The Night Before (12 page)

“Okay,” Joe said. He was noticing how nicely her curves filled her scrubs. Maybe he wasn't in such bad shape after all.

When she pulled back the curtain, Joe saw Reverend Callum, Nicole, and Malikah waiting. The reverend's hand had been bandaged so that he looked like a boxer in wraps. Nicole stepped to Joe's side while the reverend settled in the chair. There was nothing gory for Malikah to witness so she contented herself with studying all the shiny medical gear. However the shooting had alarmed her, she wasn't showing any signs. Nicole appeared far more shaken over what had transpired.

Joe asked what time it was, then said, “You're still coming to the house, right?”

The reverend and Nicole exchanged a glance. Reverend Callum said, “We can carry you there, but we weren't sure… “

“What?”

“That it'd be right. With what happened and all.”

“Doesn't matter,” Joe said. Malikah piped up. “I want to go.” Joe nodded. “I'd say that settles it.”

The reverend said, “We'll talk about it once we get you out of here.”

Joe was on his way to insisting when a woman in slacks and a white blouse approached on quick clicking heels, pushing a laptop cart. She introduced herself as Ms. Tolliver from Accounting. From her curt voice and the pinched way she peered at the computer screen, she was not happy about having to work the holiday. It didn't seem to occur to her that no one else wanted to be there, either.

Joe asked Nicole to go into his pocket for his wallet and dig out his insurance card. Ms. Tolliver used the mobile stand to copy his information.

“This is the policy from your wife's employer?” she asked.

Joe felt his face reddening. “That's right.”

The woman typed in the account number from the card and hit a few more keys. Peering over the top of the screen, she said, “Mr. Callum?”

“It's ‘Reverend,'” Joe said.

“Sorry. Reverend. Do you have insurance coverage, sir?”

“I'm a veteran. I go to the VA.”

“Yes, sir, I understand. However, there's going to be a charge for the EMT treating the wound at the scene. And some Emergency Room charges. What arrangements -”

“Hey!” It came out sharper than Joe had intended and the woman stopped, frowned, and hiked her eyebrows. “How much?” he said.

Ms. Tolliver's lips pursed. “I don't have the exact final to—”

“Okay,
about
how much?”

“About… eighteen hundred dollars,” the woman said.

The reverend held up his bandaged hand, appalled. “For this?”

As the three adults and the child stared as Joe bent down and retrieved the sheaf of bills from his sock. “I'll cover it,” he said and passed the stack to Nicole. “Count out two thousand.” The reverend said, “Mister Joe, I can—”

“It's not charity,” Joe said quickly.

It was true; the woman's tone had set him off. Reverend Callum leaned forward to speak, then stopped when Joe shook his head. Joe watched as Nicole dropped one c-note after another onto Ms. Tolliver's keyboard. The woman's grimace of distaste deepened. Too bad for her; Joe was in no mood to be charitable.

“Okay, let's go,” he said when Nicole had delivered the last bill.

She helped him with his jacket and she and the reverend started for the door.

Ms. Tolliver said, “Wait, please. I'm printing a receipt.”

Joe stood by while the paper rattled out of the printer that was perched on the shelf below the laptop. Ms. Tolliver handed him the page. “If you're due a refund, you can -”

“He's a man of God,” Joe told her tight face. “And a veteran.” He walked away. Reverend Callum and Nicole were waiting by the ER door. “You didn't need to do that,” the reverend said. “I got money.”

“I wanted to,” Joe said. “And I can.” The reverend treated him to a baffled look. “It's all right. I'll explain it later.”

Nicole called, “Malikah?” The child had disappeared. Nicole called out again. “Malikah!”

The adults stepped into the corridor and circled the floor, arriving back where they began. Nicole was starting to get frantic and Joe had just asked a nurse to call security when she noticed the directory on the wall. She peered at it for a few moments, then said, “It's okay. I know where she went.”

She stood at the bright window, peering wide-eyed at the half-dozen tiny bodies in their bassinets. Joe caught up with Nicole at the top of the stairs and they stood in silence in the doorway, watching Malikah as she pressed her nose to the glass. Joe stole a glance at Nicole and saw something sad and unreadable in her eyes. “How'd you know she'd be here?”

“I just figured…” There was more to it, but he didn't press. After a few moments, she said, “She's looking for her little brother.”

“What little brother?”

“The one we lost.”

She moved off. Joe watched as she slipped next to her daughter and bent down. Together, mother and child gazed in at the newborns. Then Nicole put her arm around Malikah's shoulder and murmured, “It's time to go.”

Reverend Callum drove with Joe giving directions. Malikah was asleep with her head in her mother's lap. The city was quiet under the blanket of snow and a pre-dawn sky the color of slate.

Joe asked the reverend to retrace his path through the night, driving past the church and through the neighborhoods. Jimmy's was closed and he peered along Queen Street, where Gina and Sonny were nestled. He thought about rousing them to come along to the house. And what about Billy and the friend that he had surely found? The more the merrier. No, let them all huddle in warm beds. For this night and a thousand more, if they could manage it.

The reverend interrupted his thoughts. “You don't think you should maybe call ahead?” he said.

Joe said, “That would just get everybody excited. It's better this way.”

“I don't remember when's the last time I was in a home on Christmas morning,” the reverend said. “With the church and all, I don't get to.”

“Where are your people?” Joe said, feeling the sweet respite of talking about common matters.

“In Georgia,” Callum murmured. “What's left of them, I mean. They're all mostly gone.” He fell silent, leaving only the sound of the hum of the engine, the whirr of the heater fan, and the tires rolling on the packed snow. Another few moments and he said, “I had a wife and children. They're gone, too.”

“Gone where?” Nicole said.

Reverend Callum didn't speak for several seconds and Joe wondered if they had stumbled onto something tragic.

“The whiskey bottle,” the reverend said at last. “That was how the devil got hold of me. I was weak. Couldn't fight him. And so he won out. They up and left me. Moved away. I don't know where.” It had all come out in a deep and measured voice, like slow-running water. “I imagine my little girl has her own family by now.” He smiled in a distant way. “Means I'm a granddaddy. Or so I expect.”

“You don't want to track them down?” Joe said.

Reverend Callum was quiet for another few moments before saying, “I will someday. Yes, I will.” They passed under Highway 12 and turned onto College Avenue. “Don't get up this way much,” the reverend murmured.

Joe said, “I can help you. Find your people, I mean. I know how to do research. I have to do it for my books.”

“What books?” the reverend said.

“I write books. That's what I do. For a living.”

“Is that so?” The reverend's brow stitched as he watched the road. “I never asked you, did I?”

“What kind of books?” Nicole said.

Joe turned in his seat. “Novels. Historical.” He felt as if he was confessing to something. “So I do a lot of research.” He looked at the reverend again. “I could help. If you wanted to find someone, I mean.”

The reverend met his eyes, then returned his attention to the road. “Well, maybe…”

“You in the bookstores?” Nicole said.

“I have been, yeah.” Joe felt himself blushing again, though now with pride. “And I will be again soon.”

Nicole eyed him. “So what's your next one about?”

“My next one?” Joe felt a fresh throb in his arm. “I don't know. Maybe about tonight.”

“That'd be some story, all right,” the reverend said.

He directed Reverend Callum onto his street. As the van rolled to up the house, Joe saw Don whisking away with a heavy broom at the patches of drifted snow that had sullied his driveway.

The reverend shut off the engine. Don stopped and stared wide-eyed as the three adults and the child piled out. By the time he discerned that one of the passengers was Joe, it was too late to make a run for it. So he stood still, broom in hand, his face blanching from winter-morning red to a sickly white that was clear even at that distance.

Nicole glanced his way. “Jesus,” she said under her breath. “Him?”

“Him,” Joe muttered back.

“I guess ugly ain't against the law,” she said, causing Joe to cough.

Don stood frozen in a fearful sort of wonder, and whatever dreams of violence Joe had been entertaining dwindled away. He couldn't muster the passion to fix him with as much as a vile glance as they made their way up the walk. No one looked at Don anymore and he was a snowman melting into a greasy puddle of his own making.

It was not until the middle of the night that Mariel fell into a sleep that was assailed by odd and disjointed dreams. She jerked awake, dozed, then came alert again. Twice she felt her stomach churning so roughly that she thought she'd have to run to the bathroom, but both times the spasms passed and she sat on the edge of the bed, her dull eyes fixed on the floor while she waited for her nerves to calm.

As the hours wore on, her sense that something had gone wrong with Joe grew. He wouldn't stay away from his kids that long, not him, and not at Christmas. He wouldn't hurt them because of her treachery. He was a good man that way.

Who was she kidding? He was a good man in most ways. His poor earning potential wasn't a crime. She had known his slapdash nature all along, starting with their very first months together. He dreamed and chased rainbows and left the worries over money to her. She knew that he possessed a remarkable talent, that he worked very hard, that his books were accomplished. All that, and a dollar-fifty, got him a ride on the #6 bus. It was something he repeated when things were slow, which was most of the time. But his negligence didn't make him a felon.

Her fears for his safety rose to her throat with a sour taste. To escape from the dark and crazy thoughts that were crossing her mind, she spent some time recalling certain moments: the first time she had seen him as a student in a writing class he was teaching; their first kiss and the first time they had lain together; when the children were born, Christian in the bright of late morning and Hannah at midnight, as their natures dictated. She wondered what time of day Joe had been born. Had she ever asked him? She couldn't remember, but she guessed it was in the kind shadows of a quiet dawn just like this one.

She rested her head on the pillow, thinking that there were other sweet shreds that she should have grabbed onto, a word or a look that told her that the moment was special. But too many times, she had just let it slip by, instead fuming because he couldn't be more sensible. This was her failing.

She didn't realize that she had drifted back to sleep until the odd noises woke her, the clanking chassis and stuttering engine of a lone vehicle rolling up the street and coming to a creaking stop at the end of their drive. She pushed herself out of bed in the gray light and peeked through the curtain.

A battered van with a scroll of letters painted on the side sat at the curb. As she watched, the engine quieted, the side door slid wide, and a thin black woman climbed down, followed by a little girl bundled in a coat that was too big for her. A burly bearded man, also black, appeared from behind the wheel and made his way to the sidewalk, moving with a pronounced dignity. She noticed that his left hand was bandaged.

She choked out a sob, sensing before she saw him that Joe was in the van. Who else could it be? When the passenger door opened and he climbed down from the seat, she saw the sling that held his arm and let out a sharp sigh. Hadn't she known something was wrong? Now she watched as he stopped to stare in a flat way in the direction of the garage next door and noticed for the first time the sound of shoveling or sweeping. Don was out working on his driveway. On Christmas morning.

She waited to see if Joe was going to say or do anything, ready for whatever happened. But he and his companions started up the walk at what seemed a weary pace. He did not raise his eyes.

The house was quiet and everything in the main room was familiar to Joe's eye: the sturdy, earthy furniture, the paintings and photographs on the walls, the tree lit up and dazzling in the corner. And yet it felt like a place he had left some time ago. He knew that this was common among people who had endured a profound shock. Their worlds were jogged so far sideways that much of what they knew seemed for a short while brand new.

Though thrilled at the sight of the tree, Malikah was still sleepy and Nicole asked if she could put her down for a little while. Joe helped get her situated under a blanket on the couch, then invited Nicole and the reverend into the kitchen. Reverend Callum settled at the table with a sigh of comfort. When Joe tried making coffee with his one good hand, Nicole nudged him aside and took over.

He joined the reverend at the table. His thoughts turned to the kids and he realized that he hadn't heard any sounds from the house. He wondered if Mariel had taken them to her parent's house in Nazareth or to her sister's in Jersey. As if in reply, footsteps thumped in the upstairs hall, followed by the bathroom door closing and water running in the pipes.

“Nice table you got here.” The reverend laid his good hand on the surface. “You build it yourself?”