The Devil's Wire (24 page)

61

Jennifer lets herself in through the garage and walks to the foot of the stairs and pauses there, veiled in the darkness like a robber in the night. Satisfied that McKenzie was still asleep, she hurries to the lounge, kneels down at the hearth's edge and opens the glass hatch.

A tepee of kindling is perched on crumpled fists of newspaper and she takes the lighter from behind the mirrored candle holder, set three places aflame and picks up the bulging Savemart bag. The plastic has split and terry cloth protrudes from a small tear. She reaches inside and withdraws the first item – her bloody t-shirt, the marl grey one she'd bought five years ago for some awareness campaign about breast cancer or global warming or child poverty, the one with the white heart on the front made up of identical tiny white hearts, the one she had found so cute and trendy and soccer-Mom chic, the one now spoiled with the blossoms of her dead husband's blood.

She throws it into the fire and it shrinks, the heart melting like snow in a blaze of flames that turn from pink to green to blue.

Her eyes begin to water. Nylon. Cotton. Something else. It hits her. Burning blood. She fights the urge to throw up and fans the door back and forth and the t-shirt rages until it's nothing more than an ashen peony rose.

She feels lightness, a blissful lightness, as if a terrible weight has been lifted, then remembers that it isn't over yet.

She tips the bag upside down, digs through the remaining items – four bloodstained rags and a knife wrapped in a torn bed sheet. She stares at the knife, nestled there against the brushed cotton, and runs a fingertip over the hardened drips of blood on the cherry wood handle.

She picks it up. Such an ordinary object for such ordinary things. How many times had she taken this knife to the stiff crust of a ciabatta loaf or the tough skin of a winter tomato or the wax rind of a Gruyere wedge. Even the aluminum cap from a bottle of Merlot had once met the slice of this blade.

So too, her own hand. Chopping basil and red peppers had once resulted in a nasty gash between her forefinger and thumb requiring an ER visit and stitches and a lecture from Hank about proper kitchen safety practices. "You need to take better care. You're always in such a hurry."

They'd bought it from a late night shopping channel binge in their early days. The two of them had fought over which one to get. She wanted the smaller cheaper knife with the free placemats, but he insisted on high end – comes with its own state of the art sharpener – surgical grade, Cohen and Kennedy chef's knife. His was fifty bucks more expensive than hers, but he'd been right, it had proven to be an excellent knife and had lasted through fifteen years of kitchen duties, until that last day, when it had disappeared right into his chest.

"What are you doing?"

The voice rings like a bell. Jennifer does not turn round. She hears breath, slow and deep, feels eyes search her back.

"You don't want to be here," says Jennifer.

"Mom?"

"
Just go
," Jennifer pleads.

It's then she finally turns around, setting the knife down on the hearth, getting to her feet.

"Sweetheart."

McKenzie's face is raw with confusion. "Is that a knife?"

McKenzie steps forward from the doorway to take a closer look, but Jennifer blocks her. "
Don't
."

"Let me see."

McKenzie tries to push pass, but Jennifer stops her with an embrace and presses her trembling lips to her daughter's ear.

"Please go back to bed, hon. Do as I say, just this one time, okay? You do that and everything will be good, I promise you. Just turn around, walk up those stairs and go back to bed. Please, please, please, just do that for me."

McKenzie's chin shudders in the groove of Jennifer's collarbone. "
Mom
," she whispers, "there's blood."

Jennifer holds tighter, stroking McKenzie's hair, breathing in that sleepy, child-woman scent, not wanting to let go, this baby, her tomboy, the true north of her life. If only Jennifer could start again, go back to the day she first brought her home, cradled in the safe alcove of her arm, when life was about the first opening of brand new eyes, a tiny maple leaf hand splashing the bathwater, dewy gums sucking the cloth ear of Mr. Bun.

McKenzie twists out of Jennifer's hold and takes two full steps backwards. "You made me think he ran away," she says.

"Don't do this."

"You made me believe it was my fault."

"It's not what you think."

McKenzie slams her fists into her thighs. "What Mom? What do I think?"

Jennifer shakes her head. "You've got it wrong."

McKenzie presses her hands to her temples. "Oh God, oh God, I'm going insane."

She bends over, unable to catch her breath. Jennifer places a hand on her shoulder, but McKenzie shakes it off. "You killed him."

"No."

"Stop lying."

"It was an accident. Lenise – "

"Lenise what?"

"She and I…He was going to hurt us and we just wanted to scare him and it got out of hand. Oh God, McKenzie you have to believe me."

"Liar!"

"It's true."

McKenzie pauses. Cinders slip through the iron grilles of the grate. "I don't even know who you are."

"Oh, McKenzie, I love you so much, please," implores Jennifer.

"Get away from me!"

McKenzie swings out blindly and Jennifer goes down, falling backward, the softest part of her skull smashing against the corner of the hearth. The world goes quiet and grey. Then Jennifer opens her eyes and McKenzie is gone and so is the knife.

62

By the time Jennifer gets to the front door, McKenzie is on her bike disappearing up the road. She's heading east, out of the neighborhood and into town. Jennifer stands there in a daze listening to the bike tires hiss curses at the bitumen. It's an effort to focus. The bang to the head was fierce. Her skull feels like it's submerged in a pressure cooker and black dots fly like arrows in front of her eyes.

She wills one foot in front of the other, gets in the car and tries to catch up to the winking pedals. They suddenly veer left and disappear down a cycle way. Jennifer circles the block and finds the exit, but by the time she gets there McKenzie is gone.

"Hon, please don't do this."

She starts to cry and her vision blurs as she scans the roads, pavements and driveways. It is all so incredibly bleak, too many dark and dangerous places. She pictures McKenzie, pedaling face first into the biting wind, tears turning to ice on her cheeks, knife clutched in her hand.
Think.
Where could she be?

Jennifer checks all the obvious places. The school. The library. The skate park. The tennis courts. No sign of her anywhere. She glides past dark alleyways, the off limits back lots, the badlands sites and under the bridge places.

The streets are mostly empty apart from an old lady in an anorak walking a terrier and, over by the substation, a shifty guy in a grey hoodie who glances briefly into her headlights revealing a face of finger-picked lesions.

She turns left and sees the Walmart parking lot and a group of older Korean kids hanging out by a pimped up maroon Concord, playing around with subwoofer settings, knocking back dollar beers.

"Have you seen a girl come through here on a bike?"

"No one like that."

"You sure?"

Abruptly, Tupak blasts from the Concord, drowning out her voice, and she moves on.

For over two hours, she drives up and down every side, back, and main street she can think of. It gets close to 4am and Jennifer grows frantic.

She spots an empty drive-through and a kid around nineteen grimly trying to wrangle burger wrappers into a black sack with a trash-picker. She winds down her window.

"Did you see a girl come through here on a bike?"

"Say again."

"Twelve, wearing pajamas, purple with white daisies, have you seen her?"

He reaches up and scratches a flaky patch of eczema under his ear. "No ma'am, just some dude on a three wheeler."

"You sure? Maybe she used the bathroom or something?"

He stares at her. "You don't look so good."

"Is there anybody else inside who might have seen her?"

He shakes his head. "Just me here from 2 to 6. You sure you're okay?"

"Please, this is important."

"I'm sorry. I haven't seen her."

He walks closer to Jennifer's window, dragging his near full sack behind him. "Here," he says, removing what she thinks is a condom from his pocket. Using his teeth, he tears open the foil and hands her the moist towelette inside. "For your face."

She glances in the mirror at her dirty, tear-streaked reflection and takes the towelette and presses it to her skin.

"It's got Aloe in it," he says.

"It's nice."

"Yeah."

She stares numbly through the windscreen. The street sweeper appears around the corner, brushes whirring in the gutters.

"I don't know where she is."

"Who?"

She buries her face in her hands and cries.

"Ma'am, please let me call someone for you."

She lifts her head. "I'll be alright."

"It's no trouble."

"I've got to go."

She pulls out of the lot. Glancing in her rearview, she can see the kid standing there, staring after her, trash-picker in his hand like a bullwhip.

Taking a right, she retraces the route she'd driven earlier, past the tennis courts, skate park, library, school. Nothing. The pressure in her head is unbearable. A searing pain strikes her temple, blinding her completely. She's forced to pull over and throw up in the gutter. Bile spills from her lips. Her insides cramp violently and she throws up again.

She rests her palm on the side door to catch her breath, legs quivering wildly beneath her. She pauses there for a moment, trying to get it together, to dial things back. All around her the sky is brightening, the color of honey, lights are flicking on inside buildings, a new day is coming.

She calls Ethan North. "I can't find McKenzie."

He pauses then says, "I'll meet you at the house."

*

When Jennifer turns the corner into Pine Ridge Road his car is already there. She hurries from the Nissan and crosses the grass toward the house. A flicker to her left stops her. McKenzie's bike, discarded on top of the holly bush, rear light flashing.

"McKenzie!"

Jennifer runs inside. The living room is empty, fire dead, rags gone.

"In here," the low intonation of a man, coming from the kitchen.

She bursts through the door. Relief washes over her. Ethan North and McKenzie look up from the table, the bundle of bloody rags and knife in front of them.

"Oh thank God," she embraces McKenzie. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for all of it."

And it feels so good, just to hold her, to know she's okay, and Jennifer doesn't want to let her go, then she hears the voice and is gripped by a sudden awful terror.

"Jenny."

She cannot swallow. She cannot see. She cannot breathe.

"Turn around, Jenny."

McKenzie is trembling. "She's got a gun," she whispers.

Jennifer turns round. Lenise is in the corner, leg bloody and raw, eyes darting, Jennifer's gun wavering in her hand, the one she'd so foolishly left behind at the plant.

"I thought we were done," says Jennifer.

Lenise brushes hair from her eyes with her wrist. "I can't do it." Her voice is low and sad.

"Can't do what?"

Lenise begins to cry. She looks at McKenzie. "Let her go."

Time falls flat and heavy. Lenise cries hard, and they watch her, and that wobbling gun.

"You can't just expect everything to be fine, Jenny. My heart isn't made of stone." Her voice is thin, like she's talking in a tunnel, and Jennifer's never seen her look so bad.

"Give me the gun," says Ethan.

Lenise blinks at him dully. "No," she says.

"You're injured, you need help," he presses.

Lenise snaps. "This has got nothing to do with you."

"You're only making things worse," he says.

"Shut up."

"Do what he says," says Jennifer.

Lenise looks at McKenzie. "What about you, girl? Nobody ever asks what you want."

"I'm scared," says McKenzie.

Lenise's face softens. "Come here."

Jennifer steps in front of McKenzie. "Leave her alone."

"Come on, girl." Lenise lifts an arm and gestures McKenzie over.

But McKenzie shrinks further behind Jennifer. "I don't want to."

"There's no need to be frightened," says Lenise.

McKenzie doesn't move so Lenise hobbles forward, energy clearly flagging, and holds out her hand. "Girl, do as I say."

"Mom, don't let her take me."

But Lenise sidesteps Jennifer and pulls McKenzie to her side.

"Leave her alone!" cries Jennifer.

"Good girl," Lenise kisses the top of McKenzie's head. "Everything's going to be fine, just fine, you'll see."

Ethan North stands up. "Enough."

Lenise points the gun at him. "Be quiet."

He raises his hands. "Think about it. This isn't the way to go."

"What would you know?" Lenise takes a phial from her pocket.

"What's that?" says McKenzie, recoiling.

"It helps people sleep," says Lenise.

The sedative they'd used on Hank. Every bad thing flashes through Jennifer's mind. "Lenise, please."

Lenise ignores her and retrieves a jug from the cupboard, gets some juice from the fridge and mixes the sedative.

"Think about what you're doing," pleads Jennifer.

Lenise pours two glasses. She holds one out to Jennifer.

"Drink it."

Lenise nods toward Detective North. "You too. Pick up the glass."

"No," cries McKenzie.

"Don't fret, girl."

"I won't do it," says Jennifer. "I won't leave McKenzie."

"Drink it."

"No!"

Jennifer slaps the glass from Lenise's hand and it goes flying across the kitchen floor. Ethan lunges for Lenise but she's too quick and she swings around and smashes him with the butt of the gun and he goes down, out cold. Lenise pivots to face Jennifer.

"For God's sake," she cries. "Can't you see you're upsetting the girl?"

Jennifer stares at Ethan lying there, unconscious on the kitchen floor, and feels hope slip away.

"Is this what you want?" Lenise thrusts the gun at Jennifer. "A bullet? In front of McKenzie? Because that's where this whole thing is heading. Now pick up that bloody glass."

"No."

"
For Christ's Sake
."

Lenise stomps over to Ethan's inert body, dragging McKenzie behind her, and presses the gun to his temple.

"You don't want me to do this," she says.

Jennifer looks at McKenzie, poor McKenzie who is caught in the middle, poor McKenzie who deserves none of this, the fear coming off her in waves, eyes pleading with Jennifer.

"Go on," says Lenise. "Drink it."

"No, Mom, don't."

Jennifer picks up the glass. "It's alright," she says.

"Please, Mom, don't leave me."

Jennifer lifts the rim to her lips and drinks and returns the glass to its place.

Lenise nods. "You did the right thing."

McKenzie is crying hard now.

"Sorry, Jenny, truly I am," says Lenise.

Jennifer can feel it take hold. Her head circling, growing heavy, her limbs filling with cement, her heart booming way too slowly inside her ribcage. McKenzie's cries begin to weaken and fade and Jennifer watches their hazy bodies turn to leave. That's when she reaches for the knife and lurches across the room and plunges it into Lenise, right between the wings of her shoulder blades. A shot rings out and Jennifer falls down and she is on her back, breathing hard, seeing the world in cubes – the ceiling, the underside of the countertop, a window segment, the chunk of sky beyond it. McKenzie is stroking and kissing her face.

"I'm alright," says Jennifer. "I'm alright."

Outside it has begun to snow.