Not in the Heart (10 page)

“He wants to see you tomorrow morning, early, so you should go back to the house and get some sleep and some fresh clothes.”

“You go back to the house. I'll sleep here tonight and catch up with him. Seriously, I'd rather you went and met with . . . Governor Townsend.” You don't know how hard it was to say those words with anything but utter contempt. I wanted to say, “the Weasel in Chief.”

“It needs to be you,” she said.

This was a song that wasn't about to end anytime soon and we would have gone round the mulberry bush a lot longer but the nurse rushed out of the room. She looked at Ellen and said, “He's having a reaction.”

Ellen hurried into the room and I followed. She pushed me back out and I stood, helpless in the hall. My first thought was
Murrow
. Then I remembered Helen's cat. I must have picked up some dander and Aiden had hugged me. I could see the news story. “Eighteen-year-old reunites with father and dies from reaction.”

My life is filled with thoughts like this, populated with ideas, choices, and decisions. A tweak here or there and maybe I wouldn't be standing alone.

Maybe it's God's fault. Maybe he was punishing us for having children out of wedlock. Maybe he visited the sins of my youth upon the son of my youth. That would be just like God, to punish an innocent for someone else's sin.

No, that's twisted. We give God too much credit. People simply get sick and die. They have allergies. We don't need God to explain that. The best we can hope for in life is not divine intervention, positive or negative, but human acquiescence to reality. Accepting the way things are and dealing with them.

Standing outside the door, watching another nurse and a guy with a stethoscope hurry to Aiden's room, my philosophy solidified. You make your own breaks. Don't trust luck or God. Nothing is a substitute for hard work and a daily search for the mojo, the groove of life where you plod and do your best. Anything else is wishful thinking, and the world eats wishful thinkers like wild animals eat their young. You have to move forward, one step at a time, and let momentum carry you. Call it redemption, salvation, or just human inertia, you have to move.

And so I did.

To the back stairwell and down, a step at a time, all the way to the parking garage and the car without a side window. The wind stung my face but I didn't slow. At the house I fell into Ellen's bed and felt guilty for sniffing her scent on the pillows and thinking of how it used to be before the wars of our lives erupted.

That thought led to a dream or perhaps a memory. I use these to help me sleep and crowd out the images of men with hoods and tire irons and a hollow-eyed boy hooked up to tubes and heart monitors. Collegiate hormones raging, young skin unveiled, blood coursing, and two hearts in rhythm. Laughter and passion and whispered words. Pure love, with wild abandon, inconsiderate of consequence, acting on impulse and emotion surging forward like the ocean surges toward the shore, toward release.

C
HAPTER
15

27 DAYS BEFORE EXECUTION

My cell phone awakened me. I walked stiffly to Ellen's dresser and fumbled for it, noticing the birthday card I had given her years ago stuck in the corner. Interesting. I noticed a text message from Ellen that came while I was asleep.
He's okay
was all it said.

“This is Truman,” I said, my voice giving me away, groggy and cloudy as the Florida sky.

It was someone from the governor's office confirming my appointment for eight thirty at the governor's mansion. Reginald somebody gave a staccato, prim rehearsal of the governor's schedule. Every minute accounted for. I looked at my phone for the time and saw 7:55. I was a good forty-five minutes away and I hadn't even brushed my teeth.

“Eight thirty is good. I'll be there,” I said.

A better man with a shred of pride would have at least showered and shaved and looked for a decent outfit. I did grab a pair of sunglasses and Aiden's NY Yankees baseball cap, figuring that was a way to subtly tick off the good gubner. The closer I got to the mansion, the better I felt about my appearance. I was glad he would need to stare at my cheek wound and the hair on my legs.

I made good time despite the rain that came down sideways and leaked through the plastic over the driver's-side window. I still pulled up to the mansion a few minutes late. Making Townsend wait gave me a sense of control. That's something I lost a long time ago.

There were concrete barriers near the entrance, but so far terrorists weren't interested in Tallahassee. A guard met me and gave my cheek and the missing window a concerned glance. He found my name on the guest list and told me where to park with a point and a grunt.

I was met at the door by a perfectly dressed male assistant who checked his watch and my soaked shirt and shorts. He handed me a card that said,
Reginald Gentry, Aide to the Governor
.

“You're late, Mr. Wiley.”

If you hadn't called, I wouldn't even be here.

“Traffic was murder,” I said.

He walked me through the immaculately decorated hallway, checking his watch again. “The governor is on a tight schedule.”

“Yeah, me too.”

He led me to a dining room with an atrium that had been redone to look like a Rainforest Cafe. “He's on an important call now but he said he will meet you for a light breakfast shortly. Please, help yourself and have a seat.”

Reginald motioned to one of the staff members, who immediately uncovered silver serving platters filled with enough food for a large Haitian village. Or maybe the whole island. I hacked my way through the jungle to get to him and used the silver tongs for some fruit and sausage, then topped that off with eggs and a sweet roll. The server poured orange juice so thick it rolled into the glass. He smiled genuinely, not as though he was being paid for it.

I had taken my first bite of the sweet roll, part of it adhering to my upper palate, when a woman entered, greeting the server by his first name and smiling wistfully. I felt the immediate inclination to stand as if I were in the presence of royalty. She had shortish auburn hair and a pleasant face, as immaculately prepared as the table. Her teeth sparkled like a glass chandelier. She wore a tight-fitting dress that reached her knees, and even a casual glance from a disinterested observer could tell you this was not a common woman. In the way she walked, the way she carried herself, everything said she was a woman of distinction.

I took off my sunglasses and rose to shake her hand. Then I remembered the sticky sweet roll, so I discreetly put my fingers in a glass of water and wiped them dry.

“Mrs. Townsend, I'm Truman Wiley. A pleasure to meet you.”

“I know who you are,” the woman said, sparkling and twinkling. She shook my hand firmly and invited me to continue my breakfast. “I just came by for my cinnamon raisin bagel. Can't start my day without one.”

She turned and the server had a plate prepared. “Has my husband left you down here all alone?” she said.

“I'm to blame. I'm late.”

“Nonsense, he should have met you at the door.”

“I think he's on an important call.”

She rolled her eyes. “Probably setting up a golf game. Another campaign expense.” She took a bite of the bagel and closed her eyes in ecstasy. “Now don't report that. It's strictly off the record.”

I laughed. “If I had a job, it would be at the top of the newscast.”

Her face turned placid. “Yes, I heard about the downsizing. I'm very sorry. I'm surprised you weren't snatched up by another network by now.” She pulled out a chair and sat primly. “I also heard about your son. I'm so sorry. You and your wife have been through so much. How is he?”

Jennifer Townsend was well known for her philanthropic work with ailing children of various diseases. From my cursory observance of her life there wasn't an unfinished hospital wing in the state she hadn't visited. But she also cared for injured dolphins and hyperactive otters and seagulls with ADD. If it hurt, the First Lady would have her picture taken near it or trying to soothe it. As far as I could tell, the only humanitarian thing she had left to do was adopt a dog with prostate problems from the local animal shelter. To me, that's the ultimate, but the Townsends really didn't seem like animal people. Too busy.

Still, I didn't recall her having a photo op with Aiden at the hospital, and her genuine concern almost choked me up.

“He's up and down. It's the story of his life. I saw him last night. Things will even out, and then he goes downhill.”

“And there's no hope outside of a transplant?”

“That or divine intervention, but I'm not holding my breath.”

She nodded. “Well, I know that my husband has this on the front burner. I assume that's what you're talking about today.”

“That and Conley.”

She shook her head and stared at the bagel. Deep in thought. Or perhaps the random pattern of the raisins looked like Elvis. Finally she said, “It's hard to understand how people can cause so much hurt and pain and then want to atone.”

“You mean Conley?”

She nodded. “I suppose it makes logical sense to want something good to come from the end of your life. Why not help someone else if yours is being taken? Maybe he thinks that will get him into heaven.”

“You think a murderer has a chance at heaven?”

She shrugged. “I don't judge people. Who can? I'll leave that up to God or the courts. But his life seems to have changed for the better.”

“How do you know about him?”

“My husband gets the reports, the requests for a stay, all of that. Plus the newspapers and TV have been rehearsing the case before the execution.”

“You know I'm helping him write his book.”

She looked up at me. Maybe it was the scar that drew her eyes, but she seemed genuinely surprised. “A book?”

“His wife wants me to tell his story. What happened to him early on, the bad choices, the murder—and then the come-to-Jesus moment.”

“I hope he confesses to you.”

“I haven't met with him yet, but his wife still swears he's innocent.”

“Isn't everyone on death row innocent?” She took a bite of Elvis's forehead. “That would be the final insult, you know. To the memory of that poor girl. Him trying to put himself up as some kind of martyr. How would you write something like that?”

“I'm just going to tell his story. I'm the pen he doesn't have.” I couldn't believe I'd just said that. It sounded cliché, like I was the wind beneath his wings.

“Don't you have any compassion for the mother of that girl?” Her tone changed, brow furrowed and blue eyes white-hot.

I took a bite of the sweet roll to give myself a chance to think of a good answer. In the meantime, back at the cinnamon raisin bagel, things weren't going well. She picked off Elvis's right eye and put it on her plate. Strange way to eat a bagel, but perhaps that's how she kept her figure.

“Have you ever spoken with the mother?” I said. “I saw her yesterday and she feels the same way. Like putting his story down is a sin.”

“You feel differently.”

“Like you, it's not for me to judge. It's like one of those announcers your husband uses on commercials. Does that guy really think his opponent is a demon in disguise or that your husband is pure as the driven snow? He just reads the copy put in front of him.”

“You're comparing my husband to Terrelle Conley?”

Sure I was.

“Of course not. I'm saying everybody has a right to be heard, especially when their life is coming to an end in thirty days.”

“Twenty-seven.” Her eyes darted from my cheek to my food to the remains of Elvis's sideburns. “You say you'll just write the story, but your son's life depends on getting that man's heart.”

Before I could answer, or even think of an answer, voices in the hallway signaled the arrival of His Royal Highness. Jennifer's demeanor changed with the expensive leather footsteps.

“In the telling, Mr. Wiley, be careful that you don't lose your own soul,” Jennifer Townsend said as her husband entered the room.

Her words left me with a feeling of dread. Who needs writer's block with friends like this? Not that she was a friend, but still . . .

She rose to meet her husband. Townsend's face brightened in a calculated way, and as he took the phone from his ear, he hugged her and gave one of those side kisses popular with the effete. A feigned connection that might have once been there. Knowing Townsend's past and the whispered stories behind the scenes during our collegiate years, I would have bet the connection was tenuous at best.

“Jennifer, good morning, darling.”

I felt the eggs coming back up but managed to hold them down.

Governor Townsend looked like the picture beside the dictionary entry for
electable candidate
. Jet-black hair strategically graying at the edges, tanned skin but not to the point of a concern about skin cancer, teeth that sparkled equally with his wife's, a body that looked frighteningly similar to the one he had in college—only a fuller chest and bigger biceps.

Townsend was known for his perpetual positivity, even then. He would sit in the student section until the bitter end of every football and basketball game, encouraging the team through any insurmountable deficit. There was always something to learn, some takeaway in each devastating loss, some silver lining behind each black athletic cloud. Not that he ever experienced the same—winning for Townsend came as easily as putting his name on a piece of poster paper.

When I first met him, the very first day, he let it be known that he would be the future governor of Florida. Somewhere along the line the next rung of the ladder had appeared and he now aspired to a bigger house farther north. After making several decisions that sent his name to the top of the charts in his party, the talk now among the political pundits was that he had more than a fighting chance in the upcoming primaries. Unless something untoward surfaced.

Jennifer gave me a wave good-bye and then spoke with Reginald, Townsend passing her off to him like a baton at a track meet. The governor locked eyes with me and winced at my wound. He shook my hand with the firm conviction of a man who would lead no matter what the cost.

“Truman, what happened?”

“Car accident.” I was out of snappy, funny answers.

“That might need some stitches. Have you had it checked?”

“I'm good,” I said.

Townsend sat, removing his jacket and unbuttoning the cuffs of his long-sleeved, perfectly pressed shirt. I guessed he had worn it once and wouldn't be wearing it much longer. The server brought his plate. Three strawberries, two slices of cantaloupe, and unbuttered toast. No wonder he was still the same weight.

“It's been a long time,” he said. “How's Ellen?”

He was dashing the cantaloupe with two micrograms of salt as he said it, not looking at me.

“She's been better. We've been better.”

“Your son's not doing well?”

I bypassed the concern and small talk about his condition, most of which I wouldn't have been able to tell him because I didn't know. “What are the chances of this Conley thing coming through?”

“You mean the odds? You looking to put some money down?” He laughed and held the piece of toast like a cigar. “That wasn't funny. Sorry. I'd say right now we've got a fifty-fifty chance. The legislature will have to approve it. We might have the votes. But the sentiment in this state about the Conley case makes it touchy.”

He bit an atom-size chunk from the toast and continued, hesitantly. “I need to know that you and Ellen will be available to help me convince the public this is a good path.”

“I don't think a PR campaign is in the cards. She's at the hospital full-time and I'm working on a book.”

“What book?”

“Conley wants to tell his story.”

“The jailhouse conversion?”

“That and his background, where he came from . . .”

“And the Wright woman. Will he come clean on that?”

He and his wife really should compare notes. I told him the same thing I told her.

Townsend shook his head. “You know, that's exactly the kind of thing we don't need. Every crazy, anti–death penalty crusader is going to be on my lawn the week of the execution. This story will only fuel that fire.”

“You'll have the backing of your NRA crowd and the conservatives who want this guy to fry.”

He ate approximately one-third of a strawberry and pushed the plate away. It's a wonder he had the energy. “This is not just about Florida. Every move I make now has the national spotlight. This kind of thing can either show the compassion of my administration or be exploited by my opponents.”