Here's the draft of the first six chapters of my novel project. Please note: NO ONE has permission to re-use this text, or any part of it, without my knowledge and permission. Also be aware that this is a draft, and probably still has errors within it--the text is subject to change.
The Quietside
To my mom and dad, who have always listened to
my crazy dreams and told me to pursue them.
1
Locals
call it The Quietside. Bass Harbor’s faded and worn WELCOME sign
approached me on the right, covered with little blue and green splotches.
Paintball guns. It was something us kids used to do in Cutler in our free time,
leaning out of the passenger window and tapping the trigger as fast as our
fingers could, the cool metallic smell of carbon dioxide puffing out from the
barrel as the muffled pop was unheard over drunken whoops and yells. I never
much liked it to be honest, even though every ball I shot hit my target and I’d
get a wet and smoky kiss from some girl in the backseat, two beers long gone.
The
billow of fog was beginning to settle in by the Bass Harbor Head Light as I
drove by it just after supper on my first night patrol there. The Hancock
County Sheriff cruiser’s high beams started to bounce back off the fog, so I
switched them down to low. I
came from the thick spruce forest that held Bass Harbor against the sea, lifted
off the gas and let the 4.6-liter V8 hum and slow. I drifted past Kennedy
General, a closet of a building with two regular-only gas pumps in front and a
diesel on the side. Across the street, two large garages loomed over a sign
that read KENNEDY AND SONS CONSTRUCTION.
It
was about the time for the locals to start a good smudge that would burn until
early morning, talk about the day, drink shit beer, laugh about relatives and
fall asleep as soon as their heads hit the pillows. I had a good idea about how
these people acted, and I liked that. Moving downeast to Portland right after I
got out of the Academy, I had no idea how city folk acted. I’ve heard that a
person’s overall temperament has a lot to do with your home state, but I think
it’s more about the size of the town you grew up in and how people live there.
I learned real quick that most city folk tend to go with the crowd and not
think things through too well. Either that or they’d think about the smallest
things, like if they’d manage to get in line for their coffee soon enough so
they could still make their bus. The Quietside was just a tad bigger than Cutler,
but in both towns they’d think you were joking if you told them people got in a
hissy over their morning coffee.
I
continued to coast, letting the car come to a gentle stop right in front of
Gerald’s Bar and Mainely Good Cookin’. Piles of weatherworn buoys decorated the
front entrance. A plastic deer target with a wide hole above and a little left
of the front leg stood leaning against the bar, head turned, staring blankly at
me. The neon Budweiser signs were still on behind the bar, surrounded by stools
and three booths. There wasn’t a television in Gerald’s like the bars in
Portland had. Didn’t need one. The stories and the company of friends were
enough.
I
only got to go in to Gerald’s couple times, real brief, to talk to Gerald
himself about an incident that happened, as I found out, after he purchased the
bar. I never went in to drink. Used to vow against it, thanks to my old man,
the notorious drunk Keith Bubba Wakefield. I bet he would’ve fit right in at
Gerald’s place with the men whose time for work had passed and time for
drinking didn’t have an end in sight. Men who had as many stories about fishing
and fucking as I do about death.
I
tapped the gas so the bar was just behind me, stopped again and relaxed in my
seat. I rolled the window down. The cool night air hit my face and made it
tense up like it does after a couple beers. I smelled the salty water and the
seaweed, the smell of hard work and sore bodies. Not a sound though. Dead
quiet. I can remember realizing how fitting The Quietside was as another name.
Cutler was just Cutler. People knew it was quiet, if they knew about it at all.
A
gust of wind whipped into the cruiser and I caught the smell of the distant but
ripe clam-flats. The one and only time I took my girlfriend and future wife,
Autumn, to meet my old man, she caught a breeze of the flats near my house and
said it smelled like pure shit. I’d never made that connection before. Clam-flats
smelled like clam-flats—they’ve never been foreign to me. Autumn’s South Portland
roots didn’t include clam-flats. She tarnished the scent, in a way, but I still
think they smell like Cutler.
I
smiled, rolled the window up and let cruiser roll forward again, only to stop
at a four-way intersection. I was going straight, towards Wayward Lane, past
the church and then a left to Pier Drive. I’d been to Bass Harbor a couple
times with the Sheriff to look at the house, enough to know my way around the
fog. The town was no bigger than a couple blocks in Portland, a lot less ground
then I was used to dealing with.
A
pickup with a rusty snowplow hanging off the front-end rolled to a stop
directly across from me. The truck looked like an old Ford, maybe an 80’s
model, but I couldn’t be sure. I flashed my high beams to let the truck go,
wanting to make a good impression. I wanted the locals to like me—better yet,
respect me, so they could let their ideas about college pricks out of their
heads long enough for me to get my foot in the door.
The
truck didn’t go. That couple seconds was enough to get me jittery so that I
went for the lights. I was about to flick them on when I heard the diesel roar
from ahead of me. The plow tilted upright, as if the truck was being thrown forward.
I watched it accelerate long enough to get a glimpse of some writing on the
door, but it was moving to fast for my eyes to catch any words.
I
sat there for a good minute or two, thinking. I knew what just happened. It was
a town where almost all the kids at recess played as robbers and that one
unlucky sonofabitch who was the cop would always lose. It was a town run by the
locals and the locals only.
Sheriff
Wittenburg told me people on that side of the island didn’t care for newcomers.
Tourists hoping to see a true costal town instead of the t-shirt shops in Bar
Harbor were told to avoid Bass Harbor by the spruce pigs—or Park Rangers, as
outerstaters call them. The Rangers followed their own preachings, even though
Acadia National Park bordered the harbor. Most flatlanders couldn’t even find
it and would turn around somewhere along the narrow winding road before they
saw the shot up welcome sign.
The
day the sheriff drove me down to Bass Harbor to show me around, he made it very
clear what the locals thought. “These people keep to themselves,” he said, “they
like it quiet. We haven’t had any trouble yet. This town hasn’t seen a cop for,
I dare say, oh, about a good ten years. Don’t expect they’ll be happy to see
there’s one living here now.”
I
didn’t need to hear that. I could tell by the stares the Sheriff’s cruiser got
that day. I spent more time staring back at people than at the town itself.
I
turned onto Pier Drive and stopped in front of house number 109. We were moving
in the next day. Wittenburg was letting me off. The man was a hard ass, but he
had his redeeming qualities. He could have given the offer to anyone else in
the station, all of whom had better records than I did. But he didn’t.
The
deal was I live in Bass Harbor as a kind of “outpost,” as Wittenburg called it.
I’d be the emergency responder here if things were to get hairy, which he
seemed to think they would. Southwest P.D. started complaining just around a
month before I arrived, bitching about how many calls they had to handle on top
of Southwest’s issues. Bass Harbor hadn’t had any major trouble, not even noise
complaints or road kill reports—mostly the occasional property damage the
weather was usually responsible for. That’s where I came in. They gave me a
foreclosed house and a cruiser and turned me loose.
The
house was as bland as my old man’s wardrobe. The siding was a dull yellow,
closer to a cream with the wear and tear of seaside weather. The trim was a
forest green and looked like it was a fresher coat than the siding. A covered
porch wrapped around the front, slanted downward, heading towards the ocean.
Some diagonal lattice had been tacked along the side, but was mostly rotted or
flat on the ground. Wittenburg promised repairs, but I didn’t take his word for
it. I’ve never been one to depend on another, at least people I don’t know too
well.
I
pulled the keys out of the ignition and pushed the door open. The salty air hit
me just like the fans they have in the big department stories, blasting more
heat outside than the furnace in our apartment could in a whole day. Even
though it was just four hours south, Portland was always a couple degrees
warmer and the snow never stayed quite as long. Growing up in another coastal
town prepared me for cold, but it felt like it’d dropped a good ten degrees in
the time it’d taken me to get from the bar to the house.
I
walked across the lawn to the front door, past the foreclosed sign that still
sat stuck in the dirt, sagging forward as if it was tired of its job. The tips
of my fingers, my ears and my nose were already cold, turning white and stiff.
I’d
forgotten if I’d locked the door behind me when Wittenburg showed me the house
and gave me the keys the other afternoon. When I asked him to turn around so I
could check, he said that it’d be fine.
“The
people here are kind hearted, Cole. They’re not going rob you. No one’s even
going think of robbing you here, neither. It’s a good bet this town has more
guns than people. You’ll have a nice break in October when it’s hunting season,
I’ll tell you that for sure.”
The
man couldn’t make up his mind about those folk. From what he was saying, I got
the impression that one second they needed to be watched, the next they’d be
bringing you warm blueberry pie and venison. Wittenburg wasn’t some mall cop.
He knew people pretty well, which is why I think I got the job in the first
place. Still, he couldn’t make up his mind.
I
pulled the screen door open and turned the stained door’s handle. Sure enough,
I’d left it unlocked. The door creaked open as I pushed against it, revealing a
dark, barren living room. The previous owners left a couch that must have been added
before the doors were installed because of its size. A worn sheet covered it
from dust.
I
kept thinking someone could have walked in the front door and could be waiting
for me when I started to move in the next morning. Some local who thought he’d
take me out before I was able to say hello. No matter how hard I tried, I saw
his eyes, squatting behind the oversized couch, .45 in hand. He was wearing
that stained white button up that hung from his scrawny shoulders. The gun
quivered slightly from his excitement. I went for my holster, still expecting
the 9mm Glock, the hard polymer and the cool metal just around the grip only to
remember halfway down that I wasn’t carrying it anymore. I took my Maglight
instead, clicked it on, and shined it inside, expecting to see his eyes sparkle
in the light before the crack of the gun. Or maybe my partner held at gunpoint
again. There was nothing but the couch and a thin layer of dust on the wooden
floor.
My
imagination would run off a lot like that, taking a bizarre trip to the past or
the possible future. The therapists told me it would stop after more therapy sessions,
imagery rehearsals, more bullshit. Of course they’d tell me that. A treated
patient doesn’t make you much money at the end of the week. I stopped going to
the sessions about a month before Wittenburg called me and told me he had a
spot open and was looking for somebody with experience, right around the same
time Autumn lost her job and things started to get tight.
It
was always at night, just before bed. Autumn would give me some books to read,
happy ones, to take my mind off the sound in the kitchen, who was outside Tucker’s
room, who was watching Maya’s crib, who was in the mirror. It never helped. I’d
have all the lights on in the apartment, walk through the apartment once more,
and make Autumn get up and shut them off as I got into bed.
I’d
talk in my sleep, screaming and thrashing until Autumn would run her hands
through my hair to wake me up. She’d tell me Michael was gone and she was my
only partner left. I wouldn’t sleep until the next night, and even that was
rare.
That
was when we were still in Portland, only a couple months after it happened,
when my imagination was more vivid then it was as a child watching the closet
door.
I
scanned the room a couple more times with the Maglight and made sure to lock the
door. I triple checked, fingers fully numb and nose running as I walked back
the car. Inside the cruiser had already cooled off and would take a good ten
minutes to warm up again on the way back to the station in Ellsworth. As I
turned the ignition, I took another look at the house. I knew it was going to
be the talk of the town the next day, not for the moving truck or the new
family but because the Sherriff’s cruiser sitting in the driveway.
2
I got back to Autumn’s friend’s house in
Ellsworth around one in the morning. We were staying there during the
transition phase between our old apartment in Portland and the new house. It
was a nice gesture, but I was glad to know I wouldn’t be staying there much
longer.
Her name was Francine but she went by Susan,
which never made much sense to me. My guess was she didn’t like her name and
didn’t want to disrespect her parents and go through the paperwork to change
it. She was a single mom with a bratty ten-year old boy that couldn’t get it
out of his mind that I was a punching bag. I don’t remember his name. Really
didn’t like the kid. I just called him Brat.
Autumn played softball with Susan at University
of Presque Isle before I knew either of them. Autumn was calling it quits with
the asshole she followed from South Portland up to school. Susan was a shoulder
to cry on, which made an inseparable bond between them until I came into the
picture. Susan got jealous of us when we started dating, and decided to get
knocked up by some business major who ended up not being so good with money or
commitment.
The house was a shitty modular that felt
half-finished. I was never quite warm enough. I’d catch the shivers just after
getting out of bed that would last until I had my second cup of coffee at the
station. A house with a fireplace never gets like that.
It was cold when I walked in that evening, but
still a paradise compared to the harsh winter night. I felt the wall for the
light switch, flipped it on and headed towards what Susan called the guest
bedroom but was actually a small computer room. Boxes Autumn got from the
grocery store for our essentials were stacked precariously around our mattress
on the floor. She was already asleep, face down in the pillow with the light
still on.
I started to unbutton my uniform and walked
over to the kid’s room, which was nice and quiet. They were sharing with
Brat—another reason I wanted out of Susan’s. The room was a lot cleaner than
Autumn and mine’s, since we left the toys back at the apartment, afraid Brat
would steal or break them.
I finished undressing in the computer room and
scrounged around a bathroom box for my toothbrush, making a racket. Autumn
rolled onto her back and squinted at me, confused but strikingly innocent and
beautiful, even with her dirty blonde hair in a mess.
“It’s already in the bathroom,” she managed,
her voice already broken, as if she had been sleeping for days. I nodded and
took a step towards the door as she collapsed back into bed.
I cleaned up and did an abbreviated version of
my walk around the house, hoping to get to bed early to get some rest for the
move. It was exciting, but in a way I felt like I was cheating myself. It felt
like a handout or a pity date in high school. I didn’t feel like I earned the
new house, or even the opportunity. Autumn told me I did, but her vote of
confidence was only part of what I needed, and was only said to calm me down
for a while. I was sure she’d turn around and question my decision the next
day, saying we were putting all our eggs in one basket.
Mary Ficher, Cutler’s librarian, would always
tell me not to put all my eggs in one basket. It’s one of the things I still
remember about her. She said it so damn much, I can still hear her say it. When
I’d run up the hill from my house as soon as my old man and the armada of
fishing boats were too far out in the harbor to see, I’d wait on the library
steps for Mrs. Ficher to come at eight on the dot and unlock the door. It’s
where I spent my days before I started school and afternoons after school was
let out. We’d have the place to ourselves most of the time, so she’d read to me
until her voice went hoarse or she lost her grip on the books. At the time, I
thought she’d lose grip because the books were too heavy, not knowing about arthritis.
So I’d only grab one book, and she’d tell me not to put all my eggs in one
basket, every time.
I left the kitchen light on and returned to our
room. I turned the single-bulb light off and staggered to my side of the bed, lifted
the covers and climbed in. Autumn rolled over, giving me the spot she had been
laying, preferring the cool, crisp sheets. I inched forward, cuddling against
her like I did until I was almost asleep. She was lying on her back, breathing
heavy. Not quite a snore, but just enough to make me feel comfortable. The
warmth of her soft skin made me want to wake her and make love, but I knew she
would protest, even though it had been a couple days since we had been able to.
She was hesitant out of respect for Susan, and it was late. She would’ve said
we had a busy day ahead of us, which was true.
I
knew taking Wittenburg’s opportunity was the right choice for us. A house, free
of charge, and place like Cutler without the bad memories, a new chance for me
to prove myself. I figured Autumn could find a job in one of the retirement
homes in Bar Harbor—it’d be a twenty minute drive, but it could work. It’d be
the hardest for the kids, and I knew that, but they were young enough to make
new friends. It was a nice, small school that could help Tucker with what the
doctors told us was ADD and let young Maya be a little more creative than the
larger public schools would.
I
knew Autumn would see this was best for us eventually.
The movers were already there when we pulled in
the driveway at Bass Harbor. The fog had mostly rolled away and the house
looked a lot less depressing with some sun on it, turning the ugly cream to a
more vibrant light yellow.
Wittenburg told me it was all right if I used
the cruiser to help move things in. Autumn still had her car from college, a
lazy maroon Camry that still smelled of her grandmother, who had passed the car
down when she went to retirement housing just before the turn of the
century.
Jim, an unshaven guy built like a linebacker,
was one of the movers. I didn’t catch the other guy’s name, but he was scrawny
and seemed new. Jim already had the ramp lined up to move the couple pieces of
furniture we had off the six-wheel truck. As soon as I opened the door, he
started moving things in, while the other guy took his time, finishing his
coffee. There’s always one like him, no matter what the job is.
I made sure to put the lighter boxes in the
Camry for Autumn and the kids, even though I ended up moving most of it
anyways. Autumn said she was sick in the morning, nervous about the movers not
showing up, and both Tucker and Maya raced to find their rooms and stayed up
there while Jim moved the heavy stuff in. Tucker tried to claim the living room
but Autumn showed him around and he eventually picked the east bedroom, which
had a nice skylight and more shelves for his model cars.
It was a pain in the ass to get our bed frames
through the door and up the stairs, but Jim new a couple tricks that made life
a little easier. Autumn kept herself to small things, like making the beds and
putting dishes away. I saw her try and move the giant couch, but stopped
herself after a couple pushes and asked the lazy mover to do it for her, which
he did without a word. She acted off, like she was coming down with something.
Whatever it was, she eventually felt good enough
to move a couple boxes from the Camry in, one that had some odds and ends of
mine in it, mostly from Machias High, my alma mater just fifteen minutes from
Cutler. I watched her take it up the stairs, making sure she wasn’t lightheaded
or dizzy. It was only a minute or so after when she called me upstairs to the
master bedroom, which didn’t seem much bigger than the other two.
I found her crouched over the box on the floor,
studying the contents.
“You needed something?” I peeked my head in the
door, wishing she would say no so I could help Jim finish so we wouldn’t feel
obligated to feed them.
“Hey.” She didn’t turn to face me and sounded
more interested in the box. “What’s this?”
“I think that’s my old high school stuff.” I
walked in and took a look at what she was so curious about.
“You never showed me this.” She was holding a
picture of my parents and me. Autumn moved it closer to my face, as if I hadn’t
studied it when it was on my bedroom desk back in Cutler. We had just gotten
out of church, I think, because we were dressed nicely, standing in front of
the garden just as the orchids my mother planted were blossoming. I was no more
than three at the time. “It looks like you and your Dad. I’ve never seen your
mother though.”
“Yeah, that’s Mom.” I took it from her. “It’s
one of the few pictures I took when I left. One of the few Dad kept of us all.”
Autumn stood up and grabbed my cheeks like distant aunts do. “Well, you were
cute. I don’t know what happened.”
“Huh.” I smiled and set the picture down on the
nightstand next to the bed. “If you say so.”
She knew when to move on, when something was
bothering me. “I’ll let you sort though this box later. I’d like to do the
bathroom now. You look like you have empty hands, go grab one of the boxes for
me.” I rolled my eyes and didn’t move. “Well?” She looked at me expectantly.
I headed downstairs, past Jim and the other guy
and outside to the cruiser, where the box of shampoo, soap, makeup and that
sort of thing was. I had my hand on the passenger door when a truck drove by
nice and slow, eyeing the house. I waved, guessing he was a local by the
condition of his truck that looked like it had been patched together from a
couple other models that were probably headed towards the scrapper. Wasn’t the
truck from the night before. He looked at me, looked at the cruiser, and gave
me a good, cold stare. I stared back.
We finished moving all the boxes and furniture
in around supper time. Autumn took a break from organizing and made the kids
and me some peanut butter sandwiches. She had some cereal, not daring to eat
much after her rough morning.
Some people say you don’t sleep well if you’re
in a new place, but more was keeping me up that night. I don’t know what
Wittenburg expected me to find there, but I had a good feeling I wasn’t going
to like it.
3
The
next morning, Autumn shook me from what little sleep I had gotten.
“We should go to church. It’d be a good way to
meet everyone, Cole. You said you wanted to relate to these people.”
“You
know how I feel about church.” I tossed the sheets off and sat up, legs hanging
over the edge of the bed.
“I
know how your father felt about church. You didn’t go because he didn’t.” She
sat up as well and poked my back, wanting me to turn around. “If you want to do
a good job here, than lets go.”
“You
really think the kids would enjoy it? Especially Tucker. I sure as hell wouldn’t.
It’s the first day here, we should go for a drive. I’ll show you and the kids
around. Something fun.” I stood up and stretched. “I’ll get to know these folk,
don’t worry.”
I
went to the bathroom and splashed some water on my face. When I walked back to
our room, she was putting on her nice white and pink dress and had a purple
vest lain out on the bed.
“I’m
taking the kids to church. Are you coming?”
Church
wasn’t a place of worship or community for me. Never has been. It’s a place of
death, where you are only reminded the dead will never come back, no matter how
much praying you do. Autumn and my wedding was the only time I’ve been in a
church for something other than a funeral.
I was four when a state plow truck hit my
mother just after one of the worst ice storms downeast Maine had seen in
generations. No snow, just layers of ice everywhere, coating anything it
touched.
She was a teller at Machias Savings and had to
leave for work before the sun came up to get to the bank at six so she could
get the drawers ready. In the winter, my old man would have to go and pour hot
water into the four-door Ford Escort’s radiator. He slept in that morning.
Whether he was hung-over or just overtired, he never told me. My mother had to
get the water.
She always backed the car down the driveway so
she wouldn’t have to back out into the sharp corner our house sat on. It wasn’t
known for being dangerous despite the awkward angle it made you turn, going
uphill and sharply left at the same time. Coming up to the corner, you could
only see our roof. If you didn’t turn, you’d end up driving right onto our
driveway. Mom would drive up the corner and stop, as if she had missed the
house, and back it in.
Rumor had it that the corner was there when the
town was built. The townsfolk knew about it, and that was everyone that drove
on it—besides the occasional visiting relative who had probably been warned
over the phone. Didn’t need a name like “Deadman’s Corner” like a lot of towns
have. Any accidents that happened in Cutler were on the pier between the
fisherman’s trucks. You’d be hard pressed to find a completely smooth area on
anyone’s truck, especially in the truck beds, where they stacked their lobster
traps higher than the roof. Dents and worn paint gave trucks character, and the
men drove the damaged pickups like badges of honor.
Normally, the twenty-three ton plow truck would
have also known about the corner and slowed down to compensate for the turn,
especially with the thick ice coating the road. Why the D.O.T. in Machias
decided to have a rookie plowman drive that day is anybody’s guess, but this
young kid fresh out of University of Maine at Machias was behind the wheel,
probably nervous as shit. Not nervous enough though. He missed the corner
completely.
Mom was leaning over the engine with the hood
up when the plow truck came sliding down the driveway, rear wheels locked and
front wheels turning as far left as they could go, all in hopes of something
catching. The plow sat a couple feet off the ground since it doesn’t do much
good against ice.
She turned around to face the truck and didn’t
have time to do anything else. The top of the plow slid into her abdomen. The
Escort slid backwards, Mom pressed against it, until the rear bumper dragged
against the back lawn for a couple feet and hit the old crab apple tree that I
watched from my window at night.
The car stopped short, but the weight of the
plow truck kept going with enough force to cut my mother in half against the
Escort’s engine before finally coming to a stop.
I woke when the plow first hit Mom and looked
out the window when my mother was cut. The plow driver shifted into reverse in
a panic. The tires spun on the ice, but he kept accelerating. The diesel engine
rumbled the house like a constant burst of thunder, rattling the pictures on
the walls and the china in the kitchen.
I didn’t rush outside like my father, or go to
the living room to call for help. I sat in bed and watched my mother weakly
flail her arms at the heavens with her last controlled and conscious movements.
I watched the blood mix with the blue antifreeze and drip onto the yard. I
watched my mother’s face, her mouth open in shock, eyes as wide as possible,
darting back and forth as the trauma took her sanity and then her life.
I couldn’t take my eyes from the scene, no
matter how much I wanted to. Nowadays when I respond to a fatal and it’s on a
popular strip of road, I see people stare as they drive by. Only difference is
that they can keep driving past. I couldn’t.
My old man ran over to Mom and pulled her top
half from the wreckage. He sat her down in the yard as delicately as a man’s
touch allows, but she was already gone. There were no cries to bring her back,
nothing asking for God’s forgiveness, or for a second chance. A man that fishes
his whole life can easily lose his faith in the good Lord after a couple rough
seasons. It makes for a heart as cold as the March tide and a mighty temper as
rough the seas in a Nor’easter.
The driver must have been in shock, as he kept
his foot on the gas pedal until my old man climbed up to the cabin and threw
him onto the solid ice. Luckily my old man didn’t have a lot of time with the
driver, as the neighbors had already called the sheriff, who brought two deputies
with him since he dealt with my father’s drunken strength on a regular basis. It
took all three to cuff the old man. The poor kid was in the hospital for three
months before he was able to leave. Pictures in the paper compared what he
looked like before and after. Lifting traps all day builds muscle fast, and
fishing was all my old man did during the season. No one said it, but everyone
was surprised there wasn’t another body taken away that day. The driver—Peter,
if I remember right—didn’t have the heart to charge my old man like people do
nowadays. He knew he was in the wrong and deserved it.
There wasn’t a soul in Cutler that wasn’t at
the funeral. No suits or fancy dresses, but the nicest clothes everyone had and
the most flowers you’ve ever seen. Mom was one of those women who was never a
bother to anyone, and people respect that downeast. When someone knocks on your
door to give you some extra venison for the winter or just to say hi, it
doesn’t go unnoticed.
My old man didn’t speak for Mom. Not a word. Most
people just thought he was too beside himself, shell-shocked. I know that not
to be the case now that I’ve seen some more of life and more of my father. He’s
not one to show his emotions when he’s sober. Even the woman he married fresh
out of high school wasn’t enough for his manhood to be tarnished in front of
the whole town.
I don’t remember him kissing Mom, holding her
hand even. I remember them laughing while watching t.v. after I was put to bed,
and them going out once a year on what was then Washington’s Lady, my old man’s
boat, to celebrate their anniversaries. He renamed it The Lovely Lady a couple
weeks after the funeral, but you still see the old name, a faded memory beneath
a white layer of paint. I remember these things because they stood out amongst
the normal. The normal times when they didn’t get along, when Mom and I would
eat alone while he went out to forget us with his friends. A plate piled with
the night’s supper would sit in front of his chair until it was cold to the
touch.
The night after the funeral, he must’ve put
down more than half of the liquor and all the beer he had around—no easy task,
even for him. I stayed in my room, considering shutting the door like Mom used
to when he’d get home late. Instead, I was captivated with the destruction he
was causing, and just like a fish out of water, he stumbled and thrashed around
the house, desperate and crazied, throwing everything that reminded him of Mom.
He picked some things up again in guilt, then realized his guilt meant nothing
and threw them down a second time.
Sometime in the mess, I was brave enough to get
up and shut the door while he was in the kitchen, turning the knob so the latch
wouldn’t click into place. I was worried he’d hear me. I hopped back into bed
and stared at the door. I assumed he’d forgotten I was in the house until the
thought popped into my head that he was saving me for last. He’d never hit me
when Mom was around. For the first time, Mom wasn’t there.
When his staggered steps found my door, he
stopped, holding the doorknob with his drunken strength, rattling the whole
door. He opened it quickly, but with a somewhat calculated ease, as if he was
worried I would be in its path. His knuckles were bloodied. He breathed through
his nose, nostrils flaring, lips twitching, unsure what to say.
He stood in the doorway, staring at the floor
and never at me, for what must have been thirty minutes. I waited for his eyes
to meet mine, wishing he’d say something to make it better, but he couldn’t
find the words.
If he had looked at me, he would’ve shed a
tear. I know it, and so did he.
Autumn
made the kids a quick breakfast and took the Camry down to the church, the
biggest building in all of Bass Harbor, besides the garages near the quarry at
Kennedy and Sons Construction. I stayed in the shower so I wouldn’t have to say
goodbye.
I
figured it would be a good time to get my headings while everyone was in
church. Instead of taking the cruiser, I put on my running gear—some
lightweight pants and under armor with one of my old Presque Isle Cross Country
shirts that had the sleeves cut off and frayed. My sneakers had seen better
days, but I kept any pair that I liked until the treads started peeling off or
the arch gave out. I grabbed a five from my wallet for the general store. Just
a bill, so the wallet wouldn’t flop around in my pocket.
I
opened the front door to a bitter cold salty gust that made me grab the door so
it wouldn’t blow wide open. Days like that, it wasn’t the cold that got to you,
but the dampness. It crept through however many layers you had on and sunk into
your bones, giving you the chills until you found a healthy fireplace and some
chowder.
Starting
was getting more painful each year, my aging knees and the ankle I hurt running
in the last college meet of my cross country career fighting my natural stride.
While running’s physical, a good ninety percent of a runner is dependant on
their mental capacity to overcome pain and that voice in your head telling you
to stop. Instead of thinking about my knees or the ankle, I listened to my
breathing, focusing on taking deep long breaths so I wouldn’t cramp. I listened
to my feet hit the asphalt, a steady thud, thud. The cracks in the pavement
were wet, like someone drew them on, and looked like dirt that’s been exposed
to a drought for months. I relaxed my hands, creating a loose fist, and
pictured holding sticks so I would pump my arms enough, but not too much. My
throat began to burn with the salty, cold air, just like Cutler.
Pier
Drive had another ten houses other than ours. They all were two stories but
modest, cozy looking homes, packed tight to keep the heat in. A couple had
garages—only one door, just wide enough for a car and some walking space. Most
were probably filled with things other than cars: boxes full of belongs passed
down for generations but not quite important enough to be on the mantle,
workbenches filled with projects to putter on, firewood from two or three years
ago, drier than a popcorn fart, and even some traps that didn’t fit outside.
The garage was just as much a part of the house as any other room. Lots of
times you’ll be able to get a better idea about a person by their garage
instead of their living room.
There
wasn’t a library in Bass Harbor for me to run to, so I ran to the docks to stop
and quickly stretch. Under armor wasn’t tested in Maine, I’ll say that for
sure, but it started working after a couple minutes, holding in my heat and
sweat, something that’s fine while running but dangerous when standing still.
The breeze blew against me and gave me the shivers. As I flipped his right foot
behind me for my hand to catch and pull up on, I calmed my breathing, listening
for the rumbling waves, wondering how long The Quietside would stay true to
it’s name.
There
was something off-putting to the silence. Dogs in the yard hardly ever barked,
the gulls never called each other, no music or doors slamming. It was like the
whole town was holding its breath. I thought it was just a drastic change from
Portland, the city landscape that never slept. Bass Harbor was like stepping out
of those clubs the young people binge drink in—the silence creates noise in its
own way as you realize your ears are ringing steady as white noise.
I
started getting too cold for stretching to do any good, so I ran back the way I
came, down Pier Drive, and took a right onto Wayward Lane, the main street of
the town. If I took another right, I’d head back down towards the docks, past
the church, a couple dirt roads, and some more houses. Left was the way out of
town, towards Kennedy General and the construction garages.
I
didn’t have to ask Wittenburg about the Kennedys. I already knew what they
were—it was the same thing with the Walls in Cutler. If you weren’t a Wall, it
was a good chance you were either related to them, married to them, or weren’t
as local as they were. Small towns promote heritage, tradition, sure—but
families will still leave, eventually, for whatever reason. Families that stay
become the elders of the town. The wise folk who had seen all the land and sea
had to offer. In most cases, they had a reason for their kids to stay, like a
family business. The Walls had a small but efficient live storage business that
sold and shipped whatever the boats brought in. Kennedys probably had a hand in
that too, but it seemed like they were focused where the real easy money
was—building and maintaining the rich flatlander’s summerhouses in the other
towns on the island.
I
ran down towards the general store, thinking I’d get some coffee and wait for
church to get out to meet some locals and socialize a bit. The parking lot
looked just as empty as the town, with only one shitty Datsun parked alongside
the shingled red building, just behind the icebox.
The
store was smaller now that I wasn’t in the cruiser. The side that faced towards
the woods was only as tall as a mid-sized SUV, while the side facing town was
only a bit taller than a living room ceiling. It made the building look like
fuckup, like someone didn’t measure quite right and went with it anyways.
Plastic brick siding ran along the front at waist height, the pinkish hues
clashing with the red shingles.
I
stopped running when I crossed the road, not bothering to look for any cars,
and walked between the pumps to the front door. KENNEDEY
GENERAL was eye level to the left
of the door with Pepsi logos on either side, faded so the red looked pink and
the blue like an off teal. A lone security camera stood watch over door where
the roof peaked, but wasn’t wired to anything. Just for show. My guess was that
what ever was under the counter was deterrent enough. To rob a store in Maine
and not think you were going to get a Remington 870 stuffed in your face was a
rookie mistake, and most robbers were rookies, young guys just out of high
school desperate for whatever they need—usually drugs. Too young to realize
what a mistake they were making.
The
door opened hard, like it hadn’t been greased since it was installed. A small
bell rang. Not a chime, but a physical bell. Inside smelled like a normal chain
grocery store—disinfectant and cardboard—but was definitely a family run
operation.
The
shelves were wider than the isles, with cans and bottles and boxes piled up to
the roof. They weren’t that tall—the ceiling was just short, even shorter than
it looked outside. Almost all the cheap white ceiling tiles you see in office
buildings or hospitals were stained brown with water damage. Dull yellow
florescent lights that may have been white at some point tried to light the
products, but only managed to hide some of the dried mud caked on the floor,
probably from the construction guys across the street. The sagging left side
that faced out of town was home to the coolers and freezers. About half the
coolers where filled with beer while the rest had only the bare necessities.
Well, beer was a necessity—there was probably a Budweiser plant out there
somewhere that dedicated all their time to making products for downeast Maine.
Fisherman could put them down. My old man certainly could.
The
right side had a small counter for the register that was cluttered with candy
bars, condoms and other convenience items. Only a couple types of gum and no
on-the-go clothing cleaners. A couple of stools that had lost their stain
coating were to either side of the register. It left a path for people to pay
who didn’t want to hear how some guy named Jonesy was banging a girl from
Northeast or how shitfaced his friend Tony had gotten last night with the boys—though
my bet was most people took their time getting any change.
A
short but thick man built like a fisherman came from out back, where there was
another counter for food orders. Just pizza, soup, coffee and sandwiches,
nothing fancy but all homemade. A Dale Earnhardt Jr. cap sat on a graying head
of hair that probably was falling out. His apron had several layers of food on
it, a colorful combination compared to the two brown streaks on his hips where
he must’ve wiped his hands when a towel wasn’t around. He was cleaning his
hands while walking, looking behind him like a person does when they’re unsure
if they locked their car. His pace was steady besides a slight limp from his
right leg, probably why he wasn’t fishing anymore. Either that or age caught up
to him. He held a relaxed composure until he looked up and saw me. It became
calculated, wary. He stopped wiping his hands and sized me up as he made his
way to the register. I took a seat on one of the stools, which felt as worn as
it looked, and folded my arms on the counter.
“Help
you?” He leaned forward, not in my personal space, but testing the waters. He
had a fisherman’s squint, a side effect from years of exposure to reflected
sunlight of the Atlantic. Any flatlander would have taken it as a look of
uncertainty. This case, they would’ve been right.
“What
kind of coffee do you have?” I took my arms off the counter and sat up
straight. He didn’t take his eyes away from me.
“Regular.”
Even I waited another second, expecting another option. When you got far enough
north, you’d be hard pressed to find extravagant flavors of anything. Bass
Harbor was a last haven for simplicity. In other towns on the island,
especially Bar Harbor, the cashier would be taken aback by a coffee order that
wasn’t blueberry or some tourist flavor that tasted like shit.
“I’ll
have a cup of that, with just a little sugar.”
He
slid a glass shaker of sugar across the counter in front of me and went back to
the food counter to grab the coffee.
The
doorbell rang, jumping me a little, no more than a twitch. I didn’t swivel
around, just looked over my shoulder. Four men stepped in, all wearing what
must’ve been their nicest clothes from church, all far dark-skinned from
summer, all over thirty, only one over six foot.
“I
don’t know Harvey, I just think it’d—“ Whatever conversation they were holding
stopped as soon as they saw the stranger on one of their stools. I kept my head
turned.
“Mornin,’”
I said. There was a pause. They didn’t look at each other. Didn’t need to. They
all were thinking the same thing.
“Not
anymore.” The one who looked the oldest beckoned outside to prove his argument.
One snickered.
I
chuckled. “No, guess not.”
“You’re
the new flatfoot.” The man who spoke stepped forward, waving an accusatory
finger, and took at seat on the stool to my right. It didn’t shock me he knew already.
Church was just as much about God as it was a chance to gossip. That’s why I
think Autumn liked it so much.
“I
guess so.”
“You
guess a lot,” another said from behind me. The one next to me piped his two
cents in with a smirk.
“Typical
cop.”
I
could feel my face getting warm. In an odd way, I liked being called a typical
cop. It was a fresh start with people who didn’t know about me, who wouldn’t
for quite some time. Still, the compliment was in a bad context. Being a cop is
all about getting along with the public, being their friend and, although it
may sound cheesy, their protector. The guy who’ll get their cat down from a
tree or hunt down a serial rapist.
There
are times, though, that you need to put your foot down. When the public sees you
as too gentle to yield to. A person can only take so much until they need to
stand up for themselves, but a cop has to put their foot down a step before
others would. It’s one thing my old man never told me—just assumed I’d get it
from experience. I learned the hard way, so before Tucker even went to
preschool, I started drilling that into his head. That no one has the right to
hurt you. That turning the other cheek like teachers tell you to do is a load
of shit. That if the other guy throws a punch, he better expect one from you. These
guys were just the type to look out for, to be ready to stand up.
I
was new, and the running gear wasn’t helping—wasn’t a working man’s clothing.
The uniform and pistol let people see you’re an authority. I just needed to
change my image before they thought they had me figured out. I turned just
enough to face the older man still standing by the door.
“I’m
not a typical cop. I’m a lot like you boys, raised in Cutler, got a wife and
kids. You best remember that.” Most cops don’t have a family, or had one that
couldn’t put up with long nights and missed baseball games. I kept looking
right at the older man, making sure the others noticed.
The
employee came back with my coffee. Good timing on his part. I turned around and
took a sip. It was hot as hell but I drank it anyways.
“Fellas.”
The man behind the counter nodded, but the others weren’t paying attention to
him. The oldest thought what I said over for a couple seconds, then replied.
“Cutler.
Huh, you got a lot to learn about the Quietside, boy.”
Might
as well been words straight out of my old man’s mouth. By my tenth birthday I’d
read more books than he would in his whole life, but I was still an idiot to
him. He’d call me nummer than a hake and said I had a lot to learn about the
way things worked.
As
the men got what they wanted and left, I sat in silence, looking my coffee,
worrying that my old man was right.
4
Autumn was home when I got back. My quads
burned as I walked up the front steps, and I realized that I wasn’t looking
forward to the talking to Autumn was going to give me. Not a speech, but a word
here or there that would make her point.
I opened storm door and was greeted with the
smell of floor cleaner. The place already looked better, the hardwood floors
regaining their former shine. I stomped my shoes on the floor mat. A couple
chunks sand and chips of salt from the road littered the carpet, but didn’t hit
the clean floor. I left the sneakers by the doorway. Autumn already had her
hands full with the kids and their grime, she didn’t need any from me.
I felt the bottom of my socks grow damp as I
walked across the hardwood, the cleaner still drying. Normally, my feet would’ve
been a sweaty mess, but it was cold enough that they didn’t have a chance to
heat up nearly enough.
“That you, Cole?”
Her voice came from the upstairs hallway, still
empty and noisy, adding a touch of reverb. I heard her footsteps creak over to
the head of the stairs, her head peaking around a wall.
“Hi babe, place looks great.” She snickered. We
both knew the place wouldn’t be home until next week at the earliest—not until
the last cobweb was found and cleaned up. She grew up in a clean house and
wouldn’t stand for hers not following suit.
“Have a nice run? You missed a nice service.”
There it was, with a hint of disappointment.
“I’m sure I did.” I stupidly looked around, as
if the little ones were hiding from me. “Where are the kiddos?” Autumn leaned
back, pulling the bucket of cleaner to her feet and picked it up, balancing it
so it wouldn’t splash as she began to walk down the stairs, leaving the mop
behind.
“They’re still at church, some of the other
parents and their kids were staying late to do some finger painting. They offered
for Tucker and Maya to stay and make some friends, and I figured I should start
working on this mess.” My stomach complained, so I moved over to the kitchen,
still cluttered with boxes full of dishware, some surviving from our college
years.
“Probably didn’t know who you were just yet.”
She stopped in place.
“Oh, so they would’ve treated me different if
they did? That’s ridiculous Cole. Just drop that kind of thought. I got along
just fine with the other women there. They seem perfectly nice.”
“Yeah—“
“I’m not in the mood, Cole.” She paused, set
the bucket down, and looked at the clock hanging above the kitchen sink. “Now
that you’re home I’m going to the store to get stuff for supper. Could you pick
up the kids in about thirty minutes?” I nodded. “And try not to walk on the
floor when it’s wet, right after I’ve cleaned it.” She motioned towards where I
had stepped.
Autumn didn’t understand what it felt like to
be public enemy number one, the guy who puts people away, who ruins families.
It’s one thing to not get along with a couple people, but another to have a job
that makes folks not care too much for you. The ones who appreciate you change
their minds pretty quick when they look at how much the speeding ticket is when
they’re already late for work.
I tried explaining it to her when we lived in
Portland a half-decade in our marriage after graduating from Presque Isle. She
needed to move back, away from the maroon sea of blueberry bushes and back to
the exhaust fueled city life. She wanted to move back with her parents to let
us get on our feet, but I wouldn’t have it, so times were especially tough with
only my paycheck. I was still getting used to being on beat and Tucker was around
five. Maya was becoming noticeable around Autumn’s abdomen.
Every rookie has their first scare, the first
time they feel the rush of adrenaline as they look into somebody’s eyes that
wants desperately to hurt them. It usually comes when they least expect it, and
doesn’t when they’re ready, the academy and textbooks still crisp in their
memory.
It was just barely a month after I started in
Portland, still a little uneasy, but not uneasy enough. It was a Monday
morning, meaning my partner Michael, who had been on beat for nearly a near,
was getting our coffee while I had pump duty at the 7 Eleven on the corner of
Federal and Crockett. The Crown Victoria had plenty of power even after five
years of service before I drove it, but it used gas like a lobsteryacht.
Michael had enough time to run inside and pay before I had it filled up.
I had the rear driver’s-side window down so I
could hear dispatch better than my waist radio would allow, but it normally
just let all the hard-earned heat the cruiser had managed to produce after the
first ten minutes of driving in mid-January. The radio clicked to life, and I
leaned towards the open window.
“Available units, report of a 10-65 in progress
at the Walgreen’s on 347 Federal. One suspect, armed, wearing a black hooded
sweatshirt.” Michael beat me to it, already pushing filthy station door open
with his foot, clutching the half-full four-cup cardboard coffee holder in his
left hand and pressing the talk button on his responder just below his collar.
“10-4 dispatch.” He cocked his head to speak
into the mic, looking at me, saying ‘Get the car going’ without having to talk. “Unit 27 en-route, ETA 60 seconds.”
“10-4 Unit 27.” The radio beeped as the transmission
ended, and I was already in the driver’s seat, turning the ignition, gas nozzle
door still open and sticking out in the side mirror’s view. Michael practically
fell in the passenger seat, setting the coffee between our seats in front of
the 870 I thought we might have to use in less than a minute.
The cruiser accelerated onto Federal and we
spun on gravel and salt from the last storm that would blanket the streets
until early June. Michael hit the lights, and the sirens blared their
obnoxious, adrenaline-pumping whine. Traffic wasn’t bad—the morning rush had
long passed, and the second rush that brought the kids to school ended about 30
minutes before we stopped for gas. Still, swerving in and out of lanes was
nothing like we practiced in the academy parking lot. Practice didn’t have the
slightest possibility of babies in the backseat of a minivan coming the other
way, or grandmothers who forgot their glasses on the kitchen table that morning
but needed to make the doctor’s appointment on time. It’s a fine balance
between speed and smarts, knowing when to challenge the cruiser and when to
back down. Hearing the V8 engine growl as your right foot touches the
floorboard is a rush like no other, a dedicated officer’s substitute for sex, a
power that’s easy to abuse.
We sat in an adrenaline-fueled silence. I
slowed for a red light we came across, checking to see if everyone heard us
coming and didn’t push their luck at beating us across. Walgreen’s was just
past the next light on the left. I turned and looked at Michael, expecting to
see beads of sweat down his cheeks, or his right leg twitching—any sign of
nervousness. Instead, he sat as stiff as a pole, looking straight ahead,
focused on what awaited in the pharmacy.
“Why’d you bother bringing the coffee?” He looked
at me, then the coffee, obviously a little puzzled himself, wondering why he
didn’t just leave the holder on the counter and let the cashier deal with it.
“Let’s just do this, Cole.” I leaned forward,
taking the mic from the center console as I let off the gas and made a hard
left into the Walgreen’s parking lot. “Unit 27 10-23, do we know the weapon?”
“10-4 Unit 27. Weapon is a steak knife. It
appears the call button was pressed, but we have a caller on the line, a
cashier, uh, caller is still on the line, standby.”
I stopped facing the automatic front doors,
leaving enough space to do a U-turn back onto the street without having the
back up. We opened our doors almost in synch, standing behind them as cover,
watching the door, listening for dispatch, for screams from inside. I scanned
around the general vicinity, looking for a black hoodie, suspecting that if the
caller was still on the line, the suspect was probably not inside, but could
still be within sight. My right hand sat on my cool Glock, still in the
holster, security strap already undone.
I spoke to Michael without looking at him,
still surveying the scene. “No sign of the him outside.”
“Haven’t seen movement inside.” Michael glanced
around the parking lot, biting his bottom lip. He took his hand off his own
Glock, reaching up to his mic. “Dispatch, help us out here. Is location of
suspect known?”
Nothing. I felt the cool breeze hit the sweat
forming around my armpits. It was the closest I had ever been to drawing my
weapon anywhere besides the firing range in the station basement, and even
though I had fired my father’s hunting rifle at the woods when my father wasn’t
around and the gun in my holster plenty at the range, I was worried I had
forgotten where the trigger was. I still had an urge to draw, to point the
Glock at the front doors, an itch that I needed to scratch.
“Unit 27, the caller is reporting the suspect
has left the store.”
Michael responded. “Do we have an estimate of
how long ago that was?”
“No more than two minutes ago.”
“10-4.”
Michael lowered his hand to his side and
relaxed his posture as dispatch informed other units to stay on the lookout for
the suspect. “He couldn’t have gotten far. I’m going to check out back, why
don’t you go in and see if you can get some more info from the caller.”
I nodded yes, taking my hand off the Glock.
Michael shut his door. I left mine open, thinking I might need to get in quick
if the suspect was spotted nearby. Part of me wanted to take the 870 in with
me, or give it to Michael, but I realized how ridiculous the thought was. It
was to be used in the most dire situations, the situations most small town beat
cops don’t have to deal with. The violence in the city called for its presence,
long after most towns stopped equipping cruisers with shotguns. I left my
security strap undone instead.
I stepped through the automatic doors, the
blast of heat making my face burn in relief from the cold. It smelled like wet
rug and plastic, like most corner drug stores. A closed sign was taped
crookedly on the glass. I heard talking towards the back of the store, by where
the pharmacy was. One cashier stood behind the checkout, and nodded me on. I
followed the curved main walkway that lead to the back-left corner of the
store, checking each aisle as I walked past them, half-expecting to see the
hooded man waiting for me.
The rest of the staff was huddled around the
pharmacy counter, where I could already tell which one of the pharmacists had
dealt with the robber because of her rosy cheeks and wet eyes. I discretely
buttoned the security strap around the Glock.
“Alright, you folks would say he hasn’t been
gone for more than a couple minutes?” The four staff members looked at each
other, making sure they all agreed before telling me yes or no. An overweight
man with a roughly-shaven goatee and a nicer shirt than the rest of the crew
was the manager. He was sweating, probably nervous about the call he was going
to make to his superior and maybe even worrying about finding another
pharmacist.
“Yeah, couldn’t have been more than that, ran
out the that door.” He nodded towards a door on the back wall.
I took a step closer to the counter, pulled my
notepad and pen out of my utility belt, and started scribbling notes for only a
second or two before I noticed the pile of over-the-counter pill boxes that
were still unwrapped along with ten or so boxes of Sudafed strewn across the
counter to my right.
“What’s all that?” I pointed to the pile, as if
no one else had seen it yet, and looked at the pharmacist. She was still visibly
shaking—couldn’t have been much older than I was.
“He made me get all that,” she stammered, “but
didn’t believe we only had this much Sudafed left.” She paused, looking down at
her feet, as if she was ashamed that she had been robbed. “He got irritated,
waved his knife around, and left.”
“So nothing was stolen?”
“Yes. Only what he could fit into his coat
pocket though. I don’t know. Three boxes?” She nodded, confirming the story to
herself.
Something wasn’t adding up. Most addicts don’t
change their mind mid-robbery. If they walk in the store, they’re walking out
with something they didn’t come with, something to cure their cravings.
“Is that an exit or…?” I trailed off, pointing
to the door the manager had nodded to earlier. He shook his head.
“No, that goes to storage, then the back exit.”
My voice became urgent. “Then did any of you
actually see him leave the building?”
The employees looked at each other, realizing
their mistake. Their scared expressions were my answer.
Trying to catch an armed criminal who, by the
looks of what he was planning on stealing, was in the meth making business, was
dangerous enough to begin with. Finding out he may still be around really threw
sand in the clam. Either dispatch neglected to tell us, or the manager didn’t
mention it to when he called, and my guess was the manager was getting paid a
little too much for how he handled his position. I touched my CB on.
“Michael, what’s your twenty?”
“Outside, back by the cruiser, about to come
in. Something wrong?”
“This guy may still be here.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, possibly in storage.” I looked back at
the employees, who were watching me talk. “Is the back door unlocked?” The
manager, who had a bead of sweat running down his face, muttered no. “It’s
locked, I’m going to have the manager come out and give you the keys in case
you need to get in from that side. I’ll yell for him and let you know if I get
a response.”
“Sounds good. I’ll make a call for another
unit.”
I focused back on the workers. “Did this guy
seem a little odd, like he was high or something?”
“Not really.” The pharmacist frowned, trying to
recollect the man who would appear in her nightmares.
“He didn’t look thin, have any open sores on
his face…”
“He was real nervous and hyper, in a hurry.”
The pharmacist shrugged, not carelessly—it was as if she wasn’t quite sure she
was remembering him correctly. She added, “He had bags under his eyes too,” and
hung her head, running a hand through her hair.
Meth addicts go on “runs” where they keep using
in intervals, keeping the euphoric feeling going until the body has enough or
they run out of ice, and this guy was definitely out. Bags under his eyes
probably meant he was on a run and hadn’t slept for a good day or two. It’s
unfortunate, but always better to assume the worst instead of being hopeful.
Most robbers generally like to get in and out
as quickly as possible, but there was a chance that this guy thought he was getting
duped by the pharmacist and went out back to check for back stock. It also was
possible he thought he was outsmarting Michael and me by staying put.
“Ok, my partner will meet you outside, hand him
the keys.” The overweight man understood and fumbled in his pockets, finding
the keys with a jingle. He headed to the front doors at a surprisingly brisk pace.
Michael was waiting to meet him at the cruiser.
“The rest of you, stay put. I’m just going to
yell in at him.” They looked lost. “He’s probably long gone.” They needed to
hear that, and so did I.
I walked over to the back wall and put my ear
to the door. Nothing.
“Police, come out with your hands on your
head!” I swallowed hard. Not a peep. I tried a second time, the same message,
and the same result. “Portland Police, open up!” I listened to my breathing.
“I got no response Michael, I’m going in.”
“I have the key.” Michael’s voice was focused
and louder than normal. “Wait for the other unit.”
But I had already kicked the worn swinging door
that read EMPLOYEES ONLY open. A towering maze of shelves packed with surplus
merchandise appeared, boxes strewn across the narrow aisles. The lights hung
lazily down from the roof. A red exit sign flickered over a metal storm door in
the back corner, next to a large steel garage door for deliveries.
The room wasn’t much bigger than your average
living room, but had a whole entire second store’s worth of shit in it. I took
a couple steps forward, walking on the balls of my feet, wincing at how loud
the gravel and grime on the smooth cement floor was. I kept scanning the room,
feeling someone watching me, waiting to pounce.
The radio just about made me scream. Michael
was quieter this time, no more than a breeze of air. “He’s right in front of
the smaller back door, picking the lock. From Michael’s deliberate whisper, I
guessed he was watching the man from behind a corner.
As if on queue, I heard a faint metallic scratch
from under the exit sign. I could only think that he forgot something after he
had already left, something important enough to come back for—maybe his wallet
or some ingredients he needed.
Now I was on the hunt, suddenly thrown back
into a world my father forced onto me, where you were unseen by the prey, and
they were seen down the barrel of a rifle. I hustled over to the door, which
appeared to open outwards—a streak of luck. I readied myself to throw the door
open into his shaking and hurried hands, throwing him backwards for Michael and
me to attack.
The scratching stopped and the door swung open,
casting the bright gray winter sky into the dark storeroom. A silhouette of a
tall man in a black sweatshirt breaking the daylight.
I froze. So did he. “Get down,” I managed, my
eyes adjusting to the light enough to see his face. I took a step back. His
eyes were becoming clear to me now, wide and crazy. He reached into the pouch
on the front of the hoodie, pulling out the concealed steak knife, much longer
than I had envisioned, started towards me. My hand eased up, on the way to my
Glock.
The man’s foot was still in the air as Michael
tackled him from the right, a blur of motion, enough to snap me out of my
hypnotized state. I leaped through the door. Michael was shoving his knee into
the man’s back, bashing the hand that still held the knife on the pavement. I
acted on instinct, kicking the hand enough for the knife to clatter away. The
man yelped. Michael hauled on the man’s arms, moving them on top of his back,
and I moved in with the cuffs.
When a person realizes they’re trapped, they
act just like an animal does, thrashing and squirming in hopes of getting free.
The man heard the cuffs click open and acted like he’d been in this position
before, immediately starting to fight, kicking Michael in the back with his
heels and rolling on his chest. I dove onto the legs side-first, getting hit a
couple times in the ribs before finally subduing him.
Michael managed to get him cuffed as the other
unit arrived. I stayed on the guy’s legs, listening to him growl, still with
some fight. As I caught my breath, I looked at Michael, who was doing the same.
“You must be pretty desperate or have a lot of
balls, buddy, to break into a place again with cops around.” The man ignored
him, continuing to try and free himself.
“Has more balls than I do.” I rubbed my eyes,
squeezing the bridge of my nose. “He had me beat.” Michael shook his head,
didn’t look at me, and began to tell the man his rights.
Later, as I sat back in the cruiser, the
possibility hit me of only one of us getting back to the station, one of us
having an extra cup of coffee, cold and still full. I knew damn well that if
that guy had a gun instead of a knife, it’d be a different story.
I remembered that the next time I had the chance
to draw my Glock on duty, the time that I wish I had froze.
5
I
sipped on my second glass of water as Autumn left for the store without saying
goodbye. My guess that all the moving around had her on edge. She usually slept
like a rock, but the couple times we stayed in a hotel to visit her parents in
Connecticut she tossed and turned like I normally do, not used to her
surroundings and the hard mattress. We had been married for about a year at
that point, but her father still refused to host me if I slept in the same bed
as his daughter under his roof. He tried to tell me what kind of man I was for
having her stay in a hotel a mile from her house. I kept my mouth shut, for
her.
I
took another quick shower so I wouldn’t smell up the church and give another
reason for these people to frown at me. Autumn had moved my box of clothes next
to the dresser I claimed and had started re-folding and unpacking it for me,
making me feel like shit.
I
tried to get my hair dry before I put on a sweatshirt so it wouldn’t freeze in
the cooling afternoon air, but looked at the clock and decided I didn’t have
time. The kids were probably getting tired, and the folks watching them were
probably ready to get home and start their dinners. I had my jacket halfway on
as I stepped into the cold outside.
Autumn had taken the Camry, so I started the cruiser,
breathing into my hands and rubbing them together as the engine warmed up. The
interior still smelled cleaner they’d used before handing it over to me.
Impatient, I shifted into reverse and backed out of the driveway, the motor
still struggling and the steering wheel a block of ice. The power steering
whined.
A couple people were out puttering in their
yards, pushing the snow banks back a little further or reaching for the layer
of snow on their angled roofs. It was a never-ending battle that only the
determined and downright stubborn could fight on a year-to-year basis without
going mad. My father would complain every year, saying he’d be damned if we got
another foot, which we always did. As I got older, the complaints dried up into
pained grumbles, too tired to badmouth Mother Nature. You need some pride in
your lifestyle to get up in a cold room, go out in the freezing sharp air and
break your back just so you can make it into the job that never calls you off.
Determination and pride, that’s what folks live on when it comes down to it.
The church was on the crest of a hill
overlooking the harbor, pier, and small graveyard surrounded by a white picket
fence. The white steeple easily made it the tallest building in town. The
wooden shingles were coated in white, battered by age and weather, but still in
good condition thanks to what must have been regular layers of paint. It was
two buildings connected by a small breezeway. One building was clearly the
sanctuary, single paned and colorless windows lining the long sides. There was
an outstretched metal ladder on the roof leading the steeple, probably to work
on the bell if it didn’t ring right. The other structure looked like a small
refurbished barn, double doors just beneath the peak of the roof, probably
nailed shut from inside the attic. Both buildings were simple, nothing fancy.
What mattered to those people was what was inside.
A sign in front read BASS HARBOR EVENGELICAL
and had some upcoming events listed in plastic letters. One caught my eye—there
was a town meeting tomorrow night.
I pulled up next to a couple other cars that
were parked alongside the smaller building. The parking lines were spray
painted on the pavement. The spots closest to the door were open. People left
them for the handicapped without needing a sign to tell them to.
A couple was walking towards the sanctuary
doors as I stepped out of the cruiser. I followed them, hoping they were there
for the same reason I was. They must’ve been a couple years younger than me and
fresh off the honeymoon years, still holding hands and bumping shoulders. I
caught up to them on the steps leading to the main doors. The man held the door
for me, but kept looking forward.
The sanctuary smelled of old books and electric
heat. There were more pews than I was expecting, all made of pinewood. A
scruffy red carpet lined the center walkway up to the large cross and podium.
The ceiling was sewn together by hardwood bracers, large enough to be masts of
large trade ships.
The minister, in a dark blue suit and a tan
tie, greeted the couple, shaking the man’s hand vigorously and hugging the
woman. I waited a couple steps back as they exchanged pleasantries, hearing
muffled children’s laughter in a nearby room. A coon cat rubbed against my
shin, leaving a trail of fur loosely hanging on my pant leg.
The couple said goodbye to the minister and
walked towards the front, where they opened a door to the right of the podium
that I guessed led to the other building. I looked at the minister, who was
also watching the couple, even after the door had shut. It was only when I
approached him that he turned and smiled.
“Afternoon, I’m Cole Wakefield, Maya and
Tucker’s father.” I held out my hand.
“Oh yes, the new family, how nice to meet you!
I’m Roger Greenman, the head minister here. Shame you couldn’t make it this
morning.” He took my hand, but only gently squeezed. “Your kids are just in the
other room, they’ve been a pleasure.” He smiled. “How are you getting
acquainted with our town? It’s small, but there’s plenty of stories to be told
and things to be learned here.”
“Oh, I’m getting along fine, just fine. Nice
place.” I wasn’t sure if that was a white lie or not just yet. Roger nodded,
but didn’t add anything to my description, as if he were waiting for more.
“Is there a town meeting tomorrow?” My question
came out louder than I expected, sending an echo through the sanctuary.
“Yes, there is, at eight. Have you met Nate
yet?” He paused. “Nate Kennedy?”
“No, I’m afraid not.” I almost asked if it was
the same Kennedy that had the store and the construction outfit at the head of
town, but stopped myself, knowing that would be a stupid question to ask in
Cutler, so it would be here too. Small towns don’t tend to have too many
families with the same name.
“Well I hope you’ll make an appearance, I’m
sure Nate would like to meet you. He organizes most of the events in town, so
I’m sure you become close with him quickly.” He smiled weakly and opened his
hand for another handshake. “Mr. Wakefield,” he said, both a reminder to
himself of my name and a goodbye. The shake was tighter than the first, more
trustworthy.
I walked through the same doors the couple did,
revealing a classroom with children’s artwork and posters about God on the
walls and desks sized for different age groups in front of a whiteboard. There
were only a couple kids and their parents still there, playing with each other
in a chaotic scramble of toys and books in the back corner. Maya was chasing
after another girl her age, both laughing themselves silly, hands colorful with
dried paint. A group of boys sat in a circle around a pile of Legos, but Tucker
sat in a spare desk, drumming with his fingers until he saw me and perked up,
ready to leave. The group of parents saw me, but continued to talk amongst
themselves.
By the time I was done surveying the room
Tucker was by my side, putting on his jacket. I looked at Maya until we made
eye contact. “Maya, let’s go.” She nodded but kept playing.
“I’m ready.” Tucker had moved to the door. His
coat was unzipped and his beanie was sticking out from his right pocket.
“Tucker, zip your coat.”
“We’re just going out to the car.” He shrugged
his shoulders, maybe hoping that his argument would seem less confrontational
if he didn’t seem too opinionated.
“Zip it.”
“But—“
“Tucker, don’t have me ask you again. And put
your hat on.” He sighed and started working on his zipper—he always struggled
with that coat—and turned away from the room, trying to hide his troubles. Maya
had stopped playing, surprising me that I didn’t have to keep after her, and
was dragging her coat on the floor by its sleeve as she walked towards the
door. I stopped her with one hand and picked up the coat with the other,
holding it as she put her arms through the sleeves. Her hat poked out of her
left sleeve, between her wrist and the coat, sticking to the Velcro on the cuff
by a couple of threads. I handed it to her to put on, waiting for her to zip
her coat, which Tucker had finally managed. His hat was crooked and looked more
like a pile of wool than a beanie out of his carelessness putting it on, but I
was ready to leave so I let it slide, knowing that if I kept after him he would
get pouty.
Roger’s words came back to me when I had the
kids in the car and was pulling out of the parking lot heading back home. There’s plenty of stories to be told and
things to be learned here. Plenty of
things to be learned here. Just like the man at the general store. It
seemed to me that I was being treated as well as they’d treat any other
passerby tourist asking for directions or when the tide was coming in. Mr.
Greenman had the impression I didn’t have a clue what I was doing, he just
didn’t say it outright. I was no better than a flatlander to them.
My father would treat flatlanders like shit
back in Cutler. Most of the time, it was someone who’d driven straight through
Machias, expecting a bigger town since it was home to a branch of the
University of Maine system. They’d be driving through town with their necks
strained and eyes squinting as they tried to figure out where they’d ended up
and if they were in Canada or not. Nine times out of ten they’d stop on the
hill leading down to the weatherworn hardwood docks and yell at the fisherman
unloading their traps as if they were tour guides there for convince. They’d
say something along the lines of, “Excuse me,” or “I hope I’m not
interrupting,” but it was too late. Men like my father would’ve already noticed
they didn’t drive down onto the dock, that their license plates didn’t have a
lobster on them, and that they pronounced their ‘r’s. He’d have them pegged for
exactly who they were within a couple seconds. It was too late for them—no
matter how polite they were, they weren’t one of us. They didn’t have calluses
on their hands like my father did, they’d never have a finger or two missing
that a chainsaw took off, wrinkles next to their eyes from squinting at sharp
glint of ocean, and would never be caught wearing grundens. Probably didn’t
even know what they were.
My father and his buds had a long running joke
to tell anybody who asked for directions or where they were that they’d crossed
the border about ten miles back. The locals said it was New Brunswick and that
they’d seen a CBSA—the Canadian border patrol—cruiser drive past just a minute
or so ago. The out-of-stater’s eyes would bug out and they’d turn around before
the laughing got too loud.
Things are a little different in real
traditional towns where families haven’t moved away in generations. I could see
that people in Bass Harbor had the same mindset as people in Cutler did—anybody
new makes them uncomfortable. Houses for sale are a rarity, and new families
are just as uncommon. Folks tend to like a degree of certainty, the daily grind,
the same hellos and goodbyes, even if they’re miserable on account of those
routines they never break. They grow accustomed to their jobs and friends,
whether they like them or not. Someone new throws that sense of security for a
loop.
I figured that’s something like what they were
feeling about me and my family, people not nearly as alien as could come down
the drain, but still different and out of the ordinary. At least we had Maine
license plates and brought enough to wear. Autumn taking the kids to church was
probably a good thing to do too.
From the sound of it, Autumn didn’t have any
trouble in church, which wasn’t surprising. She was always better than I was at
socializing and making new friends. I’m not shy—there’s no such thing as a shy
cop—but I just don’t like to open up to people until I get to know them beyond
their name and what they do. I thought that maybe she’d made some friends with
the other mothers so that she could host a little get together. She wouldn’t
need to tell anyone directions—they already knew where she lived, even after
we’d taken in the For Sale sign.
A doe leaped into the road from the ditch and
clumsily staggered into the road not even a hundred feet ahead, stopping at the
sight of my oncoming headlights, fearless or too frightened to move. I heard
Maya gasp as the car slammed forward brakes straining. I was thrown back
against my seat as the cruiser came to a halt about ten feet in front of the
doe, whose short white tail flicked slightly. Her eyes were deep black. I swore
she was looking right at me, and for a second I thought I could see the headlights
reflecting back at me off her glossy gaze.
A fawn climbed from the ditch, legs weak with
youth. It’s coat was spotted white, matching it’s mother’s tail fur, and it too
seemed to look at me, and suddenly I was back in the thick woods beside Almore
Cove with my father and his .22 rifle wedged against my shoulder.
Almore Cove was just a short drive from our
house, just off State Route 191 down Cove Road. Us kids would dare each other
to jump off the small cliffs into the Atlantic water. It would always be
freezing, so cold even the summer heat wouldn’t be enough reason to take a swim
for more than a couple minutes. Everybody knew it was a dangerous spot, but
your reputation as a boy and not a girl meant risking a harsh talk from your
parents back in middle school. Years later in high school we’d bring some
pounders out and go skinny-dipping off the cliffs, alcohol making the water
bearable and blue fingers and toes laughable. I never drank much and would only
jump in if there was a girl I wanted to spend the night with brave enough to
jump in.
The spruce, birch and pine shielded our house
nearby from only some of the ocean wind, but the day of my first hunt with my
father and his .22 was still as could be. I was about Tucker’s age, maybe a little
younger. It was early deer season and we were about half a mile from Almore
Cove, closer to Black Point up the way. Both of us were laying prone on the
frozen forest floor, in full camo besides our bright orange beanies that other
hunters would hopefully see before they pulled the trigger.
We’d seen some droppings a way back and my
father decided to sit awhile before we got to the homemade treestand past Black
Point. “You’re taking the rifle with me today,” he had said as he woke me
before the sun had risen, “it’s about time you learn to hunt.” I was quickly
learning that hunting was more about patience than your weapon or clothing. I
felt the cold seep through the layers of wool and cotton my father told me to
wear. I wished I’d taken his advice more seriously and put on another layer or
two.
The distant breath of the Atlantic was the only
sound we heard for the good part of an hour or so. I wanted to ask him if we
could keep going, or if we could call it a day, or ask again how the rifle
worked even though he already trained me enough that I could’ve probably taken
the gun apart and put it back together quicker than some of the other adult
hunters in town. Instead I breathed carefully so only a small trail of water
vapor left my mouth. I kept quiet, waiting for his say.
A squirrel would run up a tree somewhere or move
a leaf and I’d feel my heart quicken against the orange pine needles beneath
me. My father wouldn’t move a muscle, as if he knew from the sound that it
wasn’t the ten point he was looking to add to his wall, something he could be
proud of his son for doing, something he could brag about to his buds when they
came over to drink and smoke and introduce my father to a new woman every once
and awhile who’d sometimes end up spending the night and nothing more.
Some twigs broke nearby and I felt my father
hold his breath. Slowly the steps became louder and I began to sweat despite
being chilled to the bone just a couple minutes earlier. Dad slowly raised his
hand and pointed into the dense wood ahead of us. Sure enough, I saw something
tan move about two hundred feet ahead. “Wait for it to move closer,” he
whispered as I looked down the scope of the rifle to get a better view. It
disappeared behind a patch of trees before I could get a good look.
Another half hour passed and the deer
reappeared, this time about a hundred feet closer, close enough to see that it
was small—not a baby, but not fully grown either, probably separated from its
mother recently. It looked like a male. I’d never been hunting, but my father
would still talk about it with me, and I knew enough about deer to have a
general idea about their size and what was legal or not. “He’s not very big.”
“He’s legal.”
“Really?”
“For you. Not for me. This is good, means you
have to shoot.” I kept looking at him, hoping that he was joking, but even
without seeing his face I knew he wasn’t. He kept his eyes on the deer. “Well?
Get ready damn it.”
I pushed the butt of the rifle tighter against
my shoulder, closed my left eye and looked down the sight without knowing where
the deer was. I tried finding it with the scope, but couldn’t, so I lifted my
head and opened by eye again long enough to see the deer poking around at
something slightly to the left, facing us. I looked back down the scope and
found him.
“Wait for a good shot. Don’t get antsy.” He’d
told me the most reliable shot was to aim for the heart. A little high, I might
get the spine, a little low, I’d probably puncture a lung. Still, I wanted to
try and be dead on the heart. I was a good shot back then, but not good enough
to get the head or the neck. This deer was small enough that I guessed my father
wasn’t worrying about filling our freezer off him.
I studied it nibble and nudge on something it
found. Two small fuzzy bumps were above the deer’s eyes where an adult deer
would have full-grown antlers. “I think it’s too young.” I waited for a
response. “He’s young, Dad.”
“Shut up and concentrate.”
I bit my lip and readjusted my left arm. The
deer was still nosing the ground. When he looked up, his ears twitched. He
glanced around innocently. We meet eyes for a second, long enough that I
thought I’d been spotted and that he knew I was watching him down a rifle scope.
He moved to the side a little bit, just enough that his flank was exposed.
“Safety off.” I did as instructed pressed it
without taking my eye from the scope. I used the earth to steady my shot, aware
of the adrenaline tremors shaking through my arm.
“Take the shot.” He said it quietly, but it
still had a force to it, a commanding tone that I felt I had to follow. My
index finger moved from outside the trigger guard to the trigger itself, numb
until it felt the cold metal that hadn’t been touched yet. It almost felt hot,
so cold that it was hard to tell, so ready to be used.
“Take the shot.” But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
“Take the damn shot.”
I started to cry, warm tears running down my
cheeks, and I sobbed loud enough for the deer to get spooked and leap away.
“Goddamnit boy.” Nothing else was said as we walked
to the treestand, ate a bagged lunch and waited for the rest of the day only to
see a couple more squirrels. We got home and I went to my room. He cracked open
a beer and talked to our black lab King about the news on the television and
didn’t invite me to come and eat.
I only had to wait in the cruiser for a couple
more seconds before the doe finally heard another car coming and bolted with
her baby onto the other side of the road. I felt like they were daring me to
hit them, standing there. Maya was scared and was crying so I turned back and
put my hand on her leg, nothing to say, hoping that my touch would be enough to
calm her. Tucker sat quietly, unconcerned with the whole ordeal, growing more
like my father than I could ever admit.
6
The
kids climbed out of the cruiser as I turned the key and yanked it out, trying
to get to Maya before she ran up the steps to give her a reassuring hug, but
she had the flimsy screen door open as I rounded the hood. Tucker trudged
behind her, dragging his boots with each step. He acted as if nothing happened.
His coat was unzipped again. I put a hand on his back and led him inside.
Autumn
was in the kitchen with Maya wrapped around her legs. She had stopped cooking
what smelled like chicken soup and had a hand on Maya’s head and a wooden spoon
in the other. I made sure to grab Tucker before he could ruin Autumn’s earlier
cleaning. She was looking at me, concerned but accusatory, knowing it was
something I had done to make Maya so upset.
“We
came pretty close to a couple deer,” I said nonchalantly, trying to let Autumn
know that Maya’s reaction was just her age and sleepiness from a long day. I
helped Tucker take his boots off, holding his arm as he lifted one leg at a
time, pulled, and threw them to the side on top of the other shoes.
“And?”
“And
they’re fine. She’s just a little tired.” Autumn pursed her lips. I knew she
kept herself from saying that Maya was definitely not fine. She knelt down to
deal with Maya. I threw my jacket at the couch and stepped past the girls to
wash my hands and help out with supper.
Once
we were all seated at the table with steaming bowls of beef stew, I noticed
that the table was far too big for just us, and that whoever had lived here
before probably had a bigger family. I’d never thought to ask Wittenburg who
lived here or why the house was for sale. A chill went through me, even with
the steam from the soup making my nose run.
“So
how was the rest of your day once I left, guys?” Autumn looked up at the kids
and took a spoonful of soup. She was usually the one to start a conversation at
the table. I had plenty to talk about back in Portland, but nothing the kids
should hear, and nothing I wanted to bring up again. There was always a couple
stories I could tell, but for the most part I kept my mouth shut.
The kids didn’t speak up, so she swallowed and
rephrased the question. “Did you have fun?”
“Yeah.” Maya had settled down, but her cheeks were
still puffy and eyes red. I had a hard time looking at her when she was upset,
especially when it was my fault. “Julia and me played house and she said that I
should go to her house sometime.”
“Maybe you can go over after church next
weekend,” I said, and she smiled. I was already forgiven. I knew it wouldn’t be
that simple when she was older.
“What about you, Tucker?” Autumn asked.
“What?”
“Did you have fun today?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No.” Autumn glanced up at me, but I didn’t
step in.
“Was it the service? I saw you fidgeting. It
can be boring sometimes, I admit it.”
“Nobody wanted to play.” By now, Autumn had
stopped eating.
“Did you ask anyone? There were a couple boys
there your age, I talked to their mothers for a bit.”
“No.”
“Well you have to ask,” I chimed in.
“I never had to ask Collin and Matt.” They were
his friends from Portland that would come over on the weekends and play with
trading cards. They were good boys, and I knew that Tucker was going to miss
them.
“Why’d we have to leave? I’m not going to make
any friends here.” I stared down at my soup, feeling Autumn’s gaze. She wanted
me to tell them something, since it was my fault that we had to leave, but I
couldn’t.
“I’m sure you’re going to make new friends,
honey, it’s just a matter of time. There’s going to be a lot more kids at
school tomorrow, I promise.”
Autumn and I finally crawled in bed together
after the kids were tucked in. She was reading The Things They Carried with her lamp on for a couple minutes while
I closed my eyes and started to relax. I felt the book hit the sheets.
“Are we ok?”
“What?”
“You know what I mean. I feel like you’ve been
angry at me and I feel like I snapped at you this afternoon.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah what?”
“You did kind of snap at me.”
“You’re just stubborn sometimes.”
“Maybe.
You’re just as stubborn. You know I don’t like church.” She didn’t say anything
back, but didn’t pick up her book. I knew there was more on her mind, so I
didn’t try too hard for sleep.
“Do you think Tucker will make friends?” I
split my eyes open and rolled on my side to face her.
“Yeah. Yeah, I think so.”
“Really?”
“You know I had trouble making friends before
college. I turned out alright.” She pondered what I said, so I closed my eyes
again.
“You and Tucker are different though.”
“Maybe.”
“I think you are. I think he’s like your
father.” She’d only met the man once, but once was enough to see that my
stories weren’t fiction. “Have you heard from him?”
“No.”
“You should call him.”
“No, I shouldn’t.”
“He won’t know the new address. Or phone
number.”
“He’s not sending anything any time soon.
Certainly not calling either.” I rolled over, back-to Autumn.
“He might want to send something to the kids.
For their birthdays maybe.”
“I don’t think he owns a calendar, much less
knows when their birthdays are. He knows when the bar opens and closes. That’s
all.” She sighed, knowing I was probably right. “You should go down and see him,
Cole. It would help.”
I stayed silent. She’d been nagging me to go
and talk to Dad about Michael and why I’d left the house. She thought I could
talk him into going to a home but I knew better. He wouldn’t have any of it,
and I’d stay for less than an hour after a painful talk about how the weather
had been and who died that he knew and I should know.
“He’s getting old. You should talk.”
“Maybe.”
“Cole.”
“I know. I’ll think about it when it warms up.”
That seemed to please her, for the time being. I couldn’t foresee myself
driving all the way down just to not be welcome. The house would smell like it
always did, like cigarettes and old carpet, and I didn’t want the memories that
came with it.
“So I went to the general store today.”
“And?”
“And it’s a hole in the wall. I imagined it
bigger, even for this town.”
“Uh-huh.” I could tell there was more she wanted
to say, but it was taking her some time to spit it out.
“And?”
“And…well, church went well this morning.
Nobody gave me any troubles. They seemed warm and friendly, especially some of
the mothers. But the general store felt different. Like I wasn’t supposed to be
there. I’m probably just spoiled from the nice Hannaford we had. We might have
to go to Bar Harbor to get our groceries. They didn’t have much of a
selection.”
“This isn’t about selection, though.”
“No. No, it’s not. There was this, man. He came
in right behind me—I held the door for him—and he saw my face and kept looking
at it, as if he was trying to recognize who I was, and I said hi to the man
behind the counter, but he didn’t say anything back. But the man behind me
disappeared down one of the aisles as I tried to get my bearings, well, tried
to figure out where and if they had what I needed for the soup tonight. I
couldn’t believe how small it is and how much they’ve managed to put so much in
such a small area, but they didn’t have the wheat noodles I wanted. You
probably didn’t notice.
“But I knocked some boxes over when I was
scrounging around looking for the wheat elbows. The floor is filthy in there. I
went to pick it up, and that man I held the door for was just standing at the
head of the isle, watching me, empty handed.”
I thought about the older man at the general
store when I got coffee. I thought about him and his buds.
“He was just watching me, Cole.”
“Well what did you do?”
“I just stared back. But even then, even when I
made sure he knew I saw him, he stayed put for too long, longer than any normal
person would when they were caught watching someone they didn’t know.”
“He didn’t say anything?”
“No. It’s probably nothing. I shouldn’t have
even mentioned it.”
“It’s not nothing.” I turned my head so I could
see her from the corner of my eye and waited until she saw I was looking before
I moved it back. “Always tell me stuff like this.”
“Oh, don’t go thinking you need to do something
about it. I know you. The world isn’t out to get us babe.” We laid in silence as she waited for an
answer. All I could see was that old asshole I met getting coffee standing over
her, closer to her than what she described, towering over her, just as dirty as
the floor.
“You were scared, weren’t you.” It wasn’t a
question. I knew she was. I just needed to hear her say it.
“Well…yes. I was.”
“Then all I’m asking is that you be a little
more understanding about how I feel. Why I’m so suspicious like you always
point out.”
“I know Cole. I know. Sometimes…sometimes it
just seems like you’re hell-bent to prove you’re not scared too.”
“I’m not always scared. I’m worried.” She
rubbed by shoulder and turned off her lamp after she put the book on the shelf
next to her. She inched next to me, her body forming to mine. Something about
the way she would curl up next to me always let my muscles finally relax and
I’d forget how hard it was to go to sleep for awhile, listening to her heart
beat against my back. She reached over me and took my hand, clasping it into
hers.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not tonight. Not now, with all of this going
on.” I felt her nod, and like that, she was asleep. It was nice of her to ask
when she did, but she would always chose to ask right before she went to sleep.
And so I stayed up, thinking about the day I
shot Michael.
We were filling out reports with the radar on
when the call came in around one in the morning, when things usually got a
little more interesting as bars started closing and the alcohol hit people hard. Shit hit the fan around two.
“Available units, we have a report of a 10-16
on Mansfield Avenue, repeat offender, possibly armed, who is responding?”
Michael looked at me as he started the engine.
“Guess I should see the bad side of marriage some more before I tie the knot,
eh?” I snickered and picked up the CB.
“Unit 27 responding”
“10-4 Unit 27. Advise 10-85”
“10-4.” I put the CB back on the dash. “Silent
it is.”
We didn’t need to ask for the address. It was
24 Mansfield, a house that half the force had responded to at one point or
another. Michael and I had been there once before. It was always a domestic
dispute, and Mrs. Fredrick, the elderly neighbor, always called it in. The call
came once a week it seemed. The couple probably did have some issues, but most
officers thought Mrs. Fredrick was being too noisy. There was only two times
that the officers had to go inside, neither of them done by Michael and me. Most
of the time Mrs. Upstell would answer and apologize, insisting the police leave
and that she was safe. The guys said count for the ‘rough foreplay’ excuse was
up to thirteen, if I remember correctly. We even had a jar of loose change for
whoever found one of them handcuffed already.
“Silent? Why? They know us by now.” Michael
flashed the lights looked both ways as we drove through an intersection.
“Dunno. Maybe it’s a different caller this
time.”
Michael flicked the headlights off as we turned
onto Mansfield. We pulled into the short cement driveway of the Upstell
household behind a Mercedes from the nineties. There was a streetlamp that lit
their front yard and a light in their living room window that was still on somewhere
beyond drawn curtains.
Michael rolled his window down and shut the
cruiser off. We sat and listened. The streetlight hummed. A dog yapped in the
distance. Water gurgled from the nearest drain and steamed with heat. Mrs.
Fredrick’s house was dark. So were the nearby houses.
“Okay,” Michael sighed, “let’s go.” Both of us
were careful our doors, easing them shut, acting as if a newborn was sleeping
in the cruiser.
There was a stone pathway leading to the porch
steps on the side of the house. My
breath appeared and disappeared in a warm fog from my mouth as I took short
controlled breaths to stay relaxed but ready.
I watched the windows for any movement, my eyes
struggling to adjust. Most windows had blinds or curtains drawn shut, so I
stopped by the corner so I would still have a view of the living room. Michael
ran his hand along the siding as he prowled up the steps. He stopped, cocking
his head as if he heard something. I stepped closer to the house ear-first.
A woman’s scream came from somewhere inside,
chillingly loud despite the walls separating us. I took a step back, getting a
better look at the living room, but didn’t see any movement. I turned by
Maglight on and shone it in the windows. Michael was watching me and pointed to
the back while finishing climbing up the stairs. I started towards the backdoor
as he knocked and waited. The grass had frozen and crunched with each step.
A scream, followed by a crash of glass
shattering, then a wail of what sounded like intense pain. I started a hurried
jog. Michael pounded on the door.
“Police, open up!”
The backdoor was up a short flight of stairs.
Black ice covered the steps, glinting as the flashlight’s beam touched it. I
held the railing and skipped every other step.
“Portland police, open the door! We know you’re
in there!” Michael’s voice boomed in the night. I heard the screen door open.
He was going in. There was no time for a warrant. The whoosh of the storm door
and the squeak of rubber gasket snagging together was my cue to enter the house
as well.
Either Michael had found the key or his door had been
unlocked, I can’t be sure, but mine was dead-bolted shut. I bashed my shoulder against
it hard enough that the frame would’ve snapped if it were just a simple knob
lock holding it shut. I saw Michael’s flashlight dance around through the blinds,
searching for Mrs. Upstell, calling her name and reminding the couple he was
police.
I felt under the doorframe and stood on my toes
to check under the roof’s overhang for a spare key but only found spider web. A
covered propane grill was parked to my right. Thinking someone might try and
get out from the back, I dragged it in front of the entryway, hoping it would
slow them down, and hopped over railing.
The front steps were just as slippery as the
ones in back. Michael had left the door open. Heat leaked outside and warmed my
face as I stepped inside.
It smelled strongly of bleach. The linoleum
floor gave a dull shine from the porch light. Michael hadn’t turned on any
lights, so I did, glancing in each room but moving quickly to the interior. They
were all neatly organized, carpets spotless, furniture arranged in just the
right way. There was a bare crib in center of one room. It felt like a show
home more than a place someone called home.
I heard talking from somewhere deeper in the
house as I got closer to the living room, but couldn’t make out what was being
said. I thought it was a good thing, that Michael had found the couple and was
settling things out quietly. They’d always been cooperative with officers in the
past, especially Mrs. Upstell. In the past, though, we’d heard arguing, not
screaming.
I passed the living room and saw light coming
from under a door down a narrow hall. The kitchen and back door were connected
to the living room by a bar with a couple stools. I didn’t see any alcohol out
like I expected.
The talking had stopped. I lingered in the
hallway, listening for any movement or voices, trying to think about what could
be happening in the room. I didn’t want to rush in like what happened in the pharmacy.
I knew Michael would’ve let me know if anything was wrong, somehow. I started
thinking the silence was his warning.
A shadow moved across the thin blanket of light
on the floor. I paused, trying to see if I could figure out who it was. I
didn’t hear shoes, so I assumed it was either Mr. or Mrs. Upstell, pacing
maybe. Staggering around drunk even. I approached the room flat against the
wall on the same side, flashlight focused on the door. My other hand felt the
wall as I went. The bleach smell was stronger the closer I got. It was an odd
place for Michael to be talking things out. I listened a couple seconds more,
hoping to hear the voices again, but got nothing.
“Michael?”
A flurry of activity played across the hallway
floor, thudding from inside and a faint moan as if someone was gagged. I
dropped the flashlight and felt for my holster, finding it without looking,
unlatched the safety strap, and drew the Glock out. I wasn’t going to be caught
unprepared again.
The door slammed open, snapping the knob off
and partially coming of the hinges. A foot retreated back inside the doorframe.
A large shadow folded in shape with the hallway wall, too large and disfigured
to be just one person.
“Police, come out with you’re hands behind your
head!” No response. The shadow didn’t move.
“Do it now!”
“Come in here!” a voice barked. “And then I’ll
fucking come out!” I stood, pistol aimed at the door, ridged and tense, and
tried to get a handle on what was happening.
“Come in here, or he’s dead! They’ll get him!
They’ll fucking get him!”
“Now, let’s just take a minute and talk this
through—“
“There’s nothing to talk about. There’s nothing
to talk about! I did it, and I’m fucked, and I’m not giving up easy, I tell you
man. You come to me asshole, so I know where you are! That you’re not one of
them!” He spoke as fast as his mouth would allow, but was still slurred.
“Do it Cole.” Michael’s voice was low and
serious.
“I’m armed.” I didn’t want to walk around the
corner and make this guy more jumpy than he already was. I wanted him to start
and trust me.
“Whatever man! If you’re not one of them, I’m
fine, I’m fine really, they just keep following me, and it was one of them, and
it had to be taken care of. It had to she had to it had to it had to.” He laughed,
but it was as if he were mocking someone laughing. “And now I need to leave
this place before they find it try to take me too and I’m just worried I’m not
going to make it.”
“Bath salts, Cole.”
“Don’t talk so loud they’ll hear us through the roof shut up shut
fucking up!”
“Listen—“ I spoke and took a step closer to the
door, getting positioned so that I could maybe see into the bathroom. “Listen,
you’re going to be fine—“
“You just don’t get it! You don’t get it…” His
sentence turned into a grumble but continued to change pitch.
“Gunpoint.” Michael’s voice quivered.
“Do you not hear them! They fucking crawl
together every time you say something they are coming again and you’re not
going to stop them in time before we have to go so we have to leave before they
see me again.”
“Okay, okay, what do you want me to do. I’ll do
what you want me to if you let the man you’re holding go.” I pressed my CB on
an called for emergency backup. “Code thirty, I repeat, Code thirty.” I turned
it all the way down so dispatch wouldn’t add to the confusion.
“He’s mine until I get in my car. He’s mine.
And you’re going to watch us leave the house, you’re going to be the bait for
them. They’ll get you first. I took care of it. You didn’t. You couldn’t!”
“I’m going to come in, okay?”
“How many times in times do I need to say that
I took care of it! Come in already! Before they see you out there in the open!”
I turned the corner, gun first, hands flexed
and ready. I paused to see how he would react to my drawn weapon and moved
ahead when he didn’t complain. My index finger was flat on the trigger so the
safe action wouldn’t stop the gun from firing.
Upstell stood behind and slightly to the left
of Michael, holding a .45 to Michael’s temple so hard that the tip of the
barrel was beginning to mold around the skin. Shards of mirror were strewn
across the floor, along with a coating of smeared blood. Upstell’s socks were
soaked red. So was his white button up that hung loosely from his slender
frame. So were his hands.
Upstell’s wife was limp and folded over the
bathtub behind them. She was half-naked, swollen stomach exposed, arms flailed
away from her body. A deep laceration stretched across her midsection, the
sliver of mirror still wedged in, protruding at one end of the cut. Blood was
draining down across her breasts and around her neck to the floor. Her mouth
hung open. A gallon of open Clorox sat on the edge of the tub. A mostly empty
bag of blue powered Cloud Nine—what the users sometimes called it—was in the
sink. The bag wasn’t much bigger than a condom wrapper, the usual 500mg size
bought under the counter.
I had to swallow a rising lump of vomit.
Nothing prepares you for crime scenes. No matter how much graphic shit you see
beforehand, there’s always going to be a scene that’s worse than you could’ve
imagined. I felt lightheaded. The pool of blood and the overpowering stench of
bleach were getting to me.
Michael’s eyes were inflamed from crying. His
gun was still latched in the holster, his wrists bound by his own pair of
handcuffs. Our eyes met, and even with a gun to his head, I could still see the
trust in his eyes, and I knew I didn’t need to say it was going to be all
right. We both knew that drill.
“She was one of them, she was infected, I had
to clean her and the baby once and for all so they wouldn’t have someone
watching me, she would always watch me, I almost ran out of bleach, almost.”
Upstell’s face was gaunt, emaciated even, eyes
almost entirely black. Dried blood from his nose ran from his nostrils across his
mouth from snorting the powder. His tongue would hang out of his mouth, spit
dangling from it, until he pulled it back in. He couldn’t keep his head
upright, constantly re-balancing it while the rest of his body only slightly
waivered. He was shorter than Michael by about half a foot. I kept where his
head was down the Glock’s sights as much as possible, but him moving around made
it hard to get a good bead.
“How about this, Mr. Upstell, if you tell me
your first name, I’ll tell you mine.”
The urgent growing wail of sirens peaked Upstell’s
attention away from me. Backup was coming, fast. Blue and red flashed into the
room from the small window shoulder-height on the wall.
“I’m going to tell my friends that they
shouldn’t come in, okay?” I didn’t wait for his answer and moved my left hand
up to my CB, right hand still outstretched with the Glock.
“Don’t you fucking move! Don’t tell them
anything! It’s them isn’t it! They’re here for me! I knew it I knew it would
come to this I knew they would find me. You don’t say a thing to them!”
“Mr. Upstell, they are going to come in if I
don’t say something to them.”
“No! You talk to them and he’s dead!”
I slowly lowered my hand and put it back on my
right wrist as support. Backup was going to rush in without knowing it was a
hostage situation.
“Mr. Upstell, what do you want me to do so you
let my friend go?”
He
was shaking, eyes darting around the room. He mumbled something
incomprehensible.
“Mr.
Upstell—“ I took a small step forward, crunching on some mirror.
“Stop!
Don’t!” He jerked to attention, pressing the .45 harder against Michael’s
temple. Michael winced, squinted his eyes shut and clenched his jaw, expecting
the worst.
Officers
were running up the steps of the front door, a stampede of footsteps, shouting inside
that they were police, calling our names, telling each other when a room was
clear.
“I’m
not being taken by them!” Upstell grabbed Michael and pulled him towards the
tub, backing against the ceramic. He stepped on his wife’s arm and kicked it
aside. “I’m not I’m not!” His thumb pushed the hammer of the pistol down.
Michael felt and heard the metallic click. His eyes bulged and began to cry.
Backup
came barreling down the hall, and I knew he would shoot if he saw them. If I
warned them, he’d shoot. I had no choice.
“Drop
the weapon or I shoot.” My index finger had formed to the trigger, the safety
action square in the center.
“I’m
not letting them take me!”
“Drop
the goddamned gun now!” The red and blue lights shone off Michael’s wide teary
eyes. Upstell’s finger moved to the trigger. His head leaned to his right, out
of balance, almost all of it clear from Michael. I saw my chance.
Take the shot, my father said. Take the goddamned shot. So I exhaled
and squeezed.
Both
men went down in a flash of blood. Bone matter splattered against the tiled
wall of the bathtub. Cordite filled the air. My ears throbbed. The .45 bounced
on the floor, landing underneath the window.
Michael
had fallen next to Upstell’s wife. Her husband was mostly in the tub, still as
could be. Michael rolled around on the floor, shards of mirror hooking to his
uniform. Both of his hands were at his throat, still cuffed.
I
kept my pistol up and moved next to my partner, aiming at Upstell, checking to
see if he was neutralized before looking at Michael. The bottom half of Upstell’s
jaw was torn and hanging loosely to his face. I could see his yellowed molars.
He was still breathing, but unconscious.
I
knelt down, set my gun down and clutched Michael’s shoulders to stop him from
rolling. His hands pressed against his jugular, blood flooding through his
fingers, adding to the pool already on the floor. His eyes were frantic. I
pushed down on his hands, helping add pressure.
“Upstell must have shot at the same time.
Shit.” My hands slipped from his. I pushed again, harder, leaning forward and
putting some of my body weight on his throat.
“Cole,”
he slurred. His face was already pale. The officer’s in the hall called in at
us.
“It’s—it’s
me, it’s Cole, it’s clear,” I managed, a lump in my throat building. “Just call
an ambulance.” I sensed men entering the room but didn’t turn to face them. “Michael.
Michael.”
I looked into Michael’s eyes and watched his
pupils dilate and the life drain from his face and his lips turn blue. His
chest stopped moving. His hands relaxed and slid from his neck as the blood
continued to ooze out. I went into shock, frozen, dazed.
Another
officer pushed me out of the way and starting performing CPR. Someone behind me
helped me to my feet and led me out into the hallway, past officers putting
their guns away and gawking into the bathroom. They asked me if I was okay.
They asked me where Michael was, if he was okay. I told them Upstell had gotten
a shot off. One said I looked like shit and slapped me the shoulder like it
would cheer me up.
I
ended up outside in the cold, looking down at my bloodied hands under the
streetlight, the flashing emergency lights whirling around the neighborhood,
replaying what happened again and again and again in my head, asking if there
had been one or two shots, talking myself into believing there was two. There
had to have been two.
I
stood alone as the paramedics arrived and wheeled Upstell to an ambulance. They
ran in desperation but with precision, one holding an I.V., the other steering
the stretcher. He would go on to live, the sonofabitch.
They
were in no hurry when Michael was carried down the stairs and rolled into
another ambulance with the emergency lights off, sheet bloodied and covering
his face. I tried to shape a way to tell his fiancé and his mother what had
just happened, reciting it in my head, the words never the right ones. No words
fit news like that.
Someone
had thrown an emergency blanket over my shoulders by the time the crime scene
guys were taking a break. One of the officers who had been in the hallway came
over and stood a good couple feet away, keeping his distance like I was going
to thrash at him.
“Cole.”
I didn’t know his name, so I moved my head just enough to acknowledge him.
“Cole, the guy’s gun was full.”
I
thought about what he said as he walked away. I thought about what full meant, even though I knew. It was
his way of saying there wasn’t a bullet missing, that there had only been one
shot.
I
waved my hand towards the streetlight’s pole, hoping to find it for balance as
my back arched forward and I upchucked onto the curb. My legs gave way and my
knees hit the sidewalk. I threw up until there was nothing left and then some,
dry heaving amid gasps for air. I howled each time I heaved, a deep raspy howl
like a dog choking on a bone.
No
one came to help me. When I got to my feet again, I tried to find a way to tell
myself it was going to be all right. But I knew the drill. I knew it wasn’t
going to be all right.
7
I
was awake and making coffee before the sun rose, up as early as the fishermen to
tame the sea and hunt for what put food on the table and gas in the boat for
the next run. Despite knowing that criminal justice was my true calling since I
was just a boy, I always envied the fishermen in a way, getting rocked by the
water, just them and the boat and the sea. It seemed so simple, like living off
the land. But as I grew older, I saw what it did to men, slowly eating away
their bodies like stone against the Atlantic. My father always said, “She
always finds a way to win,” she being the mighty ocean, sometimes a god,
sometimes the devil himself. After a long restless night I began to think that
police work was the same, psyching myself out before I even started the first
say on duty.
It
was the kids first day of school over at Southwest Elementary, about a ten-minute
drive through the forest and past the much larger and more developed Southwest
Harbor. Still, the town was quaint by any flatlander’s standards.
Autumn
came down, still in her bathrobe, and poured herself a cup of coffee.
“You’re
up early.”
“I
wanted to see you off. Plus I still have a lot to do around here.” She nodded
towards the boxes still stacked in the living room.
“You
going job hunting today?”
“I
don’t know. If I have time. It’s winter, Cole. I’m not going to get one now.”
I
knew in my gut she was right. Most of the island’s economy was based in
tourism, and whatever scraps were left during the winter were taken by the
locals. I kept my mouth shut. We needed the money, and she really didn’t need
to hear her slim chances.
