by Ray Garton
“Bring it on. I could use a drink. I spent the afternoon dealing with some officious little prick at Braxton-Carville.”
Toby got two glasses from a cupboard, ice from the dispenser in the refrigerator door, and poured from a bottle. The small ice cubes crackled as the amber liquid covered them. “The Balvenie Portwood, 21 year old single malt. This is silky stuff. Fruit, spice, honey, a nice long nutty finish, very gentle.”
Falczek’s eyebrows rose. “Jesus, what the hell’s happened to you? You’re cooking swordfish steaks and asparagus, you’re a scotch connoisseur. When I moved to California, you were spending your evenings in front of the TV drinking beer and eating Doritos in your underwear.”
Toby said, “About six years ago, I started watching the Food Network because they have a lot of gorgeous women hosting cooking shows on that channel. But I got hooked. Cooking has kind of become a hobby for me, and along with that, I’ve started paying attention to things like wine and scotch.”
“Pretty soon you’ll be wearing a dress and singing show tunes in airport men’s rooms. When that happens, by the way, I get dibs on Cherie.”
They both laughed, then sipped their drinks.
“How’s your life been, Falczek?” Toby said. “I haven’t seen you since Sally’s funeral. You really do look good. To be honest, I didn’t know what to expect. Losing your wife after all those years together—some people couldn’t hold up after that.”
Falczek looked down into the scotch in his glass and didn’t say anything for a long moment. He lifted his head and looked at Toby. “Every morning when I wake up, I still expect her to be lying next to me. Even after all these years.” He took a breath to continue, but his throat felt thick and hot, so he just drank a little more scotch. It annoyed him that simply talking about it still hurt so intensely after so much time.
Before either of them could say anything else, Falczek heard a faint clicking sound and looked beyond Toby to see an enormous Rottweiler standing in the middle of the kitchen.
“Either you’ve got a dog I didn’t know about,” he said, “or Cherie’s really let herself go.”
Laughing, Toby looked over his shoulder at the dog. “That’s Barnabas. We’ve had him for a few years. When we got him, he was just a tiny thing. But he’s grown.”
“Grown? If he were any bigger, you’d need pasture and a stable. He’s a beautiful dog.” Falczek leaned forward over the bar and said to the dog, “And you know it, don’t you, fella? You know how good lookin’ you are, huh?”
Barnabas cocked his head, then made his way slowly around the bar to Falczek’s side. Falczek got off the stool and hunkered down in front of Barnabas, taking the dog’s big head in both his hands, talking to him.
“That’s not too common,” Toby said. “Usually he takes time to warm up to strangers.”
“He knows a dog lover when he sees one,” Falczek said. “My dog, Doug, would be an hors d’oeuvres to this guy, but he’s just about my best friend in the world these days.” He got back up on the stool and took another sip of his scotch. Barnabas settled down on the floor beside him, head lifted to look up at Falczek with questioning brown eyes.
“How’d things go at Braxton-Carville today?” Toby asked.
“Nothing more than what I expected. I waited around, talked to a guy in public relations, told my story, he denied it, I told it again, he got annoyed, and by the third time, he looked like he was ready to have a cerebral hemorrhage. I didn’t get anywhere, but I’m hoping my story will.”
“Well, I should get to work on dinner.”
“Oh, good. Time for the entertainment.”
They chatted as Toby prepared dinner, and every now and then, Falczek reached down and petted Barnabas, who seemed very appreciative.
2.
Chloe was dead on her feet when she got out of the car to go into the house at the end of the day. It had been a long day at work, with most of it spent keeping up with the rapid developments surrounding the Whiskey Lake Mall shooting that morning and answering questions from national news agencies calling her for information on the story. Holly Branstetter, an old friend of Chloe’s, had been wounded in the shooting, and after calling 911 on her cell phone—along with more than twenty other people—she’d called Chloe at the station to tell her what was happening. Chloe had put her on the air. Lying just inside a See’s Candy store and bleeding heavily after being shot in the thigh, Holly had described the event as it happened. KNWS had been the only media outlet to have someone on the air while the shooting was taking place, and clips from the broadcast had been playing all day on CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, all the networks and every radio station that covered news.
She’d stayed at work more than an hour past the end of her shift, then she’d gone to the hospital to visit Holly, who’d just come out of surgery and was pretty groggy. On the way home, she’d stopped at the grocery store to get a few things for dinner. She got home a couple of hours later than usual, but it was still too early for Eli to be home from work. And yet his car was in the driveway. As she carried the groceries from the car, she heard loud rock music playing inside the house. It was not the kind of music Eli usually listened to, and it was playing far louder than he usually preferred.
Chloe had a bad feeling as she entered the house, a feeling that something wasn’t right. Nothing had been right all day—how could it be on a day when fourteen people had been shot to death while they were shopping? But Eli being home so early... playing that pounding, wailing music so loud... it made her nervous.
Inside, the walls pounded with the hard beat of AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell.” It was so loud, she could feel it in her teeth. Her hands were full, so she hurried to the kitchen, put the groceries down, then went back into the living room to the entertainment center against the wall. She hit the button to turn off the music, and it left behind a throbbing silence and a ringing in her ears.
“Eli?” she called.
When he didn’t respond, her feeling of dread grew a little worse. She headed down the hall for the bedroom, but when she heard fingers clacking on the computer keyboard, she stopped outside the guest room and leaned in through the open door.
Eli sat at the computer, his back to her. He stopped typing, picked up a pen, and scribbled in an open spiral-bound notebook as his head turned back and forth between the screen and the page.
Chloe said, “Are you trying to—”
Eli cried out and stood with such force that the chair shot backward as he spun around and faced her with eyes and mouth open wide in shock. His startled reaction startled Chloe, and she jerked backward reflexively and slapped her hand to her chest.
“Jesus, Eli,” she said, her voice breathy. “Are you okay?”
Eli’s cheeks puffed out as he exhaled explosively, and his body wilted as the rigid tension left it. “You startled me,” he said.
“Startled you? Eli, you nearly went through the roof. What are you doing?”
“Just... I was online and... nothing, really.”
As she went to him, Chloe noticed that he looked pale and his forehead glimmered with a thin sheen of perspiration. “Are you feeling okay? Why are you home early?” She caught a whiff of cigarette odor, sniffed a couple of times, and said, “Have you been smoking?”
He shrugged one shoulder as she wrapped her arms around him and rested her head against him. “I didn’t feel well, so I came home,” he said. “I just... I’ve been... I don’t know, I just didn’t feel well. And yes, I had a couple of cigarettes today.”
“Why are you smoking again?”
“I just... I... “ He shrugged and sighed. “I felt like it, okay?” he said with a hint of irritation.
She pulled back and pressed her palm to his forehead. “You feel clammy, but not hot. Are you sick to your stomach, or anything?”
“No, I just... I don’t know.”
Chloe turned to the computer monitor. “What were you doing online?” She saw a news article on the screen with a bold headline
that read, “Teen Slays Parents and Sister.” She frowned as she moved toward the desk.
Eli stepped in front of her, quickly sat down in the chair and pulled it up to the desk. “It’s nothing,” he said, clicking the mouse. “I was just reading some news stories, that’s all.”
When she looked over his shoulder, the headline was gone and he’d returned to Yahoo, his homepage, where another headline read, “Gunman Opens Fire in Northern California Mall.” She looked at the open notebook with Eli’s writing on the page and said, “What’re you writing?”
“Oh, that,” he said as he picked up the notebook and closed it. He opened one of the desk’s drawers and dropped the notebook into it, then closed it. “It’s nothing.”
“What do you mean, nothing? Whatever it is, you were so engrossed when I came in you nearly wet yourself and you scared me half to death.”
“Just some ideas I’m putting together.” He turned his head and looked up at her with a smile that looked forced. “You’re all over the news.”
“Yeah, me and fourteen dead people. Holly was there at the mall.”
“Was she hurt?”
Chloe nodded. “She was hit in the thigh and lost a lot of blood, but so far, she’s doing okay. She had surgery today, so I stopped to see her on the way home. She’s probably going to have some pretty bad nightmares for a long time to come.”
“What about the guy? The shooter?”
Standing behind him, she slid her hands down his chest and leaned on him, pressing her cheek to his head. “He’s in police custody in the hospital. It’s a wonder, too, considering how the mall cops reacted. Holly said they were the first to run and hide. They’re not armed, of course, so it didn’t make much difference. If it hadn’t been for those two clerks from the JC Penney men’s department, the guy probably would’ve shot even more people. They jumped on him from behind, wrestled him to the floor, got the shotgun away from him, and then kicked and beat the shit out of him. Turns out the shooter’s wife was in the mall. She watched the whole thing, then keeled over with a heart attack. She’s in critical condition.”
They said nothing for several long seconds.
“A teenager killed his family in Fresno today,” Eli muttered absently, as if he were reminding himself that he needed to change the oil in his car.
“I didn’t hear anything about this,” Chloe said, standing up straight again. “Did it just break?”
“Within the last hour.”
“Jesus, what is happening to people? Is everyone going crazy?”
The only response she received was the silence of the room, the house. Eli did not look at her, did not even move in his chair, just stared at the computer screen.
“Have you eaten?” Chloe said. “Are you hungry?”
“No, I’m not hungry.”
“Do you want to lie down, or something?”
“No. I’m okay.”
“You’re, uh... you’re not going to keep smoking, are you?”
After a long silence, he said, “If I do, I’ll do it outside.”
That disturbed her. If he was smoking again, then something was up. “I got a roast for dinner. Sound good?”
“Sure.”
“I need to get started on it, because it’ll have to cook for awhile.”
“You go ahead. I’m gonna surf the ‘net some more.”
“Why were you playing that music so loud?”
He shrugged. “Just wanted to make sure I could hear it in here.”
“In here? They could here it in space.”
She’d hoped that would get at least a chuckle out of him, but he just sat there staring at the computer monitor. She frowned at the back of his head.
“Are you sure you’re okay, honey?” she said.
After a moment, he said, nearly whispering, “I just don’t feel good, that’s all.”
Chloe went to the kitchen, unpacked the groceries, and started dinner. But the feeling that something was not right would not go away.
3.
Falczek couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so relaxed, so comfortable and at ease—and he was nearly three thousand miles from home. The only thing that would make him feel even better would be to have Doug nearby, making his quiet little snoring sounds as he dozed. Instead, Barnabas—who had taken quite a liking to Falczek—lay napping at his feet.
They had finished dinner nearly three hours ago, and it had been delicious. Afterward, Falczek and Toby had gone to the living room while Cherie put all the dishes into the dishwasher and turned it on. She’d joined them a few minutes later with a bottle of oloroso sherry and some glasses on a tray. Over the distant hum of the dishwasher in the kitchen, they’d caught up on the time that had passed since Falczek had moved to California. Vivaldi played low on the stereo and Falczek sat in a comfortable chair across from Toby and Cherie, who were on the couch.
Cherie was a tall, slender woman who towered over Toby, with large eyes and a beautiful face, short hair, and mahogany skin. She had changed even less than Toby; he had a sprinkling of grey in his hair and some lines around his eyes, but Cherie looked no different than the last time Falczek had seen her.
Outside, a summer thunderstorm rumbled. The faint hiss of a downpour could be heard even over the music and conversation, and occasionally, a white flash of lightning flickered around the edges of the drapes over the windows.
They talked at length about their children. Cherie brought out a couple of photo albums and showed Falczek some pictures of their children and grandchildren. Toby and Cherie had a daughter, a radiologist who lived in Massachusetts with her wife and one adopted child, and their son was an attorney in Florida, divorced and sharing custody of his two children. Falczek’s daughter Amy lived in San Diego, where she was a professional television stage manager who’d been working for years on a long-running morning talk show. She was divorced and hadn’t remarried, but she and her boyfriend had a son.
“The old fart in me would like to see them get married,” Falczek said. “But hey, the most important thing is that she’s happy. Marriage is... well, most of them don’t last these days, anyway. Her first one sure didn’t. She was so miserable in that marriage, I’m not surprised she doesn’t want to do it again.”
“How old is her son?” Cherie asked.
The thought of his grandson made Falczek smile. “Brian is eight. He emails me almost every day. He found a scrapbook Amy had kept of my stories, and he was so fascinated by it that he’s decided he wants to be a newspaper reporter when he grows up. I just haven’t had the heart yet to tell him that by the time he grows up, there won’t be any newspapers.”
“Hey,” Toby said, “you want to chase that sherry with some more of the scotch we had earlier?”
Falczek said, “I wouldn’t beat it off with a stick.”
“I’ll get it,” Cherie said. She stood and gathered up the glasses on the tray. “Careful, Toby, you don’t want to have to go to work with a hangover tomorrow.”
“I planned ahead,” Toby said. “I told Marcia I’d be in late tomorrow.”
“Well, I have to be on time tomorrow,” she said, “so I’ll get your scotch, and then I’m going to bed.” She looked at the clock. “Good grief, it’s already twelve-forty.” Cherie left the room with the tray.
The music on the stereo stopped and the room became quiet except for the sound of the rain outside and an occasional growl of thunder.
A flash of white around the edges of the windows was followed by a particularly loud crack of thunder. It startled Barnabas and he raised his head to look around with sleepy eyes. He rose to his feet for a long, luxurious yawn, then turned in a couple of circles before settling back down on the floor.
“That may be the biggest dog I’ve ever seen outside the old TV series Land of the Giants.”
“Yeah, it’s like having two other people in the house with all the food we have to buy for that dog.”
They said nothing for a long moment and just listened to t
he music and the rain.
“You mentioned newspapers earlier,” Toby said. “Whatever became of your idea to do a book on the history of the newspaper?”
“Oh, I’m still working on it,” Falczek said. “Have been for years. A little here, a little there. But I keep asking myself, who wants to read this?”
“I think a lot of people would. It could be a very important book, with newspapers dropping like flies. If you—”
The doorbell chimed and Barnabas lifted his head, suddenly alert, ears perked. Toby turned toward his head in that direction, frowning. Cherie appeared in the doorway to the hall.
“Who’s here at this hour?” Cherie asked Toby.
Toby started to get up, saying, “I’ll get it.”
“No, no, I will.” She turned and headed out of sight for the door.
“Check the peephole first,” Toby called.
Falczek heard the door open, which made the rain outside louder, then heard Cherie talking with a man. Their words were muddled. Footsteps sounded on the foyer floor, then the door closed. Barnabas rose to his feet in a quick movement and stared in the direction of the sound. A moment later, Cherie came into the living room with a police officer. He was of medium height and wore a rain slicker over his police uniform. A low, rumbling growl sounded in Barnabas’s chest.
“Barnabas, knock it off,” Toby said, standing.
“Toby,” Cherie said, “this is Officer Graham and he wanted to ask us a couple of questions about something that happened on our street earlier.”
Officer Graham’s eyes narrowed slightly and his back stiffened a little as he gazed cautiously at Barnabas. The dog continued to growl.
“Stop it, Barnabas,” Cherie said. She turned to the policeman. “He doesn’t bite, but sometimes he’s nervous around strangers.”
“Maybe he doesn’t bite,” Officer Graham said, “but I’ve had some pretty bad experiences with dogs, especially ones that growl. I’d sure appreciate it if you could take him out of the room while I’m here. I’ll just be a couple of minutes.”
