Dying Memories

by Dave Zeltserman

  “Maybe so, but he was still delusional about who he blamed. And supposedly they’re both sane outside of their one delusions.”

  “I don’t buy that for one second,” Jack said, smiling derisively. “I’d bet anything if you spent ten minutes with them you’d find them both batty as all hell.”

  “That might be true, but this is going to make damn good copy even if it’s all bullshit. And more important, I had the feeling that Roberson was offering a trade. We write about this and he’ll try harder to let me meet his client.”

  “Then do what you have to to make that happen.”

  Jack had already tuned him out as he turned back to stare fixedly at whatever it was that was on his computer screen. Bill returned to his desk where he made a few phone calls, finding out that Trey Megeet had been sent to MCI Cedar Junction in Walpole. A few more phone calls and he was able to put a request in to visit Megeet. He had no idea if Megeet would accept the visit, but at least he’d give it a try.

  His phone rang. It was Emily calling to say hi, and to thank him again for the coffee and éclair. While he shot the breeze with her an email came in with the subject ‘about your meeting today’. He opened it up. The message was short, simply saying:

  You’re treading in dangerous waters. Be careful. –yer pal, G.

  Chapter 12

  A chill ran through Bill as he stared at his latest cryptic email message. As with his earlier email from his new good pal, G, the field showing where the email came from was blank. Was the message referring to his meeting with Roberson? And if it was, how the fuck could this G have known about it? The email absorbed him to the point where he forgot he was on the phone with Emily, and he muttered part of his last thought out loud.

  “What was that?” Emily asked, confused.

  Hearing Emily’s voice brought Bill back. “I’m sorry, nothing,” he said with a sheepish grin.

  “Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

  “I promise, nothing’s wrong. A crank email, that’s all. I’m looking forward to seeing you tonight.”

  “You sounded so strange,” she said.

  “I was distracted, that’s all.”

  Emily hesitated for a long moment before asking if Bill was really going to be leaving work early.

  “Damn straight,” he said. “I made reservations for seven, and nothing’s going to make me miss it.”

  “It will be nice seeing you this early for a change,” Emily said, a playful edge to her voice. “Think about all that extra time we’re going to have later tonight. Who knows, we might even get a decent night’s sleep!”

  “Don’t bet on it!”

  That got her laughing which raised his own spirits. Still, after he got off the phone he stared at the email message from G for a solid minute before forwarding it to the Tribune’s computer guy, hoping that this time Phillips would have better luck figuring out where it came from. Bill considered letting Jack know about the email and its implication, but decided to keep it to himself for the time being. He didn’t want to do anything to discourage this G from sending him future emails. Still, though, it unnerved him, and he couldn’t stop thinking about it.

  While he waited for the research on Trey Megeet, Chuck Boxer called fishing to see whether Bill had anything new. Both of them danced around each other; Boxer trying to figure out if the Tribune had anything more on Hawes’s background, while Bill tried to get the Boston city detective to divulge what he knew about Hawes’s emotional state. In the end neither of them said anything useful to the other.

  The research on Trey Megeet arrived shortly before noon. There wasn’t much, and there wasn’t anything that Bill didn’t already know. He was about to run out for a sandwich when his phone rang. It was Trey Megeet calling from prison. Megeet’s voice had a thin hollow quality to it, as if there wasn’t much to him. Bill had the photo of him that the Tribune ran when he was arrested. Emaciated, grizzled, a death stare locked in his eyes. The photo pretty much matched the way he sounded. Megeet wanted to know why Bill wanted to see him, and Bill gave him a bullshit reason involving getting Megeet’s story out to the world, but that seemed enough for him. After a short hesitation, Megeet told Bill he could visit him that day at three o’clock.

  Chapter 13

  Trey Megeet had gained weight since his arrest and imprisonment. Thicker in his face and body, there was a grayness about him, a dullness—both in his hair that was cut close to his scalp and in his skin—and that made him seem decades older than his forty-two years.

  “It cost me ninety cents to call you,” Megeet said in that same thin hollow voice Bill had heard earlier over the phone. “That’s money I needed to spend elsewhere.”

  There was a Plexiglas partition separating the two men. “How do I pay you back?” Bill asked.

  “You can deposit the money into my commissary account.”

  “I’ll do that.”

  Trey Megeet grunted, satisfied. His eyes were fixed on Bill, nearly unblinking. There was a deadness to them that was unsettling.

  “You’ve got ten minutes before they take me out of here,” Megeet said. “Go ahead, ask your questions.”

  “Why did you stab Tim Zhang to death?”

  Flatly, with no change of inflection to his voice, “Because he murdered my wife. Charlaine was all that mattered to me in life. A beautiful, lovely woman, and that man ran her down in the street worse than if she were a dog. I had to do what I did. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself otherwise.”

  “How do you know Zhang was responsible?”

  “How do you think I knew? Because I saw him do it, that’s how.”

  Bill checked his notes. There was still no emotion in the convicted murderer, not in his face or his voice. “According to court documents you were at work when your wife was killed,” he said.

  “That’s not true. I was there.”

  “You didn’t tell the police that at the time.”

  “I must’ve gone into shock when Charlaine was killed,” Megeet said. “Somehow I must’ve ended up back at work, that’s why people remembered seeing me in the office around that time. But I remember that moment as if it just happened. I saw that man’s face right before he hit Charlaine. I remember that car tearing into my wife. And I remember it leaving her body broken and torn in the road. I don’t care what anyone says. I know I was there.”

  “Why’d you leave your wife’s body and go back to work?”

  A flicker of confusion showed in Megeet’s eyes before they fell dead again. His mouth compressed into a tight circle as agitation began to show on his face and in his demeanor, and for the first time his eyes showed a glint of life.

  “Like I said before,” Megeet argued stubbornly, “I must’ve gone into shock. I think that has to be understandable.”

  “You became homeless after that happened.”

  “Yeah, I did. I couldn’t go to work afterwards. I started drinking. Not as much as they said, not like I was an alcoholic but I was drinking, and yeah, I ended up on the streets.”

  “For three and a half years.”

  Megeet didn’t bother responding to that. Bill could see his agitation increasing.

  “You were doing drugs also.”

  “That’s not true. I never did any drugs. I might’ve been emptying bottles of cheap wine, but I never touched any drugs.”

  Bill went back to his notes. “The reports were that you were an alcoholic and drug abuser at the time you stabbed Zhang to death.”

  Megeet waved his hand in the air as if he were trying to shoo away an angry fly. “Those reports were bullshit,” he insisted. “I was never an alcoholic and I wasn’t addling my brains with drugs either. The police said that about me being on drugs because they found a fresh needle mark on my arm when I was arrested, but it wasn’t because I shot myself up with any narcotic. My memory’s real. I’m not crazy like my lawyer wanted to claim I was, and I didn’t imagine what I saw because of heroin or anything else.”

  “
Why’d you have that needle mark?”

  He swiped several more times at the same imaginary buzzing fly. “I was sleeping under an overpass back then. It was November. Maybe some do-gooder went around giving us flu shots while we slept. It had to be something like that. But whatever it was I don’t remember it.”

  A guard called out to let Megeet know that his time was up. Megeet looked over his shoulder at him, then anxiously back to Bill.

  “Don’t forget about that ninety cents,” he said. Bill nodded, and watched as he was taken away. He ended up depositing forty-seven dollars into Megeet’s account. He might’ve left him more but that was all he had in his wallet and they didn’t take credit cards, just cash. He felt sorry for the man. No matter what evidence was presented to the contrary Megeet was going to stubbornly hold onto the belief that his act was one of justice and not madness.

  It wasn’t possible for Megeet to have been with his wife when she was killed. Bill had been able to call Megeet’s lawyer before he left for Walpole, and the lawyer told him that he had explored that and confirmed that Megeet was at his office at the time of his wife’s death, and according to co-workers, completely devastated when the police arrived to give him the news.

  “I advised him against pleading guilty,” his lawyer had told Bill, “but it wouldn’t have made any difference. I never would have gotten him off under criminal insanity. Not with over twenty witnesses to the attack. He would’ve ended up at Walpole no matter how he pled.”

  “Why’d he pick Zhang?”

  “Who knows? Trey was in pretty rough shape when he was on the streets. Maybe Tim Zhang passed him one day and the memory stuck in his head, and somehow developed into his delusion. The sad truth is this could’ve happened to any of us, and it was only Tim Zhang’s bad luck that it happened to him. But I can tell you Trey wasn’t anywhere near the scene when his wife was run down. And neither was Tim Zhang.”

  “Is he insane?”

  There was a hesitation before Megeet’s lawyer answered. “Criminally, no. Trey fully understood what he was doing. That he convinced himself an innocent man had murdered his wife shows something was off inside his head, but the psychiatrist who evaluated him wouldn’t have helped me in court.”

  Chapter 14

  Up until the moment that his dad breaks his nose for the first time, Bill’s been trying to convince himself that his suspicions are baseless. Of course the cops would think something like that about his dad. It’s their job. But it could’ve been anyone breaking into their apartment that day and murdering his mom. A delivery person, a stranger, anyone, and that he has no right suspecting his own dad. At least that was what he’s been telling himself. As he looks at Frank all that changes.

  “You killed mom,” he says.

  Frank stares blindly at him. “That’s a horrible thing to say to me,” he says at last, his mouth weakening as it exaggerates his hurt. “You’d think something like that of your own father? Don’t you never say anything like that again.”

  Frank starts crying then. A weak, self-pitying cry. If Bill knew for sure that he had killed his mom he would get the butcher knife from the kitchen and stab his dad through the heart right then and there. But he doesn’t know. He is only beginning to admit to himself that his dad might’ve done it, and he is hating himself for doing this. He leaves the room, leaving his dad to cry alone. He stuffs some cotton into his nostrils and waits for the bleeding to stop, then washes the blood from his face. Both eyes are already beginning to blacken and his nose has a bent look. He puts some ice in a plastic bag and lays down on his bed, holding the bag against his nose.

  Later that night his dad comes into his room. He stands over Bill, peering down at him. Bill ignores him. He isn’t going to give him any satisfaction.

  “It doesn’t look that bad,” Frank mutters, his voice slurred by the alcohol he’s been drinking. “It gives you some character. Ain’t worth going to the hospital over. Just lie still.”

  His dad puts his two thick hands against Bill’s nose and forces the cartilage so it’s mostly straight again. Bill wants to scream out in pain, but clenches his teeth tight to stay quiet. Frank takes the plastic bag from him that is now mostly filled with water. “I’ll get you more ice,” he mumbles. “You just stay where you are.”

  Over the next two years Bill maintains an uneasy truce with his dad where they mostly keep out of each others way. There are times when Bill finds himself so filled with rage that he feels like he’s suffocating in it, the pressure so tight in his chest that he can barely breathe. But no matter how much he suspects his dad, he just doesn’t know for sure. His dad is drinking more heavily now, the effects showing in his jaundiced eyes and his red nose that has grown thicker as it shows more ruined veins, but as much as Bill tries he can’t read the truth from his dad’s face. Over time it gets even harder with Frank spending more evenings out of the apartment or locked away in his room.

  One afternoon Bill calls one of the cops who investigated his mom’s murder. Detective Lou Massay, the thin, stiff one. Massay sounds apologetic as he explains that they had to drop the investigation because of lack of evidence. “We never found any witnesses,” he says. “No one saw anyone entering or leaving the apartment near when your mom was killed. I’m sorry, son.”

  “You never had any suspects?” Bill asks.

  Massay hesitates before saying that they didn’t. “We never had enough to charge anyone,” he explains.

  “But you thought it might’ve been my dad?”

  “He was on a job at the time,” Massay says.

  Bill knows about that also. His dad was installing a new water tank for an apartment building when the murder happened. But his dad could’ve slipped away from the job without anyone noticing. The building was only a few blocks from their apartment. He knows the cops must’ve thought that also. After a long pause, Massay asked, “Your dad say anything?”

  “No.”

  Another long pause, then, “I’m sorry, son. I wish there was more I could tell you.”

  It is on the two year anniversary of his mom’s death that Frank sits in his chair with a six pack of Bud at his side. Bill sits on the sofa watching him. As he stares at his dad, he feels the pressure of his rage squeezing his insides so tight he can barely stand it.

  “How come you don’t care who killed mom?” Bill demands, which is one of the few times he has spoken to his dad in over a year. Frank looks over at Bill, his eyes bewildered as if he can’t make sense of what his son is asking.

  “You never call the police to find out what’s going on,” Bill goes on. “Why is that?”

  “Who says I never call them?”

  “I called Detective Massay. He told me you’ve never called them.”

  “You had no right doing that.” Belligerence shines brightly in Frank’s eyes as he glares at Bill. He starts to push himself out of his chair, but then settles himself back down. “Just ’cause I don’t waste their time with calls don’t mean I don’t care,” he mutters under his breath. “They find something, they’ll let us know.”

  Bill sits breathing hard as he stares at his dad. Then everything goes hazy and he starts yelling things that he has no control over. It’s as if his voice is coming from outside his body, as if everything is distorted like from a bad dream. Through the haze he can see the shocked expression on his dad’s face. Then the muddled fury as his dad rises to his feet. He hardly feels it as his dad hauls off and punches him in the face, breaking his nose for the second time, nor all the other punches that rain down on him as he lays prone on the floor. Then blackness comes, and he doesn’t feel or see or hear anything.

  Chapter 15

  It was a quarter past four when Bill left the prison. He wasn’t going back to the Tribune. They had filler on the victim, Kent Forster, all set to run, and besides, he wanted to take a shower and change into some clean clothes before he saw Emily again. He decided discretion was the better part of valor, and turned off his cell phone in case Jack tried
calling.

  When he arrived at his apartment he stripped off his clothes and stood under the hot shower for almost a half hour, his mind drifting as he thought about Emily and how easy things were with her. Even with what had happened to her when she was younger, she was able to be so positive with every aspect of her life, and it was a quality Bill strongly admired.

  After toweling off, Bill found a clean tee shirt and pair of jeans to put on. He just couldn’t keep from smiling as he thought about how ridiculously low maintenance Emily was, especially compared to Karen. There was no way Karen would ever had gone out in public with her hair in a ponytail or without any make up on. His smile tightened as he tried to imagine Karen wearing the same jeans and grungy sweatshirt in a restaurant that Emily had worn that first night he met her. That never would’ve happened, not at least until hell froze over.

  He had lived with Karen for three years, and every morning she had to spend an hour getting her hair and make up perfect. A golden-haired beauty who, except for being shortchanged by a few inches in height, would’ve made it as a fashion model, and that was a disappointment she never quite got over. Most of the time Bill thought they were happy together, but there was an underlying dissatisfaction about her. Usually she’d try to hide it from him, and a good part of the time she seemed to genuinely care for him, but in the end she told him she wanted more out of life. More than a low rent apartment in Medford, more than weekend trips to Maine and Vermont, and much more than what he was able to give her on his salary.

  “”I’m sorry, Bill,” she had told him, “but you must’ve known this day was coming.”

  He didn’t say anything, just watched as she left. A few days later he heard that she had moved in with her new boyfriend, the founder of a dot com startup who had enough sense to cash out before the bubble burst and owned a multi-million dollar townhouse on Boston’s waterfront.