Shadow Man (10 page)

C.S
.

33

Tom Dawson

I've spent all morning on the phone, calling our relatives around the country; my sisters and their families.

They all want to know how Katherine's doing. I say I haven't talked to her yet. Then there's a long pause and sometimes there's an argument. A couple of my sisters are on their way. They say no one answers Katherine's phone.

Even Becky says I should go over there. A while ago she came down to the store. She looked so small and out of place here. Usually I just see her at home.

“You have to go see your sister,” she said. “I know how you feel and why you feel that way, but none of that matters now. Gabriel's dead.”

“Don't you think I know that? Who do you think pried him out of that truck? Whose blood was all over my clothes?”

“Listen to me, mister: I washed those clothes. You're not the only one who's suffering. I loved him too.” She brushed away tears.

I noticed that Bud Carter was eyeing us while pretending to examine a saw.

“Bud, do you mind if we have some privacy here?” I said. “We're talking about our family.”

He left in a huff. He would've charged the saw anyway. Becky put her hand on my shoulder.

She said, “That's the point I'm trying to make, hon. We're talking about our family. Those are your people, whether you like it or not.”

“They're all screwed up.”

“Who's not?” she said. “Anyway, nobody's asking for your opinion. They need you, Tom. You owe it to your sister.”

I used to try to help Katherine. She wouldn't listen. She wouldn't leave him, no matter what. No matter how many other women he was seeing. No matter how bad he was to the children. She stayed in that marriage like it was revenge. I told her: You don't have to teach him a lesson. Leave him to life. It'll get him. It gets everyone.

If my mother were alive, there would be no question: I would go to Katherine's house. She held the family together. Now that she's dead, do her wishes still count? I love my mother. Does she still love me?

My heart is so heavy it hurts to breathe. There's nothing worse than the death of a child. When they go, they take the future with them. And Gabe was a baby, even though he was big. All through his childhood I tried to help him, but Franny was still his father. He didn't seem to want his boys to get ahead. Like if they got too tall, they'd look down on him.

One time; when things were really bad, I told Gabe: “This isn't going to last forever. Someday you'll be on your own and you can live your life any way you want.”

I didn't understand then, like I do now, that you never leave the past behind. It haunts you.

Mama lost a child. Harry died in his sleep. He was just a baby, born between Judy and me. Sometimes Mama cried when she talked about him, even though he'd been dead for almost half a century. When we were all grown up she did her laundry with that baby soap because it brought back happy memories. Becky does the same thing with that baby lotion. She claims it's the only thing that softens her hands.

I keep thinking what I'd say to Katherine, if I saw her. I'd tell her how sorry I am about Gabe, about everything. I'd tell her I wish I could take some of her pain, so she wouldn't have so much to endure. Hold my hand, I'd say; I won't let go. When the darkness pulls you under, I'll be there too.

I'd tell her what I know from losing Kay. There isn't a day that I don't think about her. Not that I don't love Becky and our boys. But Kay was my first wife, my woman, my world. When she died, I would've died, if I'd had the choice. But I didn't; the twins were depending on me.

A lot of years have gone by and the loss is still there. It's like a hole in your heart, but it doesn't kill you. It doesn't get better; it just gets different. You learn to live with it.

34

Carolyn Sanders

Maybe I don't know what's important anymore. Maybe I'm overreacting.

So Gabriel is dead. Let's not lose our heads.

But if love's not the point, what's the answer?

I'm outside, on the school's front lawn, lowering the flag to half-mast. The rope runs through my fingers, inch by inch. I can feel the staring faces at the windows. They think I'm crazy. Which is terribly convenient: They leave me alone.

That little piece of cloth flaps in the breeze; the red, white, and blue, flying over our dreams. I've never lowered, or raised, a flag before, but when I got out here, I knew just what to do, as if the knowledge was in my blood, my fingertips. It's my flag too, not just Decker's.

It's lowered to half-mast when a head of state dies. Someone really important, like the president. What is more important than the life of a child? We lose a thousand Gabriels every day.

Oh, let's all drive as fast as we can, smash into one another and drive off cliffs; quench our thirst for revenge with blood, and taste our enemy's death on our lips; destroy our pain and kill our suffering, so that life will never hurt us again. Amen.

Gabe, I didn't want it to turn out like this. I could see this coming down the road for years. I couldn't stop it; I could only watch it. We all let you down, not only your parents, who loved you as much as they knew how, but it wasn't enough. It was never enough.

We'll miss you, honey. Forgive us.

35

Jennie Harding

I've tried to make Jack leave the rock. The waves are rolling in. Soon they'll cut us off from shore and then they'll devour the throne.

“Get out of here, you stupid dog!” I point toward the beach and stamp my feet. He looks at me, his eyes reproachful.

“
Get out of here, you stupid mutt
!” Gabe yelled the other night, when he was drunk. “Beat it! I don't want you around!” He kicked the dog, but Jack crouched down, as if saying: I won't run away; do what you will, I'll still love you.

I would never have gotten in the truck that night if I'd realized he'd been drinking. By the time I knew that it was more than a bad mood, we were parked in the middle of nowhere.

“Look at you,” I'd said. “You're acting just like your father. Why do you have to be so mean?”

“Shut up,” he snarled. “I'm sick of listening to you.”

“And I'm sick of you acting like this,” I said. “I won't let you drink around the baby.”

“That suits me fine. Maybe it's not even mine.”

I felt as if he'd kicked me in the stomach. In the dim light inside the truck his face looked like a stranger's.

“Gabriel, how can you say a thing like that?”

“I'm sick of you ragging on me all the time! This is the real me! Take it or leave it!”

“And I'm sick of watching you kill yourself with booze! If you hate life so much, why don't you just blow your head off?”

“Maybe I will!” he roared. He kicked me out of the truck; actually kicked and pushed me out. Then he went around back and dragged Jack out, leaving us there, by the side of the road. We waited in the dark for Gabe to come back for us, then we walked home. That was two nights ago. It was the last time that Gabe and I spoke.

Usually, after we fought, he'd call and apologize. I'm sorry, honey girl; it won't happen again. He'd say he was going to quit drinking so much. He'd promise that things were going to change.

This time he didn't call me and I didn't call him. I was too angry. I was too proud. This is the last straw, I thought; I've had it.

We were supposed to go to Mendocino for dinner this weekend. Gabe told me about it on Monday night, the night before he turned on me. We were parked in his truck, in front of my house. Gabe had his hand on my belly. My folks were inside, watching the news on TV. I thought: Wait till they hear the news about this baby.

He told me he'd made a reservation at Collins House, a beautiful old inn overlooking the sea. I said he shouldn't do that; it's too expensive. He doesn't make much money at the planter box factory.

“We're going,” he said. “You deserve the best. We'll have a nice dinner Saturday night, just you and me and Jasper.” That's what he jokingly calls the baby. He's sure it's going to be a boy. Gabe patted my belly. “It's hard to believe he's really in there. How does he breathe?”

“Through the cord, I think. It's complicated. Gabe, we've got to plan this out. We've got to tell our families.”

“You're the one who's been putting it off. Honey, I want you to marry me.”

I said, “Maybe we shouldn't get married right away.” I'd always thought we would, someday, but things were happening too fast. I had to finish high school. And what about college? I was going to go to college. How could I be a wife and mother? I wasn't done with being a girl. I felt as if someone had handed me a script and said, Here, you play the woman.

“Why not?” Gabe said. “That's what people usually do, especially when they're going to have a baby. Besides, I love you.”

“I love you too. But that doesn't mean we need to get married.”

Gabe looked mad. He said, “Most girls in town, they'd jump at the chance, if I asked them.”

“Then go ahead and ask them! How about Susie Richards?”

“I hardly even know her.”

“You must think I'm so stupid! I know what's been going on!”

“It ain't going on anymore,” he said. “Anyway, she didn't mean nothing to me.”

“Then why did you sleep with her?”

“What do you want me to do?” He hit the steering wheel, hard. “I'm not a little boy, I'm a man! You make love to me once, then cut me off! What difference does it make now? You're pregnant!”

“Thanks to you!”

“Hey, you were there too!”

He was right, of course. I'd written the script with my own hand.

He left abruptly, tires squealing. I went into the house. My mother sighed. My father gave me an elaborate frown.

Gabe called the next day. He'd said, “I'm sorry, honey. I'm sorry I've been acting so crazy. It's just that I've got a lot on my mind, with the baby and everything.”

“It's the beer,” I said. “You've got to stop.”

“I wasn't drunk last night!”

“No, but you'd been drinking.”

“Just a few brews. What's wrong with that?”

“You can't handle it,” I said. “You're an alcoholic.” That was the first time I'd let myself admit it.

“That's ridiculous,” Gabe said. He joked about it; the problem wasn't him, it was all in my head. “You never want to have any fun,” he said. “No wonder you want to be a teacher.”

He came by after supper so we could go for a drive and talk. We were going to let Jack run on the beach. We never got that far. We started to argue. Gabe was scary. I'd never seen him so angry. I thought he was going to hit me.

He said an alcoholic was someone old like his father, or someone who drinks hard liquor, like David. Not someone like him, who enjoys a few beers. He said I was just making up excuses so I wouldn't have to marry him.

“That's not true!” I said. “Why won't you listen?”

“'Cause you ain't the voice of God!”

He pushed me out of the truck. He'd never hurt me before. I could feel his hands on me long after he'd left. He looked like Gabe, but he'd become someone else. Someone I didn't know.

If you hate life so much, why don't you just blow your head off
?

I play the scene in my mind, again and again, rewriting the lines for a happy ending. I should've held him tight and never let go. I should've said: You are a wonderful person. I should've told him: I'll always love you, but I won't live your mother's life. You're losing me. Time is running out. Save yourself: Gabe is dying.

I said all that, so many times. He never really heard me. The other voices in his head were too loud: the screams and shouts, the little boys crying. The past always drowned me out.

I can't think anymore. I want to fall asleep and rest forever on the breast of the sea. The world could be so lovely if it weren't for people. We're cruel and greedy. We hurt each other. I hurt so bad. It has to stop. I'm sorry, little baby. Please forgive me, for bringing you here and then taking you away.

The air is thick with spray. Jack is pacing, worried.

“Get out of here, you idiot!” I point to the beach. “If you don't leave now, it will be too late!”

Too late. He looks sad. He leans his head against my leg. I bury my fingers in his thick coat and touch the leather collar Gabe made. The waves break in a white ring all around us.

36

Francis McCloud

I'm doing what I should've done a long time ago: I'm getting the hell out of this town. Everybody hates me. They'll be glad when I'm gone. They say, I'm sorry about Gabe. Or: How's Katherine taking it? Or they don't say nothing. They turn away. What do you say to a man who's lost his boy?

My boy is gone! I can't take it. It's like God's killed me, then woke me up so I can die again, every day. I could've sworn Tom saw me when I drove by the store, but he didn't even raise his hand. We're talking about his nephew! His sister's baby boy! And he looks right through me like we don't mean nothing! He hasn't even picked up the phone!

I'm going to drive down the highway till I get to San Diego, or maybe even Mexico. I've got to keep going, I've got to keep moving, 'cause if I don't keep moving, I'm drowning.

Why is he dead? He was such a good kid! He could've been something. My son! He's not a bum like David or crazy like Gerald. There's something wrong with Gerald. You can see it in his eyes. If he was in a war, he wouldn't care which side, as long as he could kill somebody. The only person who can call him off is his mother and she won't say nothing. She's frozen hard. Damn you, Katherine! None of this would've happened if you'd loved me, but you didn't, you starved me. When we were young, you could eat me up, 'cause I was so sweet, that's what you said. Now it don't mean nothing, all those years together, the troubles we been through, the babies we made. I might as well be dead. I wish I was. I'd stop this truck and get down on my knees and say, God, take me and give back my son! Please, God! Please!