A Confidential Source

by Jan Brogan

  The big news of the morning was a Dumpster fire in the parking lot of the Ro-Jack’s supermarket. As I was transmitting the five-inch story to Providence, the front door scraped open and Carolyn Rizzuto, my bureau manager and boss, walked in.

  “Hi,” she said, distractedly sorting through a stack of envelopes in her hand. She was often distracted in the mornings. Although she was only eight years older than I was, we were lifetimes apart. At forty-three, she’d had two marriages, two divorces, and two daughters whom she was now raising alone.

  She stood over me, a bag of Poppy’s bagels under her arm and a funny smile on her face.

  “What?”

  She dropped the envelope on my desk. “This was stuck in the mail slot, didn’t you see it?”

  I shook my head. Addressed to Hallie Ahern in Magic Marker, the envelope had no postal marking.

  Carolyn breezed past me, taking off her coat, dyed-blue leather, which she hung up in a closet instead of tossing over her chair. Then she began slicing open two bagels on a cutting board beside the coffee machine. “You wanna peanut butter and cream cheese?” she asked, her back toward me as she began to forage inside our little ice cube of a refrigerator.

  “No, just plain, please,” I replied, tearing open the envelope. Inside was a handwritten note on WKZI stationery.

  Dear Hallie,

  Sorry I screwed up on your name last night. Please don’t stop calling the show.

  Leonard

  I slipped the note into my top drawer as Carolyn approached my desk.

  “That’s why you look the way you do,” Carolyn said, putting the bagel down in front of me on a paper towel.

  She said this almost every morning and when I forgot to pick up cookies on the afternoon tea run. Carolyn was what you would call a full-figured woman, not fat, but with a good-size chest and hips that would not slim no matter how many aerobics classes she took at lunchtime. I ran every morning at dawn, which tended to keep the weight off, but I was still in need of full-scale renovation.

  “Have you seen those new bras at Victoria’s Secret? Very natural looking,” Carolyn would say with a glance at my boyish figure. “Even under a T-shirt.”

  “Shoes can make a very big difference,” she’d say, showing me a Nine West catalog. “And better jewelry.” She didn’t think the small silver half-moons I wore in my ears even counted as jewelry.

  And then, just last week, as if she’d been giving this an enormous amount of thought, she’d said, “A little azure shadow at the crease and under the arch and you’d be amazed by how blue your eyes can be.” She peered at me a little closer. “After you tweeze those brows, of course.”

  She was such a true believer in beauty, so committed to my transformation, that I couldn’t get mad about it. And she was right about the eyebrows.

  The phone rang and Carolyn picked it up. By the sound of the conversation, it had something to do with her older daughter’s habit of forgetting her homework. I took a bite of my bagel and tried to chew. Leonard must have hand-delivered the note last night on his way home from the station. Why had he gone to such trouble?

  “Okay, I’ll drive it over at lunchtime,” Carolyn said. “But this is the last, the absolute last time.” She slammed the phone into the cradle and seethed in silence. Then she turned to me. “You are so lucky you don’t have kids.”

  I nodded, noncommittally. There were only the two of us permanently assigned to this bureau, and sometimes, when I had to cover for her because the kids were sick or had to be driven somewhere, my child-free status worked in my favor. Other times, Carolyn seemed to resent me for it.

  “That friend of yours coming to stay tonight?” she asked.

  She meant Walter. He was my sponsor, a friend I’d met at substance-abuse meetings who’d helped me kick the sleeping pills my doctor had prescribed after my brother, Sean, died. Walter drove a cab in Boston but slept on my futon now and then when he had a late-night gig playing guitar in Providence.

  “Yes.” I felt it necessary to add, “He’s engaged to a good friend of mine.”

  Carolyn shrugged in a manner that suggested that was no barrier. From what she’d told me about her personal life, I’d gathered that she hadn’t hesitated to break up a marriage or two. Once, she’d fixed me up with one of her ex-husband’s coworkers, who, it turned out, wasn’t yet divorced. “Oh, please, it’s just a matter of time. They’re in couples counseling,” she’d said afterward. “And you know how that goes.”

  There was really no use explaining again that Walter was a surrogate brother. Carolyn didn’t seem to understand the parameters of a platonic relationship.

  She dropped into her chair and booted up her computer. Even though she professed to despise all office politics, first thing every morning she dialed Providence and called up the newspaper’s in-house gossip file.

  The Chronicle used its bureaus much like major-league baseball used its farm teams. The occasional “star reporter” might get hired away from a smaller paper right into the downtown newsroom, but most new recruits were assigned to these little bureaus across the state, where they were expected to prove themselves before getting promoted into the city. Bureau managers like Carolyn were former reporters who had developed “management potential” and thus had to cut their teeth as bosses in a bureau before being taken seriously as candidates for a news-editor or department-editor job downtown. Just like in the minor leagues, some would never make it to the pros. And many bureau managers, like Carolyn, claimed an outright preference for the more autonomous hinterlands.

  But whether it was involuntary or by choice, working in the relative isolation of a bureau helped whet an inordinate appetite for in-house gossip. Even the new reporters who hadn’t met each other wanted to know who was getting married or having a baby. But more important, we wanted to know who was getting praise from the editors, who was getting the choice assignments, and who had the inside track into the city.

  Today, though, I had more pressing interests. Opening my drawer to peek at the note, I could make out the big L, the hard slant of Leonard’s signature on the bottom of the paper. I shut the drawer when Carolyn abruptly turned around.

  “Susannah Rodman is leaving the paper for the New York Times,” she said, looking fierce and sad and angry. Even though Carolyn swore she had no interest in a promotion to an editorial job downtown, let alone in leaving the state of Rhode Island, I instantly recognized what she was feeling.

  “Big deal,” I said.

  “Big fucking deal,” Carolyn amended.

  We were silent, internally reeling from how big a deal it really was. From the Providence Morning Chronicle to the New York Times—not too many reporters made that kind of leap.

  “It was her investigative work on the superior court judges a few years back,” Carolyn said at last. “She was on that team that won the Pulitzer.”

  I had never met Susannah Rodman, couldn’t tell you if she was tall or short, or maybe the nicest person in the entire world. But for a single moment, I hated her.

  “You know,” Carolyn said, giving me a sly, sideways look. “They’ll need someone to replace her downtown on the investigative team.”

  When I took this job, I’d promised myself that I’d devote myself exclusively to small-town community reporting, that I’d stay in a quiet little bureau, away from the kind of high-profile investigative stories that could chew up your life and force you into no-win decisions. But the truth was, I was bored out of my mind with school committees and garden clubs. And even though this wasn’t the Boston Ledger, Rhode Island was a petri dish of bizarre stories. The investigative reporters who dug them up were awarded Pulitzers and sent off to the New York Times.

  I choked back the ambition in my throat and tried to make it sound as if it were hypothetical. “You think they’d even consider me?”

  CHAPTER

  2

  THE MAZURSKY MARKET was always busy at the dinner hour. Usually, I didn’t mind. Working in South Kingstown in
the off-season was especially lonely: the highway devoid of cars, the sidewalks and shops practically empty. Back in the city, I was often relieved to be standing elbow to elbow with other people.

  But tonight, I was hoping it would be quiet so I could get a few minutes with Barry, the owner. He was always at the register when I stopped in at night and was the closest thing to a friend I’d made in Providence. He’d steered me to the Green Poker scratch-ticket game and would be excited about my $50 win.

  I’d caught the tail end of the dinner rush. It was raining outside, and the store steamed with warm people. The line at the register was three deep and Barry was in rote mode, eyes fixed on price stickers as he scanned them into his machine. On really slow nights, he had two different newspapers in front of him, the radio playing in the background, and a lit cigarette in a makeshift ashtray. Knowing I worked for the Chronicle, he was always asking me what was the latest from the mayor’s office. He refused to believe I wasn’t privy to inside information. “Just let me know when he’s going to raise my taxes,” he always said.

  On this night, he didn’t even see me wave to him. So I skirted around the people in line and headed across the store to the farthermost aisle and the dairy case.

  It was a good-size market, a deep rectangle with the register in front along the long wall, the deli in back, and six short aisles that ran between them. The store had a nicely polished wood floor and well-tended philodendron plants hanging from ceiling hooks in front of the wall-length plate-glass window that looked out on Angell Street. But all this tastefulness was undercut by the political posters taped on the wall and the pornographic magazines on full display behind the register.

  Two guys, their backs to me, were blocking the milk cooler. The shorter one wore an old navy wool jacket and gray wool cap. Dark hair, thick like fur, ran from the base of the cap down the back of his neck. The other one, at least six feet tall, was wearing a khaki parka. On my approach, the one with the parka turned abruptly and the jacket fell open: He was enormous, with a shiny, square forehead, puffed-up chest, and refrigerator shoulders. He looked like a heavyweight fighter, or maybe a bouncer at a strip club.

  “Fuck,” he said, looking at me as if I’d just cut him off at an intersection.

  The smaller man in the gray cap never turned around; he grabbed a pint of chocolate milk and headed down the aisle, toward the deli counter. The guy in the khaki parka did not seem to register his departure. His left eyelid drooped, burdened by the weight of some kind of sty, but the right eye glared at me.

  “Sorry,” I said, “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  I should have said startle. Apparently, he took my comment as an assault on his manhood. “You didn’t scare me.” His tone was mean and mocking.

  The Mazursky Market had always been a friendly place. I stood there, stunned. Without another look at me, he pulled up the hood of his parka, turned, and headed down the aisle.

  I was still standing there when someone touched my sleeve.

  “You all right?”

  It was a man about my age, and like me, his hair and business suit were drenched from the rain. Immediately, I was struck by the concern in his expression, the openness of a clear, kind face. I’d seen him before. We were often in the market about the same time at night buying takeout from the deli, but had never spoken. I smiled and made an effort to look as if I’d already shaken off the incident. “I’m fine.”

  He watched as I reached into the dairy case for a quart of milk. “Whole milk?” he asked with a glance at my quart. He reached past me to grab a quart of 1 percent.

  “For coffee,” I said. Actually, I drank it by the glass and had it with cereal, but most people seemed to be paying attention to fat grams these days.

  “Ah,” he said, as if illuminating an important point. He smiled and I could see he had a nice mouth and a dimpled chin. I have a thing about men’s chins, and have been misled more than once by a strong jawline. But this guy’s nose saved him from the kind of perfection I’ve learned not to trust in a man. It looked like it might have been broken, giving him a distinct round-the-block look. By this time, I realized that I was analyzing his face for a little too long and quickly turned away.

  Once I got in the register line, I stopped thinking about the rude guy, who had left the store, and was thinking about the quart-of-milk guy who was now just ahead of me in line. He had been flirting with me, I decided. It wasn’t my imagination.

  I left the required distance between us, but I felt his presence as if I were standing much too close. At five foot four, I’m not very tall, and his height loomed over me. I found myself thinking about those high heels Carolyn said made such a difference. Get a grip, Hallie, I told myself, taking a small step backward. Don’t let him see how desperate you are for a date.

  I put my quart of milk on the floor by my feet and began scavenging through my knapsack for my winning lottery ticket. The line moved forward, and I was still in the midst of my search when I noticed that the quart-of-milk guy had turned around and was looking back at me.

  “Can’t find your wallet?” he asked.

  “Scratch ticket,” I confided. “Fifty-dollar winner.”

  I thought his eyes narrowed for a second, as if he thought scratch tickets were beneath me. But then he smiled. “Congratulations. I hope you find it.”

  And then I had one of those rare and wonderful moments when timing works in your favor. My right hand touched the smooth surface of the shiny lottery paper and I pulled it out, as if on cue, and validated myself with a little wave of the ticket.

  He gave me that smile again, but the line moved forward and he turned to put his quart of milk, half a rotisserie chicken, and a plastic container of pasta salad on the counter. I tried to think up some sort of clever way to note that he appeared to be dining alone. Chicken for one? Would that be completely transparent?

  “Hey, Hallie, is that a winner you got there?” Barry asked as he finished ringing up the order.

  “Two queens,” I said.

  “Told you,” Barry said, counting out change. He was just an average-size man, but he had been a marine, and had the kind of Popeye forearms that made him look formidable behind the register.

  The quart-of-milk guy picked up his bag and hesitated, as if he, too, was trying to think of something else to say. “Don’t forget your milk,” he said, gesturing to my quart on the floor.

  “I won’t.”

  Another hesitation, and then: “You live in this neighborhood, right?”

  I nodded.

  “Me, too.”

  I smiled and gave him my best “small world” shrug.

  “Since we’re neighbors, you think sometime that you might want to go somewhere else for dinner?” He frowned down at his grocery bag for a second and then looked up with a hopeful expression.

  Is it crazy to give your phone number to someone you just met in a convenience store? Maybe, but I liked this guy. It wasn’t just that I have a weakness for strong chins; he had kind eyes—something about them seemed unclouded and true. So I nodded.

  He told me his name was Matt Cavanaugh and asked me for my phone number. I tried to seem cool as I grabbed a pen from the counter and wrote it on his grocery bag, but my heart was fluttering. He put the grocery bag with my phone number under his coat to protect it from the rain. And then with a wave to Barry, he was out the door.

  Barry waited until the door closed. “You think you should give your phone number out like that?”

  “I’ve seen him here before,” I said. “And he seemed pretty nice, don’t you think?”

  Barry shrugged and turned back to the register. “You want that all in cash?” He scrutinized my ticket for a minute before opening the register drawer.

  I glanced at the blue lottery terminal beside the register. “Don’t you want to scan it?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Terminal’s down again. Piece of crap. Anybody else I’d make come back. You, Hallie, I trust.”

  My gaze
traveled to the bright colors of the scratch tickets in the plastic dispensers over his head. “How many unclaimed winners left on the Green Poker game?”

  “Like I said, terminal’s down, but the game is getting old. I think the last report said there were only two or three prizes left.”

  “What the hell, give me three tickets,” I heard myself say. It’s not that I didn’t know those were long odds for gambling, it’s just that my life had been a case study of long odds, mostly in the negative sense. I was only thirty-five years old and I’d already lost my brother, my father, and almost an entire career. It seemed to me that if I was the kind of person unlikely bad things happened to, I must also be the kind of person unlikely good things happened to.

  At the present, the world seemed full of possibilities. The last four months had been painfully lonely and now I had a potential date with a cute guy who wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.

  Barry shook his head. “Now that I think about it, there mighta been only one or two prizes left. The Caesar’s Palace game just came out a couple of days ago. It’s still fresh off the presses. Eight or nine prizes left. I’m telling you, I have a feeling about you and Caesar.”

  I shrugged, which he took as an affirmative. He began to reach up to peel off the Caesar tickets, and I realized it was only a $1 game. I glanced at the back. The top prize was only $250,000, which in my current high-stakes mood didn’t seem like much. Plus, I thought about how quickly I’d scratch off three measly cards. “Two of the Green Poker game, too,” I added, impulsively.

  Barry hesitated again.

  “I’ve got a feeling about that leprechaun,” I said. “It’s my night.”

  Barry’s eyes met mine. “You’re in the mood for long odds all around?” This was another reference to my giving my phone number to Matt.

  “Just feeling lucky, that’s all,” I said.

  He handed me the five scratch tickets. “None of my business,” he said, but he still didn’t seem happy about it.