by Greg Herren
I sank back down into my chair. “Oh God.” I started explaining it all to her—the threatening emails, my conversation with Jude, Paul’s history of wrestling video stardom. “That’s how he knew Mark Williams in the first place.” I said.
“Come on.” She walked over to the door and banged on it. One of the Feds who’d been verbally abusing me opened it. “I need access to a computer and the Internet, right now.”
“Sure.” He gave me a look. “Anything we can do to help.”
How about eating your gun, asshole? I thought as he led us to an office and booted up the computer. “What server is Paul on?” I told her, and she pulled it up, then pushed back to make room for me. “Log in.”
I typed in Paul’s account name and blinked back tears as I typed ‘chanse’ into the password line. “You’ve got mail!” the computer told me. I clicked on the envelope, and scrolled through the emails till I found the one from Chris Fowler. I pulled it up. Venus read it quickly then clicked on the printer icon. A printer on top of the file cabinet next to the desk began printing. She turned to the DMV terminal on the credenza behind the desk. She logged in, then typed in Mississippi + Chris Fowler and clicked ‘search.’
The registration came up within seconds. Christopher Fowler, of Forest Road in Bay St. Louis.
A 1988 Oldsmobile Delta Royale 88, blue.
“Now, that’s probable fucking cause.” Venus snapped her fingers. She pulled out her cell phone and dialed. “I need you to patch me through to the district attorney’s office in Bay St. Louis now.” She walked over to the window, tapping her foot. “Yes, hello, this is Detective Venus Casanova with the Eighth District of New Orleans….” I tuned her out as she explained what she needed, what was going on. “Bingo!” she clicked the phone closed, and then faxed the email printout to a number. “You up for a road trip?” She asked. “The sheriff is going to meet us at the house with the warrant. You can’t go in—“
“Try and stop me from going.” I glared at her. She just nodded and motioned for me to follow her.
Five minutes later we were in Venus’ SUV, her bubble light on top, the siren blasting as she headed for I-10. I stared out the window as we flew down the highway, weaving in and out of cars at a speed I didn’t care to know.
He’d been there. I’d been so fucking close. I’d sat on his fucking sofa while he lied through his goddamned teeth to me—and Paul had been there the whole time. He wasn’t hiding out there. Paul knew I’d be worried, Paige would be worried—and if he heard my voice and was able to, he’d have let me know he was there.
He hadn’t been able to.
The fucking ghost man was keeping him a prisoner.
Or he’s buried in the back yard somewhere, an insidious voice said in my head. Or maybe there are pieces of him wrapped up in butcher paper in the freezer.
No, he’s not. I’d know. I would know if he were dead.
I heard Mrs. Dahlgren’s voice in my head, “A mother would know if her child was dead, wouldn’t she?”
She hadn’t known. Ricky had been at the bottom of Barataria Bay for days when she’d said that to me. She’d been in denial, that’s all. I knew Paul was alive. I knew it.
Hang on honey, I’m on my way, I telepathically told Paul. Paige believed in that kind of stuff, in sending out positive energy and drawing strength from other people’s positive energy. I wasn’t sure if I was doing it right, but I closed my eyes and thought about Paul and about how much I loved him. I knew that he would sense it, and keep himself alive. He was alive.
He had to be. There was too much I had to say to him, too many things we had to do together yet. We were going to grow old together. We’d joked about it, the two of us in a gay retired home in rocking chairs with comforters over our legs. “With cute young male nurses,” Paul would say with a big grin on his face.
“You doing okay?” Venus asked as we flew over the lake bridge.
I nodded.
“It could just be a coincidence, Fowler having the same kind of car, you know.” Her mouth worked. “You got any smokes on you?”
I reached into my pocket and shook one out for her. She rolled down her window, then lit it. “I think I’ve run out of coincidences lately, Venus. I’ve had more than my fair share.”
She patted my leg. “It’s going to be okay.”
I just looked out the window as the neon lights of Slidell flew past. We had to be going over a hundred miles per hour. The siren kept screaming as we passed cars like they were standing still. We crossed the state line and zipped right through Waveland like it wasn’t even there. When we reached the city limits of Bay St. Louis, Venus radioed for the sheriff, switching off the siren. “Have you got the warrant?”
A thick Mississippi voice replied, “The judge just signed it, ma’am. We’ll be at the house in a few minutes.”
“We’ll wait for you.”
I guided Venus through the city, and then we were driving down Forest Road. “That’s the house up ahead.” I said. Venus stopped and parked the SUV on the side of the road. She pulled her gun out of its holster and took the safety off. “Stay behind me.” She said. She gave me a lopsided grin. “I’d tell you to stay here but you wouldn’t do that, would you?”
“No.”
We got out of the SUV, closing the doors carefully so they didn’t make a sound, and walked through the darkness to the foot of the driveway. The house was dark and silent, but that didn’t mean anything. He didn’t like the light.
A police car came up Forest Road from the other direction and stopped in front of us. Both doors opened, and two uniforms got out. One was in his late fifties, but he wasn’t the stereotype of the small Southern town sheriff. He was in good shape, his body all lean hard muscle. The other was younger, about my age. Venus flashed her ID at them. “You guys lead the way.” She said.
“Who’s this?” the younger one said, indicating me, shining a flashlight into my face.
“My partner.” Venus lied without missing a beat.
We followed them up the driveway onto the porch.
Something was wrong. I could sense it once I stepped onto the porch.
The sheriff started pounding on the door. “Mr. Fowler! Mr. Fowler! It’s the sheriff! Open up!” he shouted.
Nothing.
He looked over at Venus. “I got a warrant.”
“Break it down.” She ordered.
He nodded at the younger one, who stepped back and raised his foot. The door exploded open from the force of his kick, the doorframe breaking and splintered wood flying in all directions.
I recoiled. I smelled death.
The sheriff shone his flashlight inside, over piles of garbage. Cats ran back and forth, making plaintive noises. A couple made their way over to us, rubbing on our legs. The younger cop shone his light on the walls, finally finding a lightswitch and flicking it. The room flooded with light. It was even worse with the lights on.
I turned my head to where the poster of Paul had been the other day.
It had been slashed to pieces in its frame, except for the face. “Venus.” I pointed to it.
“Oh, Christ.” She said. She walked over to it.
The local cops walked into the kitchen and turned on the light in there. I could see through the door. It was just as disgusting as the living room. Fowler lived like a pig. The odor of cat urine was overpowering. Cats scattered. “Looks like we’re gonna have to call Animal Control.” The young one said.
The sheriff turned on the hall light and started opening doors. “Oh, Christ!” he half-shouted. “Detective Casanova! Can you get in here quick! Shelby, call the paramedics!”
My heart leapt into my throat as I followed Venus down the hallway. We carefully stepped over trash, dirty clothes,and piles of cat shit. Venus stopped cold in the doorway. “Oh dear God in heaven.” She turned. “No, Chanse, don’t go in there.”
I pushed her aside and stepped through the door.
“Paul.” I managed to croak out as I m
oved in what seemed like slow motion to the bed.
He was naked and shackled to the bed, spread eagled over the mattress. The sheets were filthy with human excrement. His skin looked white, too white. The sheriff was trying to find a pulse. His eyes were closed. Dried blood covered the left side of his face. “He’s alive,” the sheriff said, “but barely.”
I reached for his hand. It was cold. “Paul.” I whispered, and started shaking.
I rode with him to the hospital in the ambulance. The paramedics pumped adrenaline into him, The head injury was bad, and I could see the size of the blow as they cleaned the wound. He remained unconscious the entire way.
“Wake up, honey, I’m here,” I whispered, sitting in my little corner of the ambulance as it screamed through the Mississippi night. “You’re going to be okay, you know.”
They took him into the emergency room, and I answered questions for a kind faced nurse. When we were finished, Venus led me into the waiting room. “He’s going to be okay, Chanse.” She held my hand so tight it hurt. “You’ll see.”
And we waited.
And waited.
Sometime, I don’t know when, Paige arrived, her face white and her lips trembling. Her make up was smeared with tears. She threw her arms around me before I could even get up and sobbed for I don’t know how long. “Have they said anything?” she asked, her voice shaking.
I just shook my head.
The Maxwells came in right behind her. Their faces were just as white and strained, but Fee gave me a big hug. “Now, Chanse, me love, don’t you worry, everything’s going to be just fine, my Paul’s a fighter, you wait and see.” But her smile and her tone were lies. I could see the fear in her eyes and in Ian’s. It was also there in the way they gripped their rosaries as they paced around the waiting room.
A doctor came into the waiting room and cleared his throat. “Mr. and Mrs. Maxwell?” he asked.
We all rose. “May I speak with you privately?” he asked.
“We’re all family here.” Fee said fiercely, putting an arm around me while Ian put an arm around Paige and Venus.
“I’m sorry, but the head injury is too severe. We can’t do anything for him here.” He said. “I’ve arranged for a helicoptor to take him to Touro in New Orleans. They’ll be able to do a lot more for him there.”
My knees buckled, but somehow Fee managed to keep me standing.
“They’ll take him right into surgery.” He went on.
“So, we’ll be needing to get back to New Orleans, then?” This from Ian.
The doctor nodded. “He’ll be leaving soon.”
“Thank you, doctor.” Fee gave him a hug, which startled him, and then he walked back out.
“Well, who’ll be riding with who then?” Fee asked.
Chapter Twenty
I rode back with Paige but I don’t really remember much of it. She was blaring Norah Jones on her car stereo and chain smoking, lighting a new one from the butt of another. All I can remember is the blurry shapes of things as the car went past. Paige was driving fast. This usually worried me, but I didn’t really care this time. All I could think about was how messy Fowler’s house had been, how much that must have bothered Paul. Paul liked everything just so. I mean, he organized his clothes by type and color. His socks all had to be lined up the same way in the sock drawer. His underwear was folded this way and was also sorted by color and maker. The filth, the clutter, must have driven him insane. But then again, it was also probably likely he’d been unconscious the whole time he’d been there, which was what, three, four days? That couldn’t be good. That head injury must have really done a number on him. I wondered why there had been so little blood—head injuries really bleed a lot. Fowler must have conked him in the kitchen, carried him down the stairs and to his car—missing the walk with his first step down and stepping into the flowerbed. Then, he probably just put him in the trunk, went back upstairs, beat off on the bed, stole the print and defaced the other.
And I had sat in that disgusting living room, in the gloom, with the cats and the smells and a fucking psychotic murdering fuck just a few feet away—and Paul, unconscious just down the hall, shackled naked to a bed and covered in his own filth. I started shaking, my stomach lurching. I rolled down the window and gulped in fresh air. We were just reaching the lake bridge.
Paige turned down the stereo. “You doing okay, babe?”
“No, not really.” The cool lake air felt great on my hot face, and the sweat forming at my hair line dried. My stomach settled down a bit.
“You wanna talk about it?”
“No.” I couldn’t. I didn’t want to hear the words I would say out loud. I didn’t want anyone to hear them—at least not yet, I might be ready later, but not quite yet. It was odd. I was feeling so many different emotions all at the same time—I would switch from one to another before it could take over completely. I wanted to laugh with relief. I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream. I wanted to throw up, I wanted to get my mind to slow down.
And I wanted to feel something. Anything. Anything other than this horrible distortion of reality, this nightmarish thing my life had become in just a few hours, wake up from it and let it fade with the light of the next morning.
Nothing I could have done would have altered this.
Bullshit as it was, it was something. I had no control over the sequence of events. I didn’t know Paul made videos and therefore he was afraid to tell me he had a stalker. Had I known, maybe…
But then again, Paul felt like he couldn’t tell me about any of it. Why would he have felt I was capable of hearing it in a rational, calm manner and wouldn’t have been jealous? I proved his fears right, didn’t I? But then I could convince myself that my violent reaction was partly due to finding out after he’d been arrested for killing someone. I was in a vulnerable, emotionally raw state, and did not react the way I would have under ordinary circumstances.
“Well, I need to talk.” Paige said, throwing a cigarette out the window.
I reeled myself in from the discussion in my head and turned my head to look at her. She looked terrible. She’d been driving with her window cracked for her cigarette smoke to go out of, and her hair had been blown to shit. She’d been crying, and now her mascara hung in big clumps at the end of her lashes. I’d never really noticed she wore a bit of foundation before, but now I saw where the tears had run through it. Her face was paler than I’d ever seen her, and there were dark circles of worry under her eyes.
“So, I’m sorry, if you don’t need to talk—that’s fine, and if you don’t want to listen to me, just tune me out.” She went on without even looking over at me. Her eyes were focused on the road in front of her and weaving around cars. “I mean, he’s going to be fine, right, I mean, surgeons are miracle workers these days but he’ll make it, he isn’t going to die, right. I mean..”
I turned my head back to the window and watched as we reached the south shore. I could hear her voice going on, but I couldn’t understand what she was saying without looking at her. I didn’t want to look at her. It was fine, really. She loved Paul too and the way she had to deal with all of this was to talk—about nothing at all really— or to convince herself the worst wouldn’t happen. Maybe she was talking herself into it. I wished I could.
I wished it was Monday morning. I could see it all so clearly in my head. Sunday night we’d rented a couple of tearjerker women’s movies—Paul and I were both suckers for a good old heroine-suffers-bravely-to-die-at-the-end movie—and had gone to bed after Susan Sarandon finally accepted Julia Roberts as her replacement in “Stepmom.” We argued awhile about whether or not the movie fit the genre; Paul’s theory was that since Susan’s character didn’t die until after the credits rolled, it didn’t, mine was it was still about fatal illness. We finally compromised by moving it into Fatal Disease of the Week movie. When we’d gone to bed, Paul was in the mood and I hadn’t been. I was tired. I’d been doing my quarterly report for Castle Oil, one of my bigger s
ecurity clients, and had been staring at my computer screen for three days. So, instead, Paul went back into the living room to watch a sex video and pleasure himself. I was asleep before he made it to bed that night. The next morning, though, I woke up with him right up to my back, with one of his legs and arms thrown over mine. I could feel his breath on my neck. I woke up before the alarm, but rather then getting up I just laid there, thinking how nice it felt—
It might have been the last time.
Everything came over me at once. Paul could die; Paul could die; he might be dying now. I might not ever get to talk to him again, I might not get to tell him anything, My God, the last night we spent together I didn’t want to have sex. Oh my God please let me have that chance back, please give me another moment to hold him, to kiss him, to tell him how much I love him—
My lungs felt like they were going to explode so I stuck my head back out the window and opened my mouth. Centifugal force pushed air down into my windpipe until I finally coughed it back out and began to breath, deeply and slowly, making that horrible gulping sound every time I inhaled.
“Are you okay?” Paige’s hands were shaking on the steering wheel.
“Now, now I am.” I took a couple of deep breaths and put my hands on the dashboard to keep them from shaking. “I’m melting down, Paige. I’m trying to hold it together, but I don’t know if I can.”
“When your mind starts going fast, it’s time to slow down and take deep breaths to fight off.” She tossed her pack at me. “Can you light this for me? I can’t drive, hold it together and light a cigarette at the same time anymore.” She laughed. “I guess I’m getting older. I used to be able to do this quite easily.”
There was pain in her voice, pain from a distant place she’d locked away in her head.
She wiped a tear away with a trembling hand, and then took the cigarette from me. After a long inhale, she blew the smoke out the window through the side of her mouth. “Yeah. I always thought I’d gotten used to it. But I haven’t.”
“Paige…”
