The Captives

by Debra Jo Immergut

  Miranda turned away. Afraid to see.

  “Aw shit.” Miranda heard the guard say this, she heard her sigh, a strange and heartbroken sound, then a snap of a radio being pulled from its belt holster. “Get the med team up here, Unit 3, Number 45,” she heard Carmona say. “I’m guessing OD.”

  WOMEN CALLED IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT, WOMEN WITH NAMES he didn’t recognize, good girls who remade themselves as vixens and barflies, flashing smiles. Hoping to lure him. But how could they be blamed. Duncan McCray possessed quantities of masculine charm that were truly a surplus. Almost freakish.

  And every night he came home to Miranda, apparently faithful, and she couldn’t believe her luck. Indeed, she was enslaved by this luck. She’d landed an elusive specimen, a creature of pure magnetism and seemingly endless sexual fascination, and this unlikely fact now ruled her. When they moved in together a month after they first met, she realized how dangerous this relationship might be, because she knew without doubt that she could die for him if he so requested.

  She had never wanted a passion like this, never asked for it. What do you ask for in life, though? There are so many possibilities.

  So she found herself enslaved. When they drove up to Candora, June flaunted itself up and down the thruway, sweet green leaves everywhere, and daisies and other such nonsensical things twinkling at them as they drove into the dusk. This escapade was all wrong, she knew, but there were reasons to take comfort, as he reminded:

  “I’ll only be pretending to have a gun, I won’t actually have a gun, remember that.”

  “And the casino nights, the bingo and the roulette, they think the money’s going to help sick children and this guy should not be skimming, you know? He’s a fire captain, for fuck’s sake. So remember that, too.”

  “And it won’t really hurt him to lose it. He’s got a government job, he’s a big shot in a small town. But for us it will mean everything, Miranda; we need the funding for the rest of our lives together. Right, our lives together?”

  Duncan turned to her then, his hands on the steering wheel, and those famous eyes, navy blue, pure gold—what color were they, anyway, and why did God create such eyes, she wondered. Or biology, whatever. Eyes that could enslave. Too much power for a person not to use. Use it he did.

  The Candora Community Motel, ceiling light stippled with dead gnats, a slick polyester bedspread. She sat down and hid her face in her hands. “I can’t believe I’m about to commit a felony.”

  “I’m committing it, not you,” he said. “And it’ll be over and done with and we’ll move on. We’ll get married, if you’ll have me,” he said. He put his arms around her then and they fucked and for a few seconds at the peak it seemed he’d disassembled her body and yanked her soul out to examine it. Then they dressed again and watched the late news until he unzipped his bag and out came this vile little gun. “But you said,” she protested—“Don’t worry it won’t be loaded”—“I don’t care, you said”—“Look, Miranda.” He knelt and took her hands. “I never wanted to fall in love, you know that, I was determined to be on my own but I wanted you that much. Are you going to give up on me now? It won’t be loaded, it’s only for show and I promise you, promise that we’ll throw it into the river together when we get out of there, you saw that river we crossed as we pulled into town.”

  “The sign said Oshandaga.”

  “Right. The Oshandaga. Looks good and deep.”

  THEY WERE FORCED TO DRAG WEAVY’S BODY BAG ALONG THE DIRTY floor because someone had stolen the wheels of the last working gurney in Milford Basin. For once, the ladies on the unit had fallen silent, and in the dead thick air, the bag made a fervent swishing noise as it slid down the passage, like the hissing of infernal reptiles. Carmona and two other COs poked around Weavy’s cell, looking for evidence of foul play but all they found was a note.

  I watched her and saw it all. Please don’t burn me, bury me in the ground.

  Watched it all? They turned to look at Miranda.

  Carmona unlocked the door and Miranda met her there. “Be a good gal and put in a good word for me at Admin. There’s been one too many flyers on my unit lately,” she said and gave her a shove down the hall.

  THE SECURITY OFFICE HAD PICTURE WINDOWS LOOKING OUT OVER the entire physical plant and on this night the sleet sparkled like tinsel in the white arcs of light sent up around the perimeter fence. Shining in the wet night, Milford Basin looked like a cozy settlement, a prairie town, a logging outpost in some northern wilderness. Miranda stared out it.

  The chief warden swept in and sat across the table from Miranda, blocking out the view.

  “So where did Moore get this medication?” She was a majestically built woman not much older than Miranda. Her white blouse was darkened with a large wet spot. Clearly she had Been awakened in the night. She picked up a scrawled note. “This Elavil.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Miranda. “I’m sorry.”

  The woman pursed her lips. The linebacker-sized CO who had entered with her loomed like a dark cloud.

  “I would guess that Weavy got her drugs from the same place everyone else here gets them,” offered Miranda.

  The chief narrowed her eyes. “You want to elaborate?”

  Miranda held her voice steady. “I don’t want to, but I will if I can see my counselor. Frank Lundquist.”

  “You’re talking about telling some truth here?” She cocked an eyebrow.

  Miranda nodded. “If I can talk to my counselor.”

  “I will arrange that,” said the chief. “Share what you have to share.”

  “Ludmilla Chermayev runs the contraband. Dorcas Watkins sells it for Lu.” Miranda was aware of how they both edged themselves toward her. “A CO named Liverwell smuggles it in, I think. But maybe others do, too. That’s all I know.”

  The burly CO let out a low whistle, causing the chief to glare at him. “There’s a state trooper on his way up here, tell him we’ll need a DOCS investigator, too.” The linebacker rushed off. She turned to Miranda.

  “I need to see my counselor tonight.”

  “It’s awfully late for that.”

  “And, ma’am,” said Miranda. “I hope you won’t mind me saying this, but there’s a spot on your shirt.”

  “Goodness,” said the woman. The dark wetness had now spread across the left side of her blouse. She looked up at Miranda, mortified. “I just had my third six weeks ago,” she said with a taut embarrassed smile. “Nursing, you know.” She stood. “Excuse me.” Arms folded tightly across her chest, she slipped out the door. Miranda heard her instructing the guard to find her the number of that shrink, Lundquist.

  HIS VOICE QUAVERED. “YOU’RE JUST SCARED, WHICH IS UNDERSTANDABLE.”

  She couldn’t meet his gaze. She watched his hand at the edge of his desk. Trembling? Raindrops spattered the black window, the only sound in the night-abandoned offices of Counseling. A single guard sitting in a pool of light down the dark hall. Grumpy and drowsing, having been interrupted on his coffee break to escort Miranda down.

  “No, I’m not scared,” she whispered. “I’m done. I’m done with doing every wrong thing.”

  He crossed to stand in front of her for a long moment. She kept her eyes on his scuffed leather tennis shoes. One was untied.

  “This is a chance to begin,” he said. “Something good will come of it.”

  “I don’t think you understand. I said I’m done. I stood up tonight and did the right and good thing. And that’s what I’m going to keep doing.”

  “In here. For five decades.”

  “I’ll consider Potocki’s offer to help.” She hesitated then, frowned. “Or maybe I won’t. Maybe I will just serve the term.”

  “Fifty-two years? You—won’t be you anymore.”

  She saw, in his anguished face, how much he wanted to save her. But she intended to save herself. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  He rose then and turned away from her. Walked to the little tea
station atop the file cabinet, stood with his back to her until the electric kettle began to hiss.

  She saw his shoulders shaking. She thought he might be crying.

  He prepared the cups and poured the water as if in slow motion. It flooded her heart, a bit.

  “I’m grateful for everything, for what you’ve tried to do,” she said to his back. “But I need this to be truly over and done.”

  At this, he turned toward her, the two cups steaming. His face was blotched, eyes down.

  “I understand,” he said softly, not raising his gaze, just giving a little nod. He handed her the cup, wisps of vapor and milky beige. “So one more for the road.”

  Flight

  19

  Inform Clients of the Developing Nature of the Treatment, the Potential Risks, and the Voluntary Nature of Their Participation

  (Standard 10.01.b)

  Some things I never thought I would see up close:

  three kilos of heroin, wrapped in cellophane, sealed in Ziploc bags

  the julienned sweetmeat of a baby goat

  a heartbreakingly beautiful woman crying out for me in the night

  a singing serf dusting my dead mother’s face

  an albino snail

  But I have seen them all, in the era that began the night M died her second death.

  The albino snail I am seeing right now, in fact. It has been climbing up the far side of the window, the flat smear of its underside like a bleached tongue pressed against the glass. The snail’s body ruffles prettily around the edges as it uses its tiny muscles to advance its course.

  It has moved clear across the window in the space of an afternoon. And as it has inched along, I have recorded these notes. The snail is white and pink and looks like a little Easter treat or a mangled plastic flower. It certainly doesn’t look real. But when I look farther, past the snail, at the view from this window, the black hills, the strange huddled tin-roofed houses, that hardly looks real, either—when taken in the context of the life you might have expected a man like me to have, when compared with what you might reasonably expect to see from the window of the dwelling place inhabited by one Franklin H. H. Lundquist, Ph.D.

  And I guess that’s why I find myself setting the whole course of events down on paper. I record these notes by hand, in a lined composition book, meant for schoolkids and the only writing paper available here, purchased by our housekeeper in the little village shop.

  Yes, unorthodox, as documentation goes.

  But after all, I had to leave the official records behind. All my files, all my clinical case notes for all my clients, including a slim manila folder, obligingly placed in my Milford Basin cabinet under “G.” I know this particular folder was carefully reviewed by Polkinghorne, by the chief warden, by various attorneys and detectives. What they read were the ordinary jottings of an institutional psychologist: the client’s basic demographics and family history, the results of that MMPI questionnaire I administered in our first session, her two chief complaints (“occasional despondency, insomnia due to noise on unit”), and my interventions (“discussed positive coping skills, agreed pharma could be advisable”). A partial record of medication remands.

  Those notes hardly told the whole story.

  And so here, on this day, in this strange place, in this cheap notebook bound in gray cardboard, I have been setting the whole story down. It’s confidential, as all such notes must be, and since I’m without the standard measures for securing private records, I’ve omitted the client’s name. I simply call her M.

  I write this to complete the clinical record, yes. To gain some insight, of course. But mostly to convince myself of something: that this albino snail is real. If the snail is real, this life is real.

  FINALLY, THERE WAS THAT NIGHT. THE SLEET. THE SLEET, THE HOPPED-UP, blowing sleet, forcing me to drive slowly, ranked battalions of raindrops hurling themselves against the windshield, crazing the pavement in the beams of the headlights. The weather seemed to have swallowed the suburbs whole; a three-car accident clogged the parkway; my wipers sang a tragic monotonous tune, and my hands were sweaty and shaky.

  What I had done: set off an avalanche. Now, ride it down.

  “Come on,” I muttered, pounding the steering wheel.

  “Easy, easy,” said Clyde. He switched on the radio, munched fried chicken packed in a grease-spotted box. If you can’t be with the one you love, honey, love the one you’re with.

  I just wanted to see her face again. To remind myself about the payoff for this wholesale demolition of my life.

  What I had done. Why I had done it.

  The extra pills I’d kept tucked in a box of Earl Grey. I’d meant those for backup—or maybe, for me. In case the worst happened. If she’d somehow died from her hidden-away dose, I would have ended my days as well.

  Top of the hour news on the radio. The president had vetoed a budget. Albanian militants attacked a South Serbian base. Someone had been selling dog meat to tony restaurants, disguised as Australian-farmed lamb filets.

  Clyde shook his head. “What kind of a person,” he said. “Poor little doggies.”

  “You’ve got the first aid kit,” I said.

  “For the fourteenth time, yes.”

  “The hat?”

  He held up a floppy-brimmed ladies’ rain hat. “On loan from Agata.”

  “And the bags? In the back?”

  “In the back.”

  Over the previous week, I’d been dispensing with my few possessions—I’d delivered the aged Truffle and our never-used crystal wedding-registry candlesticks to Winnie, and, as compensation for dumping a cat on his household, I’d given Gary my brand-new picture-in-picture TV. I filled a pair of small duffels with a week’s wardrobe for myself and M. Yes, I took down her sizes and went shopping at Bloomingdales—a few sweaters, some T-shirts and jeans, underwear, and one splurge on cashmere socks. All of this, I folded solemnly into the bags. In mine, I tucked in a few family photos along with the clothes. And on top, the fisherman’s jacket—seven cargo pockets and an internal waterproof stash zone—that I’d found in a dusty old angler’s supply shop near Grand Central. I zipped the Russian service revolver, menacing and incredibly weighty for its size, into the jacket’s largest pocket.

  All this according to the plan Jimmy and I had fine-tuned during our meeting a week earlier at Nove Skopje. Agata, wearing an enormous pearl and coral brooch in the shape of an octopus, hurried from the kitchen and welcomed me with a crushing hug. She gushed in her mystifying language about Clyde. She showed me to a cluttered office behind the bar. Empty rifle racks on the walls, a window thickly curtained. She motioned me to sit and wait.

  When she left, I saw the three plump plastic-wrapped bricks of heroin, stacked in a corner next to a pair of child-size galoshes. I crouched down and studied the honey-hued bundles with mixed emotions: here was the stuff that was strip-mining my baby brother’s soul. Yet I was strangely flattered that the Macedonians trusted me enough to house me with their stash. I poked one of the malevolent pillows of junk, taut and dense as a clenched muscle. Some kind of power locked in there. I wished it would relinquish its grip on my brother. I could only pray that it wouldn’t conquer him.

  Jimmy entered with a bottle of Balkan hooch, and Agata behind him, wielding platters of something fragrant and saucy. She served us while Jimmy and I ate and drank and worked out the last details. Routes to and from the hospital, weapon disposal. Monitoring Clyde’s fix on the day so he’d be up to the task and not on the nod.

  And at the center of it: M. She’d set it all in motion. Ring the pay phone at Nove Skopje, ask for me, hang up. Take the dose of Elavil she’d hidden in her cell. Done.

  A not-very-complicated plan. A clear set of intentions.

  But then, that frigid, sleet-spitting night.

  The phone did indeed ring, but not at Nove Skopje. Instead, it rang at my apartment.

  The woman’s voice did indeed ask for me, but the voice did not belong to M. Instead,
the chief warden.

  So the plan got a bit more complicated. The intentions a bit muddled.

  THE RAIN HAT. THE FIRST AID KIT. THE DUCT TAPE. THE CHANGE OF clothes.

  “Check, check, check,” said Clyde.

  Once I’d dosed M with the med-laced tea—made that adjustment to the plan—I watched as she was escorted back to her unit, unaware of her fate, still awake but guaranteed to be down and out when the COs came around for the 10 P.M. count. Then I jolted into a previously unknown high gear—racing back to the city to scoop up Clyde and my readied supplies, figuring that I could still carry out the rest of the operation as Jimmy and I had charted it. And in under an hour my brother and I were swooping down the freeway exit to the brilliantly lit Hudson Valley Med Center, gliding to a stop in the drenched parking lot.

  “I think we’re ready then,” I said. In the pocket of the fishing jacket, the gun’s rubber grip gave slightly under the pressure of my hand. The revolver was unloaded, a scare tactic, but not a felony. Not a felony in case—oh my Christ—something went awry. My heart was pounding in deep reverb. The blinking clock on the dash read 11:20. Almost two hours since M had swallowed her Earl Grey.

  Pelted by the miserable night, we lifted Jackson’s wheelchair out of the trunk and unfolded it. Clyde, especially scarecrow-like in a pair of baggy pants and a denim workshirt chosen for the occasion, plopped the big rain hat onto his head. As I propelled him toward the main entrance. I read the sticker on the backrest: “Have you been saved?”

  Into the cheery bustle of the hospital’s lobby and onto the elevator. Clyde smiling up at people dopily from beneath the dripping brim of the hat. He really played his part extremely well. At the fourth-floor reception desk, a compact East Indian woman greeted us. I extracted my ID badge from my shirt pocket. “Dr. Lundquist, Milford Basin. Here about one of my clients. This is my brother, Clyde; I didn’t want to leave him, of course.”

  Clyde gave her an inane grin.

  “Of course.” She gazed at him with sympathy in her eyes. Then she looked back at me and knit her brows. “But we haven’t had anyone from Milford Basin tonight.”