Lingering

by Melissa Simonson

  “I think I fucked up your trellis outside that window,” I said, jutting my chin at the window in question behind him.

  “It was already fucked up. No harm done.”

  I climbed to my feet, digging out my cell phone.

  “You’re leaving?” he asked.

  “I’m getting us carryout from Hooters.” I pulled up Google on my phone and looked up the phone number. “What kind of wings do you want?”

  H ence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.’” Kylie set the battered copy of The Art of War on her lap, blinking up at me. “That sounds hard, winning without fighting.”

  “Keep reading.” I pinched the bridge of my nose as the beginnings of a headache sparked painfully, and behind my closed eyelids, Carissa bloomed in full flower, her smooth silicone face stained crimson from my alarm clock, looming over me, her hair draped on my chest, her teeth grazing my ear. Take it off. And then, with a jolt of guilt, I saw Joe’s face, his so-human face, contorted with misery, needing me, needing my help. “I’ll bet Sun Tzu will tell you how.”

  “‘Thus, the highest form of generalship is to balk the enemy’s plans, the next best is to prevent the junction of the enemy’s forces, the next in order is to attack the enemy’s army in the field, and the worst policy of all is to besiege walled cities. The rule is not to besiege walled cities if it can possibly be avoided.’ Are you okay?”

  My eyes snapped open. Kylie stared at me in curious concern, her legs swinging over the side of the couch.

  “Just a little headache.” I swallowed the wad of saliva collecting in my throat, shifting on the couch, praying to God he wouldn’t allow me to get hard enough that I’d need to cover my groin with a pillow to keep my baby cousin from seeing. What the fuck was wrong with me?

  “Mommy always tells Daddy she’s got a headache. ‘Not now, Frank, my head hurts.’”

  I stifled a laugh, having a pretty good idea why Alanna frequently claimed a headache, and tried to remember if Carissa had ever done the same to me. Probably more often than I wanted to admit, now that I thought about it.

  I exhaled shakily, willing my blood pressure back to a normal level.

  My cell phone rang, but I didn’t recognize the number. I stabbed the dismiss button with my thumb and turned back to Kylie.

  “Maybe we can just watch a movie or something.”

  She accepted the remote when I pressed it into her hand and powered the TV on, flicking through channels so quickly it made my head spin and my headache deepen.

  My cell phone buzzed in my palm again. Voicemail. I hated voicemails. I needed to change my answering message to “please just hang up and text me.”

  I entered my passcode and slapped the phone to my ear.

  “Ben, this is Detective Matthews. I’d appreciate if you called me back as soon as possible. I have—well, there’s some new developments I want to share with you. Please give me a call as soon as you get this message.”

  I bolted off the couch and headed for the kitchen, calling over my shoulder, “I’ll be right back, kid, I just need to make a phone call.”

  The call had barely made it through its first ring when Detective Matthews answered. “Ben?”

  “What new developments?”

  “I think it might be best if you came down to the station.”

  “I’m with my little cousin right now. Can’t you just tell me?”

  “I’d rather not over the phone.”

  I swallowed a grunt of frustration. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  Disconnecting in the middle of Detective Matthew’s farewell, I flipped my jacket over my shoulder and walked back toward the living room.

  “I gotta go, Kylie. I need to take you home.”

  “Why? Where do you have to go?” She slid off the couch and onto her feet.

  I waffled with what to say. To lie or be upfront; which would be worse? The truth won by a fraction. Kylie was seven, not stupid. She could read my face as well as The Art of War.

  “I have to go to the police station. It’s about Carissa.”

  “Did they catch the bastard?”

  “I—what?”

  “That’s what Mommy always says. ‘I hope they catch the bastard.’”

  Yeah. Me too.

  I stepped into the police station just as Detective Matthews was lowering himself into a chair in the lobby. He leapt up right when he saw me, as though he’d sat on a thumbtack.

  “Thanks for coming in,” he said, crossing the room in two strides, extending his hand.

  I gave it one quick shake and dropped it. “What developments?”

  “Follow me.”

  “What’s going on?”

  He flashed his keycard beneath the scanner at the door which led deeper into the building. “I’ll show you once we get inside.”

  “Can’t we talk while we walk?”

  He just looked at me, holding the door open. I gave up my interrogation, waiting for him to step through the doorway so I could follow.

  For some reason I’d always expected police stations to look like a newsroom, buzzing with frantic activity like a beehive. Not so, in this case. Just the secretary poking at her phone and one bored-looking guy playing with a cruller, his head bent over a swath of papers spread over the desk in his cramped cubicle. What ‘developments’ could have possibly happened when the department looked this lethargic?

  I pursued Matthews down the lone hallway, and the further we walked, the louder muttered voices grew until they reached their crescendo when we stopped at a cracked open door.

  “Detectives Rogers and Caroll, and Officers Floyd and Esposito,” Detective Matthews said, pointing at each individual in turn. “This is Ben, Carissa’s fiancé.”

  “Hi,” I said curtly, glancing around the room. “What’s going on?”

  Officer Esposito, the lone female, pushed back from a desk and inclined her head at the monitor, where a large man sat alone in a room with peeling yellow paint and a card table. “Meet Steven Klein, Ben. We got a DNA hit early this morning.”

  I felt simultaneously cold and feverish as my mouth fell open. “This is the guy?”

  What kind of rapist slash murderer had such a normal, nondescript name? Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer; those names inspired fear. Steven Klein sounded like the bag boy in a Stop and Shop.

  “I told you we’d find him,” Detective Matthews said, in a voice throbbing with badly disguised jubilation.

  I didn’t feel jubilant. I didn’t feel anything but cold and hollow, staring at the fuckhead who’d ruined my life, Carissa and Arlene’s lives. How could he sit there looking almost bored for Christ’s sake, a gelatinous heap of a man with a palm cupping a rippling pudgy cheek. One fat finger traced nonsense patterns into the table, and every so often he flicked a glance up at the eye of the camera in the corner of the room. He probably had an inkling that several people were watching him, but every time he stared into the lens of the camera, it felt like just me and him.

  If I knew which room he sat in and that I’d get away with it, I’d have snatched that gun off Matthews’ hip and fired a bullet into every pressure point on his flabby body.

  How many times had I envisioned this moment? Millions, I wagered. So many times I’d been sitting at my desk on a conference call and my mind had wandered into the thorny thicket of who had done it and what I’d do to him, where I’d stick a knife and what I’d say to him as I watched him bleed out. Had he said anything to Carissa as he waited for her to bleed to death? I’d always wondered about that, too.

  Every cop in the room gazed at the man on the monitor with such naked, maniacal happiness that it was painful to witness. I could understand it to some degree, but for fuck’s sake, this guy had murdered at least two women and probably hurt countless others. Looking at him with such joy was indecent and sickening.

  Knowing who it was felt suddenly pointless. Wh
at did it matter that they found him when Carissa and Arlene were both dead? Finding him couldn’t reverse what happened. Knowing his name wouldn’t magically unrape them and put their spilled blood back where it belonged.

  I’d pictured this before, the second I knew they’d finally found this prick. In those images, Joe and I were drinking frothing flutes of champagne at the cemetery, happy for once, telling Carissa’s headstone that it was finally over. Joe would make some drunken toast about justice and law and order, and I’d sleep all through the night for once. They’ve found him, Dexter, I’d say, and despite his stupid bored blinks, I’d know he knew what I meant.

  “Are you okay, Ben?” Detective Matthews asked, his voice sounding as though he were on a completely different plane than I was.

  I nodded. I didn’t know how my voice would sound if I spoke, couldn’t think of anything that would make sense to say.

  “We’ve got him dead to rights, but he’s invented some ridiculous story about it having been consensual sex with Carissa—”

  “What?” The hazy sense of shock popped like a soap bubble as I gaped at Matthews. “And she consented to have her throat slit as well, did she?”

  “That would be why I called it a ridiculous story. Nobody’s gonna buy that crock. It’s what they all say when they’re caught. ‘We had a secret affair, swear to God, the fiancé probably came home after I left, realized she was cheating on him and killed her, that’s why you found my DNA.’ No jury would believe that if he ever went to trial.”

  “That’s all he’s said? It was a secret affair? How long have you had him in custody?”

  Officer Esposito swiveled in her chair, crossing one leg over the other in a surprisingly elegant, fluid motion, given her stiff, starched uniform. Her eye makeup looked like Carissa’s, nude shadows with velvety black winged liner, lashes flaring at the corners beneath dark and sculpted brows. I’d never seen a female cop who actually looked feminine outside of police procedural dramas on television. She must have gotten hit on all the time. Probably had to be a pretend hooker during a stint in Vice; didn’t all women on the force have to suffer that indignity at least once in their career?

  Her matte lips moved, but I heard nothing. She blinked up at Matthews, then back at me.

  “Ben?” Matthews patted my shoulder.

  “Sorry.” I shook my head experimentally and refocused on Officer Esposito. “It’s stupid, but your makeup, it looks like Carissa’s.”

  She looked at me with such obvious pity it made me feel ill. “I’ll take that as a compliment. She knew what she was doing when it came to makeup.”

  “We called Officer Esposito in for that reason, actually,” Detective Caroll offered from the corner of the room. “She’s a hell of a lot prettier than any of us, and she looks similar to Carissa and Arlene.”

  She wiggled her left hand. “I’ll forget to tell my husband I had to take off my wedding ring to play the part. But yes, that was basically all he said. The secret affair story and some insinuations about how well-endowed he was. Matthews and Rogers picked him up at three a.m., not long after he came home from a bar. He shot the shit with us for a few hours and then asked for a lawyer.”

  What lucky bastard would wind up having to defend him? I’d rather drink battery acid.

  “Johnny Cochran couldn’t get this dickhead off,” Detective Matthews said, rocking back on his heels. “As far as we’re concerned, it’s case closed.”

  I looked back at the monitor, and the knowledge that this pouchy, porcine face was the last thing Carissa had seen summoned a wave of boiling bile up my throat.

  I pressed a hand against my chest, and, as Detective Matthews conjured a trash can out of nowhere and held it under my chin, I wondered just how many people he’d seen vomit their guts out for him to recognize the symptoms so quickly.

  IX

  L eaning against my kitchen counter, Joe seemed unable to assign a task to his hands. He clasped them for a moment, white knuckles exploding from the force with which he squeezed them together, then dropped them to his sides. He dragged one through his hair, the other making a vague waving motion in the air like he was swatting flies. When he found his voice and could string together a few coherent syllables, he threw both hands in the air and goggled at me.

  “I can’t believe it.”

  “Me either, kind of.”

  “So, they’re sure?”

  “Seemed that way. DNA evidence is pretty bulletproof.”

  “I don’t know how to feel. I think I should be happy. I should be happy for you, right? It’s over now. They found him, case closed. But I’m finding it really hard to be happy just yet.”

  “I know the feeling.” My thoughts had slurred ever since I’d left the police station, ever since Detective Matthews had pulled me into a bewildering hug and packed me into the driver’s seat of my car.

  I used to think this would signify the end. They caught him, hallelujah, it’s a wrap. Those Dateline episodes ended in an hour, two if it was an ambitious one, and they always concluded with the killer in jail, with the family celebrating, albeit in a bittersweet kind of way. They’d release doves and cry, but it would be over.

  Maybe it would have been that way if I didn’t know what was secreted away in the bowels of that old mill at 311 Emery.

  “I threw up when I saw him.”

  “Who can blame you for that?”

  “That was the last thing she saw. His fat fucking face. And I couldn’t even look at him without barfing,” I said, willing my voice not to shake. “It’s pathetic.” There had been no vomit at the scene of Carissa’s death. She was the one who bore the brunt of this nightmare, and she’d managed to keep the contents of her stomach firmly in place. She’d told me once that I was her rock, but I wasn’t. I couldn’t be strong for her now.

  The hot tears welling along the waterlines of my eyes felt sharp as knives.

  Joe’s hand crept along my back. “It isn’t pathetic. It’s the furthest thing from pathetic. It’s love, and that’s never pathetic. I’d puke too, if the tables were turned. I’d probably have burst into the interrogation room and strangled him.”

  I dragged the back of my hand across my eyes, trying to focus through blurry tears. “The thought crossed my mind, believe me.”

  Dexter padded into the kitchen just then, gazing at the pair of us with a kind of removed interest. I couldn’t help but give a watery laugh. My own furry serial killer bequeathed to me by my dead fiancée. There were a surplus of serial killers traipsing through my life at the moment.

  “What’s funny?”

  I waved at Dexter. “Dexter Morgan. He’s a serial killer, too.”

  Joe glanced uncertainly at me, then over at Dexter, who had decided now was a great time to lick his ass with abandon.

  “You’ve never watched Dexter?” I asked.

  “No.”

  “You should. One of Carissa’s favorites. Skip season six, though. It sucked. Except for the last five minutes of the finale episode.”

  Joe heaved a small sigh, wrapping his arms around me.

  “I’m babbling, right?” I asked over his shoulder. “I should stop talking. I’m telling myself to stop talking but it’s like there's a traffic jam in my brain preventing my vocal cords from getting the message. Maybe I need a drink.”

  “You babble as much as you want.” He dropped his hold on me and gestured toward the cabinet where he knew I kept the alcohol. “I can get you that drink. What do you want?”

  “I only have bourbon.”

  “You only have bourbon,” he scoffed. “Bourbon’s magical.”

  I watched him hunt down a glass and get the bottle, my entire body vibrating as the last vestiges of blended tears and laughter subsided. “I have so many people to call. My mom, Frank and Alanna, Jason and Jackson…”

  “Call them when you’re up to it, not before. They’ll understand.” He uncapped the bourbon, cleared his throat. “Did you ever think to ask Matthews whether you could tal
k to Steven Klein?” The lip of the bottle clinked against the tumbler, letting loose an amber wave of bourbon.

  “You’re serious?” At his nod, I said, “That only happens in movies. Matthews would shit himself if I asked him for that.”

  Joe shrugged, screwing the lid back on the bottle and pressing the tumbler into my hand. “Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe confronting him will make you feel better. Maybe talking to you would take him by surprise, make him trip up and incriminate himself, forget his little consensual sex scenario.”

  The bourbon blazed a path of fire down my throat as I swallowed hard. “Nobody would allow that.”

  “I’m just saying. If you think it might help, it wouldn’t hurt to ask.”

  But it would hurt to ask. It would hurt so fucking much to get in a room with him, to potentially hear every last detail of every horrible thing he did to her, even though a desperate suicidal and masochistic part of me needed to know what had happened, second by second, blow by blow.

  I shook my head, the bourbon whirlpooling in the glass. “I won’t be allowed to talk to him. The only time I’ll hear him speak is if he goes to trial and his lawyer is fool enough to put him on the stand.”

  “If he goes to trial, I’ll be there with you every day.”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  “I want to do it.”

  “You have more important things to do.”

  “The hell I do. You can’t keep me from showing up, either. I’ll be there with or without your permission.”

  How could I argue? I would do the same for him.

  B en?”

  I glanced up from my computer as Carissa’s voice floated down the staircase. I tried to respond, but my mouth didn’t cooperate.

  “Can you help me?”

  So I stood and headed for the stairs, turned the corner into our bedroom, and found her standing there, two flaps of skin hanging loose off her back, exposing a spine of twisted metal, copper cabling and blinking red lights.