Shame ON You

by John W. Mefford

  Brook folded her arms across her chest. “I’m with her on this one. Inappropriate.”

  I felt like I was being scolded by my mom when I was younger for playing in the mud in my nice shoes.

  “How would Cobb even know you existed?” Ivy repeated the same question three times.

  I raised my hand, and they turned to look at me. “It’s got to be Melvin Adler, right? He’d found the dead girl. He acted like he didn’t know who killed her. But I’m guessing he saw it go down. I’m thinking the killer was Cobb. Maybe the girl didn’t pay up for the drugs he gave her, or they had some disagreement. Back to Melvin. So, when he escaped from me and Ivy, he couldn’t go long without another fix.”

  “And you think he went to Cobb because Cobb was his dealer,” Brook said. “Maybe I can buy that, but you think he just gave him a run-down of who you were while he was asking for his drugs?” Brook turned her palms to the ceiling. “Not sure I can paint that picture.”

  “Hear me out. We know he ended up in Cobb’s little drug-dealing hideaway. Melvin was paranoid and scared. Maybe Cobb started asking questions, began to sense that Melvin was keeping something from him. Or, it’s possible Cobb was watching from a distance when you and your legion of cops invaded the apartment complex. And from there, he might have thought that Melvin had ratted him out.”

  Ivy jumped in. “And if Cobb even thought that Melvin had turned on him, then he might threaten Melvin’s life until Melvin told him everything.”

  A quick memory flashed through my mind, and I flinched.

  “What is it, Oz?” Ivy asked.

  “It’s Cobb. What he said to me when I was on the ground and about to stab me. He said, ‘You should have never fucked with Psycho Cobb.’”

  “Even he knows he’s a psycho,” Ivy said.

  “Sounds like it’s a badge of honor,” Brook added.

  “So we’re in agreement. Cobb wouldn’t come after me unless he’d killed that girl.”

  Brook tapped a finger against her lips. I waited for some affirmation. It never came.

  “What are you thinking?” I asked her.

  “I guess you’re right.”

  “Not exactly a glowing endorsement. Did I gloss over a key fact or a piece of evidence?”

  “No, it’s just me. That drug world is filled with so many predators and victims, and they’re all lying about something. But at this point, as far your safety is concerned…hell, everyone’s safety, we need to get Cobb off the street.”

  “Amen to that. But I’m more worried about Chantel,” I said.

  Brook eyed me. I realized I’d never filled her in on what we’d learned from Grandmother Torres. We took five minutes to review that fun conversation.

  “So there’s some hope.” She said she would make sure Chantel’s picture was distributed to the patrol divisions, just to put more eyes on it.

  Brook left after midnight. I’d tried to put a snoring Mackenzie in her own bed. By the time I crawled under my own covers, she’d slipped into the bed next to me. “I’m just here to make sure your arm is okay,” she said.

  Although I knew she simply wanted to be close to me, her caring soul warmed my heart.

  The moment my eyes opened, I knew something was different. I looked to my right. There, curled up next to me in my bed, was a lump of cuteness. Mackenzie’s back lifted with each deep breath. She was rightfully tired. It had been a long night.

  I got out of bed and reached the bathroom at the same time as Ivy. Her hair looked like she’d put her finger into a wall socket.

  “We never called Chantel’s parents last night,” she said.

  “Damn. You’re right.”

  “How about I call them, and then I can take that trip across town by myself…the one we discussed last night as you were carrying Mackenzie to bed. You can stay home with your daughter.”

  Mackenzie, rubbing her eyes, walked out of my bedroom and padded between us into the bathroom. She put a hand on the door. “I’ve got plans today, remember?”

  I looked off.

  “Come on, Dad. Are you getting old? I’m working on that painting at Tito’s studio.”

  “Right.”

  “Dibs on the bathroom,” she said with a smile as she shut the door.

  The normal Mackenzie was back.

  Ivy and I huddled in the kitchen as she called the Gibsons and gave them the news about Chantel dropping by to see her grandmother a week earlier. As expected, they started peppering her with more questions than she could answer. She chose not to reveal the fact that Cobb had tried to skewer me. After the phone call, Ivy said she could feel a bit of life return to Marilyn’s voice. The word “hope” was used at least a dozen times. But I knew that with hope came expectations. And that put more pressure on us to find Chantel.

  Ivy and I dropped off Mackenzie at Tito’s and headed east across I-35. We made it to Guadalupe and turned north; then we drove past the western side of the capitol. Once we crossed MLK Boulevard, we rimmed the edge of the UT campus. Looking eastward, I saw more cranes than I could count in those few seconds. Who would have thought that the business of so-called higher education would drive such economic expansion? Last I checked, UT was a public school.

  Once we’d gone under the green light at West 38th Street, Ivy pointed a finger to the left. I spotted the wrought-iron gate leading into Austin State Hospital. We figured it wouldn’t hurt to drop by and speak to someone at the facility and ask if they’d seen Chantel. We’d yet to understand why Chantel had mentioned to her grandmother anything about the hospital, which housed the mentally ill. Maybe there was an off chance that she had asked to be admitted, given her state of paranoia. Of all the possibilities for where she could be or what condition she might be in, that seemed to be one of the brightest hopes, even if it wasn’t likely.

  “Official visitation hours don’t begin for another forty-five minutes,” Ivy said, her sights focused on her phone. “Did you know this place opened in 1861, the first facility of its kind west of the Mississippi?”

  “During the Civil War.” I slowed the car as we drove by. I eyed a large fountain in front of a building with tall, white pillars and a dome on its roof. It reminded me more of a private-college campus administration building, something like SMU in Dallas. “Now that’s old.”

  She held up a finger. “Wow, they weren’t exactly PC back then. They originally called it the Texas State Lunatic Asylum.”

  We drove two more miles up Guadalupe, turned right on 51st, went another half-mile, and parked on the side of the road. Two stone columns anchored another wrought-iron gate, where letters spelling out “A.S.H. Cemetery” were arched across the top. We walked closer to the gate. A chain was wrapped around the two main bars in the middle, but the padlock wasn’t clasped shut.

  I cocked an eyebrow at Ivy.

  “Don’t tell me you believe in that ghost crap that Chantel muttered to Jean,” Ivy said.

  I pushed one half of the gate about two feet and slid through the opening. “You coming?”

  “Ghosts don’t care about chains and locks. They can just walk right through a gate or a wall like it’s not there,” she said, joining me on the inside of the property.

  “You say that like it’s a key piece of evidence in a criminal case. I believe you. Ghosts aren’t real.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Except,” I said, “for those that might exist in someone’s head.”

  She didn’t respond as we walked up a small incline. I instantly took in the contrast of a long row of headstones and leafless trees set against the crystal-blue sky. We weaved around a few puddles of water on the narrow road.

  Ivy stopped on a dime and threw an arm into my gut.

  “What did you see?” I asked, trying to follow her gaze.

  She pointed off to the right, near a tree. I could see a freshly dug grave—or at least, that’s what I assumed it was. She walked in that direction, plowing right through the rain-soaked grass. We pulled up next to the dist
urbed ground.

  “Looks like they just buried another one,” I said, looking at the caked mud that had seeped down the incline.

  She took out her phone again and started reading from it. “This cemetery is typically only used now when they can’t locate any living relatives of the deceased, a patient at the facility.” She looked up, but I didn’t say anything. She continued. “They used to have another cemetery site over at the facility we passed a few blocks back, but land became sparse. They exhumed all the bodies and reburied them at this location. But there are supposedly still bones and partial corpses on the state hospital grounds to this day.”

  “Creepy,” I said, circling the grave. Out of the corner of my eye, on the other side of the tree, I spotted a blade shovel. I went over and picked it up.

  “Probably one of the gravediggers left it there,” Ivy said dismissively.

  I raised both eyebrows.

  “Don’t go down that ghost trail. Again, why would a ghost need a shovel?”

  I spun around, looking at the plots within the general vicinity. “This looks like the newest grave.” I stuck the shovel in the ground and leaned on it, taking some of the stress off my ailing hip.

  “So?”

  “I don’t know what I’m implying. But I can’t discount what Chantel told Jean. Ghosts, cemeteries, state hospital.”

  “This could be a huge waste of time, though.”

  “You have any other better leads to follow? The entire APD is looking for Cobb.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe we should just chain you to the front gate of the cemetery and use you as bait to draw Cobb to us.”

  “Funny,” I said. “But I think he’s actually afraid of his own shadow. Last place you’d ever find a paranoid druggie is at a cemetery.”

  “You just said it.”

  “Said what?”

  “That it doesn’t make sense for Chantel to be here.”

  She had a point, even if I was the one who’d unwittingly said it.

  She checked her phone and said that, if we were still wanting to tie off this loose end, we should go ahead and make our way over to the hospital. I pulled the blade from the wet ground. Something came up with it. I leaned down and picked up a mud-covered bandana that had been rolled up and tied together at the ends. I dangled the knotted red fabric in the air.

  “Where’d you find that?” she asked.

  “In the ground.”

  “Again, probably belongs to one of the gravediggers.”

  “As what, a mouth gag?”

  She shrugged. “There’s got to be a logical explanation, Oz. I mean, it’s just a bandana, not a secret note from the dead.”

  My eyes went back to the ground. Something was missing. I used the shoved to push mud out of the way at the front and back of the gravesite. “No headstone.” We locked eyes. “And I’m not suggesting that ghosts or goblins or anything supernatural is involved,” I said. “Someone has been digging in this cemetery. Why, I don’t know. But this bandana might belong to that person.”

  A car honked its horn. I looked to the street, where cars whirred by, but one came to a stop, and a window slid down. “Leave the dead alone,” a woman yelled. “You shouldn’t be disturbing a person’s final resting place. Fucking creeps!” The woman flipped us off and screeched her tires as she drove off.

  “I’m getting more popular by the day,” I said.

  Ivy started walking back to the road. “I think it’s time we go check in with the hospital.”

  25

  Elena had a smile on her face as she ushered us into the doctor’s office.

  “Can I get you anything to drink? Coffee, water?”

  “I’ll take a water,” I said, raising my hand.

  Ivy shook her head. “I’m good. Thanks anyway.”

  Elena’s eyes dropped to the floor. Our muddy shoes had stained the carpet.

  I said, “I’m sorry about that. We can get some stain remover, or pay to have it professionally cleaned.”

  Her smile only broadened. “No worries. I’ll be right back with your water. Dr. Patterson is running late this morning.” She tapped her watch. “But I’m sure he’ll be more than helpful once he gets here.”

  I thought I heard a “tee-hee” laugh as she walked back into the reception area.

  “Seems like a nice person,” I said. “I guess you’ve got to find ways to keep your spirits up if you work in a place like this. Can’t be easy coming to work every day.”

  “True dat.”

  I looked at Ivy. “Where did that come from?”

  “Oh, sometimes I start talking like Cristina.”

  “Have you heard from her since we saw her perform at The Pier?”

  “Not a peep. I guess she’s been busy with…”

  “You can say her name, Ivy. ‘Poppy.’ As I told you, Poppy is a good person. She won’t hurt her.”

  “I’m afraid she might physically crush her.”

  I chuckled. “We all have to figure out life as we grow up. Seems like I’m still in that stage.”

  “But you have a child who loves you. It’s obvious that Mackenzie’s the center of your world, Ozzie. So, your love life aside, you’ve got someone who will cherish you for the rest of your days.”

  Hearing her say those words out loud validated what I’d felt all along. Mackenzie was my child, and her wellbeing, happiness, and growth not only filled my heart but also dominated my thoughts. I’d unknowingly been an absent father for the first nine years of her life. I now knew that my life had forever changed for the better, even though I still felt like I was learning on the job.

  At the same time, on a completely different level, I couldn’t deny the connection with Nicole. Yep, I’d screwed up over the last few weeks. Allowed another woman, Rosie, to rope me in by hitting my two weak spots: my need to rescue those in bad situations and my apparent inability to avoid falling prey to a certain sexual allure, which Rosie had in spades. I still felt like a complete idiot for not seeing right through Rosie’s twisted game of greed.

  I put my hands on the back of a leather armchair and pushed the ugliness associated with Rosie out of my mind. It was pointless to harp on her. I instead went back to the old times with Nicole, exploring San Francisco, making love in every conceivable place, knowing that we were each other’s biggest supporter…that rock of enduring friendship at the core of our bond. Nicole and I had taken each other for granted, toyed with our relationship, and now she was in some foreign land doing God-knows-what with God-knows-who. But somehow, even with doubt lingering in my mind, I felt that we would eventually get a chance to create a new version of our relationship. Ozzie and Nicole 2.0.

  A hand on my back. It was Ivy. “Yes?”

  She shifted her head toward the door. I turned and saw a man standing there, his mouth agape. He looked at the stained carpet and then back at us.

  “Elena!” he yelled. Then he flipped around and walked out.

  26

  Dr. Charles Patterson’s eyes jittered about like those of a bird. He changed positions in his oversized burgundy chair every few seconds, like a skinny kid trying to get comfortable on a wooden pew. Ever since he’d reentered his office, he’d yet to utter a word beyond, “Have a seat, and let me get settled.” Of course, we were already seated.

  His settling process was both strange and time consuming. Kind of fit the facility, I figured.

  Another minute passed. I couldn’t take the awkward silence, so I said, “I appreciate you taking the time to see us, Doctor.” The doctor was the facility’s chief administration officer.

  “Uh, yeah. I’m just…” He sighed and pushed his glasses up his nose. “I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night. Up late working.”

  “I’m sure you have your hands full running a facility this large.”

  He took in a slow breath. “We admit about three thousand patients a year. We’ve got their average stay down to eighteen days. When I was an actual practicing psychiatrist in the early days, eightee
n days was not the norm. We had patients here for years. Some, I suppose, could have been released. But we were kind of like an extension of a homeless shelter. They had no place to go.”

  “Sounds like you’ve served the community for many years,” Ivy said. “I’m sure it’s been rewarding for you.”

  He nodded over and over again, his gaze suddenly drifting to something between me and Ivy. I leaned toward her, hoping to get his attention. He was wearing a sweater over a shirt and tie. The knot of the tie was off-center. And it appeared he’d forgotten to shave. Either that, or he was going for the grizzly, earthy look. Lots of people did, of course, but the look just didn’t fit Dr. Patterson. He seemed more of an academic type. I saw no ring on his finger, so my guess was that he spent a good amount of time reading countless books about his chosen profession.

  “Sorry, I just have a lot going on. What can I help you with?” His elbows plopped onto his desk as if an extra twenty pounds had just been wrapped around his arms.

  “We’re private investigators. We’ve been hired to locate a young woman.” Ivy leaned forward and held her phone across the desk.

  He took a quick glance at the small screen and then looked away. “Never seen her.” His eyes were now plastered to the wall where his degrees were hanging.

  “Are you sure you got a good look?” Ivy asked.

  “Yes,” he shot back almost before she’d finished her question.

  Ivy and I traded a quick glance as I drew my ankle up to rest across my opposite leg.

  “Her name is Chantel Gibson.” I paused, looking for some type of response. He didn’t respond, nor was he even blinking. For a second, I wondered if he was still breathing.

  I added, “She’s been missing for two months. Her parents are worried sick about her. She’s run off before for a week or two but never this long.”

  He swallowed but still didn’t turn to look at me.

  I thought about taking it to the next level. Considering his apparent lack of interest, I had nothing to lose. I went ahead and shared that Chantel had gone to see her grandmother about a week earlier.