Tribe

by R. D. Zimmerman

  That was three years ago. Three and a half years, actually, and not a word or any news from him since. He'd just disappeared. Perhaps her honesty had frightened him. Perhaps she'd been too lawyerly, too probing. Perhaps she'd looked too formidable in her pretrial blue pinstripe suit that made her appear distinctly tight and conservative. Or maybe he'd vanished because he really couldn't handle the fact that she was a dyke.

  Shit, thought Janice, hugging her dark blue wool coat around herself, it was too cold for this kind of thing. Early January in Minnesota was no time to be sitting in your car in some snow-whitened parking lot, waiting for a punk to show up. If he showed up. She shivered and rubbed herself, then wiped a film of fog off the inside of the windshield and peered out. It was a classic Minnesota winter night, the famous kind—fourteen below, the night sky clear, the air still and amazingly pure. A car drew in from the street, and two people got out and ran for the glaring lights and promised warmth of the supermarket.

  A month ago she couldn't take it anymore, so she went out and bought the one and only Christmas card she was to send that season. Janice wrote a brief note inside, included a couple of photos, and then mailed it off to the only address she had for him, printing on the front please forward. Ever since she'd dropped it in the mail Janice had wondered if he received it, and then finally at four this afternoon the response came. She'd been sitting at her desk, reviewing a case on a woman who'd been fired from a computer firm, when the call came. He was in town again, he told her, and he desperately needed to see her. They could meet tonight, right? Behind his pushy request she'd immediately sensed some sort of trouble—could it be drugs again?—but she was so stunned to hear from him that she didn't ask. Yes, she'd replied, for in truth she'd meet him anywhere, anytime. Eight this evening. Sure, the parking lot of Rainbow Foods at Lagoon and Dupont. Of course she knew where that was, right in south Minneapolis, right on the edge of Uptown, the trendy and popular neighborhood adjacent to the chain of now frozen lakes.

  Janice tilted her rearview mirror and checked herself in the faint light. She'd changed after work and now wore jeans and a red wool sweater that complemented her deep-auburn hair. Perhaps they'd go out for coffee and he'd tell her what was up; they certainly couldn't sit out here very long. With any luck she'd get him back to her house. She dabbed at her makeup, tried to soften it a bit, for she didn't want to look like a hard-ass defense attorney who regularly went up against the top lawyers in town. She just wanted to look like her real self—a forty-two-year-old woman who was trim, her narrow face attractive, her mouth always ready with an eager laugh. She didn't want him to sense, however, the emptiness in her heart.

  Janice's car windows were fogging up badly, and she turned a knob until the heater died and the defroster began to spew full blast. Glancing at the car clock, Janice saw that it was ten after eight. Maybe he wasn't going to show. On the phone he'd said there was something he had to tell her, but maybe he'd chickened out. Perhaps he was afraid or perhaps he couldn't bring himself to trust her after all.

  The lights of another car swept off Lagoon Avenue and toward her, and Janice felt her stomach tighten. It was a small car, blue and old and rusty from countless winters. A kid's car? Probably. Studying the vehicle as it pulled into the parking lot, however, Janice couldn't really see much, for the windows on that car were mostly iced over as well. But there was just one person in there, wasn't there? Right. She saw a head of long hair but couldn't tell if the driver was a man or a woman. Her eyes trained on the vehicle, Janice watched as the car came to a stop some forty feet away. Though she had followed his directions and parked in the exact snow-filled corner, she wondered if she should climb out of her own car and identify herself, call out to him perhaps. She twisted around, saw a figure emerging from the other car, bundled in a thick nylon parka.

  Damn, a young woman. Janice couldn't really see the face, but she could see a purse and—

  Her entire car seemed to shake as the passenger door was hurled open. A large bundled and hooded figure descended rapidly into her car, and Janice tensed and threw herself against the seat. Reflexively, she grabbed the door handle, for more than anything it seemed that she was about to be accosted. The figure then slammed shut the door, sat there for a moment, and finally pulled back his large black hood.

  “Shit, it's cold.”

  As was seldom the case, Janice was at a loss for words. He was no longer a boy but a young man, his once long hair now as short as if he were in the army. His baby face had melted away as well, he'd grown so that he had to be over six feet tall, and despite the overcoat she guessed that there were broad shoulders beneath that bulky parka. The shading of a beard lined his chilled red cheeks, and the eyebrows had indeed grown thick, just as she had imagined. She hadn't foreseen, however, the dark circles beneath his eyes.

  Oh, God. Somewhere deep inside herself Janice moaned silently, and her entire body flushed with a deep, penetrating warmth. She had to have him, this Zebulun. She had to take him and hold him in her arms. She had to kiss this gorgeous young man and tell him how she loved him with every part of her being and that never, not for one moment, had she ever stopped thinking of him. And she had to tell him how she never wanted to lose him again.

  Instead, attorney Janice Gray clenched down on her teeth and held herself in check.

  “Hello, Zeb,” she said.

  They stared at each other in the faint light of her Honda Prelude. There was so much to say, so much to catch up on.

  “Hi,” he replied, his voice hesitant and low and deep.

  “How have you been?”

  He wrapped his arms oddly, nervously, around his waist and looked away. His profile silhouetted by the parking-lot lights, she was struck as much by his beauty as his seriousness. Every trace of boyishness seemed to have been eradicated, and this adulthood saddened Janice.

  Finally he replied, “I've been better.”

  “You want to get a cup of coffee?”

  Obviously disturbed about something, he quickly said, “No.”

  All Janice could imagine was that he found her disgusting. Watching as his hands fumbled around his waist—what the hell was he doing, did he have something hidden beneath the folds of his parka?—Janice felt her heart ripping in two. She shouldn't have come. This was far too hard, for she already sensed that he was going to disappear again.

  “Zeb…” Janice clenched her eyes shut, forbidding herself to cry, telling herself that, no, she couldn't beg him to stay this time forever and ever. “What is it? Why did you call?”

  “I needed to see you.”

  “But why?”

  “I'm in trouble.”

  “What do you mean? What's happened?”

  “I…I…”

  He stopped his muttering, and Janice watched as Zeb slowly unzipped his parka with one gloved hand. He most definitely did have something stowed away beneath his coat, she realized as an awkward bundle began to emerge. Dear God, she feared, he's not going to hurt me, is he?

  And then there was a slight cry. Janice couldn't believe it. The entire world seemed to stop.

  “Beautiful, isn't she?” asked Zeb, a proud grin emerging on his sullen face.

  “Oh, Lord,” gasped Janice. “Is…is she yours?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Zeb lifted a baby girl—a tiny thing not more than a few months old—from his coat. Bundled in a pink snowsuit, a pure white cotton knit blanket, and a white knit hat tied on her bitty head, the infant squirmed and cried until Zeb pressed his cheek to her face and cooed softly in her ear.

  The young man turned to Janice and said, “Would you like to hold her?”

  A weird sensation went charging through Janice, for she had never known that horror and joy could fuse together into an altogether new and bizarre emotion, a paralyzing one at that. She stared at this tiny baby girl—admired the dark curl of hair that hung on her forehead, her little nose, thin lips—and couldn't speak, couldn't move. Her own breathing started coming short
and quick, and for a fretful second Janice feared she was having a panic attack, which she quickly dismissed when she realized her heart was pumping wildly and purely with unbridled happiness.

  As he held her toward Janice, Zeb softly said, “Here.”

  A dam of tears broke from Janice's eyes, and she nodded. Yes, Janice wanted to scream, let me take this treasure, let me hold her and rock her and love her. And in the front seat of the Honda Prelude Zeb awkwardly passed the baby girl, and Janice took her and thought she'd never seen so beautiful a child.

  “Oh, my God, I can't believe it. How old?”

  “Four and a half months.” Zeb pulled out a small can and a vial and set them on the dashboard. “This is her formula and her drops. She's fine, but she has to have these drops three times a day.”

  “She's perfect.”

  “I know. And I love her. With all my heart I love her.”

  “Of course you do.”

  “But will you tell her that?”

  “What?” asked Janice, briefly looking up.

  “If anything ever happens to me, will you tell her that?”

  “Of course, but dear God, Zeb, don't talk like that. This child's an angel. She'll protect us all.” Janice bent forward, pressed her lips against the silky softness of the baby's cheeks. “Zeb, she's…she's just so beautiful. What's her name?”

  “Ribka.”

  “Ribka,” repeated Janice, letting the name hang in the air. “That's a pretty name.”

  He hesitated, then added, “I wanted to name her after you, but it all got really complicated.”

  Janice could only manage to mutter a small “Oh.”

  All the pain, all the sorrow of Janice's life came rushing forward, focusing on the joy she now held in her arms. A sob rose from the deepest, darkest corner of her soul, and she held the little baby in her arms and cried and cried, for now she understood there were indeed miracles.

  Zeb said, “Tell her every day that I'll be back soon.”

  Over her own crying, Janice barely heard. “What?”

  “I'm in serious trouble. Don't come looking for me. Promise me that? Don't come after me. I just don't want anything to happen to the baby.”

  “Zeb, what are you saying?”

  “I don't want them to hurt her. That's why I'm giving her to you.”

  Janice began to panic. What had he gotten himself involved in? Smoking a joint or two in your teens was one thing, but could it be anything more serious, could the problem have gotten worse, was he doing heroin? Oh, Christ, she thought, what if he's dealing?

  Janice demanded, “Zeb, what the hell are you talking about?”

  “I need to hide her so no one can find her. I've got some things to straighten out. Don't worry, I'll be around—I just interviewed for a job at a hospital in Edina.”

  The baby twisted in her arms and she glanced down, saw this infant and her dark curls, a greater gift than Janice could ever have hoped for. But then she heard something click, saw Zeb's thick, gloved hand reaching for the door. Who could be after him and what would they do if they found him?

  Seized by panic, Janice awkwardly grabbed him by the sleeve. “Zeb!”

  “I'm sorry.” He turned toward her, his own eyes glistening with tears that would freeze as soon as he stepped into the wintry night. “Don't worry, I'll be back. Just don't come after me or they'll hurt her too.”

  “Who?”

  “You don't understand, I'm just trying to protect her.”

  “Zeb, no!”

  But she couldn't stop him, and the son Janice Gray had given up for adoption when he was three days old scrambled out of her red Honda Prelude and disappeared into the frigid Minnesota night.

  2

  The brilliancy of a Minnesota winter never ceased to remind Todd of the gray Chicago winters he'd left behind. Sipping his first cup of coffee of the day, he sat on his black leather couch, the dazzling light pouring in through the windows of his fifteenth-floor condo. Of course it was colder than hell up here in Minneapolis—the night before last the thermometer had dipped to twenty-three below—but the frigid temperatures came only when the arctic blasts cleared the skies of every bit of cloud cover. Not like Chicago, where the days stretched warmer perhaps, but dull and damp, Lake Michigan attracting winter gloom like a meteorological magnet.

  The sun wasn't supposed to last forever though. Nor the cold. The frigid snap was due to end about noon today, according to every educated guess, of which there tended to be a great, great number in Minnesota. The clouds were supposed to move in, the temperature rise all the way to twenty, and then, of course, the snow was expected to come falling. Lots of it, which was all they'd been talking about at the grocery stores around town as people loaded up on supplies. Todd now glanced outside, and squinting he saw the distant bright sail of an ice sailboard go zipping across Lake Calhoun. He almost preferred the clarity of the cold to the expected heat wave.

  Having gotten out of bed only ten minutes earlier, he stretched and yawned and rubbed his stubbly beard. He wore a large gray T-shirt, faded blue jeans, no socks. Now in his early forties, his light brown hair was just beginning to gray, and he took pride in being in almost as good shape as he was in his college days. Maybe today he'd go to the gym. Maybe not. He hadn't worked a day since his lover Michael had been murdered and the scandal of their relationship broadcast on all the media. And he didn't know if he'd ever work in television again, not because he hadn't had any offers but because that drive, that thirst, seemed to have evaporated. Hard to imagine that less than six months ago he'd won two Emmys, been the hottest TV reporter in town if not the Midwest, and was about to be offered the anchor position on Channel 7. And now? Perhaps this was a mid-life crisis. If that were the case, though, shouldn't he be in turmoil or at least experiencing angst of some kind instead of this subtle sense of peace?

  He took another sip of coffee, then reached for the shoe box full of photographs that sat on the coffee table. Among the many things he wanted to accomplish in this, his first pause in his professional life—he'd taken his first job at a public television station just a week after graduating from Northwestern twenty years ago and had worked constantly since—was to sort through all these pictures and get them into some albums. He also wanted to paint the second bedroom that he used as his office. Get some new skates. And do some writing about what it was like to be closeted for so long in the television industry.

  Pulling out a handful of pictures, he came to one of his father taken not long after he'd emigrated from Poland following World War II. There he was, strong and smiling, dressed in a suit, hair slicked back, square-jawed and striking. The man who'd studied in Warsaw to be a doctor and ended working in an automotive parts plant in Chicago. The man who'd castrated the family name from Milkowski to Mills. The man who'd married an American beauty and never spoken his native language again. He and Todd had some terrible fights, particularly in the latter vodka-sodden years.

  There were pictures of their cat, the huge black one, Trix. The little brick bungalow in Chicago that was the family's first house. The big station wagon, all shiny and new. The trip to Yellowstone. His kid brother, Timmy, once so scrawny and shy, standing there in shorts and a Davy Crockett raccoon hat, now a stockbroker in New York. His mother, simple and sweet and beautiful. And young. Todd peered at the picture, shocked at how youthful she looked, her hair dark and thick, her face so slender. Now she lived in a trailer park in Florida, white-haired and happy, her own life having had a renaissance with the death of her husband. In the next bunch Todd fished out a handful of photos from college. His dad had been so proud that his oldest son had gotten into Northwestern, and there was a snapshot of them loading the car with Todd's things, another of them unloading the car, yet another of his mom and him and awkward Timmy on the front steps of the dorm. Oh, brother. He remembered his dad and that camera and that first day. Snap, snap, snap. It had been so embarrassing.

  “What are you grinning about?”

  Tod
d looked up, saw Steve Rawlins stumbling out of the hall and wearing Todd's white terry cloth robe. He was shorter, a tad stockier than Todd, and his brown hair was ruffled, his dark eyes puffy. Of all the things since Michael's death, this budding romance with the police detective had been one of the most confusing. Rawlins was more than good-looking. More than nice. But…

  “Well, look who's up,” said Todd.

  “Some of us have to work, you know.”

  “Hey, I've been working. I made coffee.”

  There was no need to tell him where the mugs were, because Rawlins had been spending at least a couple of nights a week here for the last two or three months. And he would have been staying more but for Todd's reticence. Simply, now that Todd was out of the closet in a major-league way, he wasn't sure if a full-blown, monogamous relationship was what he wanted or needed right now. He'd never just dated around, let alone gotten to know himself as an openly gay man. So if this wasn't the time for these things, when would it be?

  He asked, “What do you want for breakfast?”

  “Just coffee,” said Rawlins as he poured himself some. “I'm supposed to be down at the station in a half hour, so I'd better get in the shower. Will I see you tonight?”

  “Actually, I'm busy.” Seeing the all-too-obvious disappointment on Rawlins's face, Todd added, “I'm having dinner with Janice.”

  “I see.”

  The answer didn't seem to appease Rawlins. Which was part of the problem. Todd needed space. Time. Not guilt at not giving himself fully to Rawlins. So even though he was a tad resentful at explaining just why Rawlins wouldn't be welcome at dinner, he knew he had to. After all, Todd wasn't sure he wanted to lose Rawlins either.

  “Sorry,” Todd said, “but Janice has got a sitter so the two of us can go out. She specifically asked that I come alone— she promised she's finally going to tell me what's going on with her and this baby.”

  “Oh,” he replied, his voice rather flat. “A good story there, I bet.”