Midnight Lullaby

by Jen Blood

  Maybe Johnny hadn’t been as gracious as I’d thought about me taking Solomon home tonight.

  Or maybe the man who’d held me at knifepoint in the alley the night before was coming back to finish the job.

  I doubled my pace. Solomon had to triple hers to keep up.

  “Will you slow down?” she said. “I’m not up for a midnight jog if it’s all the same to you.”

  I kept moving. The footsteps behind us were closer now; I could hear them, the hush of sneakers rather than the clipped echo of dress shoes. I glanced behind us.

  Twenty-five yards away, hidden in the shadows, was a dark figure I could barely make out. Definitely male, though. Definitely big.

  “Do you have your cell phone?” I asked Solomon.

  “It’s charging back at the apartment.” She followed my gaze, still struggling to keep up with me. Whoever was behind us slowed, but he didn’t stop. “You think he’s following us?”

  “I’m not sure.” I turned and looked ahead again. We were almost to a section of the park where a couple of streetlights had been smashed out about a week back, and had yet to be repaired. Adrenaline chased the fatigue from my veins.

  I glanced behind us again.

  The man was gone.

  Solomon had slowed, her attention on the darkened stretch of path before us.

  We could go back, hit the street, and try to find a cab. We were only a few blocks from home, though, and I didn’t like the idea of going back through the exact area where I’d seen our shadow last.

  “What do we do?” Solomon asked.

  “Keep moving,” I said. “If someone comes after us, I want you to run like hell. I’ll try to keep him with me.”

  “That’s the shittiest plan I’ve ever heard.”

  I took her hand and picked up my pace again, pulling her along. “Well, it’s all I’ve got right now. Just do it.”

  Solomon kept up with me easily this time. I could feel her fear—strangely enough, it helped to settle my own. If she was worried, I couldn’t afford to be. We passed a park bench with a man stretched out on his back. Broken beer bottles glittered like gems in the moonlight.

  And then, to our right—coming toward us faster now, his intent unmistakable—our shadow returned.

  “Run!” I said to Solomon.

  “But—”

  I loosed my hand from hers and gave her a little shove.

  She ran.

  I turned to my right. It was still too dark to see the man’s face—it could have been the scarred man from the pier, or it could have been any one of a hundred big guys in the city.

  Whoever it was, he moved more quickly once Solomon was gone.

  “What do you want?” I said as he drew closer.

  He kept to the darkest shadows, seeming to know exactly where to walk to stay hidden. I took a step toward him. A thin shaft of moonlight broke through the clouds.

  The scarred man stared at me. He held something in his hand, stretching it toward me.

  The fear vanished in an instant. All I felt now were the watery edges of fatigue and uncertainty. “Who are you?”

  A siren cut through the night before he could answer. I turned for a split second and saw flashing blue lights approaching. When I turned back, the man was gone.

  The lights came in fast, siren louder now. I went to the spot where the man had just stood, knelt, and found something hard and plastic on a patch of bare earth well worn by local foot traffic. A videotape.

  I picked it up and stowed it in my bag as a police cruiser stopped at the head of the path in front of me. Solomon jumped from the passenger’s side.

  “Are you all right?” she demanded, running to me.

  “I’m fine,” I said. Solomon’s breath came hard. She slipped her hand into mine as the cop got out of the cruiser and shut the door behind him. I didn’t recognize him from my time spent at the precinct less than twenty-four hours before.

  “Everything all right, sir?” he asked me. “Your friend flagged me down—suggested you were in some trouble.”

  “I overreacted, I’m sorry,” I said. “Thought someone was following us, but I was wrong. I’m fine.”

  He looked at Solomon. He was young—my age probably, with the swagger and barely concealed uncertainty of someone new to the force.

  “Can I give you a lift back to your apartment, then?” he said. “We’ve been having some problems with homeless folks in the park. A couple of muggings, some drug stuff. It’s not a good idea passing through here at night.”

  I glanced back at the area where the scarred man had last been. There was no way he’d be back—I had whatever it was he’d wanted me to have. Thinking of Solomon, though, I nodded. “Yeah, actually. If you wouldn’t mind, that probably wouldn’t be a bad idea.”

  ◊◊◊◊◊

  Solomon sat up front with the rookie on the way home. I sat in back. Two nights in a row riding the streets of Portland in the back of a cruiser. It seemed like a dangerous precedent to set. I kept my mouth shut while Solomon and the cop—Officer Barstow—chatted about the goings-on around town, most notably the death of Charlene Dsengani the night before. Solomon conveniently neglected to mention my name, or the fact that we had been there when the police descended on the Dsengani crime scene.

  When we reached the apartment, I got out of the car first. Solomon lingered. She and Barstow exchanged phone numbers. I heard her tell him I was her roommate, an old friend from her hometown. No more, though. He told her he’d call—just to check up, make sure she was all right.

  I went to the front door without waiting to hear the rest.

  It was a little after midnight by the time I crossed the threshold of our apartment, Solomon just behind me. I closed the door. When we were safely inside, I leaned back against the door and closed my eyes. The fear I’d held at bay crashed over me in a wave, then receded.

  Solomon stood watching me, arms crossed over her chest, eyes guarded. Her hair and clothes were damp, her face still flushed from a combination of the run and the fear.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “It was the guy from the pier,” I said, ignoring the question. “After you took off, he approached me. The cop spooked him before we could talk, but he left something for me.” I took the videotape from my bag and held it up for her to see.

  “He didn’t say anything at all?”

  “Not a word.” She tried to take the tape from me, but I held it out of her reach and nodded toward the living room. “Not so fast. I trusted you enough to tell you I have this—I could just as easily have never mentioned it. That means you’re in this thing, which means we need to set some ground rules. Officially.”

  “All right, fine,” she agreed. She took a step back, head tipped to the side. “What are the rules?”

  “We work this together,” I said. “That means you don’t breathe a word of it to Rafferty over at the Tribune. We share the byline when it goes to press. If you’re going somewhere, you need to keep me in the loop—”

  “Does that go both ways?”

  I hesitated. Collaboration has never been my strong suit, but Solomon had always been the exception in the past. And considering how badly I’d screwed up without someone to watch my back in Baja, this could be exactly what I needed.

  “It does,” I finally agreed. “Even if it’s just for safety’s sake—if you’re headed somewhere, check in with me first and let me know. I’ll do the same.” I waited a second before broaching the subject that I knew would be the hard sell. “And I want you to stay away from Johnny Cole.”

  There was no missing the way her eyes drifted from mine when she nodded. “Fine. You got it—I won’t be alone with Johnny.”

  “That’s not what I said. I’m telling you: steer clear of him. Completely.” She was silent. “Solomon?” Her lips tightened, her arms once more crossing at her chest. “Damn it, Sol. What did you do?”

  After another bout of stony silence, she sighed. “Fine. He’s having a par
ty at his lake house tomorrow night. I figured I’d just go, maybe take the chance to talk to Lisette, or even Charlene Dsengani’s sister.”

  “Were you planning to tell me, or were you just gonna go and hope for the best?” She didn’t answer. I prepared to dive into another lecture, but she held up her hand to stop me.

  “I get it, okay? You know about it now—I won’t go. Now, can we please move past the drama and watch this tape already? Or do we need to draft a written contract first. Maybe get a lawyer in here to mediate terms?”

  I shook my head, tired of arguing. “I think we can leave the lawyers out of it for now.”

  We went into the living room and I slipped the tape into the VCR. The first minute or so was blank. I fast forwarded, Solomon standing beside me in front of the TV. Finally, a picture came on—a sweeping shot of a packed auditorium. A familiar voice addressed the crowd when I hit play.

  “What I’ve learned in my time in these poverty-stricken nations, is how pivotal every individual is to the strength of a community,” Rick Foster said. A smattering of applause followed. The camera panned to the congressman. Charlene Dsengani stood rigid at his side, her intelligent eyes fixed on the camera.

  “What the...?” Solomon said. She stopped when Foster continued.

  “These people who come to this country in search of safety, security, an opportunity to live in peace... These are good, hard-working, strong people. The integration of these individuals into our communities, our state, is pivotal to Maine moving into the twenty-first century and becoming a diverse, thriving home for future generations.”

  “It’s the Blaine House,” Solomon said. “I remember this. He was lobbying for general assistance for asylum seekers coming to Maine.”

  “This was a couple of years ago, wasn’t it?” I asked. I couldn’t argue with the man’s politics, but there was still something about him that bothered me. The fact that he was on a tape I’d gotten under such questionable circumstances topped the list.

  Solomon nodded. Foster introduced Charlene, who watched him with what appeared to me as unmistakable uneasiness—though she could have simply been nervous about speaking in front of the crowd. Dsengani was met with applause before she took Foster’s place at the microphone.

  “When I came to this country four years ago, I spoke no English.” Her accent was strong, her voice clear and rich. With Foster out of the way, any anxiety she had shown vanished. “I did not know how to drive a car. I had never seen snow, or been in a place where the ground froze each fall and thawed each spring.

  “I came to America with a student visa. When it expired, I applied for asylum in this country. Because of my status, I was not legally able to seek employment. During that time, I used the financial assistance afforded by the state of Maine to house, feed, and clothe my young daughter. I took English classes with other Africans. I learned to drive through an outreach program for refugees here in Portland.”

  She took a sip of water, and I noted the way her hand shook when she set the bottle down. Her gaze shifted to Foster and her jaw tightened. She looked away quickly, and continued. While she spoke about her experiences working on a farm in the neighboring town of Gorham, Maine, the camera once more panned the audience.

  “Wait. Stop,” Solomon said.

  I was already on it. I stopped the tape, rewound it half a second or so, and hit pause. Caught in frame, looking a little younger, maybe a little bit rougher, was Lisette Mandalay.

  “When was this, exactly?” I asked Solomon.

  “I’m not sure—1997, maybe?”

  “Before Lisette moved to Maine then,” I said. “Before she met Johnny.”

  “Which means it’s supposedly before she’d ever met Charlene.”

  We watched the remainder of the tape, but the entire time that Charlene Dsengani spoke, I was waiting for another glimpse of Lisette in the gallery. There was one more shot—this one showing both Lisette in the background and Rick Foster at the microphone again. There was no doubt that he was the focus of her gaze. She didn’t look happy with him—or with Charlene.

  When the tape ended, I looked at Solomon. “Do you still have that interview with Foster on Monday?”

  “Yeah, as far as I know. Unless Rafferty’s changed his mind since I ditched him at the bar tonight.” She managed a scant smile, but she looked exhausted. I was feeling much the same.

  I thought of Johnny Cole again. The look on Charlene’s face when she looked at Rick Foster. Lisette, seated in the gallery watching this whole thing. What was the connection between them all?

  “So, about this party tomorrow night—” Solomon began, while I was still mulling things over.

  “No. Damn it, Sol—”

  “Listen to me,” she said stubbornly. “It could give me a chance to talk to Lisette, right? Chances are better than average that she’ll be there. We need to know what the hell’s going on. This guy left the tape for us. He wants us on this story. Maybe that will make a difference to her.”

  “I’m not worried about her,” I said.

  “I know how to take care of myself. You don’t think I’ve been to parties before? I’m not an idiot, I know the drill. No leaving my drink unattended, no taking drinks from strangers... I’ll make sure I’m never alone with Johnny.”

  “Because God knows you should always approach dating like you’re going into a war zone.”

  “It’s not a date, you idiot!” she shouted, turning on me. The color had risen in her cheeks again, her fists clenched. “You can’t protect me from everything. I want a career—a real career, like you have. That means taking some risks.”

  “Calculated risks,” I said. “You didn’t see the way Johnny was looking at you—”

  “Oh my god. Are you mental?” She walked away, shaking her head. “Trust me, I saw him—you forget, I was the one he was feeling up under the table.”

  “Trust me, kid—that’s not something I’m going to forget any time soon,” I ground out.

  She turned at my tone. “I’m not having this fight with you. You’re not my father. You’re not my big brother. You’re not my babysitter. We’re supposed to be partners—we just agreed, right? Partners.”

  “We also just agreed you’d stay away from Johnny,” I pointed out.

  “That was before I saw the tape. Lisette is the key to this. Tomorrow night is a chance for me to get some time with her.” I started to argue with her again. She stopped me, her hand in the air. “Just... Let’s sleep on it tonight, okay? Otherwise, all this will be is a pointless argument that pisses us both off.”

  I bit my tongue before I told her there was no way in hell I was changing my mind. Instead, I nodded and watched in silence as she went to her room. When she’d shut her door behind her, I sat back down and replayed the tape.

  After I’d watched it another couple of times, I picked up beer bottles and washed the dishes, still going over the details of Charlene Dsengani’s death and the confrontation with the scarred man on the pier and the contents of the tape and, yeah, the kiss between Solomon and me at the bar—the memory of which was lingering a hell of a lot more than I was comfortable with.

  Solomon’s bedroom door was open just a crack when I went by on the way to my own room. I pushed it open quietly, until a shaft of light from the hallway fell on her bed. She wore a t-shirt she’d filched from me and she slept under a sheet, her body curled into the fetal position, her red hair splayed against the white pillow. A gust of something lonely, hollow and desperate, echoed through me at sight of her. It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling, but I wasn’t used to Solomon being the one to elicit it—in fact, she was usually the one to chase it away. I stood leaning in the doorway for a few seconds, shards of the past needling into the silence like slivers of glass under my fingernails.

  When I was twelve, I convinced my little brother to skip school with me. He was ten at the time. It was a hot June day, the kind you’re more likely to see in mid-July or August—if at all—in Maine. I got a ratty bla
nket from the closet and stole a couple of candy bars and Cokes from the general store, because that was the childhood I had, growing up in Littlehope: swimming holes and fishing and ‘Do unto others...’ We rode our bikes to the local quarry, laid the blanket out on the rocks, and passed the morning. A couple of other friends were supposed to join us, but they bailed—it was just Josh and me.

  By eleven that morning, we’d gotten bored. I did cannonballs and a couple of swan dives from the highest ledge while Josh looked on. I was a pretty athletic kid, voted MVP for most every sport I played, always on the move. Joshy was quiet, a little pudgy, forever trying to keep up with me.

  “Are you gonna try, or are you just gonna sit there watching me all day?” I asked him. It was just past noon. I was hungry, and a little pissed off that no one else had shown up.

  I expected him to argue, or just plain refuse. Instead, he got up from the blanket, took off his sneakers and his t-shirt, and walked to the ledge. His hair was darker than mine, and shorter. It stuck up at odd angles, and his pale belly hung out a little over his board shorts. He looked back over his shoulder at me.

  “I’m not scared, you know,” he said.

  And he jumped.

  Those were his last words. I’m not scared.

  I heard him hit the ledge with a sickening, unforgettable crunch before he dropped to the water below. I jumped in after him, praying and panicked, and then I dragged him out of the water and propped him—his head bleeding and the life gone from his eyes—on the handlebars of my bike as I pedaled to the nearest house for help.

  Too late, though.

  After that, my parents weren’t big fans of mine. Josh had always been the favorite child, and I’d taken him from them. They made it clear that the wrong son had died, and to be honest I could never really come up with a convincing argument to dispute that—for them or me.

  Since that time, I’d had friends and girlfriends and even one embittered ex-wife. Somehow, none of them had ever wormed their way under my skin the way Solomon had.

  Solomon stirred before I could leave the room, rubbing her eyes as she rolled over to face me. If she found it odd that I was watching her sleep in the middle of the night, she didn’t say anything.