The Forgetting Place (22 page)

I did as he directed, centering myself on the seat, but continued to stare at him in horror.

“It's not that bad. It just grazed me.”

“I'm a physician. I want to take a look.”

“Not now,” he said. “I'm going to take us downriver a ways. Then we'll find a suitable shoreline to get off the water for a minute. You can look at it then. For now, sit still. The water's getting rough.”

He was right. The wind had picked up, pushing my hair back
from my brow. The boat rocked heavily on the waves, and I had to hold on to the side to keep from being tossed about. The sky was gray and overcast, the air cool in my lungs—the heat and humidity of the day not yet upon us. Haden pointed the bow into the waves and opened the throttle, propelling us downriver in the direction of the Chesapeake. I forced myself to turn and face forward—away from the wound—narrowing my eyes to protect them from the wind buffeting my face, and for the next forty minutes I concentrated only on the good fortune that we were both still alive.

W
e eased into an inlet at the mouth of the Magothy River, adjacent to Sandy Point State Park. It was a protected harbor, and the water here was smooth, the only sound coming from the rumble of our motor and some activity along the docks to our right. Haden guided us onward until the banks narrowed, forming a thin creek that we followed for a short distance until it dead-ended in a patch of reeds. He hoisted the motor's propeller out of the water and used the oars to nudge the boat through the reeds until the underside found purchase on the sandy bottom. We were within a foot of the shore now, and I was able to step out over the lip of the bow onto dry land. Haden did the same, handing me the rifle and box of ammunition before climbing out himself. I held them cautiously, as if the rifle was already loaded and might go off at any moment.

Haden gave me a brief appraising look as he disembarked. “You hurt?”

I shook my head, my eyes going once more to the darkly matted sleeve of his T-shirt, the blood there already drying. He studied me for a second, then went about the short task of
tethering the boat to the closest tree. His hands moved quickly, despite his injury, and when he was finished he turned, took the rifle and ammunition, and motioned for me to follow him up the slight grade. We found the fallen trunk of a large tree and sat down, the rifle across Haden's lap.

“I should look at that wound now,” I told him. He started to pull up his sleeve, but I made him remove his shirt so I could get a full look at the area. I'm no trauma surgeon, but I know enough to not get tunnel vision on the most obvious wound and run the risk of missing any less obvious ones. I inspected his back, chest, and neck—eased his arm upward to get a good view of the left chest wall and underside of his arm. There were no other injuries and no exit wound, so I returned to his shoulder, which was caked with blood but not particularly swollen and seemed to have good range of motion. I used his shirt to wipe away some of the blood. He was right. The bullet had only grazed him, leaving behind a long but relatively superficial gash. The bleeding had stopped, and there did not appear to be any significant damage. The wound would need to be cleaned—
but not here,
I thought, glancing down at the brackish water below us. I handed him back his shirt and he slipped it on, careful with his injured arm. We were quite a sight: me with my splinted right forearm and him with dried blood on his sleeve.

“We should get that cleaned as soon as possible. Some stitches and antibiotics would be ideal. When was your last tetanus shot?”

“I left the army five years ago,” he said, and I felt a piece of his background snap into place. “They kept us updated on those things.”

I looked up at his face. “Did you see combat?”

“Iraq,” he said, but the way he refused to look at me told me not to press further. “I got out after my second tour of duty.”

I allowed the silence to spool out between us, wondering if he would say anything else about his experience. He didn't. I looked out across the creek. Near the shoreline to our right a blue heron waded through the water, its eyes searching for fish, the beak opened slightly in anticipation of the downward lunge.

“What do you do now?” I asked finally, glancing at his faded jeans and cowboy boots, my mind turning back to his massive pickup truck, the John Deere hat he'd worn the day before.

“I write children's books.”

His response took me by surprise. I gave him a thin smile, assumed he was joking. He looked back at me blandly, and a good five seconds elapsed before it occurred to me that he might be serious. “What—” I said. “You're kidding, right? I mean . . .”

“I don't look the part?” he asked, one eyebrow cocked slightly.

“Well . . .” I said, trailing off once more, checking his expression to be certain he wasn't having me on. “You seriously write children's books?”

“I do.”

“Have you sold any?”

“Does it matter?”

I thought about it. “Only if you're trying to make a living at it, I guess.”

He looked down at the boat, then back at me. “I've written about ten stories over the past couple of years. Published my first one about a year ago.”

“And the others?”

“In time,” he said. “My illustrator's busy with college right now.”

I thought of the Terrapin magnet clinging to the refrigerator in his kitchen. “Your daughter?” I asked, hazarding a guess.

He nodded. “She's really talented,” he said, studying the back of his hands. “You should see some of the work she's done.”

I heard a splash and the soft flap of wings, looked up in time to see the heron take to the air, a small fish grasped in its beak.

“So what makes you go from serving as a soldier in combat to writing children's books?”

He shifted his weight on the tree trunk. “We all have to atone for something,” he said, lifting the rifle and pulling back on the lever.

I started to apologize, but he waved it away.

“Listen, if people are going to be firing weapons at you, then you should at least know how to load this thing.” He looked at me. “You've never used a bolt-action rifle before?”

I shook my head.

“Fine. This is a Remington 798. It's a hunting rifle. You see this?” he asked, pointing to the far end of the weapon. “That's the muzzle. You keep it pointed in a safe direction at all times. And this”—he grabbed the metal lever on the side, sliding it forward and flipping it down—“is the bolt handle. Watch what happens when I flip this up and pull back.”

“The top part opens.”

“Right. You load rounds in there.” He opened the box of ammunition and removed one for me to see. It was longer than I'd expected. And heavier. There was a quiet lethality to it.

“This is how you load it,” he said, taking the bullet back from me. “There's a receiver just in front of the bolt. You place the round in here and press it down with your thumb until it snaps into place. Here”—he handed me the rifle—“you try loading a few.”

I laid the gun across my lap, muzzle pointed toward the trees, then took a round from the box and placed it in the receiver, pushing down until it clicked into place.

“Keep going. The magazine will hold five rounds, but you can put one more directly in the chamber, like this.” He placed his hand over mine, guiding the bullet. I felt my skin break out in goose bumps. “Now, since your right hand's in a splint, you'll have to use your left hand to slide the bolt handle forward and down.”

I practiced loading and unloading the gun until I could do so with reasonable proficiency. Once I got the hang of it, I found that I enjoyed it—the sound of the bolt sliding back and forth, the rounds snapping into place, the smooth grain of the wood pressed against the flesh of my palm. Haden watched me for a while, then walked down to the boat and covered it with fallen branches, allowing the camouflaging shelter of the reeds to do the rest. When he was satisfied, he returned to where I sat on the log, the Remington resting on my lap. “When do I get to fire it?” I asked.

“It's going to be hard to do with your hand in the splint. Whether you use your right hand to hold the forestock or pull the trigger, you'll need some working fingers on that hand. Can the splint be shortened?”

“Yes. The fracture is in the lower part of my forearm, not my hand.”

“Okay. Even so, the recoil might hurt. You'll have to see.” He looked out over the water, then back at me. “A friend of mine lives close to here. It'll be a good place to clean my wound and shorten your splint.”

He turned and started to make his way up the embankment. I followed, the leaves crunching under our feet.

“Do you cover that in any of your children's books?” I asked. “How to load and unload a Remington 798 bolt-action rifle?”

I was walking behind him and his back was to me, so I couldn't see if he was smiling.

“Most of the story lines so far have been about fully automatic machine guns,” he replied. “But I've been considering branching out.”

T
he trek through the woods was longer than I expected as we moved through the northern section of Sandy Point State Park. A smattering of residential houses were backed up against the park's heavily foliaged perimeter, and one of them belonged to Haden's friend—a veterinarian who owned a small animal practice not far from here. The two of them were apparently fishing buddies, which was how Haden was familiar with the creek and surrounding waterways, why he seemed so confident that we were heading in the right direction. The Remington was still in my hands, my left palm on the grip with the fore end cradled in the crook of my right elbow the way Haden had demonstrated. I looked down at it, struck by how comfortable and natural the firearm felt in my grasp. We'd been lucky to escape with our lives, and that got me thinking about Jason—of where he might be, if indeed he was still alive at all.

I stopped short, nearly bumping into Haden. We'd emerged from the woods and were standing on the outskirts of someone's back lawn. There was a wooden shed to our right, the sides painted barn-door red with white trim. Affixed to the side facing us was a life-size image of a black cat, the fur on its arched back
standing on end, the mouth drawn back into a silent hiss, the pointed teeth like an irregular row of tiny daggers. The grass here was not completely unkempt, but it was clearly overdue for mowing, and the gray siding on the back of the house looked tired, a little dirty, holding up the best it could under what appeared to be years of neglect.

“Your friend,” I said. “He lives alone?”

“Since his wife died,” Haden replied. “He's been . . .”

“Depressed?” I ventured, reminded once again how often our inner world bleeds out onto our external one, how the crosses we bear in silence are reflected all around us.

“I try to visit at least once a week,” he said, moving toward the back door. “He looks forward to our outings together.” Haden got down on one knee, fished behind the shrubbery, and brought out a key that he inserted into the lock on the doorknob. “We both do,” he said, turning the key and knob together and swinging the door open for us to step inside.

“I guess security's not a big concern for him,” I commented, following Haden in and standing just inside the doorway as my eyes adjusted to the dimness of the house's interior. There was a sudden scurry of movement near the floor as an orange cat shot past me and out into the yard.

“His cat just—”

“It's okay,” Haden said, walking across the room and flipping on a light to make up for the paucity of sunlight coming through the open doorway, the one solitary window looking out onto the backyard. “That's Tabitha. She's allowed.”

I remained near the open back door, hesitant to follow him much farther into the house. “Your friend . . .”

“Richard.”

“Your friend Richard,” I said. “He doesn't mind you rummaging around inside of his house while he's not here?”

Haden had disappeared into an adjacent room. I had to step inside a bit deeper to hear his response.

“I take care of the house and Tabitha when he's out of town. I wouldn't normally just walk into the place when he's not home,” he said, reappearing once again, “but I think it's safe to say that this is sort of an extenuating circumstance.”

I nodded, feeling uncomfortable just the same.

“Listen,” Haden said, one hand resting against the door frame. “I'm going to clean this wound, and after I'm done maybe you could sew it up for me. I know Richard's got a medical kit around here someplace. In the meantime, why don't you see if you can shorten up that splint of yours so you can at least use your right hand if you have to. There's a heavy-duty pair of scissors in the kitchen upstairs. If that doesn't do it, he's got some shears in the shed.”

He retreated into the bathroom and shut the door before I could object. A moment later I could hear water running in the shower. I stood there a moment, then placed the Remington on a table behind me and went in search of the stairs leading to the second story.

The house was a split-foyer. The upstairs kitchen and living room were considerably better lit than the rooms below. The furniture throughout looked like it had once been nice but, similar to the exterior siding, was now weighted down with a weary, worn-out appearance, as if this whole place—and its owner—were merely marking time until the inevitable end. There were a few framed pictures on the living room's bookshelf, but I tried not to look at them. They would be of Richard and his wife, I
figured—maybe a few children if they had them—but it was evident that this place maintained none of the vitality that had once thrived here. I was surprised at how that knowledge weighed on me. Maybe it reminded me of my own childhood home, of the years of emptiness I'd lived through and the person I'd become because of it. I looked in the direction of a chair perched near the front window, could see him sitting there, peering through the glass at the street below.
I can hear him running around on the lawn just outside my window,
Uncle Jim whispered to me, and for the span of a few seconds I was eight years old again, confused and terrified, not knowing what to do about this man I loved who was deteriorating in front of me.

Sometimes he scratches to come in.

I shook my head, blinked, and he was gone, leaving me standing alone in the living room, the knot in my throat so tight I struggled for breath. I sat down right there on the floor, lowered my head, and squeezed my eyes shut. And though I could no longer see him I could still hear the sound of his voice—almost imperceptible—calling to me from far away. It was hard to make out what he was saying, although I tried, I really did. Because suddenly it seemed important, maybe the
most
important thing he would ever tell me. But then it, too, was gone, and the voice that took its place was Haden's as he knelt down beside me.

“Lise.”

I opened my eyes and there he was, in his jeans although he'd left his blood-encrusted shirt behind in search of something clean to borrow from Richard's collection. He was well muscled, but a little too thin, the lower ribs clearly visible along the sides of his body. A midline scar ran the length of his abdomen,
reminding me of the trauma patients I'd encountered during my medical training.

“What happened up here?” he asked, but I didn't feel it was something I could explain, and I turned the subject to him instead.

“Why aren't you living with your wife, Haden? Did she pass away, too? Like Richard's?” I knew it was none of my business, that I had no right to ask if he wasn't ready to tell me. And yet it was something that was hanging out there between us.

“No,” he said, looking away from me toward the window. “She didn't die.”

I waited for him to continue, but he was quiet for a long time. I could hear a clock softly ticking away the seconds through the open entryway to the kitchen. It seemed to give voice to everything I hated about this house.

“When I returned from the war,” he said at last, “I was a different person from the one she'd fallen in love with—the one she'd known through most of our marriage.” He ran his gaze along the hardwood floor beneath us, his eyes restless. “I tried to be the same. I
wanted
to be the same. But some things in life, they just . . .”

“Change you,” I said, and he nodded, looking back at me.

“That's right. They change you, Lise. And you can never go back to being the person you once were.”

My thoughts returned briefly to Uncle Jim. It was not his face I pictured this time, but for some reason his hands—the strong fingers dangling loosely at his sides. And on the heels of that was the image of Jason kneeling beside his lover's dead body in the stillness of the hallway as the sound of approaching sirens grew near.

“People who've survived military combat talk about how hard
it is to return to civilian and family life afterward. It's not just that it's different. That's to be expected. The problem is:
you're
different. And the people who love you, that tears them up inside. They've been waiting so long for you to come home, you know? But when you finally do . . . you're a stranger to them, no longer the person they've been waiting for. You can see the confusion and disappointment in their faces.”

“I'm sorry,” I said.

“Yeah. Me too. Deborah—that's my wife—she rode it out for almost a year. I was drinking back then, and that didn't help matters. There was just so much . . . guilt and rage inside of me, and I turned some of that on her. Eventually, she couldn't take it anymore. Got in her car and left one evening after an argument and never came back. That was rock bottom for me. I've been working my way up ever since.”

“Maybe it's not too late to—”

“She's remarried now. And six months pregnant.” He smiled, shaking his head. “You believe that? We had our daughter, Rebecca, when we were so young. I always assumed there would be more, but . . . as it turned out that was it for us.”

“Haden, I . . . I'm really sorry.”

“It's all right,” he said, helping me to my feet. “Probably better this way. For both of us.” He opened his mouth to say something else, but then stopped and turned his attention toward the front door.

“What is it?” I asked, but a moment later I heard it too. The sound of a car on the driveway.