by John L. Monk
We shook hands. It took everything in me not to hold on a fraction too long. My sister’s hand, after all these years.
Why is she a Jenkins again?
Jane had gotten married when she was nineteen, a few months before my death. We all figured it was a rebellion thing. It was a little weird, too. The groom’s family had ponied up the money for a great wedding with a live band, a team of photographers, and a catered reception on a river cruiser. A thirty-one-year-old man marrying a nineteen-year-old girl, but she said she loved him, and Jane always got her way. Nobody thought it would last, and clearly it hadn’t. I wondered if they’d had kids.
I checked out her rings, of which there were several. She could have re-married and hadn’t changed her last name this time. Plenty of people kept their names for professional reasons, or when their husbands’ last names were things like Dickmeister or Fugenheimer.
Jane Fugenheimer…
“Something funny, Mr. Schaefer?” Jane said, smiling curiously. Not at all like the girl who’d purposely burst into tears when Dad walked into the room, and then lie and say I’d hit her. Now she was talking like a grownup.
“Just something I heard on the way in,” I said. “On the radio. Those shock jocks, I tell you.”
“They are amusing,” she said.
Tara glanced from me to Jane and back again.
“We were just going over our situation,” Tara said.
“Great,” I said. “How do we look?”
Jane whipped out an iPad, something that hadn’t existed on my last ride, and began pecking away at it.
“I’m afraid I don’t have any good news,” she said. “You’re upside down on the house. The government has a program for folks in your situation, but with your income, Mr. Schaefer, you don’t qualify. So you’ll have to come up with the additional fifty thousand at closing.” She shook her head sadly. “I’m really sorry.”
Tara said, “I was thinking with our savings, and some help from my mom and Scott’s dad, we might be able to do it. Or maybe we can just … you know … walk away?”
Jane shook her head and said, “That’s a really bad idea, Mrs. Schaefer. They’ll auction the house off for less than I can get for it and you’ll owe that much more. Plus it’ll destroy your credit. Talk to your mom, and you, talk to your dad. Also, it’s worth a shot to check with the bank. They might be willing to forgive a portion of the money if they thought you were entertaining ideas of walking away.” She shrugged. “Worst that happens is they say no.”
To think this was the same girl who’d brought a brick to school for show and tell.
Tara studied me and said, “Why are you still smiling?”
“Just keeping a positive outlook on life, that’s all.”
“Hey, that’s right,” Jane said. “Mrs. Schaefer tells me you’re a psychologist.”
Chuckling politely, I said, “I dabble…”
A bit loudly, Tara said, “I insist you call me Tara.”
For the first time since arriving, Jane’s professional face slipped. She looked in my eyes and appeared momentarily confused—no longer the self-assured real estate agent. And maybe I was imagining it, but for a second it seemed some hidden knowledge passed between us, special and deep and thicker than water.
Jane blinked her eyes and smiled embarrassedly.
“Forgive me,” she said. “But … um, can I come by your office some time? Make an appointment? It’s about my mother.”
Then, realizing how that sounded, she added, “Not that way. It’s just … well, it’s sort of personal, and that’s not why I’m here today, I know. I’ve just been worried about her.”
“Not at all,” I said, grinning to put her at ease. “If it weren’t for families, I’d be broke.”
Jane smiled weakly.
Tara was watching me, her head cocked at an arch angle. She glanced at Jane and then back at me again.
This was my chance to throw a monkey wrench into the Great Whomever’s plans. He’d set this whole scenario up just to get me alone with my sister for who knew what reason. Whatever it was, I probably wouldn’t like it. Also, I was worried. People around Dan Jenkins had a statistically higher chance of getting shot or stabbed than, say, Eliot Jenkins or Marty Jenkins or even Leopold Jenkins. But if Jane was in some kind of trouble, I couldn’t just walk away.
“Tell you what,” I said. “Why don’t you come by tomorrow? Say, nine thirty?”
In a fractionally higher octave than normal, Tara said, “Don’t you have a patient then?”
Tomorrow’s nine thirty was another in-and-out scammer.
“He cancelled,” I said. “Schedule’s wide open.”
“Well, great,” Jane said. “I’ll see you then.”
I shook her hand again—my flesh and blood—and let her go.
“I guess that’s it then,” Jane said. “Mrs., um … sorry. Tara. I’ll send you both a packet from the agency. It’ll have all the information about that government program I mentioned, and tips on how to get your house ready to show when we get to that phase. And thank you so much for having me over.”
“Our pleasure,” Tara said, visibly relieved we were back to talking about the house again.
Tara walked Jane out.
Jane Jenkins, after all these years.
Chapter Thirty-Six
It was Wednesday morning, approaching eight thirty, and I was standing in front of St. Stephen’s church wearing a backpack. There was nobody around outside, and the place was just as deserted when I walked in.
The confessional, when I found it, was an ornately constructed wooden affair with doors on the front. Looking around the quiet church, I wondered if I’d gotten the time wrong. What a shame that would be. I’d never gone to confession before and thought it might be fun—especially if I told the truth.
As I stood there twisting with uncertainty, one of the doors opened and an old woman with a cane came slowly out. She stumped past without saying hello, her head bowed as if from a lifetime of sins. They must have been doozies, because she didn’t look up even once.
Wouldn’t want to be her when she dies…
“Just in time,” the minister called from the other booth, its door now open.
He stepped back in and closed it.
I entered the booth the old woman had come out of, shut the door, and sat down on the narrow bench. The window between my booth and the minister’s was a wooden latticework of tiny roman crosses inside bigger roman crosses.
“Whatever you do,” I said, “don’t bless me.”
“I don’t understand,” the minister said. “You’re supposed to say—”
“Consider that the latest of my many sins, Anthony.”
The minister chewed on that briefly, then said, “I’m sorry, Scott, what’s this about?”
As fun as it was acting all mysterious and clever, I was too nervous to keep it up.
“It’s me,” I said. “Dan Jenkins.”
And just like that, my seat in the confessional felt like sitting at the bottom of a deep dark well looking up, the walls spinning round and round and making me dizzy. Normally it was something the minister could control, but I’d surprised him.
“You’re back,” he said.
“We’re both back,” I said. “What are you doing in those wizard robes way up here in Toledo?”
The minister got up and left the booth.
Just as I worried he’d fled on foot, the door to my booth opened and he said, “Follow me.”
I got up and closed the door, then followed him to another part of the church. He reached out and opened a door I hadn’t even realized was there, so well did it blend with the textured wall. Kind of like a secret door—my second secret door in five years. Inside was an office with bookshelves and a desk and even a computer.
From a little radio on a shelf came the sound of a morning news program, which he lowered.
The minister sat down and invited me to do the same.
“What about
the other sinners?” I said. “Don’t they get to confess?”
He checked his watch. “Eight twenty-five. Close enough. So where have you been?”
No chitchat. Didn’t ask me how I was doing or who I’d seen on the other side.
“Stuck in the Great Wherever,” I said. “For five years.”
The minister nodded. “What are you doing with Scott?”
I thought about how to proceed. He was a man, after all. And there were things I needed him to do, but only if he was the right kind of man.
“One second,” I said, and got out Scott’s laptop, which I’d snagged from work earlier that morning. I set it up on the minister’s desk and clicked Beth’s folder. There were eighty-three files. I opened the latest one and turned the laptop his way. “Go ahead and click play.”
“I hope this isn’t what I think it is,” he said.
“All hope abandon, ye who enter here.”
The minister frowned, then reached over and clicked.
I didn’t need to watch to tell what was going on. Beth sitting down in front of that close-up camera and Scott sitting beside her. He told her how naughty she was and she disagreed vehemently, playing into his hands and not even realizing it. My hands were hurting, and then I remembered to unclench them. When Scott started groaning the minister slammed the laptop shut, crossed himself, and said a quick prayer.
He glared at me, his face livid—and the world turned upside down and sideways on me. Unbalanced, I fell out of my chair, overcome with that smell you get from a punch in the nose.
“Are you all right?” came the minister’s voice, as if from far away.
“I’m not Scott,” I said, and got up carefully. “You gotta … wow … remember. That was a big one.”
I’d had a lot of kicks in my time, but what the minister had done was simply stunning. Like getting two kicks at once from two directions. I’d thought he had to touch me to cause the full-on kick, but righteous fury seemed to work, too.
I sat back down.
“I read that in your story,” he said, shaking his head. “Hard to believe, if I hadn’t felt it myself. Right here.” He pointed at his face. “A jolt, like a punch.”
Fascinating. The minister had been kicked. An intriguing development, and scary. Maybe he could get kicked out? And maybe something else could slip in?
“What’s your name?” I said, warily.
“Why?” he said.
A dangerous ten seconds passed and then he said, “Anthony. Why?” Then his eyes widened in understanding. “Oh … well. Very interesting. I think we should tread carefully.”
“You’re the one with the super powers,” I said.
“Never mind that—tell me about the video.”
I gave him the bare bones of the story: Joan, Beth, the scam with his perfectly healthy patients coming in and out and signing their names. He listened carefully without interrupting.
When I finished he said, “How can I help?”
From my backpack, I took out the video camera and laid it down next to the laptop. I’d checked it before coming in. Both the visual and audio quality of the recording were excellent.
“This,” I said, “has Beth’s mom admitting to giving her daughter to Scott, and me admitting my part. I also hit her and expressed remorse. That’s the part that worries me.”
“You hit her?”
“I’ve been hitting a lot of people lately.”
The minister shook his head. “What’s this about remorse?”
“If I’m on camera expressing remorse…”
“Ah, yes, I see,” he said. “You’ve helped Scott’s case.”
“Right. I’m remorseful, and Scott can maybe twist that into something to reduce his sentence, then let Joan take most of the blame.” I frowned. “Only he’s not getting off the hook, is he?”
The world felt stretched and narrow again, like I was at the bottom of a deep pit.
The minister said, “I cannot let you harm Scott Schaefer. He’s under my protection. You still have enough to convict, so we do it the legal way. This way, nobody gets killed again.”
He was still sore about Nate’s evil fiancée.
“One second,” I said, and opened the laptop.
“I’ve seen enough already.”
“No you haven’t,” I said, and turned the computer back around so he could see. “Look at the filenames.”
After a brief hesitation, he said, “So?”
“Read the filenames.”
The minister sighed patiently and did as I asked—and then his superpowers kicked-in again, making me dizzy. Unlike last time, he squelched the effect before it got too bad.
“Twice a month for three years,” I said.
“She can’t be more than twenty,” he said, shaking his head slowly.
“She’s nineteen. Which puts her at sixteen when he started on her. And you want the law to handle this?”
The minister grew quiet.
It was getting close to nine, and I needed to get to the office.
“That summer you sent me your story,” he said, “I decided to quit the wedding business and get a job somewhere. Maybe an office building, managing a different sort of folk. Years before, I’d abandoned the church for a more personal relationship with the Almighty and an open mind. Then, after spending my whole life searching for the truth, along comes Dan Jenkins, a somewhat tiresome fool enjoying the most personal relationship with God I’d heard of in two millennia. And what did he do with it?”
“You tell me.”
The minister smiled patiently. “Anything he wanted to.”
Despite my being here to help Beth, in his typical negative way the minister had turned this around so I was somehow to blame for his problems. I’d trade him my so-called personal relationship any day for his lavish office with the neat secret door and all those people looking up to him. He even got to hear the confessions of sinful old ladies. And all those church bake sales…
“Keep the laptop and the recorder,” I said. “Do whatever you can to help Beth. Also, take this.” I handed him one of Jane’s business cards. “That’s my sister. For some reason, she lives up here, just like you live up here. I’d appreciate if you contacted Nate and had him buy Tara’s house—for way more than the asking price. He can afford it, and he owes me big time. Tara’s a good woman, married to a snake, and she could use some good fortune.”
The minister nodded and said, “I’ll see what I can do. Anything else?”
“Just a question—why are you in Toledo?”
The minister smiled. Then he laughed. He wasn’t a big one for laughing and I found it jarring.
“I contacted a friend of mine and mentioned I wanted to come back. There was an opening here for a Parochial Vicar, so I took it.”
“What’s a Parochial Vicar?” I said.
“Associate priest. Mostly the same duties as the pastor, except it’s harder for me to get to Heaven.”
What the … but that doesn’t…
I pointed at him and said, “Almost had me there. Who knew you were funny?”
The minister shrugged.
“But why are you here?” I said. “In the same place as me? It can’t be a coincidence.”
He nodded. “I’m inclined to agree with you. For some reason, your Great Whomever—who may be God, though I have an altogether different theory—has thrown us together again. For now, the best we can do is pray for guidance and see where that takes us.”
He was an awfully cool cat when it came to divine intervention.
“So what’s this theory of yours?” I said. “Because I’ve been thinking he’s not God, either.”
The minister shook his head. “Not yet. Call me when you’re ready. Did you get that email I sent? The one with my phone number?”
“Yeah,” I said, turning to go.
“Good,” he said. “One more thing: if you harm Scott, other than sending his sorry ass to jail, whatever understanding we’ve had is over.”
I glanced back and said, “So that’s how it is, now.”
The minister smiled in a way that seemed both kindly and dangerous at the same time.
“You bet.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
It was after nine and I needed to move if I didn’t want to miss seeing Jane. As I approached my car, I flinched at the screeching of tires. When I turned around, Melody’s brother jumped out of his silver sports car, baseball bat in hand.
“Don’t got no gun now, asshole!” Johnny yelled, and moved toward me. Probably to teach me a lesson, or show me who was boss, or fix my little red wagon.
I pulled out the gun Tara had given me and pointed it at him.
He yelped and hit the deck, eyes wide with terror, bat raised to block any bullets I shot at him.
“Don’t shoot, man!” he yelled. “What the fuck?”
Lowering the gun, I looked around for witnesses, but the parking lot was empty.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” I said.
“With me?” he said. “What about you? What you did to my sister. That shit’s whack, yo.”
“Now what did I do?”
“You hit her, that’s what. Nobody hits my sister.”
“Have you seen your sister?”
“Course I … why?”
I laughed. “Johnny, what your sister and I … Whatever she’s been telling you, you shouldn’t believe it.”
“She said you punched her where it wouldn’t leave a bruise.”
“Come on, Johnny. She’s bigger than me.” I pulled back my shirtsleeve to show my upper arm. “I mean look at me.”
To emphasize the point, I flexed one of Scott’s flimsy psychologist muscles.
“See that?” I said. “Like a little white soda straw, with freckles.”
Shaking his head, Johnny said, “You could have threatened her with that gun.”
He loved his sister. It wasn’t his fault she was a woman scorned.
“I didn’t start carrying it,” I said, “until you and your buddy George jumped me. I’m a psychologist, not a gangster—we don’t carry guns. All I did was break up with her. Just a guess, but how many men have broken up with Melody that you know about? I bet you can’t name one.” I could see him thinking about it. “Now, how many men have stalked her over the years?”
