by Dave Cravens
Exhausted, high as a kite, and gushing blood out of her leg, Parker crawled on all fours through her mother’s house in her attempt to pursue Bill. To her surprise, when she reached the doorway, she found the entire street crowded with cars, emergency response vehicles and people.
Parker would later learn, that her last-minute gamble had worked almost perfectly. At Parker’s request, when Valerie had set up the motion camera in the kitchen, she’d also emailed everyone on the school’s PTA registry a live link to the camera. Some people ignored the link, thinking it was spam. But for those who did watch, spread the word like wildfire. Bill’s confession was witnessed by hundreds of people on social media in Oak Creek.
When Bill exited Valerie’s house, nearly the entire PTA stood to meet him at the curb, along with the state highway patrol, a few FBI field agents and even some of Bill’s own confused deputies. At the forefront of the group stood Julie, Glory and Valerie who angrily aimed a shotgun at Bill’s head.
When Bill asked them who the hell they thought they were, Julie proudly replied: “We’re the mother-fucking PTA.”
Bill passed out from his blood loss only seconds before Parker did.
Then everything went black.
99.
Parker’s eyes opened to the soft morning light of a hospital room and the hard aching of her entire body.
Each beat of her heart caused a sharp and powerful throbbing in the bridge of her nose, cheek bones and right thigh.
I guess the heroin wore off.
Parker couldn’t believe the power of that drug. Under its influence, she literally couldn’t feel anything, good or bad. For those with nothing but misery and pain in their life, she could understand how so many could be tempted by it. But the price to be paid simply wasn’t worth it. In a strange way, Parker missed her pain. Without it, she didn’t quite feel whole. Parker looked down at her left arm to note the IV running into it. “Blehk,” she grumbled, disgusted by the sight.
“You blew my cover, Ms. Monroe,” said a voice from her right.
The statement startled Parker, which prompted another shock of pain. Parker slowly turned her aching head to find Principal Mendez sitting in a chair next to her. Of course, even with the bruises on her face, Mendez still looked picture perfect. “Have you just been sitting there, waiting to for me to wake up so that you could tell me that?” asked Parker. “Creepy.”
“I ran into your family as they were leaving for lunch,” said Mendez. “I offered to say with you until they got back.”
“Ah hell, I missed them?” Parker tried sitting up in her bed, which prompted even more aches and pain. Gah, maybe that heroin wasn’t so bad? “I could really use some hugs right now.” Parker gave her best puppy dog eyes to Mendez. She grimaced as she outstretched her arms. “Unless?”
“No.” Mendez defiantly crossed her arms.
“But we, like, went through some serious shit together! You got beat up. I got beat up.”
“I’m not a hugger.”
“We both shot people. We bonded, man! Bring it in.” Parker opened her arms wider, ready to receive Mendez.
“Ms. Monroe,” Mendez cleared her throat in an attempt to change the subject. “You took an incredible risk the other night texting me to come over.”
“The other night? How many has it been?”
“Two,” answered Mendez. “How did you know I was undercover FBI?”
Parker waved the question away as if it were no big deal. “I knew you had to be something undercover. You are a terrible principal. And you obviously hate kids. And you practically begged me to investigate Bernstein’s ranch. And you came when I messaged you 911.”
Mendez allowed herself a small grin. “So, you hoped I was undercover FBI.”
Parker shrugged. “When Bill turned up at the hospital, you were my best bet. I couldn’t call the local authorities. I didn’t know how deep things went. Even if I was wrong and you simply were just a terrible principal, your presence doubled my chances of survival. The worst that could happen was that Bill killed both of us. I simply hate the idea of dying alone.” Parker winced. Even my toes hurt! Why do my toes hurt? “How much did the feds know about everything going on?”
“Oak Creek has had an unrealistically low-crime rate for years,” answered Mendez. “But we had no evidence that the Sheriff was doing anything wrong. My assignment was to look for signs of trafficking within the school system. We’d busted a ring last year that clued us in that there might be activity within this county.”
“But Heller never knew about you, did she?”
“No. Only the superintendent. Maybe that’s why Karen never trusted me. If she had, it might have saved her life.”
“I don’t think Karen felt she could trust anyone,” added Parker. “She’d been Bernstein’s greatest advocate. They’d built the music program together. His secret would have destroyed the both of them.”
“Bernstein hid it all very well. I had a few leads, but it wasn’t until you unmasked everyone the other night that the dots started to connect. You’ll be pleased to know we raided Mr. Bernstein’s ranch this morning and arrested his wife as an accomplice. She revealed an underground tunnel hidden beneath a false floor in their barn. It ran three miles to an outhouse across the border. The longest ever discovered. But it’s all shut down now. Johnson, Bernstein and his wife, and her brother Victor Cortez whose dealership provided transport for migrants will be behind bars for a very, very long time.”
“Prison is too good for them.”
Mendez stood up and rested her hand gently on Parker’s. “I like to believe there’s a special place in hell for human traffickers. They are the worst of the worst.”
Parker smiled. “Aww, you do have emotions!” Her smile suddenly dissolved. “What about Pedro?”
“He’ll become a ward of the state. We can’t locate his mother anywhere.”
Parker’s eyes lit up. “He has a grandmother, here, in the States. Her name is Cecelia. She’s been searching for him.”
“Interesting,” Mendez nodded. “I wasn’t aware of that. I’ll look into it, okay?” Mendez looked up toward the door. “I can hear your family down the hall. Your son keeps shouting about ghosts in the hospital or something.” She patted Parker on the arm. “Good luck to you, Ms. Monroe. I wish you a speedy recovery.”
Parker frowned. “Wait. You’re leaving? Like, forever leaving?”
“Oak Creek Elementary deserves a real principal. It’s about time it got one.”
“You could at least stay through Boo Fest! We’re short volunteers! We could really use your help!”
Mendez’s smile widened. “I have no doubt Boo Fest will be a roaring success.”
100.
“Boo Fest is a fucking disaster,”
grumbled a green-faced witch-costumed Parker. The make-up did a remarkable job hiding her swollen nose and black eye, a poor consolation when Parker surveyed the sparse crowd of costumed kids and their parents exploring the lavish Halloween themed carnival sprawled about the school’s grounds. There was literally no waiting in line at the Ferris wheel, the tilt-a-whirl, or the zipper rides on this hot and arid Friday afternoon. Slippery When Wet jammed in front of only twelve die-hard Bon Jovi fans, which included the dancing train wreck of Cray-Cray who proudly wore her child’s undersized Boo Fest t-shirt “because it fit like a glove” – if the glove was meant to announce to the world she wasn’t wearing a bra.
Parker took some solace in the fact that those families who did show, arrived in elaborate Halloween costumes. The Power Rangers, Frankensteins, Pokémon’ handlers, Hobbits, Fobbits and Harry Potter clones appeared to genuinely enjoy the event. But the math was obvious. Such a poor turnout meant the fundraiser was well below hitting the break-even point. Parker angrily adjusted her pointed witch’s hat that perfectly accessorized her lavish purple satin costume rental for the umpteenth time. “All this work, and for what?”
Valerie, appearing as a regal Cleopatra, gently patted
her daughter on the shoulder, causing her to cringe from her days old bruises. “I’m rather surprised anyone showed up at all,” she stated blatantly.
“Thanks, Mom.”
“I mean, who wants to give money to save a music program started by a pedophile?”
“Maybe ask that a little louder,” Parker tried smiling at the shocked constituents who passed by.
“Still,” Valerie smiled. “You should be proud. And if you aren’t, I’ll be proud enough for the both of us.”
Parker and Valerie began to walk and survey the grounds, with Parker doing her best to hide her limp.
“Do you think you should be walking so much?” pressed Valerie.
“Sure,” Parker waved her mother off. “Walking is good for a bullet wound.”
“Really?”
“I don’t know. I’m hopped up on pain killers.”
Parker waved to Glory, who had perfected his non-penis balloon swords that children chased each other with. She waved to Maddy, who patiently (for once) guided Drew and Ally along to the kiddie dragon themed roller coaster. She smiled at Julie who painted a young girls’ face into an alarming rendition of Kiss’s Gene Simmons. The young girl stuck out her unusually long tongue out at Parker. Then there was Brad wrapping his arms around Holly at a carnival game. He pretended to help her aim the stream of a water pistol into the mechanical clown’s mouth. God, if that isn’t a pathetic suggestion. Parker tried to shield her eyes from the display. It was only when her mother and her reached the end of the fairway, that Parker finally spotted him.
“Mom, can you give me a minute?” asked Parker.
“Is something wrong?” replied Valerie.
“No. I just need to have a quick conversation with the Grim Reaper.” Parker parted from her mother’s side and circled around the back of the dunk tank’s shack. About a minute later, the skull-faced Grim Reaper rounded the corner to stand silently before the witch. He gently laid his scythe against the back wall.
“How are you feeling?” asked Joe Ward as he pulled off his skull mask.
“The pain killers the doctors gave me aren’t nearly as effective at killing pain as that heroin Bill shot me up with,” answered Parker.
“It’s powerful stuff,” said Joe. “I nearly got hooked on it years ago after I got shot in Afghanistan. Stay away from it.”
“Yes, sir.” Parker offered a sarcastic salute. She paused as her eyes met Joe’s. In the past she’d always had tried to read him and gauge as to whether he was telling her the truth. Without all that distraction, now she searched his eyes for something else. “Your text was rather vague. What did you want to talk to me about?”
“I wanted to thank you. In person.” Joe drew a long, deep breath. “And I wanted to apologize.”
“For what?”
“I didn’t mean to lose it on Bernstein the way I did,” Joe looked to the ground in shame. “That must have been awful to witness. I was out of control.”
“Yeah, you were.” Parker didn’t mince her words. “You have a serious problem.”
Joe nodded. “I thought I was doing better. It’s been years. But when I got those pictures of Bernstein with those boys – it all came flooding back.”
Parker looked Joe up and down. She finally found what she was looking for. “You were abused,” she deduced.
“No,” Joe shook his head. “Not me.” He looked up to the afternoon’s cloudy sky. “Funny, I don’t even know what his name was. But he served as a ‘tea boy’ on base in Afghanistan. There was a commander in the local police militia, a guy the Rangers were partnering with for Christ’s sake who had a real interest in this boy.”
“You’re talking about bacha bazi,” stated Parker.
“You’ve heard of it?”
Parker swallowed. “I’ve read about it. Roughly translated, it means ‘boy play.’ Young boys are sold to prominent men in Afghanistan for entertainment. Of course, it’s all just cover for them to be sexually abused.”
“They’re sex slaves,” added Joe. “At night, on base, you could hear them crying from time to time. And their abusers were men we had to work with the next day. It made us all sick. But we were ordered to stand down. It wasn’t our culture. It wasn’t our place get involved. There were rules to abide by.”
Parker folded her arms. “So, what did you do?”
“Nothing,” answered Joe. “And that kid who served my coffee every morning? He took my inaction as being complicit. He saw it as the Americans giving permission for him to be abused. So, one morning, after suffering a particularly brutal episode from the local police chief, that boy didn’t serve me coffee. He served me a bullet.” Joe pointed to his chest. “Missed my heart by an inch.”
“I’m sorry, Joe. That’s awful.”
“I couldn’t blame the kid. He was right to be angry with me. I failed him.” Joe clenched his fist. “We went over to protect these people from the Taliban, and some of the assholes who replaced them were just as bad. After weeks of recovery, I was still pissed. I took it up with my CO. He gave me the same spiel about our mission. The rules of engagement. How we needed that Afghan police chief to continue doing his job, so we could win. And I lost it. Just – lost it. I took all my rage, I channeled it through these fists,” Joe held up his hands, and curled them tightly until his knuckles were white. “And I beat the living crap out of my CO. Just like I did with Bernstein. Both times, it cost me my job.”
Parker’s eyes widened. “You’re being fired?” she gasped.
“I’m resigning,” admitted Joe. “All the teachers saw what I did. They’re frightened of me. Who could blame them? This school has enough issues. It needs a fresh start. Without me.”
Parker sighed. And you were just starting to get interesting. “What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know,” said Joe. He lowered his fists and took another cleansing breath, then offered a smile to Parker. “Whatever it is, I just wanted you to know why.”
101.
Later in the evening…
hours after the Boo Fest had closed down, Parker answered the doorbell in her mother’s home. She couldn’t help but to smile at the small, elderly man in front of her. “Good evening, Mr. Heller.”
Heller’s lips parted into a tired smile. “You look ghastly,” he greeted.
Parker took a wet cloth to her face, continuing her effort to rub off the last of the green make up, and revealing the black and blue bruises beneath. “Not all of this color is make-up, unfortunately,” she chuckled. “Please, come in. Mom nearly has dinner ready.”
“It smells delicious,” said Heller, slowly shuffling his feet into the entryway. “How was your fundraiser?”
Parker’s heart sank. “It was fine,” she lied, not really wanting to talk about it.
“Fine?”
“It was good.”
“Good,” Ken nodded, apparently satisfied with Parker’s last descriptor. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it down there today.”
“I imagine you’ve had a lot to process.”
“You could say that,” Ken paused to stare at the floor. When he looked up, his eyes were glassy. “Karen tried to do the right thing, you know. I truly believe that.”
“I know.”
“She could just be so stubborn sometimes in asking for help.”
I know that too. Parker put her hand on Ken’s shoulder. “No one blames your wife for what happened.”
Ken swallowed. “I don’t want people to remember her as the champion of some pedophile. Or the victim of a crooked cop.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small mail envelope. “Her legacy needs to be about her passion for helping kids. So, I’m making a donation in her name to the music program. It’s not much, but there’s more to come.”
“That’s not necessary,” Parker tried to smile as she received the envelope. “But, thank you. I’ll make sure Karen gets due credit.”
“Thank you,” Ken smiled and slowly turned for the door. “Good bye, Ms. Monr
oe.”
“Wait, you aren’t staying for dinner?”
“I’m very tired tonight.”
Parker frowned. “Suit yourself. But my mom opted to make duck again when she heard you were stopping by.” The statement gave Ken pause. “And Maddy would very much like to play for you again. If that’s alright with you. But if you’re tired, we can certainly take a rain check.”
Ken turned his head back with a slight twinkle in his eye. “Well,” he said. “Maybe for just a little bit.”
The dinner proved to be as enjoyable as Ken’s first visit. Valerie’s bottle of a ’04 Premier Cru paired perfectly with her broiled duck. Drew and Ally regaled the table with ideas as to how to get the most candy during the upcoming night of trick-or-treating. Maddy pointed out how the bullet hole in the ceiling above the kitchen table went straight into her bedroom. Ken drank it all in, enjoying every moment. Afterwards, Maddy played several songs at the piano, prompting more requests from Ken. Did she know any Scarlatti? Schubert? Maddy eagerly accepted every challenge, digging into musty music books in the cabinet nearby that hadn’t been opened for years.
The piano playing drew long into the night, several hours after Drew and Ally had gone to bed. Valerie had retired to the kitchen to wash some of the dishes, leaving a very relaxed Ken and Parker to enjoy Maddy’s latest music selection. When the clock approached ten, Parker excused herself to check on her mother.
Parker found Valerie at the sink, drying a plate as she looked out the window. “You were drying that same dish the last time I came in here. You sure you don’t want any help?”
Valerie smiled at her daughter. “I’ve just been enjoying the music. When you were a child, I’d do the same thing. I’d come in here, do the dishes and listen to music on the radio. It was my way of unwinding from the day.”
Parker looked back toward the front room where Maddy played. Parker recognized the next piece – Moonlight Sonata. But when she played it this time, it was different. It told a story. It told Maddy’s story, with all the emotional up’s and down’s only a real musician could express. Parker wiped a tear from her eye. “She’s pretty great, isn’t she?”
