“So you became a live-out boyfriend.”
“For the time being.”
“I see,” I said again. “I guess she wasn’t just a couch to you.”
“No,” he said. “I guess not.”
“In fact,” I concluded, “I was the couch.”
He sighed. “You know it isn’t like that between us, Donna. I do have feelings for you.”
Really, I wasn’t going to go through all that again; e.g., let me go on doing all sorts of egregious things because I do have feelings for you. I sat there silently, shaking my head.
“Okay, if that’s the way you want it,” Julian admitted, finally. “You were the couch.”
What he should have realized is that if he hadn’t admitted to it, I might actually have let him stay. Honestly, didn’t he know me by now? But once it was out in the open, once the criminal had confessed, what else could I do? “Out!” I said, my finger pointing to the door.
“Oh, Donna. What’s the big deal? Look at all the fun we’ve been having!”
“Out!” I repeated. I dropped the finger. There was only one way out, after all.
“But I can’t go back to her place yet,” Julian whined. “Her parents are still there.”
“That’s your problem,” I told him.
I watched while he packed his three Louis Vuitton bags. Then he was gone, and I didn’t even track him to find out where.
HENRY
Saturday afternoon I was at the home again. I walked in to find the detective and Sherry having an animated conversation, face to face in two vinyl chairs, the detective asking something low and ominous, Sherry, seemingly, lost in thought. I stood at the doorway for a minute or two, the detective’s back to me, hearing again Brown Suit’s threat not to talk to the NYPD. Fine, I thought; I wouldn’t say a damn thing. But just maybe, I might hear a little about what she was saying....
Just then, Sherry looked up. Then Detective Sirken turned around, too, saw me and closed her mouth, mid-sentence. Whatever they had been talking about was history. I walked towards them.
“Mr. Jackman,” Sirken said as I leaned over to give Sherry a kiss.
“Detective Sirken,” I replied.
No one moved. It was a stand-off: two gunslingers dead-still, hands on their weapons.
“What brings you here?” I finally asked.
“Just come to see how Sherry is. She seems so much better,” the detective said, a fake smile on her face.
I thought back to the picture of them as I stood at the doorway, their chairs pulled close, huddled together in sisterhood, and suddenly I felt the strangest sense of dread. It was as if there were more to this whole situation than first appeared, more to Sherry and more to me, more to the detective, more to the whole world, and though I didn’t know what it was, I could sense that it was bad.
“Bullshit,” I said.
“Henry!” Sherry scolded.
I don’t know what came over me. Paranoia, maybe, maybe not. I watched Sirken out of the corner of my eye. She seemed oblivious.
“So, really, what were you talking about?” I asked, casually.
The detective didn’t answer.
“Henry,” Sherry said, her eyes telling me to quit it.
“Have you been putting ideas in her head?”
“Do I need ideas in my head?” Sherry asked, staring at me.
I didn’t answer that. I could tell that Sherry was not pleased, but she wasn’t the one I was aiming at. Here I was facing off with the detective, and Sherry kept getting caught in the crossfire.
“No, really, Henry. Tell me,” Sherry was saying. “You think I’m so stupid now I can’t think on my own?”
“No,” I said. “Stop it, Sherry, this isn’t about you.”
“No?” Sherry cried. “Who is it about? Who got hurt? Who has to pay?”
The detective was getting up. “Good seeing you, Sherry.”
“Don’t go,” Sherry told her, a hand on her arm. “Henry should go. He’s in one of his moods, and you don’t....”
“Moods?” said the detective.
“I’m not going,” I said, surprising myself with my stubbornness. “I’m staying right here. I want to hear what you were saying about me.”
“Who says we were talking about you?” Sherry asked.
“Sherry,” I said. “Are you really so naive to think the detective’s here to find out how you are? She’s here, because she’s trying to find someone to pin the crime on. Some schmuck like me. She’s pumping you for information. What did you tell her?”
Sherry eyes said don’t you dare fuck with me. “What shouldn’t I tell her, Henry?” she demanded. “What shouldn’t she know?”
Something unfamiliar told me to hit her, told me to hit the cripple and shut her up. I lifted my hand, and Sherry saw.
“You mean your temper, Henry? When you’d blow up and threaten to hit me?”
I put my hand down, but Sherry was just getting started.
“Or maybe your jealousy? How you said you’d kill Ryan if you ever saw him near me one more time?”
“I never lost my temper with you.” I shouted at Sherry. “I never did those things!”
Sirken was standing there, taking all this in.
“What are you still here for?” I yelled.
“I’ll just come back another time,” Sirken said, picking up her notebook from the chair, and leaving the room.
Sherry was crying quietly. “Why don’t you believe me? I never said a thing until you went to hit me. Not one thing.”
By now whatever had taken hold of me was gone. I went to her, got down on my knees and begged her forgiveness. “I don’t know what came over me,” I said.
We sat there a long time, me at her knees, Sherry’s hand caressing my hair. “I’m sorry, too,” she said. “I’m sorry for what I said.”
By now it was early evening. The nurse came in with Sherry’s supper, the meat pre-cut, potatoes mashed, stuff for someone who could hardly maneuver a knife and fork. I peeled off the top of her milk container, tied her bib around her neck. She ate a piece of meat or two, a spoonful of potatoes. I tried to help her, but she wouldn’t let me. “I have to learn to do it myself.”
“That’s my independent Sherry,” I said, smiling.
She ate some applesauce while I obsessed over everything that had happened that afternoon. I couldn’t quite get rid of the paranoia I was feeling before. “She said she’ll be back,” I said. “She’s gonna ask you more questions.”
Sherry put the spoon down carefully. “I love you,” she said. “I won’t ever tell her what happened that night.”
“Won’t?” I echoed. “Does that mean you remember?”
She looked at me with somber eyes. “I remember what happened,” she said.
“When? When did you remember?”
“Now. I remember now.”
“Who did it?” I cried.
“I’m not telling,” Sherry said. “Not even you.”
* * *
Needless to say, I obsessed about that the rest of the weekend. Could she really have remembered? And why wouldn’t Sherry tell me? Was it Ryan? Did she think if she told me I’d kill him? Could she have told the detective? No, she insisted she didn’t tell. Round and round I went, getting nowhere.
Monday came, and I tried to put it out of my head. I walked the eight blocks to work in the cold rain, grabbing a latte on the way. Nadia had already opened up. I busied myself in the back until Carl came in. He seemed in a pretty good mood, as if our talk the other night had never happened. We joked around for awhile until the first customers came in.
Old Mrs. Levinson came in demanding a renewal on her Fosamax. “I came Thursday night just after eight o’clock, but your store was closed! Aren’t you supposed to be open Thursday nights?” she yelled.
“Mrs. Levinson, you don’t have to shout. Turn up your hearing aid,” I told her.
“What?” she shouted.
“We’re always open Thursday night
s,” Carl called from the back.
“Well, you certainly weren’t last Thursday! I came all the way up from 96th, and the door was locked. I had to walk the whole way back in the rain. And now I have a cold.” She coughed.
“Mrs. Levinson,” I said, trying to shush her. “I was here. Maybe the door was just stuck.”
“Oh, no,” she insisted. “You had the little sign turned so that it said ‘Closed.’ I know because I put my glasses on just to make sure.”
By now Carl had come down to the front. His eyes were on me, not her. “Henry,” he said. “I left you here at six o’clock. When did you leave?”
“Um, 9:55?” I said. “I don’t really remember, Carl. I mean, it could have been five minutes before. I’m sorry if...”
“Oh no,” Mrs. Levinson said again. “It was definitely a little after eight when I came. I don’t go out any later than that. Lots of crazies out in New York at night.”
“I’ll deal with you later,” Carl said and turned to Mrs. Levinson, apologizing for her extra trip and telling her to take a seat; he’d do up her Fosamax right away. Ten minutes later he handed it to her along with a package of Luden’s cough drops. “Take care now,” he said.
The moment she was out of the store, he was back to me. “Henry, did you or did you not leave the store early Thursday night?”
“Well,” I said. “It might have been a few minutes....”
“Henry, I’m not taking any bullshit. When did you close the store last night?”
“Um, Nine...”
“I said no bullshit. I believe Mrs. Levinson on this one. She said she was here at eight.”
“She said she was here a little after eight.”
“Don’t quibble.”
“I closed up at eight.”
Carl gave me a long sad look. “You’re fired,” he said.
I couldn’t believe it. He fired me. “You don’t mean that, Carl.”
“Henry, I told you one more time and this is it. Get your stuff and get out.” His face was pale but determined, the face of someone who wasn’t ever going to back down.
I thought what the hell, what did I do? So, big shit, I closed up a little early. And nobody would ever have known the difference if it weren’t for that old fart Levinson who probably couldn’t read, anyway, and who might have been there at nine or ten, for all anyone knew. Or maybe she came Wednesday night. And here I was busting my butt for the past two years, but Carl took the old fucking bitch’s side of it.
I looked at Carl’s face, and suddenly, I didn’t see a friend and all-around good guy. I saw a big, fat son-of-a-bitch. I don’t know what came over me. I just hauled off and punched him in the face. Then, as Carl was holding his bloody nose, groaning in pain, I sauntered down the aisle, my arm outstretched, dumping everything I could reach onto the floor: Advil, Lubriderm, Maalox, Aveeno Oatmeal Bath, Milk of Magnesia, Oil of Olay, Colgate toothpaste, the whole fucking drug store on the floor, and it felt totally awesome.
I went looking for a bar, but it was too early. I ended up in Central Park, chasing squirrels and climbing rocks in the rain. Lunch time, I bought a hot dog with everything on it from a cart. I walked down to the pond, rented a row boat and rowed out to the center, where I sat for forty-five minutes paddling the boat in circles. I walked along Central Park West, past Tavern on the Green, and the zoo. What started out freedom and high spirits deflated hour by hour until by five o’clock, I found myself sitting on a park bench staring at the ground, cold, wet and depressed.
By now it was getting dark. All I’d had to eat for hours was one hot dog. I crept out of the park, and stumbled along the periphery for a bit until I found a bar. I found a stool and a bowl of peanuts and ordered scotch. There I sat for about two more hours until I fell off the stool. Then I staggered home, took two Somnolux and fell into bed.
* * *
And that’s it. Nothing else happened until I suddenly wake up this morning in jail. I open my eyes, expecting to see my bedside lamp and blue wallpaper, and see instead a blinking fluorescent bulb and flaking cinder block. My bed’s turned into a lumpy cot. My room’s become a dirty cell with a cement floor. This has got to be a dream. I rub my eyes to make it go away, but it’s still here.
I stand up, walk across the cell and rattle the cage. “Hey!” I shout. Across the way I hear “Shut up” in a couple of languages. A big burly cop comes sauntering down the aisle.
“What?” he says.
“Where am I?” I ask, looking around.
“Heaven. Whatcha think?”
“Am I dead?” I ask.
The cop laughs and starts to walk away.
“Am I in jail?” I shout after him.
He spins around, faster than you’d think a big guy like that could move. “Whassamatter with you, Jackman? You going for an insanity defense? Yeah, you’re in jail.”
I rattle the cage again. “What’s the charge?”
Across the way, someone’s cursing me in Spanish . The cop gives me a quick rendition of what I was supposed to have done. I supposedly broke into a nursing home and tried to smother some nice lady in her sleep. They caught me red-handed, lowering a pillow over her face.
“I didn’t do it!” I shout, but all the cop does is snicker.
“Yeah,” he says, turning away. “No one does.”
Mom and Pop come down later with their friend, Jerry the lawyer. Pop looks old and sad; Mom’s so wired no one can get her to shut up. Nothing works until Pop scrunches her face with his hand and tells her if she doesn’t shut up, her son is gonna get life. That shuts her up. Me, too.
But Jerry the lawyer says not to worry. He’s already questioned my girlfriend Sherry, who’s a little hazy about the pillow incident. She doesn’t even remember who attacked her the first time. She said the detective just got her to say that to force my hand. And she guesses it did. She’s sorry to have tricked you, Henry.
“Well, I wasn’t there,” I insist.
“We’ll have to do better than that, Henry.” Jerry says.
* * *
A few hours later, the big burly cop is escorting me into this small side room. No one’s inside. I’m walking around now and looking at myself in this big mirror. Mirror, sure; it may be a mirror to me; to the guys behind it, it’s clear glass. They’re probably watching me right now. I stick my tongue out at them.
Detective Sirken comes in, all decked out in her fake smile. “Mr. Jackman,” she says.
“Detective Shitken.”
The smile disappears for just a second, then bounces back up. We stare at each other.
“I want my lawyer,” I say.
“If you wish.” Sirken goes out the door and comes back in. “He’s on his way.”
We sit there for a few minutes doing nothing much.
“I’m not asking you to say anything. But you can’t dispute the fact that we caught you in the act.”
“In the act of what?” I ask.
“C’mon,” Sirken says. “You acknowledged that last night.”
“I did not.”
Sirken laughs. “It’s on record,” she says. “What I want to know is why you wanted Sherry dead.”
Why is she even asking me this? “I want my lawyer,” I say again.
“Fine. We’ll wait. He was just pulling into the parking lot when I called him.”
Five minutes later, Jerry Sussman, shiny pinstripe suit and Andiamo briefcase, comes in. “Hi Henry. How ya doin’?” he says and goes to sit down next to me. Jerry’s a good guy; he’d come to your rescue whenever you needed him, if he had to fly to Uzbekistan. He’s just not such a hot lawyer is all.
“So,” Sirken says again. “Why were you trying to kill your girlfriend?”
“Don’t answer that,” Jerry said.
“Why shouldn’t I answer that?” I ask him. “I wasn’t even there last night. Why would I want to kill Sherry? I love her!”
“Henry, we caught you red-handed! You can’t deny you were there.”
J
erry leans over to me and whispers, “You can’t deny something when they catch you in the act.”
I sit there dumbfounded. “What act? I wasn’t there.”
Sirken looks a little dumbfounded herself. “I’m not going to argue the point.”
“Is Sherry all right?” I ask.
“She’s fine. We had her room staked out ever since you snuck in Thursday night.”
“I didn’t sneak in. The doors were open. I just stayed after hours is all.”
“Henry,” I hear Jerry saying in the background. “Don’t volunteer information.”
“I don’t have anything to hide.”
“Well, Henry,” the detective says. “We’ll see about that. Let’s go back to July 6. What were you doing in Jessica Finklemeyer’s apartment that night?”
“I wasn’t there,” I say to the mirror.
“We’ve got a positive ID on you that night.”
“What?”
“The first floor neighbor in Jessica’s apartment building agreed to a photo lineup.”
“Arlene,” I whisper.
“Henry, don’t volunteer information!” Jerry hisses.
“Yes, Arlene. She ID’d you out of hundreds of photos. She swore you were Jessica’s boyfriend, and that you were there the night she was killed.”
“She said she wouldn’t tell anyone,” I whisper to Jerry.
“Be quiet,” he says.
“So you know Arlene?” Sirken’s saying.
“Yeah, but...,” is as far as I get before Jerry interrupts.
“I never knew Jessica!” I shout over him. “I wasn’t her boyfriend. I only met Arlene when I came to see Ryan!”
Jerry looks disgusted.
Sirken is looking pretty pleased with herself. “So what is it that Arlene promised not to tell anyone, Henry?”
I guess she heard me. “She said she told the cops that the boyfriend always came at night but she’d never seen his face. And she promised never to say anything different.”
“Why did she tell you that?”
Come Out Tonight Page 22
