by Thomas Scott
“Why didn’t you just bring it to the bar?”
“How about we go inside?” They walked through the front door with Murton leading the way. They were only a few steps inside when he stopped and turned around. “What gives, Jonesy? I thought you said you had something for me. The place is empty. Where’s all your dad’s stuff?”
“I had the mover’s put it in storage. You can have anything you want, Murt. Just let me know and I’ll get you the key. I had everything stored because I thought maybe you might want your own stuff here. You know, a way to sort of make the place your own.”
Murton visibly swallowed and opened his mouth to say something, then closed it just as quick. He looked around the front room, walked into the kitchen and then back out again. “What are you saying? You’re giving me your old man’s house?”
Virgil smiled at him. “I wish I could take the credit, but I can’t.” He pulled the deed from his pocket and handed it to Murton. “I’m not giving you his house, Murt. My dad is. He left it to you in his will.”
__________
They rode back to the bar with little conversation. After pulling into the rear lot, Murton turned and looked at Virgil.
“What?” Virgil said.
“I’m not sure I know what to say. His house? It’s too much, man. I’m not going to take his house.”
“Well not to put too fine a point on it, Murt, but it’s already yours. He left it to you, just like your percentage of the bar. You own it, free and clear.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“What’s not to believe? He wanted you specifically to have it.”
“Why?”
For reasons Virgil could not readily explain, he found himself irritated. “Why? What do you mean why?” he said, his voice louder than necessary. “Jesus Christ, Murt, that is a hell of a thing for you to say to me after everything we’ve been through.” He laughed without humor. “And people are questioning my judgment lately?” But when Virgil saw the effect his words had on his friend he wanted to try again, except Murton cut him off.
“I’m going inside. Thanks for the trip down memory lane. What time is it anyway? You sound like you might be ready for your medicine.” He slammed the door and walked away.
How much damage can one guy do in a single day? Virgil thought.
10
__________
Sandy was already asleep when he got home. Virgil thought about waking her so he could apologize and explain his feelings in a way that might put them back on track, but in the end, he simply let her sleep. He went into the kitchen and poured a glass of ice water, but when he raised it to his lips his hand shook so badly he had to set the glass back down. He pulled out his pills and set them on the counter, then reached into the silverware drawer for a straw. And that’s when it happened. He took a pair of kitchen shears and cut the straw down to half its original length, then put both of the pain pills between two spoons and ground them together until they were a fine blue powder. He dumped the powder into a little pile and used the handle of the spoon to draw out two lines then bent over and snorted the medication through the straw, one line for each nostril.
The rush hit him at once, the warmth and lightheadedness something like a surprise meeting of a long lost friend or lover. When he stood and turned from the counter he saw that Sandy was standing behind him, her blonde hair askew, sleep lines etched across one side of her face, her naked body warm and inviting. The look she gave Virgil was one he would not soon forget, if ever. She covered her breasts and pubic area with her arms and hands and ran back to the bedroom. When she snapped the lock into place on the knob, the finality of the noise reminded him of the sound a jail cell door makes as it clangs shut.
He stood there, a cut down straw in his hand, the buzzing in his head as loud as a gas-powered leaf blower, blood pounding through the dark rivers of his heart. But when he picked up the glass of water, his hand was rock steady.
__________
He knocked on the bedroom door but Sandy refused to acknowledge his presence, so he walked outside and sat down in a lawn chair near the edge of the pond and stared across the black water. The moon was out and full, the night sky cloudless and when he looked up and cupped his hands around his eyes and blocked out the ambient light it felt like he could see halfway across the galaxy. Tree frogs and crickets sang in the darkness and Virgil thought were it not for his addiction and the people he continued to abuse with his own selfishness and indignation, the night might have been a grand one indeed.
A sense of calm floated over him as he stared upward into the night sky. At some point he fell asleep for a while and just a few seconds after he woke and without warning, the tree frogs and crickets stopped their nocturnal calls and the buzzing in his head went quiet. He closed his eyes again and folded his hands into his lap. A soft breeze blew across the pond and tickled his face. When he spoke, he thought he sounded like a fool. “I’m not doing very well, am I?”
“No, Son, I don’t suppose you are.”
Virgil opened his eyes and looked at his father’s willow tree. Mason stood there, just like before, visible behind the hanging branches. “Lately I’m having some difficulty distinguishing reality from fantasy, Dad.”
“I’m not surprised. When you flood your system with mind-altering chemicals, you’re not foolish enough to believe that they won’t have any ill effects, are you?”
Virgil didn’t ignore the question, but he didn’t answer it, either. “I don’t know what to do.”
“The answer is right in front of you, Virgil. It has been all along. You do know what to do, you simply refuse to do it.”
“You may as well ask me to stop my own heart from beating. That’s how much control I have over it.”
“That’s a bullshit cop-out, Virg and you know it.”
“They let you swear in heaven?”
Mason smiled and the lines on his face looked like a familiar road map one might consult out of ritual rather than necessity before taking a well-known cross-country journey. “One of the first things you learn when you come back home is that there isn’t anything you can do that is ever wrong.”
“So it’s not like it is here, huh?”
Mason laughed. “No, Virg, it sure isn’t. But you already know that. You just can’t remember it. But you will, when your time comes.”
Virgil looked away from his father for a long time…so long in fact, that he thought his dad might be gone when he looked back. But he was still there, now seated at the base of the tree, his fingers interlaced behind his head, his legs crossed at the ankles.
“I feel like my time might be right around the corner.”
“It’s not hard to understand why you might feel that way.”
“Are you real?”
“We’re talking aren’t we?”
Virgil nodded at him. “Yeah, we are. I just don’t think that answers my question. Are you chained to that tree or can you move around?”
He stood up and dusted off the seat of his pants with his hands, an act that Virgil found odd. “You’re asking all the wrong questions, Son.”
“Am I, Dad? Never mind. Don’t answer that. Answer this instead: Am I doing anything right?”
Virgil wasn’t very surprised that his father refused to play the part of enabler when it came to his own self-victimization. “Have you already forgotten what I told you earlier? You’ve got people in your life who are going to need you.”
“Everyone seems to be doing just fine.”
“Your thoughts are deluded, Son. Everyone is not doing fine. Sandy lied to you today. When was the last time that ever happened?”
“What? It’s never happened,” Virgil said, his voice louder than necessary. “Ever.”
“You’re mistaken, Bud. She lied to you today, she just doesn’t know it yet.”
“How about we can the mysticism? Will you please just come out with it, already? It’s almost time for—”
“Almost time for what? To snor
t some more Oxy?”
“So you’re not tied to that tree after all.”
“I never said I was. Do you remember what I told you that afternoon at the bar, the day my body was killed? We were talking about Sandy…she’d just gotten there…it was right before Amanda Pate came in.”
“Yeah, I remember. What about Amanda, by the way? Is she there?”
Mason smiled in a way Virgil did not expect. “She sure is. In fact, we’re on something of a journey together.”
“What does that mean?”
“Answer my question, Virgil. What did I say to you that day?”
“I said I remember, Dad.”
“Then tell me what I said.”
“You said, ‘that’s one you don’t let get away, Son.’ What about it?”
“The intricacies of free will are really something. Absolutely amazing. I wish I had the words to describe it to you. I almost think I could spend the rest of eternity studying nothing else.”
Virgil rubbed the heels of both hands into his eyes. “You’re losing me, Dad.”
“That might be the most accurate thing you’ve said all night. Sandy told you she’d never leave you, but she was wrong. You’re losing her, Son.”
Virgil stood from the chair and pointed at him. “You’re wrong. Do you hear me, you’re wrong. She’d never leave me.” Then, as if he had to make his point to an apparition whose existence was questionable at best, he added, “You’re not even real.”
“Virgil? Who are you talking to?”
The sound of Sandy’s voice made Virgil jump and he lost his footing in the wet grass and ended up flat on his back. She walked over and ran her fingers through Virgil’s hair. She wore an oversized sweatshirt that hung just below her waist and a pair of lime green rubberized garden boots embellished with images of multi-colored daisies.
“Who’s wrong? And why are you yelling?”
“Will you help me up please?” Virgil asked.
The night was warm and the sky was clear and instead of helping him up, Sandy laid down next to him in the grass and placed her head on his chest. They stayed there like that for a few minutes, neither of them speaking, then she lifted her head and began to kiss him, her tongue probing desperately inside his mouth. She swung one of her legs over his body and sat on top of him before peeling the sweatshirt over her head.
But Virgil was having some difficulty with the sequence of events as they unfolded around him and he grabbed her arms and gently pushed her back. “Sandy, I don’t think I can. I want to, but the medicine—”
Even in the dark of night he could see the embarrassment of his rejection play across Sandy’s face. She grabbed the sweatshirt from the ground and then, almost as an afterthought, dropped it on his chest. She stood over him, her mouth moving as if to speak, but if she said anything at all Virgil never heard it over the buzzing in his head. He watched her walk back to the house, her daisy-laden garden boots leaving dew tracks across the lawn. She looked, Virgil thought, like a little girl.
When he looked back at the willow tree, his father was gone.
11
__________
Virgil and Sandy had a quiet Sunday to themselves, both taking a mental break and pretending that Virgil did not have a drug problem and the events of the previous night had not happened. They spoke of nothing of consequence, were together yet separate and when they made love in the evening Virgil felt a sense of urgency and a longing for normalcy that seemed to exist without boundaries. She fell asleep in his arms that night and Virgil began to understand what his father had said, the truth of his words. He was losing her. The woman he loved more than anything else was drifting away, yet he felt powerless to do anything about it. Ultimately he would have to make a decision, one that would not come easily. He wanted to talk to Sandy about how he felt with the hope that it was not too late, that they could put the past few months behind them and look forward to a future free from the relentless grasp of the pills and the damage they’d done. Those were the thoughts going through his head as he fell asleep, but by the time he woke on Monday, Sandy had already left for work.
In truth, he felt a little relieved.
Virgil killed the morning and most of the afternoon taking care of household chores. He paid some bills, mowed the lawn and generally kept himself busy, even though he knew what he was really doing was nothing more than delaying the inevitable. It was time to go to the office and collect his belongings, sign the necessary forms for his discharge and participate in an exit interview, something Virgil thought was absurd. Someone gets fired from their job and the H.R. people want to interview them? What did that look like? ‘Tell us, Mr. Jones, would you characterize your time spent here as a productive part of your professional life and career as a whole? Would you recommend the State of Indiana as a viable and worthwhile employment opportunity to someone if they were to ask you? Do you promise not to sue the everlasting bejesus out of us for firing you after you were nearly killed in the line of duty?’
He crushed a couple of pills, snorted them back and made it downtown in record time.
__________
When he got to his office—which now belonged to Ron Miles—he walked in only to discover that somebody had been kind enough, or, depending on one’s generosity of thought, cruel enough to box up his belongings for him. The cardboard box sat atop one of the two chairs that fronted his old desk. The box itself was old, had notched out ovals for handholds and the words, ‘Produce: Handle With Care’ printed on the side. Virgil rifled through the contents to make sure everything was there and in doing so discovered there wasn’t much in the box that he cared about anymore. Most of it was old police procedural manuals that he’d picked up over the years, a certificate of perfect marksmanship from a handgun competition, a distinguished service award and a few photographs. Virgil put everything back in the box with the photos on top. He was about to carry it out to his truck when Ron Miles walked in. The look on his face was an odd mixture of embarrassment and shame. He walked behind the desk and sat down, let out a sigh and motioned Virgil into the empty chair next to his box of belongings. Virgil remained standing.
“I’m not exactly sure what I should say here, Jonesy.”
Virgil had always liked Ron. He was a fine investigator, a streetwise cop with one of the best homicide closure rates in the state and despite his age and time on the job, he was still one of the most energetic, loyal and uncompromised law enforcement officials Virgil have ever met. None of that could suppress the feelings he had at that moment, though, and as irrational as it was, Virgil felt like knocking Ron’s teeth down his throat. “Then maybe you shouldn’t say anything.”
“I was going to come down to the bar and talk to you tonight.”
“Were you?”
“Look, I didn’t ask for this, I didn’t want this, I didn’t know anything about this and I sure as hell didn’t know what they were going to do to you.”
“You must be relieved as hell then, Ron,” Virgil said, his voice thick with sarcasm. “I can’t imagine the level of stress my situation must have caused you. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me.”
“Hey, that’s not fair.”
“Fair? You want fair? Let me tell you something, Ron. I haven’t seen fair in so long I’m not sure I’d recognize it if I did. Fair can kiss my ass. As a matter of fact, so can you.”
Virgil grabbed the cardboard box by the handles and turned to leave, but his dramatic exit was not to be. The box was weak and overloaded and when he pulled it from the chair the contents spilled out the bottom and landed in a pile at his feet. The glass shattered on the picture frames and the distinguished service award broke into pieces with much the same sound as Virgil’s cane pole after Pearson cracked it in half.
Ron came around the side of the desk and gently took the ruined box from Virgil’s hands. “Hey, come on now, Jonesy. I’m sorry, man. I really am. Look, why don’t you wait here and I’ll go get another box. Just sit tight, okay? Wi
ll you do that?”
After Ron walked out, Virgil picked up the photos and removed them from the damaged frames, slipped them into his pocket and left the building.
__________
Virgil was due at the bar but instead of going straight there he drove a few miles in the opposite direction and stopped at a city park situated between the suburbs and downtown. He walked across the grassy knolls and tree lined trails before sitting down on one of the benches. Sunlight glimmered through the tree limbs and shadows danced across the trail in the afternoon breeze.
Virgil heard a rustling noise behind him and when he turned he saw a small child—a boy, no more than four or five years of age. He held a packaged toy fishing pole in his hands, the kind with a superhero screen-printed on the plastic spinner reel. The boy’s hair was light and fair but more than anything it was the colors of his eyes that caught Virgil off guard and left him momentarily unable to ask even the simplest of questions, like why he was alone in a public park or where his parents might be. His left eye was a deep crystal blue and his right was as green as the ocean waters of Montego Bay. He wore a white T-shirt with an American Flag across the front, blue dress shorts that hung to his knees and white tennis shoes. The boy stared at Virgil for a few seconds, then smiled and darted across the trail and up the hill. Virgil stood and shouted for him to wait, but he ran up the hill without stopping or turning back.
Virgil began to climb the hill, conscious of the fact that he was a middle-aged man chasing a young boy through a deserted park. Nevertheless, this child was alone in a place where he shouldn’t have been and no matter what anyone might have thought, Virgil felt it was his responsibility to help the boy find his parents or guardian. He shouted to him again. “Wait, let me help you. Where are your parents?”
