by John Hart
Only Gibby and X.
* * *
I left the recruiting office overcome by something close to religious awe. I’d never seen such respect and conviction, and tried to imagine what kind of act or action would make a stranger rise and salute with tears in his eyes. What had I done in life that even came close?
With that thought in my head, and nowhere I had to be, I decided to find Becky Collins. On her street, I passed a shattered tree and a hollow-eyed woman who watched me roll by. When I reached the right house, Becky was in the yard as if she’d known I was coming. I was afraid the unannounced visit might make her angry, but that’s not how it played. She waved broadly, and smiled as I parked.
“This is a nice surprise.”
“Chance thought you’d be upset with me if I showed up uninvited.”
“Chance is an idiot. Can you stay?” I said I could, and she took my hand to pull me from the car. “Come with me, then.”
She led me into the backyard, then into a stand of trees, and down a red-clay bank rutted out by heavy rains. At the bottom, we picked our way into deeper forest and along a footpath to a creek that gurgled among the stones.
“I found this place when I was six.”
Becky spoke over her shoulder as she led me deeper, parting a tangle of vines so I could follow her into a clearing where the creek spilled into a basin dappled with light, its loveliness so unexpected and complete it startled me.
“Isn’t it something? Sit here.” She gestured at a mossy spot near the water’s edge. “Give me a second, okay?”
I watched her gather bits of trash washed in by the creek, making a neat pile of it beside the trail.
“I have to stay on top of this, especially after it rains.” She dropped a final bit of plastic, then sat beside me with her knees up and her arms crossed to make a place for her chin. “So,” she said. “Gibby French.”
“Becky Collins.”
“You want to talk about it?”
“What?”
“Whatever it is I see down in the bottom of those pretty green eyes.”
I didn’t want to talk about Jason or Tyra, so I changed the subject. “This place is pretty amazing. How’d you find it?”
“Any kid would have.”
“Have others?” I asked. “Found it, I mean.”
“Not for a while, I guess. I don’t see people here. There are houses that way—a whole other street—but there are brambles and kudzu. The drop is steeper.”
“Do you ever swim?”
She raised one eyebrow into a perfect arch. “Do you want to?”
I did want to. It was the coolness and the depth, the vines that made a curtain, and the stillness of the deep, green shade.
“I’m not taking off my clothes,” she said.
“Me, either.”
“Underwear, then?” I looked for the joke, but there was no such thing in her eyes. “You first,” she said, and then watched as I took off my shoes, stood awkwardly, and fumbled at my belt. “Do you want me to turn around?” I nodded stupidly, surprised when she closed her eyes and covered them with her hands. “How about this instead?”
I took off my shirt and pants, realizing then that her fingers were spread and she was grinning as she watched. I said, “Cheater,” then stepped into the pool, which was deeper than I’d thought. I moved to the middle and sank to my chin.
Becky stripped as if the act were devoid of sexuality. Tossed shoes. A quick roll onto her back to pull off the jeans. She stood to remove her shirt, and I looked away because her sexuality was obvious, whether she meant it to be or not. In the water, she said, “This is nice,” then went under and rose, dripping. The pool made her eyes look something other than blue, and the water made the bra translucent. “Do you want to talk about it, now?” she asked.
I wasn’t sure if she was teasing or not, but words had never been hard for me. I spoke of my father, who thought Jason might be guilty, and of my mother, manic in the kitchen. That led to Chance and prison and the question of college versus war. When I reached the place that hurt the most, I looked away and shared my thoughts on brothers and death and the guilt I harbored for my easy life. When the words ran out, I found Becky close in the water, not touching me, but nearly so.
“What do you think?” I asked.
She stared for a handful of seconds, still silvery-eyed and lovely. “I think you have troubles, and that none of them are bigger than you.”
“What do you think I should do?”
“With your life? I can’t answer that question.”
“What about now? Today?”
“Be there for your brother. Let him know he’s not alone.”
“That’s it?”
“It’s enough,” she said; but the words, in my ears, were strange.
Be a man, I heard.
For once in your sheltered life.
* * *
Ripley returned at ten minutes before five, and Jason considered how strange it was to walk the prison halls in loafers and jeans. He’d served twenty-seven months behind these walls, a full twelve of them before he’d met X.
But those last months …
He’d fought and bled, and been brought back to fight again. Fifteen months. A blur of pain, blood, and bandages. No one had fought X so many times or come so close to beating him. For a time, the guards had wagered in secret on the conflicts, but X didn’t fight for sport—not that kind—and two days after he’d learned of the wagers, one guard lost an ear in an unprovoked bar fight, and another, his home to fire.
After that, there were no wagers.
“This way.”
Ripley led Jason down a series of halls, then outside and through the main yard. Jason watched the prisoners, and the prisoners watched him back. Blacks. Hispanics. The white prisoners paid the most attention. Nazis. Bikers. Loners with the right ink. They had a corner of the yard, and it seemed every eye was on Jason as he passed.
“Because of the Pagans,” Ripley said. “Word is out about what you did to Darius Simms.”
“Is that why I’m in solitary?”
“Let me put it this way. If guards come for you that aren’t on X’s detail, tread with serious care. X is not the only one with deep pockets and corrections officers on the payroll.”
They kept moving. So did every eyeball in every white face. After that, it was all about death row. The building was the oldest at Lanesworth, a onetime weapons depot modified in 1863 to hold Union army prisoners of war. Security inside was unpleasant, but Jason knew the guards, the protocols.
“Open one.”
A buzzer sounded, and the old hinges groaned. A second guard appeared, not one of X’s. He was midforties and florid, same buzz cut as every other guard.
Ripley said, “You got him?”
“I do.”
Ripley met Jason’s eyes for half a blink, then turned on a heel, and left without a word. A red hand settled on Jason’s arm, and put damp marks on his skin. “I’m sure you remember the rules. Stay in the center of the hall, clear of the cell doors. Don’t talk to anyone. No eye contact. Make it easy for me, I make it easy for you.”
They turned to face the row, and it was like every nightmare Jason had had since getting out: the small, hot cells, and pale faces against the metal, the long walk to the end, and then down the stairs to X.
“Walk on, prisoner.”
Jason squared up, and took that first step. If X wanted him dead, he wanted him dead. If it was something else …
He kept his eyes down as cells slid past, and one inmate hissed, Hey, slickness … hey, slick … At the end of the row, another guard stood at the top of the stairwell. He was part of X’s detail, and had been for years. Jason could not remember the name, but the face was familiar. He waved off the red-faced guard, and put a hand on Jason’s arm. “I’m sorry to see you back. You okay? You good?”
“Well enough.”
“We’ll do it like every other time.” The guard turned a key. “He’s in a g
ood place today. You should be fine.”
Jason stepped through the door, and faced the stairs with the usual anxiety. X could speak of history and philosophy, of literature and art, the great works of mankind. In a single hour, he could show the world through fresh eyes, then just as quickly recall some far-off murder in detail so exquisite it turned your stomach. X was brilliant; he was insane.
Then there was the rest of it …
Jason flexed his oft-broken hands, and twisted once to take pressure off the poorly healed ribs. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he looked up as the guard nodded, and locked the steel door to leave Jason alone in the shadows beneath death row. There was a stone archway at the bottom of the stairs. Beyond that was the corridor and X’s cells and X.
“Hello, Jason.”
The voice was the same. So was everything else. Jason had wondered at this moment: his physical reaction, his first words. He wanted to vomit. He wished for a .45 in his hand. “You told me I was free of this place and of you. You said I was out clean.”
“I meant it at the time.” X stood center corridor, a lean man of average height, casually dressed. “Things change.”
Jason moved beneath the arch, and into the corridor. “Things like what?”
X shrugged, but seemed happy. “Let’s say that a date certain for one’s execution tends to sharpen the mind until some things become painfully acute.”
“Such as?”
“Old regrets. Final aspirations.”
“You had Tyra killed to bring me back.” It wasn’t a question. For Jason, it had never been a question.
“Sadly for the young woman, I didn’t know that you would be arrested on gun and assault charges, that I might have simply waited.”
“She was an innocent woman.”
“But was she really?” X took a few steps, eyes glinting. “She taunted the men on that bus, forgotten men with little dignity and few reasons to live. She teased and tormented them, and did it for what, exactly? A moment’s distraction? Her own venereal pride?”
“Please spare me the false indignation. You don’t care about the men on that bus. And any sins of Tyra’s pale beside your own.”
X raised his shoulders, both hands behind his back. “I’m merely deconstructing whatever narrative you’ve built in that otherwise fine mind of yours. The men on the bus are irrelevant, yes, but any positive qualities your young friend may have had, she was, at the core, selfish and unworthy.”
“Of her life?”
“Of you, Jason. For God’s sake, did you learn nothing from me in our time together?”
Jason took a deep breath, trying to steady himself. It had always been like this with X. “Why am I here?”
“Can’t two friends simply visit?”
“We are most certainly not friends.”
“Kindred spirits, then.”
Jason shook his head. It was all so familiar. “I’ve never understood these delusions of yours.”
“Delusions!” X raised his voice for the first time. “How many men have you killed, my friend? And how many of those deaths do you actually regret?”
“That was war. It’s different.”
“But is it different there?” X pointed at Jason’s heart. “Does a song not play each time? You alive, another dead…”
“I’m not doing this with you. Not again.” Jason backed away, knowing X could kill him if he wished. There’d be a blade nearby, a shard of glass, a twist of wire …
X trailed languidly behind. “I did take pains to bring you here.”
“Tyra’s pain. My pain.”
“You’re upset. I understand. We can try again tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow will be no different.”
“Yet time is not our friend.”
“The electric chair. Yeah, I heard.” Jason kept moving: the second step, the third.
“If you knew my heart, you would feel differently.”
Jason climbed higher, and X watched him go, a smile on his face. “The heart, my young friend, and all the songs that play.”
21
An hour after we climbed from the creek, I was back in the car, and Becky, again, was leaning above me. The sun hung below the trees. The light was soft on her face. “This was good,” I said.
“Come anytime, Gibson French.”
Without intending it, my gaze slid to the house behind her. The porch had collapsed on one side. The screens were rusted and torn.
“Hey, handsome. Eyes front.” Becky touched my cheek, and turned my head. “It’s just a house. It’s not who I am.”
“Chance told me not to come.”
“And I told you, Chance is an idiot. Will you stay a little longer?”
“I need to go.”
“Important business?”
“Kind of. Yeah.”
A hint of doubt showed in her eyes. She sensed my unease, but misunderstood the reasons. “I’m a cool girl, you know. We can talk about other things. It doesn’t have to be so heavy.”
“I think you’re the coolest.”
“So let’s go somewhere. Sunset. Dinner. The place doesn’t matter.”
Her words made sense, but others did, too.
Be a man …
For once in your sheltered life …
“I’m being pushy,” she said. “And that’s not normally my thing. Just tell me you’re not blowing me off.”
“I’m not.”
“Is that a promise?”
“It is.”
She bent low, her elbows crossed on the window frame. “Tell me I’m beautiful.”
“You’re gorgeous.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because you’re a gorgeous, beautiful girl, especially in your underwear.”
She blushed and looked away, but was not unhappy. When she turned back, we kissed, her lips softly parted, her breath warm and sweet. When she drew back at last, the grin was in her eyes, and she held up two fingers.
My second kiss …
That’s what she meant.
I held up the same two fingers, then put the car in gear, and watched her dwindle in the dusty light. She shielded her eyes to watch me, too; and I considered how fast the world was changing. A week ago, life was the quarry, the dive, a few cold beers with Chance. Now there was Becky and Jason, my father and mother, a house full of lies.
Maybe this is how it feels, I thought.
Adulthood.
I preferred the clarity of single-mindedness, so I thought about the best way to help my brother. Before, the answer would have been simple. My father was a cop, with his own kind of clarity. But I couldn’t ask for his help—he’d worry more for me than Jason, and act accordingly. Should I visit Jason in prison? I debated as I drove, then stopped at a pay phone and lied to my mother.
“How late?” she asked.
“I’m not sure. A few hours.”
“What are you doing?”
“Something with Chance. Nothing big. Hanging out.”
“But your father—”
“Just tell him for me, okay?”
I hung up because I knew how the rest of it would play. On Chance’s street, I parked a half block down, and watched my back as I walked to his house. It was that kind of street. His mother came to the door when I knocked, her hair streaked with gray and pulled back in a kerchief. She’d worked two shifts already, but none of that tiredness touched her eyes when she saw me. “Gibby, sweetheart. Come inside. You’re in time for dinner.” She gave me a hug, then called out to Chance. “Chance, come say hi to Gibby.”
Chance emerged from the back hall, surprised to see me.
“Can we talk?” I asked.
“Yeah, sure. Mom?”
“Dinner in ten minutes. Gibby, do you like creamed chipped beef on toast?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Chance led me to his room, a small space with a single window. “Have you ever had creamed chipped beef on toast?” He closed the door. “Dried beef, milk sauce, an
d Wonder Bread. Your basic staples.”
“I’m sure it’s awesome.”
“I guess you’re here for a reason.”
I said that I was, and told him what I wanted to do.
“Are you nuts?” he demanded. “Are you fucking high?”
“I don’t know. You tell me.”
“You want to figure out who killed Tyra Norris? You? Not the cops?”
I nodded.
“Then yeah, I’d say you’re nuts, like off-your-rocker, nuthouse nuts. Leave it for the cops, man.”
“The cops think Jason did it.”
“Not your dad, though.”
“I don’t know. I think maybe he does. He won’t talk about it, but he’s got this grimness, like he’s braced for it. And the other cops are watching him. I can tell you that. They’re looking at him strange.”
“Dude, you’re just a kid…”
“Am I, though? I can vote, drink, go to war.”
“Forget that bullshit. Let’s break the rest of it down. We have a murdered woman—”
“Tyra.”
“Tyra, fine. I know her name. This Tyra’s been seriously, hard-core murdered, and you want to prove your brother didn’t do it.” He leaned into the next word, pausing with one hand up, as if to throw a dart. “How?”
“That’s why I need your help. It’s why I’m here.”
“Who am I? Kojak? Columbo?”
“Screw those TV guys. You’re the smartest person I know.”
“All right, that part’s true. So what? You want to brainstorm this thing?”
“I do, yeah.”
“Dude, we don’t need to brainstorm anything. There’s nothing to talk about. You can’t do it.”
“Why not?”
“Because you haven’t thought this through. You want to save your brother. Fine. Fair enough. But what’s on the other side of that coin? You need to prove he’s innocent. Straightforward, right? So you find the guy who killed her. You go out in this big, bad world, in the black of night, and you find whatever sadistic, soulless, murderous son of a bitch decided, at some point in life, that torturing women to death is what he really wants to do with his time. To find that guy, you’ll have to ask questions and get up in his business, up in the place he lives, where he eats and hunts and sleeps, and that, my friend”—Chance used a finger to jab me in the chest—“that is some serious, scary, crazy-dangerous business.”
