Dead Air

by David A. Poulsen

  “How likely is it that you would have seen it, if it did happen?”

  “One of the things I did like about Hope — there was a policy that teachers didn’t just sit at their desks. During class changes and before and after school, we were expected to be in the halls, talking to kids as they went by, interacting. It wasn’t a security thing, either; the administration just wanted us to be visible, show the kids we cared enough to get out of our classrooms, smile at them, say hi, that sort of thing.”

  “So you saw Larmer during some of those times.”

  “No more than any of the other kids, but, yes, I saw him.”

  “But never talking to Jaden Reese?”

  “Never. And I remember that because I did think it was strange. If the little rumblings we heard were true and Buckley-Rand had saved Jaden from a beating, then you’d think … I don’t know, it was just strange.”

  “Were you aware that Reese was gay?”

  She paused, then nodded. “Again, it wasn’t something that was talked about among staff and admin. Hope was a Christian School — conservative family values, yada, yada. We knew, but that was it.”

  “Anybody disciplined because of the fight?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. At least if there was any disciplinary action, I didn’t hear about it. The fight was off the school grounds, but even so there could have been repercussions for those involved, but with nobody saying much, it probably would have been hard to do a whole lot.”

  “One kid apparently had his nose broken. Did you hear anything about that?”

  She paused, thinking, then shook her head. “I didn’t. And I don’t recall seeing anyone in the hall with a bandaged face or anything. Of course, it’s possible he went to a different school. Or didn’t go to school at all.”

  I looked down for a minute, then back up at her. “How about we share that last tart?”

  “Thanks, but one’s my limit. I think you better have it.”

  “Oh, all right then,” I said and we both laughed.

  I hate it when women see right through me.

  Back in the car I cranked my head around, scanning the street for a dark-blue Jetta. Saw nothing. I phoned Jill. This time she answered the phone, but sounded like she might have been sleeping. At two-forty in the afternoon.

  “I’m sorry if I woke you,” I said.

  “It’s okay,” she murmured. “I was going to call you. I was just grabbing a nap. I’ve kind of been sleeping when Kyla sleeps and last night that wasn’t a whole lot.”

  “So our girl isn’t getting better?”

  “I honestly don’t know, Adam. Sometimes I think, okay, she’s over it, and then bang, suddenly she’s got bad cramps and she’s back in the bathroom again.”

  “Both of you must be going through hell right now.”

  “Yeah, I guess … some anyway. I talked to the doctor twice today and I went out and got some meds he prescribed, so I’m hoping that will get things back to normal. Now all we need is some sleep and everything will be perfect.”

  “And you’re finally getting some and I phone and wake you up. I’m sorry.”

  “Hey, hey, none of that, okay? You couldn’t have known and I know you’ve been trying to reach me. I should have called back but I thought I’d just lie down for five minutes and —”

  “Hey, hey, none of that, okay?” I mimicked, got a small laugh. “Look, I’m going to hang up, you go back to sleep, and if you call me later that’s great and if you don’t that’s okay, too. Just take care of yourself and your daughter and remember I love both of you.”

  “I could never forget that. Thanks, Adam. We’ll talk later, okay?”

  “Of course it’s okay. Now get back to sleep.”

  I heard a half-hearted attempt at a chuckle as we both rang off. I sat unmoving for a long time, worry about Jill and Kyla interspersed with questions about the growing-up years of Buckley-Rand Larmer — questions I couldn’t answer. I wondered if there was anyone other than Larmer himself who could.

  I reached into the CD case and pulled out Diana Krall’s Glad Rag Doll. I figured with a cut like “I’m a Little Mixed Up” on the album, it was pretty damned appropriate. The rest of my day was spent phoning people I’d already phoned and listening to their voice messages again, a brief stay on the computer, a TV dinner, a couple of Rolling Rocks with a lacklustre Blue Jays–Mariners game in the background, Fred Stenson’s latest novel in the foreground, and sleep, some on the couch, some in bed. Not much further ahead on Larmer. I was glad when the day came to an end.

  TEN

  My sleep was punctuated by weird dreams; the only one I recalled was me as a kid in grade school encountering two classmates, one boy and one girl, arguing over a swing. I stepped in to break it up and the boy suddenly was a mafia enforcer about to blow my head off when the phone, never more incongruous than at the moment of a mafia hit, played Blue Rodeo’s “5 Days in May.”

  I reached across to the table next to my bed and glanced at the caller ID. I picked up to hear my favourite voice in the world speaking to me. But the voice, as it had the last few times I’d heard it, had an edge to it, maybe more so this time. Concern evident even in the “Adam, I hope I’m not bothering you this early.”

  “You could never bother me,” I told Jill as I shot a glance at my bedside clock: 7:53 a.m. “I should have been up an hour ago. Everything okay?”

  Pause. “Not really. I’m taking Kyla into emergency. She’s not getting any better even with the meds the doctor prescribed and I’m worried.”

  “Where are you going? I’ll meet you there.”

  “You don’t have to do that, we can man —”

  “No argument. I’ll be there. Where?”

  “Foothills. We’re leaving right now.”

  “I’ll see you there.”

  It took me five minutes to change, wash my face, brush my teeth, and pull on jeans, hoodie, and runners. I was in the car and headed for Foothills Hospital, had just turned west on Memorial Drive when my cellphone rang. Cursing myself for not having taken the car in to get hands free installed, I ignored the call, instead pressing a little harder on the accelerator.

  Traffic was decent and despite a bit of a jam up at Memorial and 10th Street — an intersection etched forever in my memory courtesy of the previous winter’s re-examination of the death of my wife, I made good time. My haste and stress cost me time at the parking machine as I fumbled around long enough to have the guy behind me honking his horn and holding his hands up in the universal “What the fuck?” gesture.

  I considered responding with a gesture of my own, then thought, What if the guy is as stressed as I am and for a similar reason? and decided to give him a free pass this time around. I finally received the ticket, parked the car, and ran to the emergency entrance, slowing to a fast walk as I entered the packed waiting area.

  Jill and I spotted each other at almost the same moment and after a hurried hug we sat. She held my hand, squeezing hard. No sign of Kyla.

  “Where’s our girl — they have her in one of the examin­ation rooms?”

  Jill shook her head and I noticed the tension in the muscles of her face. Her mouth was taut, her eyes narrow and tight.

  “She’s in the bathroom.” Her voice caught. “Adam, she’s in the bathroom all the time. Something has to be wrong.”

  I nodded and leaned in to her, brushing my lips against her cheek. It would be stupid to say it was nothing when both us knew it was not nothing.

  “Let’s just see what the doctors have to say,” I murmured.

  “I’m really worried. She’s so not herself. We’ve got a game tonight. Playoffs. And tomorrow Josie’s mom was planning to take Josie and Kyla and a couple of other girls to the Stampede midway. This morning Kyla said to me, ‘Mom, I don’t think I can play tonight or go to the Stampede tomorrow. I don’t wa
nt to do the rides right now.’ That’s just not my daughter.”

  I nodded again. “I know. But let’s not panic. You did the right thing bringing her here — we let the doctors do what they do and we’ll go from there.” I looked around. “Have they said how long they think this is going to be?”

  “Who knows? I hope it’s not long.”

  “Yeah,” I said, but inside I was thinking this could be a real long time. I looked around at the people in the waiting room, doing my own visual assessment of how sick or injured they were. I figured half of them probably didn’t need to be there at all, but that conclusion might have been my own anxiety at work.

  I was still working my way around the room when Kyla returned from the bathroom.

  She wasn’t a big kid at the best of times, but I had to work at not letting the shock of what she looked like now register on my face. She was thin and pale … and sick. Of course diarrhea can do that, but I was instantly aware that whatever was causing this wasn’t some minor tummy upset.

  I smiled at her, touched her hair, and said, “Hey, kid, not feeling so hot, huh?”

  She shook her head, sat next to her mom, and curled herself up against Jill’s side. Jill was right. This was not Kyla.

  “You want anything, sweetheart, a drink or something, maybe some water?”

  She shook her head again and closed her eyes. I imagined that the endless trips to the bathroom had played hell with her sleep, which was likely exacerbating whatever it was that had hit her so hard.

  “How about you?” I said to Jill. “You want something?”

  “Do you think you could get me a coffee? I’d love that.”

  “On it,” I said, and headed out into the hall and in the direction of the hospital’s main foyer. As I walked I was reminded of how much I disliked hospitals. Shook it off, trying to drive negative thoughts out of my head.

  I was at the coffee machine fumbling for coins when my cellphone rang again. It was Cobb. I decided to take the call. “Hi, what’s up?”

  “The game’s changed, big time.”

  I was used to Cobb’s often cryptic communications, but this one told me nothing.

  “What do you mean?” I jammed a toonie into the machine.

  “I called you earlier.”

  “Yeah, sorry, I was driving.”

  “Hugg is dead.”

  “What?” The news actually forced me to take a step back from the coffee machine. “What the hell happened?”

  “He’s been murdered.”

  “Jesus,” I said. “Where? When?”

  “Last night sometime. Or early this morning. I don’t know much yet. I’m at the crime scene. His body was found in the parking lot behind the station. If you’ve got time, you might want to get over here and —”

  “I can’t,” I cut him off. “I’m at the hospital. There’s something up with Kyla, and Jill brought her in to emergency.”

  A beat, then, “Forget this call. You take care of things there. I’ll keep you posted.”

  He ended the call without waiting for my reply and I slipped my cell back in my pocket. I was moving in slow motion now, my mind overloaded with the morning’s events. Hugg is dead … murdered. That made no sense.

  I pushed buttons on the machine and watched a cup fill with medium-blend, one milk, one sugar, realizing as I did that I didn’t actually know how Jill took her coffee. I stuffed more coins in the machine and got one for myself. Then I stepped to the adjoining machine and bought a bottle of water for Kyla, just in case she was up to drinking something.

  When I got back to the waiting room, neither Jill nor Kyla was there. I wondered for a second if they’d gone back to the bathroom, but as I sat down in the seat I’d been in before, an angular, red-headed woman with bad teeth and a bandage wrapped around the fingers of her right hand leaned toward me and said, “They’ve gone in. Over there.” She pointed. “Your wife asked me to tell you.”

  I nodded thanks without explaining that Jill wasn’t my wife and thought about whether I should head off down the hall in the direction the woman had pointed or just sit tight. I decided on the latter course of action, painfully aware again that I was not Kyla’s father and had no business being in the examination room with her and her mother.

  I sipped coffee and looked at the woman seated next to me, pointed at her hand. “Bad cut?” I asked.

  She grimaced and nodded, then shook her head. “Not a cut,” she said. “My son slammed the car door on my hand.”

  I winced. “Ouch. When are they going to see you?”

  She looked over at the triage station and shrugged. “They don’t tell you much.”

  “Would you like this coffee? I got one for … uh … it looks like it might be wasted.”

  “Well … thanks, I’d love it, but are you sure it’s okay? I mean, I —”

  “Trust me, it’s fine. If Jill comes back, I’ll get her another.” I handed her the paper cup.

  We sat for a while, silently nursing our coffees. As much as the smell of hospitals bothered me, sitting in a waiting room — any waiting room — bothered me more. I stood up.

  “Think I’ll test your theory.” I smiled at the woman, trying to keep my eyes off her injured hand, and strode over to the desk. A nurse who looked like she was in the last hour of a twelve-hour shift raised tired eyes to look at me.

  “Yes?”

  “My … uh … girlfriend and I brought her daughter in — bad flu symptoms. Apparently she’s in with the doctor. I was wondering —”

  “Sorry, only immediate family permitted during the examination,” the nurse informed me. “You’ll be able to see her after they’ve had a chance to look her over.”

  “Yeah, I’m aware of that. I was just wondering if you knew anything, you know, if it is the flu, it’s been going on for quite —”

  “Sorry, we won’t know anything until the doctor has completed his examination.”

  “Right,” I said. “Of course. Thanks.”

  I walked slowly back to the chair, sat down.

  “And?” said the woman with the injured hand.

  “You nailed it.”

  Fifteen minutes later the tired-looking nurse called, “Olivia Paxton?”

  The woman next to me waved her good arm and stood up. “That’s me.”

  She started toward the nursing station, then stopped and turned back to me. “Thank you again for the coffee. I hope everything is okay with your daughter.”

  I smiled and nodded. “And with you, as well.”

  She walked off then, leaving me to think about waiting rooms and the people in them. Twenty more minutes passed and Jill appeared from the hallway to the right and crossed to where I was. She sat down and looked at me, working at smiling and not succeeding.

  “They’re going to keep her in here for a day or two,” she said. “A specialist will be coming in later this afternoon.”

  “What kind of specialist?”

  “Gastrointestinal. The doctor thinks it would be a good idea to check out Kyla’s gut, as he called it. They might have to do a colonoscopy.”

  “I’ve heard of that,” I told her. “But I thought it was something that only older people have.”

  Jill shook her head. “I guess not.”

  “So we don’t really know much more.”

  Another head shake. “Not until they run some tests … and decide if she needs the colonoscopy.”

  “How’s she feeling?”

  “They gave her something to reduce the diarrhea and they’ve got her on an IV to get some fluids into her. Even though I had her drinking what I thought was lots of water, she’s quite dehydrated.”

  “Can I see her?”

  “You can, but you’d only be watching her sleep. She was so exhausted from getting up to the bathroom all the time for the last few days, e
ven a little relief, and she was ready to sleep.

  “Good,” I said. “That’s good.”

  Neither of us spoke for a few minutes. Finally Jill turned to me.

  “There was a radio on in the examination room.”

  I looked at her.

  “Jasper Hugg is dead,” she said softly.

  I nodded.

  “I suspected you already knew that.”

  “Cobb called me a while ago. He wanted me to come to the crime scene.”

  She frowned. “Crime scene?”

  “Cobb said Hugg was murdered. I’m surprised it’s already been on the radio. Usually the cops don’t release victim’s names until next of kin have been notified.”

  ”I’m not sure they did. The bulletin said an unnamed source had stated that a body was found in the parking lot of RIGHT TALK 700. And that the source believed the body was that of Jasper Hugg. The report said the police had declined comment for the moment.”

  “Probably somebody who hated the bastard and couldn’t wait to get the word out.”

  Jill didn’t speak for a time. “I know you didn’t like him, but this is so …”

  I nodded. “I was one of those who couldn’t stand the man. But I’m not glad he’s dead. And not like that.”

  “I know,” Jill murmured. “Why does Mike want you there?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Maybe you should go. It must be important.”

  “It might be,” I conceded, “but this is more important.”

  Jill smiled and took hold of my hand, brought it to her lips. “Have I mentioned lately that I totally love you?”

  “You might have, but I’m okay with hearing it again.”

  “I love you, Adam Cullen.”

  “And I love you.” I wanted to kiss her but wasn’t sure if that was considered acceptable waiting-room behaviour.

  We sat for a while, holding hands and looking at the floor. “I … I’ve been really worried.”

  Jill nodded. “I know you have.”

  “No … I mean I was worried that you were keeping me at arm’s length … that there was something wrong … between us.”