Wayward

by Gregory Ashe

  The potato, who on closer inspection turned out to be a grubby older woman in a brown barn coat, just nodded and smiled. “Don’t be silly. I’ll have it all waiting for you on the kitchen table.”

  “Gladys, I really don’t know about this. You shouldn’t be walking—” Melissa cut off when she saw Hazard.

  The potato, presumably Gladys, didn’t spot the disruption. “Stop it. I won’t hear another word of it. I absolutely don’t mind. It takes five minutes, and it’s good for me to get out of the house. Besides, it’s just down to the street and back. It’s hardly even a blink.”

  Melissa didn’t do anything particularly suspicious when she saw Hazard—no gulping, no sudden pallor, no significant rubbing or wiping of appendages. But she had stopped talking for that fraction of a moment, even though she had known Hazard was coming. She seemed to recover quickly, though, smiling down at Gladys and saying, “If you’re sure.”

  “Of course I’m sure.” Gladys turned a stink eye on Hazard. “This is him?”

  “Yes,” Melissa said, swooping down to peck Gladys on the cheek. “Thank you again, dear.”

  “Stop, stop, stop. Not another word.”

  Gladys trundled toward Hazard; he hadn’t seen another car, and so he assumed she lived close enough to walk, but she spared him the trouble of any more deductions.

  “That’s my house,” Gladys said, pointing a stiff finger across the lawn. “I keep a loaded shotgun by the front door. You think I won’t hear if you give Melissa any trouble?”

  “This is he.”

  “What?”

  “The correct grammatical construction is this is he. Not this is him.”

  Gladys snorted and continued on her way.

  As Hazard approached the door, he said, “One of your clients?”

  “You know I can’t answer that, Mr. Hazard.”

  “Why is she getting your mail for you?”

  “I’m going on vacation.”

  Hazard followed her into the house, which was abundantly decorated—the politest way he could think to describe it. Stuffed to the fucking gills came closer. Houseplants of all sizes filled the hall, some in giant planters set on casters, some on occasional tables of varying heights, a lone orchid with an ice cube slowly melting on its soil. Amidst all the greenery, knickknacks and tchotchkes occupied every available surface: tin lanterns and carved wooden figurines, fat candles and vases, a metal star painted barn red and a wreath that looked like a bird’s nest. Here and there, the stone heads of busts poked up through fronds and leaves. Hazard couldn’t help feeling watched. Or, more accurately, like he was being hunted on safari.

  “We can talk in here,” Melissa said, leading him into a room just off the foyer and then shutting the French doors behind them.

  Books lined the built-in shelves, and an airy confection of a desk occupied one corner, complete with an aesthetically pleasing MacBook and pencils lined up in a row. Most of the space in the room was given to a triangular seating arrangement: a tufted sofa, an armchair, and a linen-covered chaise longue. The message in here was on point, in contrast to the bewildering presentation of the foyer: this room was a safe space, so painfully neutral that Hazard wanted to shoot something just to give it a little character.

  “A little on the nose, don’t you think?” Hazard said, taking a seat in the armchair while Melissa settled on the chaise. She didn’t stretch out, sitting with legs off to the side, but she still looked ready for a nap. He gestured at the chaise. “Isn’t that the stereotype of psychoanalysis?”

  “The client lies on the couch and tells Dr. Freud his dreams?” Melissa smiled. “I don’t do psychoanalysis, Mr. Hazard. It’s just a comfortable seat. Does it bother you to speak in my office?”

  “Does it bother you?”

  “I suggested it.”

  “Sure. After I blackmailed you into it. Tell me about Donna May Plenge.”

  Melissa nodded. “The family hired you to find her and bring her back, didn’t they?”

  “I’m like you: I don’t talk about clients. Unlike you, I actually have to do some work to get paid. I can’t just string them along for twenty years, hoping they’ll stop fantasizing about mommy’s breasts.”

  Hazard wasn’t sure where the jab had come from; he recognized the stupidity of it almost immediately.

  All Melissa said was, “A lot of people have a mixed understanding of mental health. Even very intelligent, educated people. Is that what you want to talk about?”

  “I want to talk about Donna May Plenge.”

  “She’s a client of mine. I can’t talk about anything she disclosed in a session, I’m afraid.”

  “What about other times?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Can you talk about things she didn’t disclose in a session?”

  “I don’t really understand.”

  “It’s a simple question. Here’s an example: let’s say you accidentally run into Donna May at a bar. Let’s say you accidentally say hi. Let’s say you accidentally get handsy with her boyfriend—that’s the same guy who accidentally had your tits in a vise grip the other night. Can you disclose anything from that conversation?”

  Red moved into Melissa’s cheeks. “You’re being exceptionally rude, Mr. Hazard. This kind of hostility isn’t helpful.”

  She was right; Hazard knew she was right. But something about being in this room, something about the foyer, something about the carefully modulated tone of her voice, like she swaddled every word so it wouldn’t hurt, was turning up his dials.

  “And you’re dodging my questions. I want to know about the last time you saw Donna May.”

  Melissa might have been a sculpture on the chaise except for the tip of one index finger, worrying the stitching on the upholstery.

  “All right. But you have to understand, I’m doing this because I’m genuinely worried about Donna May. I wouldn’t tell you these things if I didn’t think she might have done something foolish.” Melissa took a breath. “The last time I saw Donna May wasn’t at the Maniacs—that’s the bar you’re talking about. I saw her later that night. She came here. She was terribly upset after the fight, and she needed emergency counseling.”

  “You do that for patients?”

  “Clients. And no, I don’t do that as a rule. It’s important to have professional boundaries.”

  Hazard couldn’t help the sharp grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

  Melissa saw it, understood, and blushed, but she kept speaking. “But I also don’t turn people away when they show up on my doorstep, begging for help.”

  “And this is when you tell me that you can’t disclose anything about that conversation because it’s privileged.”

  “No,” Melissa said, her hands moving to her lap where she smoothed a fold out of the sweater, her eyes dropping. “Donna May found me with Josh. We were . . . together.” Even with her face turned down, her humiliation was obvious. “Do I need to be more explicit than that?”

  “Maybe,” Hazard said. “But not yet. Was that the beginning of your relationship with Josh?”

  “No. We’d been spending time with each other on and off for some time. Ever since he started seeing me professionally.”

  That was not what Courtney had said, and Hazard wondered if the girl had been lying. “Is nooky a service you offer to all your clients? Or just cute, dumb, rich ones?”

  Her chin came up. She leaned forward, about to stand, and then she froze. Her eyes locked with Hazard’s. And then she leaned back and nodded.

  “I’m sorry you’re upset about how things ended with your boyfriend, but your hostility right now isn’t helping things.”

  “Don’t talk about me,” Hazard said. “And don’t say a fucking word about John.”

  “You’ve latched onto this detail, my relationship with Josh, because it’s so close to your own. I’d like you to think about that for a moment.”

  Hazard didn’t want to thin
k about it, but it was like that old trick, try not to think about a pink elephant. He could see the parallels: Melissa had transgressed a professional line to pursue a relationship with Josh, in the same way Hazard had with Somers.

  “The ethical considerations of our situations are totally different,” Hazard began. Then he cut himself off. “I asked you a question. Please answer it. Did you have sexual relationships with other clients?”

  “Did you have sexual relationships with other partners?”

  “This isn’t tit for tat. Answer my question. I’m not on the police force anymore, so you can’t do shit to me. But I can sure as hell get your license taken away.”

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? To punish me, the same way you’ve been punished. Is that your concept of a just universe? If you are hurt, everyone should hurt too?” Melissa leaned forward. “And, of course, the wound is raw right now. Not only did you lose your position with the police because of an inappropriate relationship, but now that relationship has fallen apart. You gambled everything on love and lost. Anger is a very appropriate emotion right now, Mr. Hazard. You’re allowed to feel angry.”

  “You haven’t seen me angry. What happened when Donna May found you fucking Josh?”

  “She was very upset. We had an argument. Josh stayed; he didn’t want things to escalate. Finally, Donna May ran out of things to say and went home; Josh left too. I went to bed.” A thin smile painted her lips. “More accurately, I drank a bottle of wine and passed out near dawn. I was very upset too.”

  “Because Donna May knew something that could damage you.”

  “No. Because I was worried she was going to do something horrible.”

  “You thought she was dangerous?”

  “Donna May was dangerous, in her own way. She’d lived a hard life—some of that was due to her own choices, to be fair. And when she came home after this most recent trip, she was radicalized.”

  “Calling for the death of a policeman in front of the entire city.”

  “But she was doing much better. She was handling her substance abuse problem, and she was receiving therapy. To answer the real question you’re asking, Mr. Hazard, no, I wasn’t afraid Donna May would hurt someone else. I was afraid she’d hurt herself.”

  “Did she have a history of self-harm? Suicidal ideation? Attempts?”

  “I can’t talk about those things with you.”

  “Did she say anything about leaving town? During that fight, I mean. Did she tell you she was leaving?”

  “No, she didn’t say anything like that. But I wasn’t exactly surprised when I learned she’d gone away again. As her family has told you, she has a history of running away from problems.”

  “Is that what you think happened? She ran away?”

  Melissa looked down at her sweater again. “I hope so, Mr. Hazard. But I honestly don’t know.”

  “I think that’s all for now,” Hazard said, needing to be out of this room that had the emotional tenor of a paint sample. “I assume in the future you won’t make me resort to blackmail in order to have a conversation.”

  “I think whatever I say, you’ll do what you want to do. Does it make you feel better, Mr. Hazard, knowing that someone else made the same mistake you did? You must feel very powerless right now, having sacrificed your career for a man who left you. I imagine it’s intoxicating to be on the other end of that power now.”

  “Yeah, well,” Hazard said, moving to the door, “fuck your imagination.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  MARCH 28

  THURSDAY

  10:42 AM

  HAZARD DROVE THE MINIVAN along a stretch of Moulton Estates, the parade of brick colonials blurring, and then cut down a side street named Nottingham Court, which ended in a cul-de-sac with four houses and a dead cherry tree. He parked and called Courtney.

  “Hello?” Courtney’s voice competed with a blow dryer in the background. “I’m kind of busy right now.”

  “This is Emery Hazard.”

  “Yeah. I know. Nobody else actually uses a phone to call people.” The blow dryer cut out. “Oh my God, did you find her?”

  “No, I’m still looking. I had a quick question.”

  He thought about pressing Courtney; he wanted to know why she had lied about the fight the night before Donna May disappeared. He particularly wanted to know why Courtney had left out the Shakespearean mix-up of sexual partners and the resulting aftermath. And he still wasn’t convinced that Courtney was telling the truth when she said Donna May didn’t know anything about Josh and Melissa. Those questions, though, Hazard wanted to ask in person. When he could observe her reactions. And, if he were honest with himself, when he could bully her a little.

  Instead, he said only, “You said Donna May didn’t have a car.”

  “She didn’t.” The blow dryer clicked on again, a whoosh of air, presumably hot, passing over the microphone. “Look, I’m getting ready for work.”

  “But she worked third shift at the Tegula plant.”

  “Yeah. One of us dropped her off, and then somebody would pick her up in the morning. Sometimes she got a ride home from somebody on the same shift.”

  “What about the night she left?”

  “She didn’t work that night.”

  Hazard fought a growl. “I mean the car.”

  “I told you: we drove home. I went to bed.”

  “Did she borrow your car?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.” The blow dryer seemed to pick up; the hiss of hot air over the microphone became a steady droning. “I’ve got work. I need to go.”

  Another lie Hazard wasn’t quite ready to press her on. “Did she borrow your car often?”

  “Sometimes, I guess. I mean, it was my car. But if she asked nicely, or if she gave me some money for gas, yeah, sometimes she drove it. Sometimes she didn’t even do that, though, because, um, she’s Donna May. Sometimes she’d just grab the keys and take off. They’re just in the kitchen, you know. In case Mama has to go somewhere.”

  “And you don’t remember her using the car that night.”

  “She didn’t drive off in my car, ok. She never—” Whatever she said after that was scoured away by the blow dryer.

  “For fuck’s sake,” Hazard shouted, “turn off the damn hair dryer.”

  The dryer cut off. Courtney’s voice, when it came back, was even more girlish than usual. “Boys shouldn’t talk to girls like that, you know. Even if you are, you know.”

  “A fag? Say that part again. About the car. Donna May never what?”

  “She never used my car to run away. She didn’t do it this time either.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Duh, I mean it’s still here.”

  Hazard swallowed another shout. “No. When she ran away before.”

  “She always gets a ride to the Greyhound station. Or she hitches. She’s crazy. Do you know what happens to girls who do that kind of thing? I mean, there are a lot of crazy people out there. I was reading this Redbook article about hitchhiking. Do you know people get cut up and, like, put in freezers and stuff? I mean, it’s horrible. Or they make you, um. You know.”

  “Statistically, you’re in more danger behind the wheel of a car than hitchhiking,” Hazard said, not because he knew it was true but as a kind of schoolyard shove. Then he disconnected the call.

  Hazard tried to package up the conversation, but he could still hear the whine of the blow dryer; it made his head ache. The important part, the thing he had called to find out, was about Donna May using the car. If the keys were normally in the kitchen, as Courtney claimed, then it would have been easy for Donna May to get the car and drive over to Melissa’s for emergency therapy. Melissa claimed that, after the confrontation, Donna May and Josh had left at the same time. Hazard would like some independent verification of that fact.

  But all of that was secondary. He had met Donna May Plenge when she had been in the city jail. Sh
e had been fiercely suspicious—almost, in Hazard’s view, admirably paranoid—and she had been smart and she had been militarized. To some extent, at least, she had genuinely believed she was a soldier in a war. Hazard wondered how much of that mentality lingered. Courtney had described Donna May as a woman coming back from a difficult time in her life, and that certainly sounded true. But what had happened when Donna May found out her therapist and her boyfriend had been sleeping together behind her back? For years? Did the antifa soldier come out?

  And then another piece slid into place, and it was like having a bird’s eye view of this section of Wahredua. Moulton Estates, here. The Oaks at Emerald Point, here. A walkable distance. So close, in fact, that—what had Daniel said? They’d put up a fence to keep the riffraff out? Hazard pulled up the Maps app on his phone and checked, just to be sure. Josh’s house, Melissa’s house, and the Vega’s trailer made the three points of a triangle. The longest leg, from the trailer to Melissa’s, was about a mile.

  A normal person could walk a mile in twenty minutes. A normal person could run a mile in ten. What about a person who’d been cheated on, lied to, betrayed? What about a person who wanted revenge? Or, even simpler, someone who just wanted another fight? He pictured the woman he had known, the one who had paced the jail cell like a wild animal, the way she had screamed for Hoffmeister’s death over a loudspeaker and fought the officers who tried to drag her away. He remembered her in the sheriff’s office, handcuffed to a chair, kicking and screaming, furious and amped up on meth.

  Hazard killed the minivan’s engine and got out. He left the van parked at the end of Nottingham Court, and then he hiked back toward the main drive of Moulton Estates. There was no point in going back to Melissa’s house, not while he knew she was home. But he wanted to get back inside and have a better look. The same held true for Josh’s house. If Donna May had come back that night—in the car, possibly; walking, possibly—and if the fight had been bad enough, he might still be able to find signs of it. It would be useful to have his suspicions confirmed before he confronted Josh about all of this.