by Bob Avey
Elliot took a step forward. “What are you getting at?”
“I’m talking about murder. Terrible thing, especially when it happens in small towns. They were friends of yours, weren’t they? But you didn’t stick around. You got yourself a football scholarship to Oklahoma State and left it all behind. But guess what? It began to happen in Stillwater. Three young girls, if I’m not mistaken. Then, just as they’d started, the killings at the University suddenly stopped. Interestingly enough, that happened right around the time you graduated and moved to Tulsa. And again the killings didn’t stop, they merely changed location. Kind of like you did.”
Elliot wondered why he’d wasted a private part of his life on such a worthless individual. Perhaps he’d thought there was hope for him, but as Beaumont finished his statement, Elliot’s right hand doubled into a fist and rose quickly from its lowered position to connect hard with Beaumont’s chin. He stumbled back and fell to the ground, nearly unconscious but still able to speak. “Keep away from me you psycho freak.”
Beaumont’s words hit home, for Elliot realized Beaumont saw him as others in his world did. What had started out as nothing more than a good poker face had evolved into a better-than-life facade that his peers knew as Kenny Elliot, while the real Elliot stood in the corner and tried to cope with the multitude of fears and anxieties behind the mask. Standing over Beaumont, he said, “Stay out of my affairs, kid. Don’t make me tell you twice.” He left Beaumont lying on the sidewalk. He wasn’t happy about what he’d done, but Beaumont hadn’t left him any choice.
Elliot found his car and began to drive. He had no idea where he was going. A few minutes later, he called Molly. This time she answered. “It’s good to hear your voice,” she said.
A heavy silence followed while Elliot worked up his answer. “I don’t know what Judas said, but I suspect it was something like that.”
“What are you talking about?” She asked.
“Don’t play dumb with me, kid. When you start dealing in friends, you’ve lost your soul. Let me put it to you straight. I’ll get out of this somehow, get back on my feet. You might want to consider a new venue. I’m good at what I do. Everybody’s got something to hide and I’ll find it. I’ll drag you through the mud, Molly.” With that he disconnected and threw the cell phone on the floorboard.
The emptiness closed around Elliot like the jaws of a trap. He drove until he found a suitable location to relieve his anxiety. He pulled into an out-of-the-way local dive, parking behind the building so he wouldn’t be seen. He needed to cool off. He didn’t want to be bothered, but he soon realized it might or might not happen. Someone else was in the parking lot with him. He heard a car door slam, and footsteps, but he didn’t look up. He locked his car, went inside, and found the loneliest seat he could, a booth in a dark corner of the room. He slid in, facing the wall. He didn’t want to talk to anyone, and he didn’t want anyone talking to him. When the waitress appeared, Elliot told himself to just keep his head down, but he didn’t. She spoke and he looked up. She was pretty, with wide blue eyes. Elliot wondered about her hair. He thought it looked blonde.
17
In his car, he lowered the sun visor behind which he kept a photograph to remind him of what she had been and in so doing he caught a glimpse of himself in the vanity mirror. It was unnerving. The sight of their own image doesn’t shock most people, even when it’s bad, but seeing something entirely wrong, well that’s a different story. She was to blame for that. As if it might gain her attention or offer insight, he stroked the surface of the photograph, and along with an array of jumbled emotions a disturbing memory ran through his head. He’d been awakened during the night, knowing from the sick feeling in his gut what it was. He’d gone outside where he’d heard somewhere in the distance the sound of breaking glass followed by laughter: Just a pack of kids, delinquents abusing their privilege of freedom as if it were nothing more than a worn-out emotion, cheap and easily given. They could not be more wrong. But they were not the problem. She’d come back. He had no doubt about that, but like a terrified homeowner creeping through the darkness to check out a noise in the night, he was powerless against a pressing need to confirm it.
It was not a ritual he cherished. She scared the hell out of him, and as he knelt before her, the moisture from the damp earth seeping into his pant legs, he began to tremble. He could not understand why she wanted such a life back, but she always did, and he had no more than placed the fresh cut roses onto the ground when…
“What have you got there, sweetie, picture of your girlfriend? Must’ve dumped you, the way you’ve got her all wadded up like that, like you’re trying to squeeze the life out of her. Bet you’d like to, huh?”
Jerked back to the present, he took a moment to gather himself. He’d blanked out again. He hated that sensation, losing pieces of time. But he was back now, and inside some bar. He opened his hand and watched the photograph uncurl then he straightened it and stuck it in his pocket.
Posing as a waitress, she put a beer in front of him, and he paid her with a twenty, wanting her to make change so he could get a better look. His run of luck was still holding out. Even considering her sudden propensity for tenacious behavior, her being there was almost too much to accept. Indeed it was like wishing upon a star, and having it come true.
She caught him watching her as she handed him his change and her lips quivered into a smile. Her apprehension didn’t stem from his attention. She was quite used to garnering the stares of men. She was trying to hide the fear that crawled alongside her recognition of who sat in the booth in front of her.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
He blinked, nearly knocking over his beer. Had she actually spoken to him? Yes, he thought she had. This was a new development. He wondered if she might actually sit beside him, and they could be together for a short time, maybe even hold hands while they talked about old times. It seemed plausible, but then he caught himself. Remember Papa’s words, he scolded under his breath. It was just one of her tricks. In spite of himself and his warning, he smiled at her. “The beauty of your eyes is quite incomprehensible,” he said. “I never could get over it.” He studied the ball cap she wore. “What have you done with your hair?”
She stepped closer, taking off the cap and letting her long blonde hair spill from beneath, its softness falling across his arm. His pulse quickened. Even a relationship as non-symbiotic—and yet arguably just the opposite—as theirs had its limits, and she was testing it, stepping over the boundaries. Every ounce of common sense he had screamed for him to walk away and leave this uncanny happening alone, but a part of him, a part that had been left unnourished and starving for answers couldn’t let go. He’d dreamed of such an encounter. To let it slip away now would be a sin. They had never had the chance to talk and they had so much to talk about.
And then, as if she’d read his mind and decided to let him off the hook, she spoke again. “He lived in our house and he made sounds like a man. He wore pieces of my pride hung on his trophy belt like bloody scalps.”
“Why did Mother allow it?” he asked.
“Maybe you should have something to eat with that,” the waitress said, but what he heard was, “Mother was a shadow, not in the sense that she followed anything around, but rather as a non-distinct being, existing from the corners of our eyes as she slunk about the house. I was surprised to see her when on occasion she’d sit with us at the table and beckon with her shadow hand for me to join her. She seldom spoke and when she did the venal bastard mounted his assault, a strident coughing of visceral threats and accusations. I couldn’t blame her for being afraid.”
“It hasn’t done well for me either,” he said. “Even among strangers I’m a stranger. My sanity has cost me my insanity, for no longer can I hide in it. Some have reached out in genuine gesture, but a leper cannot be touched or helped.”
She nodded. “He was a throwback, living in the wrong time. His demeanor, his clothes and even his speech gave witness. I hated
his hair, always cut wrong and always shining from a fresh dose of tonic, the cheap alcohol-based variety found in barbershops that cater to old men. His angry spider eyes float in the darkness of my night.”
“He growled like a demented dog.”
The waitress’ forehead wrinkled, part curiosity and part concern as she kept silent, only listening, but he heard her say, “At least you were spared the demands of his cleanliness, the house smelling of furniture oils, and everything in its place.”
“But I could hear and see the clock, clinging like ivy to the wall and breaking the monotony with its tedious ticking.”
“I used to imagine that the dust constantly driven from the house hid behind the walls, caked thick and providing the exiled roaches a place to live with acres of musty tunnels.”
Again Papa’s words rang through, “‘Even angels take out the garbage.’” Ralph quoted. “Which means,” he continued, “they also tweeze unwanted hairs and shave the tops of their toes. Love, like blue denim jeans and memories, is meant to fade. Just you remember, cats hate the water, but they’ll run through the rain to get to you.”
“When Papa smiled,” she said, “It was a slow, sadistic process, his lips curling, exposing unnaturally large teeth with gaps between them like tombstones in a cemetery. He was an undertaker with a false air of Baptist minister laced about. He destroyed everything, even the marker I’d made from ice cream sticks to put over my pet’s grave. I used to dream you would break free and rescue me, come out of your room and creep into his exile where you could put the blade to him, plunging it deep into his chest, and make him see the color of life and the dingy gray of death.”
He shook his head. He couldn’t believe how much they had in common. They stared into one another’s eyes for a moment then she turned and walked away. He was truly saddened. He couldn’t deny their kinship, and yet he had to overcome it. She had defiled Papa, disrespected him in his name.
And then she turned back and said, “I wanted to set you free, but I couldn’t, for I knew Papa snaked through every inch of you, like the invasive roots of a mint plant twisting through the fertile soil of a garden.”
Her abusive words blackened her lips as she spoke. Papa was right. She was designed to torment.
18
Elliot sat in a lawn chair on his front porch, holding a cup of coffee that had turned cold, and watching the sun crawl over the eastern horizon. He’d been there for hours, trying to convince himself to move ahead and stop avoiding the obvious. It was time he got to the root of the problem. He threw the brown-colored contents of the cup onto the lawn, then went inside and showered. He had a trip to make.
When Elliot reached Coweta, he picked up Highway 51B and his heart began to sink. It was just a stretch of road that led to a town—a place like many others, where people acted out their lives—but it was his hometown of Porter, and it harbored a past he’d always thought best to leave alone.
It didn’t take long to get there; the trip was a little over thirty miles, but as he entered the outskirts of town he realized it was another world and he thought of turning around and heading back to the city. Charlie Johnson, Porter’s chief of police, had always held a high opinion of Elliot, even looking out for him when he needed it. But a lot had happened since then and Elliot had no idea how Charlie felt about him now. Facing him would not be easy.
And then there was Carmen. Her presence had never really left Elliot, and again seeing the familiar streets and houses where they created those memories intensified his emotions, like removing tarnish from antique silver or brushing the dust from a piece of crystal art. He was still in love with her.
Elliot pulled into a parking space in front of the Porter municipal office, an old WPA structure made of native stone, and slowly climbed out of the car, readying himself for the confrontation. As he neared the entrance, the sudden sound of barking made him pause on the sidewalk. He stared at the large oak tree in front of the building, remembering.
A dog had been baying outside his window that day. He was hungry, but the only thing that filled the house was death. It was Charlie Johnson who saw him walking alongside the road and stopped to pick him up. Later, he helped arrange for foster care.
Elliot walked the few paces left to reach the building and went inside, opening the first door on the right, the office of the Porter Police Department. Charlie Johnson wasn’t there, and a middle-aged lady who came to the counter told Elliot he might catch him at home.
Charlie lived a couple of blocks away. Elliot left his car parked at the municipal building and walked. The old house peeked from behind several massive oak trees that dominated the yard. Charlie kept it looking neat and tidy, with a fresh coat of yellow paint for the clapboard siding each spring, and white for the trim. Two wicker rocking chairs sat on the front porch on either side of the white French doors, and an American flag, hanging from one of the wooden porch supports, waved in the breeze—a perfect picture from the heartland.
Elliot knocked on the door and a few seconds later he stood face to face with Porter’s chief of police. Grinning, the old police officer stepped outside. He’d put on some weight, his well-curved belly making it nearly impossible to see his belt, but other than that he looked like the same old Charlie Johnson.
Studying Elliot, he said, “Well if my eyes don’t deceive me it’s Kenny “Bulldog” Elliot.”
Elliot smiled. It was a nickname he’d picked up in high school. “How you doing, Charlie?”
They went inside where Johnson sat on a Victorian couch, Elliot on a rocking chair. Charlie’s expression said he still couldn’t believe Elliot was there. “You know, to be honest, I never thought I’d see you again.”
Charlie seemed happy Elliot was there, but his statement sounded as if he didn’t think he ought to be. “It’s been awhile,” Elliot said, “seems like a lifetime.”
“So what have you been up to?” Johnson asked, meaning, what do you want? Charlie was never one for small talk.
Elliot pulled out the leather case that held his badge and handed it to Johnson.
Charlie leaned forward, placing his forearms on his knees, and examined the badge. He looked both pleased and worried. “Never figured you for a cop. Strange things do happen, I guess.” He handed the badge back to Elliot. “So what is it exactly that brings you here?”
“You’ve probably heard about the murders in Tulsa?”
Johnson nodded, a grave look crossing his face.
“I’m the investigating officer.”
Johnson drew his hand across his forehead to wipe away the beads of perspiration that had formed there. Standing, he said, “I could use some coffee. Want a cup?”
Johnson went into the kitchen and came back carrying cups with matching saucers. He handed one filled with black coffee to Elliot. Elliot thought of Dombrowski and didn’t mention cream or sugar.
“I need to get ready,” Johnson said. “But don’t leave, I’ll just be a minute; make yourself at home.” He took a sip of his coffee then took it with him down the hallway toward the back of the house.
Several minutes later, Elliot took his cup into the kitchen and rinsed it out, placing it in the sink. Johnson was still gone. Elliot had been in Charlie’s house before, but never beyond the living room or the kitchen, and as he walked past the hallway he noticed an open door leading into a back room. He recalled a small addition that protruded from the back of the house. He and his friends had always wondered about it. Unable to resist, he quietly walked down the hallway, going through the doorway into the addition.
The small room was clean and bare of furniture except for a twin bed and a chest of drawers, and it could’ve used a coat of paint to cover various places along the walls where pictures had once been. Over the chest was such a spot, triangular in shape as though some kind of sports pennant had once hung there. Following an instinct to explore further, Elliot opened the closet door and poked his head in for a look. It was empty; no clothes hanging on the bar, no shoes on
the floor. But something was on the top shelf and when Elliot stretched to see he found a football. He pulled it down and when he flipped it around he saw that it had words on it. A name written with a black marker read: Johnnie Alexander.
Elliot sat on the bed, closing his eyes and gripping the football, close to his chest the way Coach Sims had taught, and in his mind he saw Johnnie walking toward him across the field. It’d been a rough game and Johnnie was dirty, his shoulder pads showing through rips in his jersey. “Who’s the kid?” Elliot asked.
Johnnie shook his head. “I’ve seen him at a couple of the games.” Pausing Johnnie looked around to see if the kid was still there, but he wasn’t. “He wanted my autograph.”
After that Johnnie and Elliot autographed a few cheap footballs and tossed them into the crowd on game days.
Elliot put the football back in the closet where he’d found it and left the room, returning to his chair in the living area. Dressed in his uniform, Charlie came into the room and sat on the couch. He stared at Elliot for a moment then said, “Tell me something, Kenny. How does Porter figure into your investigation?”
It took Elliot a moment to answer. He had to force the words out. “I think the killings in Tulsa might be connected…” He paused then continued, “connected to the deaths of Johnnie and Marcia. I was hoping you could tell me a little about the old case.”
Johnson nodded but said nothing.
Elliot had known this wasn’t going to be easy. To relieve the tension, he said, “We can talk about it later, if you want.”
Johnson sighed. “Do you reckon that’ll change anything?” He got up and walked to the window, pushing the curtain aside so he could look through the glass.
“Were there any suspects?” Elliot asked.
“I think you know the answer to that.”
“Any other suspects?”
“Not really.”