was nothing if not patient. “The DNR issues two hundred permits on a lottery-based system for that area, and the season for hunting with a statewide firearm license is short. Evan was killed on the third day of the season with legal hunting ammo. If his death was intentional, whoever killed him knew an awful lot about deer hunting season in Minnesota.”
Jess’s chin dropped to her chest. She knew what was coming next. She had asked the questions a dozen different times in just as many ways. Was there another hunter nearby? Did any neighbors hear the shot? How could someone mistake her husband for a deer? Or, why would someone blindly shoot into the darkness on a moonless night?
“We’re tracking down every single license holder,” Deputy Mullen reminded her kindly. “This isn’t a closed case. Accident or not, we are still looking for the person who killed your husband. Somebody knows something. It will come out.”
It had rained that night, the night that Evan was shot. And it wasn’t until late the following afternoon that a local resident—fifty-nine-year-old Wendy Anderson—discovered his body while she was bow hunting with her pair of Irish setters. They found his body before she did, and by the time she caught up they had trampled the area as they sniffed and nudged and whined for her to hurry and investigate their morbid find.
Dogs and wind and rain that coated the ground in a thin coat of ice that melted by midday hampered the investigation significantly, but even if the conditions had been perfect, Mullen explained that the deck was stacked against them. The firearm season for deer was short, and the woods were crawling with hunters hoping to get their buck. In central Minnesota, shotguns with single-slug shells were permitted for eight days, and the Tri-Ball 12-gauge buckshot that ended Evan’s life was consistent with the ammunition any number of hunters used. The ground was crisscrossed with boot prints and cigarette butts and spent shells. Finding evidence from one specific discharge was a nearly impossible task.
“Someone took one last shot in the dark,” Deputy Mullen said. But he didn’t sound very convincing.
After Jess hung up, she went to her bedroom and put the envelope from the coroner’s office in the drawer of her night table. She couldn’t read it, not yet, but the knowledge that it was there rumbled beneath her skin like distant thunder. Because she wanted to scratch, to drag her fingers across her arms and legs and stomach, Jess turned on the shower and scrubbed her hair instead. It felt good, the hot water, the rising steam, and she stayed beneath the spray until she felt raw. Scoured clean.
Jess slipped a fresh shirt off a hanger in her closet and then put on a pair of jeans. How long since she had worn real clothes? At least, something other than yoga pants and soft T-shirts that espoused mantras like Exhale and Namaste. Clearly it had been a while, because her jeans hung off her hips and her fingers fumbled over the buttons on her shirt.
But she was dressed. And that was something. She ran a brush through her damp hair and pulled it into a neat knot at the base of her neck. No makeup. Jess couldn’t be bothered.
She was up, off the couch for the first time in days, and because she had forward momentum, Jess decided to keep moving. The grocery store for sure. People had been bringing food, but her boys weren’t interested in chicken and broccoli casseroles or eggplant lasagna. Jess knew what her kids wanted and it was comfort food. Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tarts and cheddar popcorn for Max, anything baked and frosted for Gabe. Cinnamon rolls, usually, but he would accept boxes of doughnuts, Little Debbie snacks, anything nutritionally bankrupt and bursting with empty calories. Jess could do that.
Because they worried about her and checked in every day—sometimes multiple times a day—Jess forced herself to text Meredith, her father, and Anna before she pulled out of the driveway. She didn’t want to, but reaching out was like putting a little deposit in the bank. See? I’m okay. I’m going to be okay. On days when she couldn’t bring herself to get out of bed, she could point back to that one time she got groceries.
I’m out, she wrote. Groceries.
The flurry of replies kept her parked for longer than she would have liked, and the more they congratulated her, the more they chimed in, the less she wanted to leave. There was an indent on the couch that was exactly her shape and size, and it called to Jessica like a lover. It was comfortable, safe, the only place in the entire house where she could sit and relieve just a bit of the pressure that threatened to crush her heart. Arms curled in close, legs tucked sideways beneath her. Head resting on the back of the couch or the arm if need be. For some reason she could breathe there, just a little, and for a measure of time every day it was enough.
Good girl, her father texted. Then: Time to move on. No guilt.
No guilt. What a joke. Jess knew that she was the only one to blame for what happened to Evan. If he were with her, if they were still a family, he would have been beside her on their sofa that night. They liked to watch Parks and Recreation, even the first season, which nearly everyone agreed could be skipped right over as if it had never happened at all. Maybe they would have shared a bag of microwave popcorn, Evan’s favorite, their hands brushing against each other as they reached for greasy handfuls. Surely even that, the tentative, unfamiliar way they touched in their final months together, was better than Evan’s body cold in the ground.
Jessica felt a tremor shake her from head to toe. If she didn’t leave now, she never would. She tossed the phone into her purse and put the car in reverse, texts be damned. She had done more than her part.
The big Hy-Vee close to school was where Jessica usually got her groceries, but she would run into people that she knew there. Like the cashier with the peasant braids who knew her by name and who always joked about all the bunches of bananas in Jess’s cart. “Got a couple monkeys at home?” she asked without fail. Jess would smile and nod. “You know I do.” And the aisles were littered with moms from the school who timed their shopping to coincide with the final bell and the perfect position in the pickup lane. No, Jess couldn’t go there.
Instead, she pulled into the parking lot of the Food Court, a mom-and-pop store that was a quarter of the size of Hy-Vee but conveniently located on the opposite side of town. Jess was convinced it stayed in business thanks to milk, bread, and eggs alone, but it contained all that she needed for her first real outing since Evan’s funeral. Sure, she had brought the kids to school, stopped by her father’s house to sign some papers, and even ventured into her own classroom late one evening so she could gather up her books and lesson plans, a few stacks of grading, and the novel that her English 10 class would start right before Christmas. The Book Thief. She’d had to make a presentation to the school board to get permission to teach a book narrated by Death. Now she wished she hadn’t bothered.
And Jessica wished that she had gone online and ordered grocery delivery instead of venturing out into the harsh, noisy world.
Too late now. The wind was stiff, the air crisp and set to shatter, so she pulled the cuffs of her sleeves over her palms and pushed the cart quickly through the cold aisles. Three bunches of bananas (Gabe had at least two a day), a loaf of bread, a gallon of 1 percent milk. Then a box of chocolate doughnuts and a clamshell from the local bakery with an oversized cinnamon roll. SunnyD and Dr Pepper and a family-sized bag of Doritos. Jess was grateful that the store was all but empty and no one was around to see her make such horrific nutritional choices for her family.
Her phone rang while she was checking out, and Jess ignored it. But when it started to trill again (the twinkle ringtone that Gabe had chosen when she first upgraded to an iPhone), she dug in her purse to see who was being so insistent. Caller ID told her it was Auburn El
ementary.
“Hello?” Jess said, pressing the phone between her cheek and shoulder as she rooted in her purse for her wallet. The cashier was waiting for her to insert her credit card.
“Hi, Jessica. Nurse Amy here.”
Jess’s stomach cartwheeled as every worst-case scenario skittered through her mind. A fall on the playground, an accident in PE, a fight.
But Amy knew the drill and continued before Jess could truly panic. “I’ve got Gabe in my office complaining about a sore throat. He’s got a bit of a fever, too.”
“I’m on my way,” Jess said, scrawling her signature on the electronic pad. She nodded at the cashier and accepted her bags, lining them up on her arms so that she could carry them all in one trip.
She wasn’t happy that her son was sick, but it felt good to have a purpose, something that she had to do. Gabe needed her, and the click into full-fledged Mama Bear mode hitched just a little before Jess gave herself over to the task at hand. He’d need ginger ale, but she could buy that from the vending machine outside the pharmacy where she would pick up numbing throat spray and a tin of cherry throat lozenges. And maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to have him looked at.
Jess jerked to a full stop in front of the trunk of her car. Her children had never, not once, seen a doctor other than their father. At least, not for the basic stuff. He often checked them out at home, lifting his stethoscope from the ratty backpack that he lugged back and forth to the office every day. If the situation was really serious, Jess would just show up at the clinic and he’d squeeze them in, usually in his private office or the back hallway or even the break room if the examination rooms were filled with other patients. His verdict was almost always the same, the prescription doled out with a kiss to the forehead: one bear hug from Dad, an afternoon of snuggles from Mom, plenty of liquids, and rest. Besides Max’s emergency appendectomy at the age of eleven, the Chamberlain boys had never experienced an illness beyond the seasonal flu or the occasional ear infection.
No, Jessica decided. She could not take her boys there. Not yet. Maybe not ever. There was another medical office in town, bigger and fancier and connected to the hospital. She had never been there because Evan’s community health clinic needed patients with good insurance to cover the ones who didn’t have any. Jess had always been proud of her husband’s generosity, of his commitment to providing quality, affordable health care to anyone and everyone—especially those who society tried to overlook. But now? She knew that even people with the best of intentions made the worst kind of mistakes. And she couldn’t face Cate. Thankfully Evan’s nurse hadn’t shown up at the funeral. Or, if she had, Jess hadn’t seen her. And Jess had no desire to see her now. Gabe would have to tough it out. Ginger ale and rest would have to be enough.
But by the time she had him signed out at the school office and bundled into the backseat of her car, he was shivering uncontrollably and had more than a bit of a fever.
“You’re burning up, buddy,” Jess said, putting the car into drive. Her lips were still warm from pressing a kiss to his temple. She had found over the years that she could measure a temperature nearly as accurately as a thermometer—102 degrees, she guessed.
“I don’t feel so good,” Gabe said weakly. His eyes were glassy when she caught his gaze in the rearview mirror.
Jess didn’t have a choice, not really. “I know. We’re going to take care of that, okay? I’m taking you to the doctor.”
Strep throat, Jess was sure of it. She had battled it more than once in the years that she had been a teacher. Teaching was a hazardous profession, and after her first miscarriage she had seemed prone to every infection that crept through her classroom. She knew what a sore throat and a sudden, high fever meant. Strep every time.
At Urgent Care, a heavyset woman with rust-colored curls photocopied Jessica’s insurance card and handed over a clipboard with a new-patient questionnaire. It felt strange to fill out information that had been a given for so many years. Patient history, known allergies, and past surgeries (none) were all things that Evan had known by heart, and Jess realized she had taken the simplicity of their medical care for granted.
But besides the fatherly kiss at the end of the appointment, the minutes Gabe spent with the unfamiliar Dr. Zhu were really no different than Evan’s exams. Jess was right; a rapid strep test confirmed the infection, and as she accepted the prescription for antibiotics, she felt a burst of gratitude that her son was in the throes of a fever dream. He was so out of it she was sure that he didn’t have the emotional capacity to feel wounded by the fact that it wasn’t his daddy who stuck the giant Q-tip down his throat for a swab.
“Come on, baby.” Gabe was sitting on her lap, head lolling back against her shoulder, and Jess turned him around gently so she could carry him to the car.
“I’m sure he can walk,” Dr. Zhu said, and although she couldn’t see his face, she was certain that he rolled his eyes at her. Gabe was a big boy, taller and broader than most kids his age, and people expected him to act as old as he looked. But he was only six, still her baby—and a child who had to deal with more than his fair share of obstacles.
“I’m sure I can carry him,” Jess snapped back, and left the office without a backward glance, the prescription crumpled in her sweaty hand.
Jess brought the prescription to a new pharmacy instead of the Walgreens where the pharmacists knew her by name. While they filled the prescription, Jess carried Gabe around the store, a surgical mask firmly over his mouth and nose so that he wouldn’t infect anyone else. His cheeks were blazing beneath the blue paper, the red so high and alarming there was no doubt that he was seriously sick. But what else could she do? He couldn’t stay in the car while she gathered children’s ibuprofen, throat lozenges, and Vicks VapoRub.
She gave him the first dose of ibuprofen and the pink, bubblegum-flavored amoxicillin in the car. Gabe hardly knew what was going on, and she had to hold the bottle of cold 7UP to his lips and coax him to drink, then wipe the evidence of the fluorescent medicine from the corners of his mouth.
“We’re going home, honey,” she whispered, resting her cheek against his hot forehead for just a moment. “I’ll make you a bed on the couch and you can watch PAW Patrol for the rest of the day.”
Jess was late to pick up Max, and as she pulled up to the school she worried that he had left without her. Walked home or caught a ride with someone or simply disappeared. He seemed to want to these days. But she was relieved to see that he was lounging against one of the stone pillars at the entrance to the middle school, thumbing through his phone even though Jess knew that there was nothing for him to look at. He didn’t have a data plan and could only access the internet when Wi-Fi was available. The school Wi-Fi was on lockdown.
“I’m so sorry I’m late,” Jess said when he wrenched open the passenger door. “I got called to school because Gabe is sick.” She motioned toward the backseat, but Max didn’t bother to look.
“Strep,” she said. “It’s really contagious. How are you feeling?”
“Fine,” Max said. He took the earbuds that were hanging around his neck and fit them into his ears. A second later she heard the fast beat of a song that sounded explosive, angry.
They drove home in near silence, though the song that Max was listening to thrummed in the still air of the car and Gabe whimpered occasionally. Both sounds made Jess’s skin crawl.
At home Max disappeared into his room and Gabe waited in the armchair while Jess riffled through the linen closet for a set of sheets. Her mother had turned the couch into a bed when Jessica was a child, and now she did the same thing for her children when they were sick. Fitted sheet tucked tight around the cushions, flat sheet on top. A bed pillow with a crisp, cool pillowcase and a water bottle with ice at the ready on the floor. The TV was nearby, and so was Mom, because the hub of the house—the kitchen—was only steps away. It was comfort and proximity and everything Gabe needed to feel better. Well, almost everything. The patina of grief tha
t made every surface in the house seem slick with loss made Jess squeeze her eyes shut for just a second. It was a relief to have something to do, a purpose to fulfill, but she was breathing heavy, winded from the effort of holding the pieces of her broken heart still.
Jess cupped her face in her hands so she could gather herself. Then she hobbled on her knees to the place where Gabe was waiting in the chair. “Hey, how’re you holding up?” She wanted to pull her baby onto her lap and hold him until his fever broke, but she knew from experience that his skin was alive, every nerve ending awake and tingling in pain. “I’m almost done here. Do you want a bath before I settle you on the couch?”
Gabe shook his head, his shoulders trembling.
Jess reached to touch him but thought better of it. Instead, she stood to shake out the fitted sheet. But when she went to slip it over the cushions, something stopped her. The corner of the couch, the place that she had claimed as her own, was not as it should be. A gray throw pillow, the one with the plush lambswool cover, was on the floor, partially hidden beneath the coffee table. She had been clutching it against her stomach only hours before, hadn’t she? Between the arm of the couch and her body? She had left it crumpled there, against the whorl of the elaborate stitching—she was sure of it.
Something dangerous, mercurial rippled through the air. Her house felt different. Jess spun a slow circle, taking in everything from the clock on the mantel to the heavy curtains that were still drawn over the tall windows flanking her front door. Everything was as it should be, except that it wasn’t.
The hang of one of the curtains was off; it was caught on a lip in the hardwood floor, tented forward as if someone had peeled it back to look at the driveway. Jess hadn’t done that. And the picture beside the half wall that bordered the staircase was crooked. Just a bit. Not enough to make her blame Max and his broad, oblivious shoulders. He routinely bumped into her and kept right on walking as if he didn’t register the contact. She wondered if he even noticed.