by Carrie Smith
He had examined that night in his mind from every conceivable angle, and he recognized now what he hadn’t known then—that he had made a fatal mistake when he had followed her out of the bar. She had left because she was as terrified of her feelings as he had been of his. She had not been ready to face them, and he should have let her escape. He should have waited for her to come back to him—because whether or not she ever had, at least they would still be friends today.
He had been too drunk for that kind of wisdom. Instead, he had caught up with her outside, turned her around, pressed his hand into the small of her back, and pulled her close, expecting her to relax in his arms. She hadn’t relaxed. She’d said, “What the fuck are you doing?” and tried to push him off, but he had held her even tighter.
You couldn’t hold on to someone like Codella. She had to choose you, and in that moment, she hadn’t. And was that so surprising? He could only imagine how bad he must have smelled and tasted as he’d tried to kiss her. He still didn’t know how long he’d pressed himself against her, murmuring whatever it was he’d said about his feelings until Reilly and Portino had come out of the bar and pulled him off her and told him to go home. The rest was history. Two weeks later she’d accepted the Manhattan North homicide post and two months after that she was in the hospital, and now their seven-year partnership seemed like a distant memory of better times.
He opened his eyes and let the pounding between his temples obscure her image in his mind. “What the fuck!” he mumbled.
Chapter 6
Marva Thomas led the detectives into Hector Sanchez’s office. “I’ll send in Delia Rivera, and I’ll be next door if you need me,” she said in her most professional voice. Then she retreated.
“Your mother just called,” Janisa told her as she passed the front desk toward her own small office. “I put her through to your voice mail.”
“Thanks,” Thomas said grudgingly. Despite Janisa’s earlier protests, Marva was still convinced the receptionist had failed to line up a substitute for Roz Porter’s second grade, and she wasn’t about to forget it. If Hector weren’t dead, he would have skewered her for the lack of coverage. She would have gotten an F for the day on his infamous grading scale. She shut her office door and whispered a perfunctory prayer for his soul. Then she concentrated on the fact that two NYPD detectives were sitting on the other side of the wall to her right, but the red message light on her phone kept blinking as if to say, Notice me.
She listened to the succinct message in a voice exacting and oppressive. “I can’t get myself to the bathroom. I’m shutting down.” She heard the unstated command. Come home. Take care of me. You exist for me. Don’t keep me waiting.
She dialed.
“How soon will you be here?”
“I’m still in my office.”
“Didn’t you get my message?” Her mother’s irritation was palpable.
“Yes, Ma. Just now.”
“Well, what’s taking you so long?”
“I’ve got a crisis. I can’t come home right now.”
“What kind of crisis could you have?”
In a clinical way, Marva registered her mother’s absolute narcissism. Her eyes found the Post-it note taped to her computer and she quickly read the verse from Ephesians. She stared at the word compassionate. She did not feel compassionate. “I’ll call Carla for you,” she said calmly.
“No!” came the impatient reply.
“Why not?” But she already knew the answer.
“She’s busy. She’s got the boys. You know that.”
The silent insult roared in Marva’s ear—your sister’s obligations, her whole existence, are more important than yours—and Marva wanted to crush the receiver under her sensible SAS work shoes. She didn’t respond.
“I’m going to have an accident soon.”
Have one, Marva wanted to say. Just not on my couch. She breathed deeply and tried to resurrect the calm she’d felt two mornings ago during the 10:00 AM service at St. Michael’s when the choir had sung “Abide in Me” as she had stared at the vibrant Tiffany stained glass behind the altar. Something in the hymn’s melody always released her deep sadness and made her cry and left her feeling serene and purified. Now she was able to keep the anger out of her voice when she said, “Then I’ll call Mrs. Sucek to come and help you.”
“I don’t like it when she comes over. She always looks so put upon.”
Marva closed her eyes and counted to ten. She had ceased to feel true Christian empathy toward her mother long ago. She only felt obligation and resentment. “It’s going to have to be the neighbor if you won’t let me call Carla.” She waited. Her mother waited. Marva was not going to break the silent standoff this time.
“Okay,” her mother finally conceded. “Call the neighbor.” Then she hung up on Marva.
Marva called Mrs. Sucek, the building super’s wife. Then she replaced the phone in its cradle and let out a deep sigh. She felt suddenly bilious and bloated, as if she’d been slammed by a killer period. She pushed out her chair and lowered her head. She took several deep breaths. Then she picked up the phone again and dialed the district office. “Dr. Barton, please. Right away.”
“She’s busy,” said Karen Babb, Barton’s new receptionist. Apparently Babb was quickly learning that the best way to keep her job was to shield her boss from as many callers as possible.
“You have to interrupt her, Karen. This is Marva Thomas at 777. She needs to take this call.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
A minute later, Barton was on the line. “What is it, Marva?”
“It’s Hector. He’s dead. He was murdered. Two detectives are here right now. They just found his body.”
“At the school?” Barton’s digitized panic was deafening through the receiver.
“No, no, no. At his apartment.”
“Oh, thank God for that.” Barton sighed, and Thomas guessed what the administrator was thinking: A principal murdered at home was bad enough. A principal murdered on school premises was an absolute disaster. “Do they know who did it?”
“Not yet. They’re posting security in front of the school. They say it’s just precautionary, but who knows.” Thomas steadied her voice. She wanted to blurt out, What should I do? She wanted to say, I’m not ready for this. In the silence, she heard Barton’s deep intake of breath and she imagined what the superintendent was thinking. Marva’s not cut out to lead. Marva was never cut out to lead. And maybe she wasn’t. Her hands were shaking slightly. She felt as if hundreds of taut rubber bands were wrapped around her chest. So many things would have to be done today beyond the normal routine, and she was already overwhelmed. Teachers would have to be informed. Children would find out. They would cry. They’d be frightened. They’d want their parents. The parents would panic. What should she do first?
Barton’s voice startled her to attention. “Listen to me, Marva. As of right now, you’re in charge over there. You’re the acting principal. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” said Thomas. “Of course.”
“I know you weren’t happy last year when I chose Hector over you, but forget about that. It’s water under the bridge. For now, you have the top spot, and six hundred children will be looking to you for answers, for stability, for reassurance.”
“I know.” Marva stared at the blue, green, and pink pixels of her mesmerizing screen saver.
“This is a shock for us all, but you need to let the teachers, the students, and the parents know that the school is going to be all right. A terrible tragedy has occurred, but they are not leaderless.”
“How?” The word escaped her lips before she could censor it.
“You have to get in front of this crisis, Marva. You have to let your troops know that you’re not afraid. You need to take charge. You can do that, can’t you?”
Every muscle and sinew in Marva’s body wanted to cry out no, but she forced herself to say, “I think so.”
“You think so?
”
“I know so. I can do it,” Thomas said with a little more energy as Janisa opened her office door and stuck a phone message slip on her desk with the message, Call your mother back ASAP.
“Look,” Barton said in a gentler voice, “we’re going to do this together.” It struck Marva that now the administrator sounded like an air traffic controller talking a novice private pilot through an emergency Airbus jetliner landing. “Don’t panic. I’m going to get you the support you need right away. As soon as we hang up, I’ll call Tweed. We’ll get the communications liaison involved. There’ll be lots of press on this. Thanks to Hector’s little Proud Families campaign, everyone who rides the buses and subways has 777 on the brain. But forget about that. You just worry about the teachers and the children. I’ll worry about the press.”
“How should we break it to the children?”
“We have procedures for everything, Marva.” Barton sounded so nurturing now that Marva guessed her goose was cooked as far as school administration in District 124. Barton was never nice without a motive. She was demanding, egotistical, and mercilessly honest. Marva still remembered how her interview for the PS 777 principal slot had ended. Barton had stood dismissively after twenty minutes and announced, “You’re not tough enough, Marva. You’re not even close to tough enough to lead that school.” Now, she imagined, Barton was only being kind to her out of self-preservation. “I’ll have grief counselors over there within the hour.”
“Okay,” said Thomas numbly.
“And I’ll send Ellie Friedman over, too. She can help you set up assemblies and break the news. You’re going to be swamped.” Marva knew what that meant. Friedman would play principal until a suitable replacement could be found.
As soon as Marva hung up, she buried her head in her hands. She had wanted the top spot so badly—she had wanted it every day she’d walked past Hector’s door into her own little closet of an office—but now that she possessed the title, now that she had this chance to show her strength under fire, she realized she didn’t have any strength. She didn’t have what it took to “get in front of” anything, let alone a crisis like this. She was no leader. She would never be a leader. She stared at the message Call your mother again ASAP on the pink message slip. She had been raised to live in the shadow of people stronger than herself. Even her mother, with advanced Parkinson’s disease, was stronger than she was.
Marva took a deep breath. She felt completely alone. But then she remembered Sofia Reyes. Kind, confident Sofia Reyes, who she had never gone out of her way to support. Sofia would know exactly how to take charge of this situation. Sofia wouldn’t judge her. Sofia could guide her through. Sofia could help her keep face. She picked up her phone and called Sofia instead of calling her mother.
Chapter 7
Codella stared at the dead principal’s desk close to the wall facing the door. The desktop was neat. The message light on his phone was blinking. The Dell computer on the right side was at least five years old. She powered it on, but a login screen requesting a user ID and password blocked her progress just as Safety Officer Rivera stepped through the door. Rivera was short and overweight but sturdy in a way that made Codella wonder if she might have pitched for a high school softball team years ago.
“I’m Detective Codella and this is Detective Ragavan. We’re here because your school’s principal was murdered last night.”
“Mr. Sanchez? Oh my God.” The officer sat down. “Who did it?”
“Did you know him well?”
“Not really. Where did it happen? Who found him?”
“There was an incident here yesterday. A student was attacked. I’d like to hear about that.”
“You think it’s related?”
“I think you’ll be most helpful to us if you just answer our questions,” said Codella.
Rivera got the message. “It happened about one o’clock. I was sitting at my desk. All of a sudden, I hear a scream from the boy’s room, so I get up and go check it out, and he’s sitting on the floor in one of the stalls.”
“John Chambers?”
The officer nodded. “He was all wet from toilet water. He didn’t look hurt, but he was crying and rambling. I got him on his feet and walked him out of the bathroom. I walked him straight to the nurse—Brenda Sparks. He was—how do you call it when you’re breathing too fast?”
“Hyperventilating.”
“So Brenda, she got a brown paper lunch bag and told him to breathe into it. But then his nose started bleeding—it gushed all over the bag and his T-shirt—so she got an ice pack and made him lie down, but he didn’t want to stay still. He was kicking and screaming and saying, ‘My skin, my skin,’ over and over. ‘My skin. My skin is burning.’ I went upstairs for Miss Thomas, and on the way back, we ran into Miss Bernstein. She was looking for him. We all went to the nurse’s office, and John was still screaming about his skin, and Miss Thomas was telling Brenda she better call an ambulance, but Miss Bernstein, she took over. She grabbed John’s arm and said, ‘Let’s wash those hands.’ Brenda tried to stop her because his nose was still gushing, but Miss Bernstein did it anyway, and then he calmed right down.”
“Miss Bernstein is his teacher?”
“That’s right. Jenny Bernstein.”
“Then what happened?”
“Miss Thomas went back to the office to call John’s mother, and while she was gone, John told us who attacked him. A fifth grader, Miguel Espina. You don’t think he did it, do you?”
“What happened next?”
“I went to look for Miguel. First I went to his classroom, but he wasn’t there, and Mr. Bosco had no idea where he was. In fact, Mr. Bosco was sleeping at his desk when I came in. I had to wake him up.”
Like every media consumer in New York City, Codella had read and watched her share of exposés about incompetent New York public school teachers, but she found this a little hard to fathom. “He was sleeping? In front of a class full of kids?”
“That’s right. He swears he wasn’t, but I saw it plain as day. Why should I lie? I had to shake his shoulder twice before he opened his eyes. I can tell when somebody’s sleeping, and if you ask me, you can’t blame Mr. Sanchez for suspending him.”
“Mr. Sanchez suspended this teacher yesterday?”
Rivera nodded.
“Where did you find Miguel?”
“I didn’t. Milosz did—Mr. Jancek, the head custodian. He and Mr. Rerecic searched downstairs while I looked upstairs. They found him hiding in the school auditorium.”
“Mr. Rerecic is a custodian, too?”
“Maintenance worker.”
Codella typed these names into her iPhone, guessing at the spellings. She typed in Brenda Sparks’s name, too. “Then what?”
“I took Miguel to the office.”
“Mr. Sanchez had arrived?”
“Not yet. But John was already there with Miss Thomas, and he told us the whole story. Then I took Miguel into the hall and wrote up what happened while we waited for Mr. Sanchez and the parents to get there. I was still with Miguel when John’s mother arrived. John rushed out to her, and he was talking a mile a minute and blinking and pulling at his hair, and she told Ms. Thomas she had to get him home right away to take his medication.”
“When did Sanchez get there?”
“A few minutes later. Maybe one forty-five. And Miguel’s mother got there pretty soon after that.”
Codella noted these times in her iPhone. “What happened next?”
“First Mr. Sanchez talked to Ms. Thomas in his office. Then he talked to Miguel’s mother. Then he talked to Miguel alone for a long time.”
“Did you see anyone else?”
“Lots of people were in and out. It was crazy.”
“When did Miguel and his mother leave?”
“Just after three.”
“And Sanchez?”
“He walked past me around three thirty and left the building.”
Codella nodded. “I appreciate y
our help, Officer. I wonder if you could show Detective Ragavan around the school. He’s going to be stationed here to help with our investigation. He needs to get familiar with the layout.”
When Rivera and Ragavan were gone, Codella peered out the door and caught Janisa’s eye. The young woman was wearing a short tight skirt and three-inch heels. Her long, thick hair was ponytailed and resting on her right shoulder. She met Codella’s eyes. “I couldn’t help but overhear things. It’s terrible. Really terrible,” she said.
“Were you here yesterday afternoon?”
“Until two o’clock. My filling fell out last Thursday, and I went to get it fixed. They say the city is safer than ever, but when something like this happens, you wonder, is it really?”
Codella had no intention to debate crime statistics. “What was happening here just before you left?”
Janisa clicked her gum. “Mrs. Chambers had left. Mr. Sanchez got back from the meeting, and he and Ms. Thomas went into his office and shut the door. They were in there when I left.”
“Do you know what they were they talking about?”
“Not really.” Her eyes darted to the cork bulletin board above the bench.
Codella followed her eyes to the posted school announcements. “What is it?”
Janisa pointed. “That sign-up sheet for iAchieve. Ms. Thomas posted it yesterday morning, and when Mr. Sanchez got here and saw it, he ripped it off, and that’s when he called her into his office.”
“Did he strike you as angry?”
She nodded.
“About the sign-up sheet?”
“It seemed that way.”
“What made it seem that way?”