by Lisa Lutz
“David’s got a big mouth.”
“I think he’s just happy to discuss anything other than your father’s illness and the princess’s kingdom.”
“Fair enough. I should have this thing sorted out soon. I think I’ve got the suspects narrowed down. There are only a couple dozen people who would be able to access the account information.”
“You are assuming that this is someone who works for the company?”
“Or is closely connected to my boss.”
“It could also be a cybercrime. Have you thought of that?”
“A hacker?” I said, mulling it over. And then I stopped mulling when I realized what a complete imbecile I’d been. Gruber could have been behind all of this.
“Excuse me,” I said, placing my beer on the stoop. “There’s someone I need to see.”
• • •
The old me would have gone in with my metaphorical guns drawn. But I knew who I was dealing with, and nothing short of an Oscar-worthy performance of submissive contrition and conciliation would do. First I had to purchase provisions. Aside from the mix-and-match pack of varietal savory snack foods, a stolen stash of crack mix, and a cheesecake with a personal message (I’m sorry, I’m an awful person) written in red letters on top, there were the more embarrassing purchases. These acquisitions required some limited educational surveys, which included me asking strange men questions like, Is there some kind of new fetish I should know about? Is Jugs magazine passé or retro-hip? I assembled all of the items in a large basket that I found in my parents’ garage, left over from the Frank Scharfenberger3 days, and wrapped it all up in a giant ribbon, which had faux cutouts of a pin-up girl in the style of truck mudguards. The basket was topped off with a glitter-coated Hallmark card adorned with flowers and carrying a rhyming message of friendship.
I got into my car and was about to have a face-to-face meeting with the man responsible for many of my recent troubles when I got the phone call.
“Isabel, it’s Edward.”
“What’s up? I have a really important meeting that might be the answer to most of our problems.”
“That’s great. Um, I need you to bail me out of jail.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t think I heard you correctly.”
“I was arrested. You need to post bail.”
“Arrested for what?”
“Indecent exposure.”
* * *
1. Claire wasn’t the kind of child who drove you to drink.
2. “Deny everything” is my policy.
3. To date, our worst client ever. His relatives would often send us apologetic gift baskets.
EXPOSED
I’ve never posted bail for anyone before; it’s always been the other way around. I will freely admit I relished this opportunity to walk into a police station without a bull’s-eye on my back. My inappropriately perky mood shifted into deep concern when I caught a glimpse of Edward as he was escorted out of the holding area. They had given him a pair of light gray sweats in size extra-large. His face was pale and drawn and his eyelids so hooded, he appeared to be sleepwalking. When I found him at the mental hospital, he had been on guard, in fight mode. His expression and composure now hinted at helplessness, and I suddenly felt the same way.
Someone was doing this to him, but I had no idea who and I couldn’t help but feel I had been remiss in my duties since learning about my dad’s illness. It was starting to seem like everything I came in contact with was contaminated. I couldn’t recall a time when I’d had less of a grasp of what was going on around me.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” I said when we got in my car.
“I was working late.”
“Did you get any phone calls?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Who was in the office with you?”
“I don’t recall. The next thing I knew, I was asleep, naked in front of a grammar school, being woken by two patrol officers. I think someone knows.”
“Are you sure?”
“I was naked in front of children. The only way to defend that would be to admit I had Alzheimer’s and the incident was a product of the disease. But I know it wasn’t. I get lost. I lose nouns. I don’t strip in front of schoolyards.”
“Do you remember what you had to eat or drink before this happened?”
“I was in the office. I drank water. Maybe some green tea. That’s the last thing I remember. I could have been somewhere else when it happened. Who is doing this to me, Isabel?”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry. I have been—”
“You’ve had other things on your mind,” Edward said. “And someone took advantage of that.”
“Where the hell is Charlie?” I asked.
As it turned out, Charlie had drunk the Kool-Aid, too. Or whatever concoction knocked out his boss. Evelyn found him passed out on the floor. Instead of waking him and sending him home, she called an ambulance, since Charlie was slow to respond. The paramedics arrived and carted Charlie off to the hospital, where they ran a slew of tests. Charlie had left several messages on Slayter’s cell phone, but that phone was sitting in Slayter’s office. Charlie gave the nurse my information, but she only called me when he was ready to be discharged.
Charlie had almost no new information to provide. He couldn’t remember that Willard had had the Lenore/Nora talk with Edward or if there had been any visitors the night before.
While I was picking up Charlie from the hospital, I got a phone call from David.
“Where are you?” he asked.
“I was bailing Edward out of jail and picking Charlie up from the hospital.”
“Did you forget your shift?”
I checked my watch. I was two hours late.
“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I said.
“Try to remember who your real family is,” David said.
• • •
After Dad got sick, the hospital became the Spellmans’ center of operations. You could arrive at any time and find two Spellmans in Dad’s room, one or more in the cafeteria, and another in the main waiting area, drinking coffee and using the Wi-Fi. When I finally did arrive at the hospital, my father was hardly alone. Tralina had waived the two-person limit and David, Rae, Maggie, Demetrius, and his crack mix were all crowded into the ten-by-twelve-foot room. Everyone was wearing masks.
“How’s the patient?”
“I can’t complain,” Dad said.
Maggie sat on the edge of the bed and held Albert’s hand.
“So how many times has Ruth come to visit? This must be hard on her.”
Everyone in the room looked at their feet, except Dad, whose feet were blocked by Maggie. He looked at the ceiling. That was an excellent question.
“Oh my God. Are you insane? Your mother doesn’t know you’re sick?” Maggie asked in disbelief.
Rae chimed in. “She totally thinks Dad’s sick.”
Dad cleared his throat. “We told her I have the flu. Since she’s deathly afraid of communicable illnesses, we knew it would keep her away.”
“As a mother, I can tell you that’s really fucked up,” Maggie said.
“Can I offer you some lime Jell-O?” Dad said. “I’m partial to lime.”1
“I’m good,” Maggie said, pulling a half-eaten oatmeal cookie out of her pocket.
Once Maggie was done speaking her mind to Dad, she turned her attention to the trio of slapdash investigators undermining her Washburn case.
“You people,” she said, looking at Rae, D, and me. “What the hell are you up to?”
My phone rang, just as the drama was starting. Damien. I thought there was a slight chance I could escape Maggie’s wrath if I answered the phone.
“Do not answer that phone,” Maggie said.
“Business,” I said.
Then Maggie snatched the phone out of my hand and answered. “Isabel’s phone. Oh hello. Hi, Damien. We met once. Isabel is going to have to call you back. She is busy answering questio
ns. How long? She might be answering questions for a very, very long time. Hope you’re enjoying the city. Bye.”
Maggie ended the call and tossed the phone at me.
“You can call him later,” she said.
“Nah, that was perfect,” I said.
Rae mistakenly thought she could derail the conversation by mentioning Mom’s disappearing acts.
“What does Mom do when she’s not here?” Rae asked. “Because I know she’s not at home.”
“Maybe a new hobby,” D suggested.
“She hates hobbies,” I said.
“Let’s take this outside,” Maggie said.
“Let’s keep this inside,” Dad said. “There’s nothing good on TV right now.”
Maggie dramatically tossed a report on Dad’s bed. It was an odd gesture, since the report was obviously related to the Washburn case and would require a lengthy debriefing to bring him up to date.
Since I had helped assemble the report, I knew it contained an impressive collection of witness testimonies on the wrongful-conviction case for Louis Washburn, only decidedly skewed in favor of the prosecution.
“I don’t even know what question to ask first,” Maggie said. “D, you are aware that we are trying to exonerate Louis, not launch a personal attack against his character or provide fodder for the prosecution team?”
“Yes,” D said. He was totally ready to take the fall for me and Rae.
Rae remained silent; however, you could tell she really had something to say.
“Let’s start with an easy question. Why was Rae doing all the prison interviews?”
“I was busy,” D said, “so I asked Rae to step in.”
“Busy doing what, baking cookies?”
Rae and D had one of those silent eyeball conversations. Eventually D spoke.
“I had a panic attack,” he said.
“When?”
“The first time I got to San Quentin.”
“The Big Q,” I said.
D ignored me and continued. “I made it past security and then I started sweating. I couldn’t breathe. I tried one more time, but I couldn’t get out of the car. I can’t do it. I can’t go back there. You were so busy, I didn’t want to bother you. Isabel was gone. Everyone was out of the office, so I asked Rae. We swapped cars, since I figured you’d check the mileage.”
“So that’s how you knew about the tear gas,” I said.
“Tear gas? What tear gas?” Maggie asked.
“Yes. What tear gas?” Dad asked.
“Relax, I went with a stink bomb,” Rae said, tired of the conversation.
“Do we need to talk about tear gas?” Maggie asked.
“No. It’s done. Continue, D,” I said.
“Rae is good at getting information. I thought she’d do a good job.”
“I did a good job,” Rae said defensively.
“Until you decided you just didn’t like him,” Maggie said. “Washburn did not rob that liquor store. The witness has already recanted. What have you got against getting an innocent man out of prison?”
“Nothing,” Rae said, “only I’d bet dollars to donuts that he’s guilty of way more crimes than that.”
“Me too,” I said, raising my hand.
“Be quiet,” Maggie said to me like a schoolteacher. Then she said to D, “Do you agree?”
Dad seemed to be really enjoying this reality TV show.
“I do. He doesn’t want to use DNA evidence. He wants his case to rely solely on witness misidentification,” D said.
“But that’s what applies in his case.”
“Still, there was DNA at the crime scene,” Rae said. “It could help substantiate his claim and he won’t get tested.”
“That’s why you started interviewing other inmates and known associates not on my witness list?”
“Yes,” Rae said.
Dad handed Maggie the lime Jell-O and a spoon.
“D, what do you think?” Maggie asked.
“I think you need to make him do the test,” D said.
Maggie sat down on the bed and opened the seal on the Jell-O.
“You should have told me. I would have never made you go there if I thought it reminded you of—this is disgusting,” Maggie said after taking a spoonful of the lime Jell-O.
Mom found all of us in the hospital room.
“Tralina let everyone stay?” Mom asked.
The next thing we knew, Tralina was kicking everyone out.
“Okay, this isn’t the ferry terminal. Everybody out. Now. Immediately. Albert needs to rest.”
It was my shift, so I stayed put.
Dad showed Tralina the barely consumed lime Jell-O and asked for a cherry.
“Dear, do you have any idea what you’re eating?” Mom asked.
“Water, sugar, and gelatin, which is an animal product rendered from hides and bones. Not cow hooves, like Rae originally said. I looked it up.”
Mom put on her mask and crawled into the narrow bed next to Dad and nestled her head on Dad’s shoulder.
“You can go home, Isabel. We’re good.”
They were good, and it was a sign of how unclearly I was looking at the world that I could have doubted their marriage for even a moment.
* * *
1. Dad hates to see it go to waste.
THROWING IN THE TOWEL
Late that night as I was getting ready for bed, wearing my usual evening attire, a threadbare JUSTICE 4 MERRI-WEATHER T-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms, there was a knock at my back door. Since my last uninvited guest was Henry, I assumed the worst. Or, maybe, in the back of my mind, I was hoping for the worst. Either way, my nerves were as raw as sushi until I opened the door.
“Edward, what are you doing here?”
“I wanted to talk to you.”
“Did your phone battery die?”
“Did your manners die?”
“Please come in,” I said, taking the hint.
As Edward entered my “apartment”1 his eyes darted about the room, studying every detail with disappointment and pity.
“You live here?” he said.
“It’s temporary.”
“This isn’t how a grown woman lives,” he said, opening the refrigerator.
“I’d offer you something to eat, but—”
“Then I’d have to have my stomach pumped.”
“Did I sign up for a home inspection and forget about it?”
“Is there a place to sit?”
“Yes! Sort of.”
There was one old La-Z-Boy, a Bernie leftover,2 in the corner. I pointed at the chair. Edward hesitated but sat down. I took a seat on my bed.
“What’s up?”
“I’m going to step down as head of Slayter Industries,” Edward said. “I’ll make the announcement tomorrow morning. I will remain on the board and we’ll vote for a new CEO.”
“Don’t do this,” I said. “You are not there yet. You can still run the company.”
“Not if someone has me in the crosshairs every minute. I can’t live like that. I was charged with indecent exposure. In my entire life I never thought I’d have to utter that last sentence.”
“You fight them,” I said. “We have the lab tests from the guy in the bar. That whiskey contained Rohypnol, and the bartender will testify.”
Even as I was saying it, Edward and I knew it all sounded too preposterous.
“Isabel, I was held on a 5150 without any explanation. Then I was discovered naked in front of a schoolyard. It’s much more dignified to say I have Alzheimer’s than some mystery man is forcing me into compromising positions. No one will believe it. If I back down, maybe whoever is trying to set you up on the embezzlement scam will stop.”
“What about the indecent exposure charges?” I asked.
“My physician explained my condition to the DA and he’s willing to drop all charges. No record, no probation. Nothing.”
“You already talked to the DA?”
“Yes. Today.”
“So, it’s done?” I asked.
“It’s done.”
“I think you’re making a mistake.”
“We knew this couldn’t go on forever. Maybe I’ll take up golf. I bet Charlie would make an excellent caddie.”
“You hate golf,” I said. “That was always one of my favorite things about you.”
“You’ll find another favorite thing.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “So I guess this means we won’t be going jogging anymore.”
“Nonsense. Now we’ll have more time. Five days a week, minimum. And afterward we can go apartment hunting. Although I don’t know how we’ll find a place as charming as this.”
“Okay, time for you to go.”
Edward got to his feet. He put his arm around me and I walked him the ten steps to my back door. He gave me a reassuring squeeze and said, “I never had any children. The few moments when I entertained the idea, what I envisioned was something so very different from you.”
“Thank you.”
“Let me finish. If I did have a daughter, now I think someone like you would do just fine.”
“When I was fifteen, I had this math teacher who hated me. He had exactly five pairs of shoes he wore on rotation every day of the week. My best friend and I broke into his house, bought or stole another pair of each shoe, wore them down to a match, and swapped out the left for the right, so that one morning he would wake up and have only shoes for his right foot.”
“And you’re telling me this so I know how difficult a child you would have been?” Edward asked, smirking.
“No, I was just bragging.”
“Did you get away with it?”
“Not exactly. Mr. Blind—seriously, that was his name—suspected me all along, but he couldn’t prove anything. So every time I got a math test back after that, whenever I wrote the number three, he’d correct the test as if it were the number nine. If the correct answer was thirty-three, I’d get marked incorrectly since he read it as ninety-nine. The number was clear and I debated him on this until finally Mr. Blind called the principal into the room to make the final call. Mr. Blind pointed to what was clearly the number thirty-three and said, ‘What number is that?’ What do you think Mr. Lang, the principal, said?”
