You Say Goodbye

by Keith Steinbaum

  “You never saw him come over?”

  “She’d have them at night when I was performing somewhere and wouldn’t be home until late, so I wouldn’t know for sure. But like I said, it’s likely he was there.”

  “When you describe this other man as his partner, are you talking business or love life?”

  “Merissa told me that Elliot’s gay, so I’m assuming the guy’s his partner. I remember him from a couple of fund-raisers I performed at. They arrived together, sat together, walked around together, et cetera, et cetera.”

  “Do you know anything about him?”

  “No, nothing,” Sean answered. “I was introduced to him after the service, but I don’t even remember his name.”

  “You said you’re assuming they’re partners, so you don’t know for sure?”

  Sean stared at the photo again, observing the shoulder-to-shoulder togetherness of the two men and the concerned expression on the partner’s face as he looked at Elliot, dabbing his eye with a handkerchief. Crossing his arms, he squirmed and shook his head. “It’s hard enough getting me to believe that anyone at Merissa’s service, people we know, could have done this,” Sean said. Turning away to cough several times, he continued. “Now you’re asking me to think that a couple of gay guys are suspects? Can I see the next one, please?”

  Writing the word gay on the back of the picture, Maldonado included a question mark before moving on to the fourth photo--a gray-haired man in a dark suit, walking away from the others with his arm around a woman.

  “That’s Tom Claiborne, our general manager,” Sean said, “with his wife, Arleen.”

  “What kind of relationship did he have with Ms. Franklin?”

  “Not much to speak of. Tom’s a nice enough guy, but he’s all business when it comes to his employees. He was friendly with Merissa, but never more than that.”

  “Never went to her place?”

  “Not that I know. If he had, I’m sure Merissa would have mentioned it to me.”

  “She worked there before you, so it’s possible, right?”

  Sean shrugged his shoulders and nodded. “I suppose, but I don’t see any reason for it.”

  Maldonado marked the back of the photo with a check before moving on to the next picture.

  Three men and two women stood in a group.

  “They’re all from Merissa’s department at work,” Sean explained. “I only know one of the men’s full name--Hank Sendowski. He’s the one on the right. Travis is standing between the two women, and Arnie’s on the left. They were all friendly with her but only in a co-worker kind of way. I doubt any of them were ever at Merissa’s place.”

  “But you’re not sure?”

  “No, I’m not sure.”

  Maldonado’s next photo showed his friend, Adam, standing with his wife, Eleanor, holding what appeared to be a Bible cradled in her arms. Eleanor’s reputation as a Jesus-spouting human megaphone made her someone to avoid at every holiday party.

  “That’s Adam McBride,” Sean said. “He’s one of our car salesmen. We all call him Saint Adam because he’s a religiously conservative, play-by-the-rules type. Definitely too prim and proper for my taste, but a good guy. Merissa always called him ‘sweetie,’ which he seemed to like. I know he’s one of the guys Merissa invited for her poker nights, so I guess you can go ahead and put another check on the back.”

  Maldonado looked at Sean with a smirk. “I see you’re catching on,” he said, checking off the photo before moving on to the next one. Two men stood together, one with his arm around the other in an apparent attempt at comfort. Sean felt particularly saddened by the captured scene.

  “The man who’s crying was Merissa’s hairdresser, Dino. I go to him, too. He’s on a leave of absence right now because of what happened.” Sean paused, swallowed hard, and waited to regain his composure. “Dino really loved Merissa. He must have told me a hundred times how lucky I was to have her.” Grasping his cup, Sean took a few moments to stare at the black liquid before taking a sip. Directing his gaze upward, he kept the coffee in his mouth for several moments before drawing a deep breath and continuing. “The other man is Dino’s partner...his boyfriend, Leander. They also played poker at Merissa’s, but just like Elliot and his partner, these two don’t count.”

  “Let me be the judge of that, okay?” Maldonado replied, keeping the photo front and center. “Do you know if Dino or Leander ever went to Ms. Franklin’s place?”

  “I have no idea. But one thing I’m sure of is that if you ever met Dino, you’d cross him off your suspect list real fast. Let’s just leave it at that.”

  Turning the picture over, Maldonado wrote the word gay before adding it with the other suspects already discussed. “I’m not ruling anybody out right now,” he told him.

  Sean brought the cup within several inches of his face and stared ahead, rubbing his forehead with his fingertips. His brain felt like the cerebral equivalent of a punctured tire, flattened and impossible to revive.

  Maldonado grasped the last two unseen photos simultaneously, raising them to eye level. “Just some group photos taken when the service ended,” he said. “It’s an opportune time to take these shots, when people converse afterward. There’s one more new face, the guy with his arm around the tall redhead. Do you know him?”

  “That’s Roger Peterson,” he told him, “another one of our salesman. He and Merissa were real friendly with each other from the time I first met them. I actually thought they had a thing going, even though Roger was married.” Sean stared in compassion at Anita Peterson, a woman he’d known from his schooldays, when she hung out with his sister, Rebecca. Anita was always funny and cool, but she’d landed in an unhappy marriage. “Roger’s one of the guys who bowls with us, so there’s another one for you.”

  “Were you ever at Ms. Franklin’s home during the card games?” Maldonado asked.

  “Like those meetings for the guidance center where she volunteered, Merissa used to invite people over to play poker when she knew I’d be home late from a gig,” he explained. “By the time I’d come back, they were pretty much done.”

  Maldonado reached over and set the pictures on top of the others. “That’s it for the men at the service,” he said. “Can you recall any other person we may have missed? Maybe some others from those poker games?”

  Sean mulled the question, plopping his elbows on the table, his chin on top of clenched fists. He recalled just a few card games played in the time they dated, so remembering men other than Adam, Roger, Dino, and Leander didn’t seem a difficult task.

  “No, I don’t believe so,” Sean replied. “Merissa also invited some of her girlfriends, but they always came alone.” Sean glanced at the top photo on the pile, a group shot of Elliot and his partner standing with Roger and Anita. As his eyes targeted Roger, he slowly shook his head.

  “Why the face?” Maldonado asked, looking at the photo.

  “Roger and his wife were separated for a while but they’re back together again,” he told him. “Let’s just say it’s more than his eyes that wander. I think he came to those card games more intent on getting laid than playing poker.” Sean shook his head again, exhaling for an extended period as if blowing out smoke. “But that’s irrelevant to what we’re talking about here.”

  “Maybe,” Maldonado said. “Was everyone still there when you got back?”

  “Depends how late it was,” Sean replied, eyeing the detective. “Why?”

  “Simple reasoning,” Maldonado said. “If you’re one of the last to leave, that means you’re in no rush to go. And if you’re a man, that probably means good looking women, plentiful liquor, and/or tasty food. Merissa may have been your girlfriend, but that kind of thing wouldn’t stop a lot of guys from planning for the future in case things headed south.”

  Sean nodded, his eyes glazed over from the overwhelming possibilities. And two other photos still remained on the table.

  “You got some others there?” he asked.

 
; Maldonado reached over and grabbed them in one hand, spread like playing cards. One of the photos showed Elliot, his partner, Roger, Anita, and two women Sean didn’t recognize in a semicircle around Dino and Leander, with one of the women’s hands placed behind Dino’s neck. The other one included Roger and Anita again, his arm draped around her shoulder, standing and apparently conversing with Adam, Eleanor, Hank, and Carlos.

  “These are a couple of group shots, but nobody we haven’t covered already, as you can see.”

  Sean placed his hands together as if to pray before letting his fingers slide between each and dropping his forehead to rest on them. The entire experience with Detective Maldonado salted his unhealed wound, leaving him glum and heavy-hearted. The revelation that the man who’d raped and killed Merissa might be someone he knew left him unable to think straight.

  “You okay, Sean?”

  “No,” Sean answered, his voice close to a whisper. “Why should I be?”

  Maldonado kept silent and stationary before leaning forward in his chair. “We need your help,” he said. “It’s something you’re in the best position to do for us.”

  Sean remained in the same head-on-hands position as he spoke.

  “I’m listening,” he said.

  “We want to find out what the people in these photos were doing the night of Ms. Franklin’s murder. Where were they? Who were they with? But the last thing we want them to think is that we suspect them, and that’s what’ll happen if I’m the one asking those questions. If one of the men is really The Beatles’ Song Murderer, and they realize there’s a chance of being discovered, they’ll work extra hard to keep from being caught.” Maldonado placed his hand on Sean’s shoulder. “Do you see where I’m heading with this?”

  Sean inhaled until his lungs reached full capacity, exhaling in a slow, meditative manner. Now he saw the big picture. “You want me to ask them for you,” he said, facing the detective as his stomach churned in anguish. “You want me to somehow bring up a night nobody wants to talk about, especially me. And not just once, but with each of them?” Sean shook his head and stared at the blank wall across the room, his tears threatening to overwhelm his eyelid dams. “And when you get your answers, you’ll be through with me, right? Then you’ll wish me luck and send this fucked-up man on his way, hoping he doesn’t try to head-butt a speeding car.”

  Maldonado reached out and clamped an unyielding grip on Sean’s forearm. “I have no intention of using you like a roll of goddamn toilet paper,” he said, his scolding expression matching his harsh tone. “Dealing with tragedies is part of my job, but that doesn’t mean I’ve grown callous to the people affected by them.” He narrowed his eyes and reviewed the photographs of the possible suspects. “There’s only one thing we can do to put this nightmare behind us, and that’s finding the bastard who killed Ms. Franklin.”

  Sean wiped the tears away as he listened to Maldonado. Like people who dealt with the loss of a limb, he’d learn to face life despite the hardship, but he couldn’t live with himself if the echoes of her cries grew faint and went unheeded. He still couldn’t believe, wouldn’t believe, that anyone he knew was The Beatles’ Song Murderer, but doing something to help, anything, offered him a chance at purging the unrelenting sense of helplessness that continued to overwhelm him.

  Sean rubbed his face in his hands, sat up, and looked into Maldonado’s eyes. “You keep referring to Merissa as Ms. Franklin,” he said. “She was Merissa, all right? Ms. Franklin wasn’t the woman I loved and lost.”

  Maldonado stared back at Sean, unwavering. “That’s exactly right,” he said. “To you, she was and always will be Merissa. But I didn’t know her, did I? And out of respect to her, and to you, I’m not going to call her by her first name, as if we were friends. Do I make myself clear?”

  Sean pondered the response and smiled. “Yes,” he said, “you make yourself clear. And for Merissa’s sake, I’ll do as you ask.”

  Maldonado nodded his head one time and leaned forward to clasp Sean’s shoulder. “Thank you,” he said. “I know what I’m asking you to do is extremely difficult, but if I didn’t feel strongly about this--”

  “Wait!” Sean blurted, turning his head toward the photos. Gathering them in his hand, he studied each one separately, focusing on the people in the background. Seeing the same main characters as the other pictures, or some random girlfriends of Merissa’s, he tossed each one aside until none remained.

  “I take it you didn’t find what you were looking for?” Maldonado asked.

  “You mean, who I was looking for,” Sean replied. “The strange thing is, I wouldn’t even know him if I saw his face.”

  Maldonado furrowed those distinctive sparrow eyebrows into a high, angular arch.

  “What am I missing here?” he asked.

  Glancing at the photos one more time, Sean narrowed his eyes in thought and paused a moment before nodding his head, convinced that one relevant person remained a no-show.

  “You asked me earlier if there was someone else from those poker games we may have missed,” he said. “I forgot about this guy because he only came to the last one.” Sean leaned back and smiled to himself. “It was actually pretty funny. When I came home, Merissa, Roger, and Adam came up to me at the same time, wanting to show me what this guy, Amazing Stan the Magic Man, had taught them.”

  “Amazing Stan the Magic Man, huh?” Maldonado’s lips curled into a tight line, causing most of his mouth to disappear under that bristle-broom mustache. “What was his relationship with Ms. Franklin?”

  Sean leaned over, placing his weight on the right armrest. “I have no idea. He showed up one time, did his thing, and was never mentioned to me again by anybody.”

  “Not even Adam or Roger at work?”

  “Not that I recall,” he answered.

  Maldonado removed a notepad from his coat pocket. “Amazing Stan the Magic Man,” he repeated, writing down the name. Tossing the pad on the table, he leaned back, crossed the fingers from both hands together, and stretched his arms outward. “Looks like we got us another suspect.”

  Chapter 10

  Halfway through a Big Mac and still thinking about the meeting with Detective Maldonado, the sound of his doorbell interrupted Sean’s thoughts. Peering through the peephole, he spotted the purple and gold Lakers cap at the bottom of his viewing angle.

  Kayleigh stood there with a smile on her face and an outstretched hand.

  “You promised!” she told him.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked.

  She flashed a look of disbelief. “My fifty cents, remember?”

  Sean felt a flush of heated embarrassment.

  “Hey, I’m really sorry,” he told her. “I’ll give you a dollar, okay?”

  “Wow! Thanks, Mr. Music.”

  Sean returned from his bedroom with the money and saw Kayleigh staring at his guitar case from the doorway. “Could I hear you play something?” she asked.

  “No,” he replied, handing her the dollar. He realized his tone sounded harsh, his answer rushed. “I’m sorry, Kayleigh,” he said. “I don’t play anymore.”

  She looked surprised. “Why not?”

  “I don’t know,” he lied. “I lost my inspiration, I guess.”

  Kayleigh squinted as she looked at him, her rounded left eye remaining larger than the heavy-lidded right one. After several seconds, her frail shoulders registered the slightest of shrugs as she gazed back toward the closed case.

  “I sure wish I knew how to play.”

  “Take some lessons and learn, like I did,” he told her, anxious to return to his hamburger and privacy.

  “But why won’t you teach me, Mr. Music? I thought we were friends.”

  The prickly heat of exasperation started to creep up the back of Sean’s neck. “We are friends,” he replied, “but that has nothing to do with it.”

  “Please teach me, Mr. Music, pleease?”

  “Look, Kayleigh,” he said, his voice stern and ste
ady, “when somebody tells you no, you have to respect it and accept the answer, okay?”

  “But you could teach me ‘Yellow Submarine,’ and we could”

  “No!” he shouted, leaning down closer to her face. “No ‘Yellow Submarine’! No Beatles! No nothing! Do you understand?”

  The instant he finished talking, Sean regretted his overreaction but couldn’t undo the damage. Kayleigh’s expression shifted from sweet hope to stunning shock. Moments later, her pale, almost transparent flesh contorted into twisted lines of extreme hurt. Hanging her moon-shaped face down toward the ground, she started to weep.

  An unfamiliar voice cried out from the direction of her house.

  “Kayleigh! Kayleigh!”

  “I have to go, Mr. Music.”

  The distraught little girl turned from the doorway and started to walk away, dragging her feet as if she wore leaden shoes. Sean felt like a complete ass, covering his face with his hand and squeezing his temples in frustration. Kayleigh deserved an apology, but a private one seemed out of the question now that someone appeared heading their way.

  He observed an auburn-haired woman with a ponytail, wearing jeans and a red sweater, slow her approach, shoot him an accusatory gaze, and stop in her tracks to stoop to her knees when she reached Kayleigh. Sean hurried out to the two of them.

  “Why did you yell at my niece?” she asked, her brows furrowed and jaw tight.

  “Because I’m an idiot, and I lost my temper,” he told her. Sean walked behind the woman to face the tearful little girl. “I’m really sorry, Kayleigh,” he said. “I acted like a jerk.”

  “I agree,” her aunt replied, staring into his eyes.

  Sean held her gaze for several seconds before responding. “I--I’ve had a rough time of it lately, and I guess Kayleigh caught me at a bad moment. She’s a great kid and we struck up a nice little friendship yesterday at her lemonade stand.” He reached down and offered a gentle squeeze on her shoulder. “Me and my dog.”