by Julia Dahl
“Was he?”
“Who knows,” says Van. “Nobody ever caught him doing anything illegal.”
“But he had to know what his brother was doing.”
“You’d think so,” he says. “Chief’s dad married Connie’s mom back in the seventies. From what I’ve heard, Chief’s dad was a real bastard. Drank too much, beat his mom when he was little, which led to the divorce. Chief had a lot of experience with cops coming to the house and having to pry his dad off his mom. I think he thought of the guys as heroes. So he joined up. Connie went the other way, and since they have different last names and live in different counties not that many people know. But the State Police have never heard of Pessie Goldin, and the thumb drive with my pictures from the scene is gone from our evidence room.”
“Do you think he … did something with it?”
“I don’t pretend to know what he did. But I know he didn’t pass the information along like he said he would. And if he told Connie that someone saw his truck in Roseville, that could be very dangerous for whoever that person is—or whoever Connie thinks that person might be. I’m guessing you probably don’t want to tell me who your source is, but you should make sure they know what’s going on. Connie’s not a reckless man. He’s not going to make noise until he needs to. But now that Pessie’s name is the paper, if he’s connected to her death, he’ll be watching.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
AVIVA
“He’s not here,” said the woman at the jail when I called to be put on the visitors’ list.
“What do you mean he’s not there?”
“I mean he’s not here anymore. He’s been transferred.”
“Transferred where?”
“You have to call the DOC for that. All I can see is that he left here two weeks ago.”
It took three days of phone calls to find out that Sammy was at a state prison almost 150 miles away. Isaac got on the computer and looked up the visiting procedures and we made a plan to drive there the next week. I dreamt of Sammy in a cage of animals. Shirtless, bleeding, swinging at them, exhausted and outmatched, knowing it was only a matter of time until he was torn to pieces. At the prison, a man escorted the visitors in the waiting room through a metal detector and a set of heavy sliding doors. We sat down in a booth and Sammy came out. There was glass between us; we spoke through telephones.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“I had to do it, Aviva,” said Sammy. He had a poorly stitched-up cut above his eye and a chipped front tooth. He seemed smaller, somehow, and he couldn’t sit still. He looked around constantly, like he was waiting for someone to jump on him. The man attacked him once, he told us, whispering into the telephone. When he tried again, Sammy was ready with a weapon made from springs in his bed.
“But why did they send you away? You were defending yourself!”
“They don’t care,” said Sammy.
“How long will you have to stay here?” I asked.
“They added four years to my sentence,” he said.
“Four years!” I must have screamed because the guard came immediately.
“Calm down, ma’am,” he said, standing above me.
I began to cry. Isaac took the phone and told Sammy we would come back as often as we could. He told him not to forget that we loved him. That Pessie loved him. That we did not blame him, and that we would be here when he came home.
Sammy got paroled three years later, just before Thanksgiving. It had been more than two years since I’d seen him. The last time I visited he told me not to come back. He said it was better if he didn’t think about anything outside prison while he was inside. He said it made him weak. I didn’t argue. I did not like seeing him in there. I did not like the way his voice sounded, and the way he couldn’t seem to look me in the eyes anymore. He was getting bigger—from lifting weights, he said—but all those muscles did not make him seem stronger. It took days, sometimes more than a week, to clear my mind of the way he looked in that jumpsuit, his skin gray, his eyes rimmed with red. I had to take more pills and drink more wine to sleep than was good for me. I could not stop imagining all the things that could happen to him—that were happening to him—in there. The crushing loneliness; the fear. The shame of where he was. The secret of who he was.
It was cold on the day we picked him up at the prison, and Sammy slept the whole ride home, huddled in the backseat with an old blanket over him. Isaac drove and I rode in the front, peeking back at him, wondering who we were bringing home, wondering what would happen next.
Sammy’s parole officer explained the conditions of his release: He would be tested for drugs every week. He needed to find a job. And he could not affiliate with criminals.
“What does that mean?” I asked the parole officer.
“What I said. He can go back to prison if I find out he is hanging out with anyone else with a criminal record.”
I looked at Sammy, but he was looking at the ground.
“Did you hear that, Sammy?” I asked.
“I’m not deaf, Aviva,” he said.
“You better check your attitude, son,” said the parole officer. “I have no problem violating you.”
For the first week, we left him alone. He slept all day and lay in front of the television all night. Finally, one night at dinner, we broached the subject of work. Isaac said that he could get Sammy a couple shifts a week at the store where he worked part-time.
“The hippie place,” said Sammy.
“What is this hippie thing?” asked Isaac. “It is a job.”
Sammy rolled his eyes. “I’m not going to sell incense and beads to college students, okay?”
Isaac took a deep breath. “You think it is beneath you?”
“I think it’s fucking lame,” he said.
“Why do you think it is okay to insult Isaac?” I asked.
“I’m not insulting Isaac,” said Sammy. “He can do what he wants. I’m not into hippies, okay?”
Isaac shook his head. “You have to work.”
“I’ll find a job.”
“Doing what?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’ll pump gas. Whatever.”
“Well,” said Isaac, getting up with his plate, “you better get started.”
Sammy stayed at the table, pushing his food around.
“I know this is hard, Sammy,” I said. “Don’t let this change who you are. Don’t let this get in your way.”
“You don’t know shit about who I am, Aviva,” he said. “You know that, right? You know you bailed on our family. You know you left me alone with Tatty and Eli and the sicko molester freaks. Why didn’t you take me with you?”
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t take him for the same reason I didn’t take you. I didn’t think I was good enough. I had nothing when I came back to Borough Park. Who was I to take a baby from his home? I couldn’t even get a job. I was broken to pieces and needed time to create a life for myself. Just like him now.
“Whatever,” he said, when I didn’t answer fast enough. “This is who I am. Sorry if you don’t like it. If you want to be a mother so bad now, go find Rebekah. Maybe she still cares.”
PART 3
CHAPTER TWENTY
REBEKAH
It’s nearly 11:00 P.M. by the time I check into a ground floor room at the Comfort Lodge between New Paltz and Poughkeepsie. There is a piece of duct tape over a crack in the window and water stains in the toilet, but at seventy-two dollars a night, I’m way under budget. I turn the room’s heat up high and e-mail Larry to relay what I’ve learned from Van Keller, then send Nechemaya a text saying we need to talk. I haven’t heard from Saul or Iris. After about twenty minutes of CNN, I turn off the bedside lamp and, with the hotel’s floral blackout curtains drawn, fall into the big silence of the little room.
The sick feeling begins in my dream. Mellie is in front of the synagogue on Ocean Parkway shouting Junior! Junior! But instead of emitting a human noise, she barks. She b
arks and barks and then she pulls a handgun and points it at me. Van Keller is at my side, his arm around my waist. Mellie pulls the trigger and it makes a barking sound. The bullet hits my stomach and I think, I will never meet my mother. And then I am awake. I keep my eyes closed—sometimes, I’ve found, I can return to my dreams. I always imagine that I can change the outcome, but usually I’m just back in the pain, as ineffectual as before. Mellie shoots me again. I am on the ground but this time Saul is beside me instead of Van Keller. Take her gun! I shout. He waves his arms, like he is directing traffic. Someone has painted a swastika on the stone steps. The paint drips white. Where is she? I yell. Saul says nothing, but suddenly I can see her. Her back is to me, her long red hair. She is walking away. And I can’t get up.
At 7:30 A.M., Larry calls.
“Connie Hall has a gay son?” he says. “Unbelievable!”
“You know him?”
“Sure,” he says. “I was the Albany stringer back in the eighties. I covered his manslaughter trial. He ran a guy down with his truck. They couldn’t prove intent so he only got, like, eight years. He pops up every now and then, waving his Nazi flag on Hitler’s birthday, shit like that. People always said he ran drugs and guns for the Aryans but nobody could ever make anything stick.”
“I actually went out to where he lived yesterday and talked to his son’s girlfriend. She said they’re stockpiling weapons for a race war.”
“She said what?! Is this on the record?”
“No,” I say, throwing off the hotel covers and sitting up, trying to fling out the fear left in my stomach by the dream. I’m going to have to use the bathroom soon. Fucking anxiety. I always laugh when movies and TV shows portray mental illness as, like, glamorous. Oh, that poor, sensitive girl. I’ll tell you what’s not glamorous: diarrhea. “I was … I wasn’t sure it was, like, safe to say I was a reporter. I kind of just went poking around, trying to find the son or his boyfriend, Pessie’s ex.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“The son?”
“Or the ex.”
“Not yet. I’ve left messages but I haven’t heard back.”
“So, what do you have on the record?”
“I have that Pessie was still hanging out with her ex and that he spent time in prison. I guess I need to confirm that with the DOC. The girl I talked to used to live with the gay son and the ex and told me they used to deliver drugs for Connie. She said they all got arrested about four years ago. Plus, we have the license plate number of the truck a neighbor saw at Pessie’s. The cop told me it’s registered to Connie Hall, but that’s off the record. But if we could confirm on our end…” I trail off, hoping he’ll interrupt with an idea.
“His truck being seen at the apartment doesn’t mean he killed her, but clearly it means they have to talk to him—it’s not exactly his neighborhood.”
“Not at all. And if the Roseville chief is related to him, that’s a pretty major conflict of interest.”
“I can get the library working on confirming a family relation between a possible murder suspect and the chief supposed to be investigating the case. I think that’s the best lead. The whole gay son, ex-fiancé thing feels iffy. I don’t want to write about a relationship if we haven’t talked to either of the people supposedly in it. You make sure the State Police never got a call from the Roseville chief. You also want to get them to say that, yes, murders in towns with small forces are typically kicked up to them. Your first story already made the point that police didn’t seem interested. We need to advance that with specifics. Can you get the neighbors on the record saying they gave the plate number to the cops?”
“They didn’t actually give it to them—they gave it to my burial society guy and he gave it to the cops.”
“Is he on the record with that?”
“No.”
“You need to get this stuff on the record. I’ll try to confirm that the plate is Hall’s. Meantime, get the chief’s response as if we know for sure. Does he deny getting the plate? What’s his comment on it being Hall? Does he think he’s got a conflict of interest? And ask about Hall’s son. Does the chief know about this relationship with Pessie’s ex? I’ll loop in the city desk.”
“Tell them I have a photo of Pessie’s apartment.”
“Great. That’ll help. E-mail it to me.”
“What about the guns at the Halls?”
“Pessie wasn’t shot, was she?”
“No,” I say. “Well, I don’t think so.”
“No autopsy, right?”
“Right. But my cop and the husband both saw her and neither mentioned a gunshot wound or anything like that.”
“Okay, let’s keep the stockpiling in our back pocket. One thing at a time. Actually, now that we have all this new information, why don’t you go back at the husband. Get his reaction to her hanging out with these people.”
“Okay,” I say.
“Let’s regroup around noon.”
I head to the toilet and then turn on the shower. I breathe in the steam and close my eyes beneath the water, but the sharp fright of being shot at in my dream won’t dull. I’ve made myself a target again. I’ve pushed into another ugly little world that doesn’t want me.
When I get out of the shower, I take a pill to try to ease the terror that the water didn’t wash away. On my phone is a text message from Iris.
I love you, too. everything ok up there?? Call me
I call immediately. I hadn’t been letting myself think too much about what it might mean if Iris really closed herself off from me, let alone if she moved to Asia. She is all I have in New York. Iris and the Trib. And only one of them gives a shit about me.
“Hi,” she says. “Where are you?”
“I’m at dumpy motel near Poughkeepsie.”
“Awesome. The Trib really lays out the red carpet for you guys, huh?” I hear a bus backfire. Iris is probably walking toward the subway from our apartment. She’s kind of living the dream. A working girl in New York City. A good-looking, gainfully employed boyfriend. She wouldn’t have dared dream it a year ago. Or maybe she did dream it. I look in the mirror beside the TV. I’m sitting on a motel bed wearing a towel. The motel room is being paid for by a newspaper. I am here reporting a story about the overlooked death of a young mother. I have a source in the police department. On paper, this is my dream. Maybe someday living my dream won’t make me feel sick.
“I’m lucky I got them to agree to cover an overnight at all,” I say.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call yesterday. I just needed to, like, feel bad for a minute.”
“I’m really sorry I ditched you guys. I’m…”
“It’s okay,” she says. “I’m glad you’re working. What did Saul say?”
My conversation with Saul in front of The Doom Room feels far away. “Aviva’s mom died when she was in Florida with us,” I say.
“Wow. She’s motherless, too.”
“Yeah,” I say.
“And her phone is still off?”
“Yeah. I think I found her house, though. I went by last night but it was all dark.”
“Holy shit. Are you sure it’s hers?”
“Not a hundred percent,” I say. “But I talked to a girl who said Sam sometimes lived with his sister in New Paltz, and this was the New Paltz address the library found when they ran his name.”
“Have you found Sam?”
“No,” I say. “The girl I talked to used to be his roommate but she said she hasn’t heard from him in a while.”
“Do you think they’re together?”
“Him and Aviva?” That hadn’t occurred to me. “Maybe.”
“Will you be home tonight?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “Larry said I had a hundred and fifty for a hotel, but I only spent half that so I’m hoping maybe I can squeeze another day out of him.”
“I’m about to go underground,” she says. “Keep me updated, okay?”
“I will,” I say. “I’m really glad
you still love me.”
She laughs. “You should be.”
We hang up and I feel marginally calmer. Calm enough, I decide, to try Aviva again. I go RECENT CALLS on my phone and press “Mom.” The call goes straight to a voice mail message saying this mailbox is full. So much for the calm. Something feels wrong. What if this Sam guy is dangerous? What if he’s done something to her?
I pull on new socks and underwear and then the same bra and jeans and purple sweater I was wearing yesterday. My hair is already dry—a perk, I suppose, of having almost none of it. At just after nine, Nechemaya calls. I tell him who the plate belongs to.
“You need to be careful,” I say. “It sounds like Sam was dating this man’s son. Secretly. Conrad Hall is…”
“I know who Conrad Hall is,” he says.
“You do?”
“We are not naïve, Rebekah. We know our enemies.”
“I’m going to call the chief now and confront him about getting the plate and doing nothing. Can I use your name?”
“Yes,” he says. “He knows my name. I made no secret when I called.”
“What about for the newspaper?”
He is silent a moment. “All right.”
“Thank you,” I say. “And listen, I don’t want to tell you what to do, but there’s a cop in Roseville I think you should call. He’s a good guy…”
“I am through with the Roseville police. We have a connection with the district attorney. We will be meeting him tomorrow.”
I scribble “call DA” in my notebook and then dial Van Keller’s cell.
“Officer Keller? It’s Rebekah. Can you talk?”
“I just left the station,” he says, breathing hard.
“Did you talk to your chief?”
“Hold on.” I hear a car door slam. “He denied getting the plate from your man. I told him I’d run it to Connie Hall and he ripped me a new one. Bunch of shit about chain of command.”
“Does he know we’ve been talking?”
“No. I didn’t tell him, anyway. And I swore Dawn and Christine to secrecy.”
“I tried to get my guy from the community—the one that gave him the plate—to call you but he says he’s going to the district attorney.”
