Into the Night

by Suzanne Brockmann

  Mary Lou wasn’t sure what kind of gift to buy someone who played the stock market other than a hat that said “I am richer than God.”

  But as far as deeply personal gifts for Donny went, a roll of heavy-duty aluminum foil would have been far more appreciated than any dumb sweater. Especially since, despite all of his clothes, Donny had two favorite shirts and two favorite pairs of pants. He wore each outfit every other day, day after day after relentless day.

  Once a week, his grandparents would come to visit, and his grandmother would somehow manage to get him into something different—which lasted until about three minutes after they pulled out of the driveway.

  Both she and Donny’s grandfather were about a million years old. Mary Lou worried about what would become of Donny after they were gone.

  She rapped on his door again. “Donny! Please open the door. It’s me, Mary Lou. I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

  Silence.

  When he was like this, ringing the bell repeatedly would only make it worse.

  “Dammit,” she said, and turned around—to find Ihbraham Rahman, the yard guy, standing three feet away from her, at the bottom of the steps. She juggled Donny’s mail with the baby monitor and dropped most of the mail. “Oh! You scared me to death!”

  “I’m sorry.” He helped her pick up the envelopes and catalogues. “I was working at the Bentons’, and heard you over here and…”

  Mary Lou could see his truck parked in front of the yellow house three houses down from the Robinsons’. So that was their name. Benton. She’d never met them face-to-face.

  There were a lot of people in this neighborhood that she’d never met.

  “Is everything all right with your friend?” he asked as he handed her back the mail. There was genuine concern in his eyes.

  “I don’t think so,” she told him. “He won’t answer his door. He’s kind of crazy—” She lowered her voice and barely even breathed the word, just in case Donny was listening. “—even when things are going well, so…”

  “Are you sure he’s home?” Ihbraham asked, turning to look at the house. He was tall. Not as tall as Sam, but still, she had to tip her head back just to talk to him.

  “Yes,” Mary Lou said. “Considering that he never leaves. Ever. Besides, I saw him peeking out at me.”

  “Is there no one you can call?” He dressed kind of the way Jesus might dress if He were alive today. Loose pants made out of some kind of lightweight, flowing material, with a comfortably worn-out T-shirt. And of course those leather sandals.

  “Well, he’s got grandparents who don’t live too far away. I suppose I could try to find their number. I’m not exactly sure of their last name, though.”

  “You could call the police,” he suggested.

  Mary Lou laughed. “Yeah, I don’t think so. The last thing I want to do is get Donny locked up. He’s not hurting anyone, here.”

  “Except maybe himself,” Ihbraham pointed out.

  Mary Lou sat down, right there on Donny’s front steps. “Who gets to decide that? You know—whether or not he might be hurting himself…? Because he might see it differently from the police or the doctors in the funny farm or even me and you. He’s got food and water in there—enough so that he doesn’t have to come out for years if he doesn’t want to. Who are we to say that he doesn’t have the right to spend the rest of his life in there with the shades pulled down if that’s really what he wants?”

  “May I?” Ihbraham asked, as if she owned the step.

  “You don’t have to ask just to sit down. It’s a free country.”

  He sat. “Free more for some than others. I’ve learned never to assume.”

  Mary Lou looked at him, at his so very foreign-looking face. Dark skin. Thick dark slashes of eyebrows. Dark beard. Full lips that were nearly always smiling.

  And those eyes, so warmly, richly brown and filled to overflowing with concern and kindness and a calm acceptance and wisdom.

  When most people looked at him, unless they looked closely, they wouldn’t see his eyes or his smile. And if those people were anything like her, they’d cross to the other side of the street when they saw him coming. They’d assume, from the color of his skin and from the way he looked, that he was dangerous.

  She remembered all those nervous phone calls she’d made to her sister when he’d first started caring for the Robinsons’ yard, and she was ashamed.

  “I’m sorry,” she told him, although she was certain it didn’t make up for all the shit he’d no doubt been through since 9/11.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “I have T-shirts that I sometimes wear when I go out. They say ‘I am an American, too.’ It’s helped a little.”

  “Life really sucks,” Mary Lou said.

  “No,” he said. He shook his head. “No. It can be hard sometimes, though.”

  And then they sat there for a moment in silence.

  “I could really use a drink,” she admitted.

  “I know,” Ihbraham told her quietly.

  And she knew that that was true. He did know.

  “Bottom line,” Muldoon said as he watched Joan across the restaurant table. “We feel that it’s just not safe for the President to come here right now. At least not the way you want him to come here—with a demonstration that’s open to the public. Crowd control will be impossible.”

  She tapped her fingers on her coffee cup. “So you’re telling me Commander Paoletti would rather Team Sixteen not receive this citation from the President?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “If the choices are to do it at this dog and pony show here on the base or not at all, the CO would choose not at all because he values the President’s—and the public’s—safety over his own career. We’d be more than happy to go to Washington, though. I haven’t cleared this with the commander, but I’m willing to bet he’d be okay with us giving some kind of a demonstration right there at the White House. On the President’s—and most important the Secret Service’s—own turf.”

  Joan looked out the restaurant window at the sparkling bay and the glistening skyline of San Diego. As much as Muldoon preferred the vastness of the open ocean, this was a pretty nice view. She gazed at it for quite some time, while he watched her.

  They’d shared a dessert, two forks but only one plate, as if they were lovers. Or best friends. She’d made it clear both last night and today that they weren’t going to be anything more than friends.

  She’d begged him to go on a date with Brooke Bryant, which was freaking weird. Not just the concept of escorting Brooke to this party at the Del, but the idea that Joan had had to beg him to do it.

  What was wrong with him, that he didn’t jump at the chance?

  Well, it was one thing to fantasize about someone like Brooke when she was three thousand miles away from him. It was another thing to walk into a party with her on his arm.

  Especially when he wanted to walk in with someone else entirely on his arm.

  Joan was supposed to have realized by now that she wasn’t too old for him. She was, after all, much younger than Brooke Bryant.

  But no. It was obvious that the problem wasn’t that she was too old for him. It was that she thought he was too young for her.

  So he was going to escort Brooke to some pain in the butt party where he’d have to wear his dress whites and keep up polite conversation and small talk all night long.

  Which was something that he hated doing and completely sucked at.

  God help him.

  He’d lost the age battle to Joan right at the start of their lunch. And here he was—judging from the expression on her face—about to lose another.

  He had to give her credit—she’d actually paid attention and heard him out. She’d listened carefully to what he’d had to say about the risks of going forward with the President’s visit to Coronado.

  “Well, I’ll certainly bring your concerns to the President’s attention,” she finally said as she turned back from the view. “But I’m
pretty sure I already know what his response is going to be. ‘If I can’t feel safe within the gates of a military base on U.S. soil, where can I feel safe?’”

  “It’s not the base that’s the problem,” Muldoon told her. “It’s opening up the demonstration to the public. There are known terrorist cells in—”

  “San Diego,” she finished for him. “Yes, and in every other major city in the United States, as well. But it’s time to start campaigning for reelection, and I know for a fact that Bryant isn’t going to sit in the basement of the White House, quaking with fear.”

  “He’s the President,” Muldoon countered. “He owes it to this country to stay safe.”

  “Actually, his policy has been ‘Don’t let the terrorists win,’” Joan shot back at him. “‘Go on about your daily lives. Be vigilant and alert, but fly, go on vacation, go to concerts and football games. Live on the ninety-eighth floor. Don’t live in fear.’”

  Muldoon nodded. “There’s an FBI counterterrorist team in town because there’s some kind of threat to the area’s commercial airports.”

  “Well, that’s good news,” Joan said, “seeing as there are no commercial airports on the base.”

  “Commander Paoletti hasn’t put it into these words exactly, but I know he’s had a bad feeling about this visit from the moment news came down from Admiral Crowley.”

  “That’ll go over well. ‘We need to cancel your visit to Coronado, Mr. President, because Commander Paoletti has a bad feeling about it.’” Joan laughed.

  Muldoon didn’t. “This is a man whose hunches you should trust,” he told her. “Talk to your bosses.”

  “I will, but don’t expect too much.” She leaned slightly across the table, and for one brief moment, he thought she was going to take his hand. No such luck. Jeez, he really liked her. Every minute he was with her, he liked her even more. This was so totally not fair.

  And meanwhile, on the other side of the room was Mrs. Tucker, whom Joan seemed to think was ready to blatantly proposition him if she had half a chance. Oh, boy, wasn’t that perfect?

  “My turn for serious conversation,” Joan said. “I still want—”

  “To see Team Sixteen in action, training.” This time it was his turn to finish her sentence. “I know. So, okay.”

  “Okay? Just like that? Okay?” She was purposely echoing the words he’d used earlier and, he realized, quite possibly trying to imitate him with that wide-eyed look.

  “Very funny. I’ve set up a simulated training exercise this afternoon. It’s a beautiful day for a boat ride, so at 1600 hours I’ve got a bunch of volunteers—including Jenk, who publicly proclaimed his total devotion to you at a recent team briefing—”

  “Jenk?” she said, laughter in her eyes. “Cherub-faced with freckles? Why is it that I seem to attract the children?”

  Mark Jenkins was actually a little bit older than Muldoon—a fact he chose not to point out. “Cosmo volunteered, too.”

  “Old break-your-neck-without-a-sound Cosmo, huh? That’s…lovely.”

  “He’s a good man.”

  “I’ll have to take your word for it. He’s not exactly a glowing conversationalist.”

  “If you’re done insulting my friend—”

  “I wasn’t being insulting,” she told him. “Just observing. He also has very nice sunglasses. But that’s all I know about him.”

  Muldoon had to laugh. “If you’re done with your observation of Cosmo—”

  “I’m done with everything I can say aloud without being accused of being harassing and sexist.” She smiled at him, and he lost his train of thought.

  What was she telling him? That she found Cosmo attractive? Cosmo?

  He pulled himself back to the point. “Look, at 1600 hours, there’re about seven guys willing to put in some additional time to demonstrate some helocasting and recovery techniques. Just for you. Is that okay?”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel guilty?” she countered.

  “No. Just maybe a little appreciative.”

  “I am. But I still think I’ll keep my distance from Cosmo, thanks. What’s helocasting?”

  “It’s an insertion technique,” he told her. She wanted to keep her distance from Cosmo. He gave up trying to figure her out. “Helocasting is just a fancy name for jumping out of a helicopter and into the water. Of course, there are wrong ways and right ways of doing it. Hopefully this afternoon we’ll demonstrate only the right ways. And we’ll also show you a recovery technique—basically hooking the men in the water with a big rubber loop and yanking them up and into an inflatable boat. It’s a tried-and-true method for getting guys out of the water, developed during the Second World War.”

  “Demonstrate,” Joan said. “That means I watch, right? No one’s pushing me out of any helicopters? I stay out of the water?”

  “Lose the heels,” Muldoon recommended, “and your chances of staying out of the water will greatly increase.” He smiled at her. “But just in case, I’ll make sure you have a life jacket on before we leave shore.”

  Joan looked at him. “Michael.”

  “Just in case,” he said, and flagged down the waiter to get the bill.

  “What are you doing here?” Donny pulled his laptop back as he scooted into the farthest possible corner, away from Vince.

  “People worry about you when you don’t answer the door. That’s what I’m doing here.” It smelled like a gym locker in there, but Vince shut the closet door behind him, hoping that would calm down his grandson. Way too much whites of his eyes were showing.

  He sat down on the floor of the closet—which Don had completely covered, walls and ceiling, with aluminum foil. “Your friend—that gal with the southern accent—gave us a call.”

  “Did you lock the door behind you when you came in?”

  “You know I did,” Vince said. His grandson was wearing his favorite hat today. With that, the closet dwelling, and the rocking back and forth, Vince was pretty sure it was safe to assume that he’d been off his medication for at least a few weeks now. “You know, Don, you need a few pillows in here. Once you pass seventy, you start to bruise your own ass just by sitting on the floor without a cushion.”

  The rocking got more pronounced. “Don’t let Gramma open any windows.”

  “No, son, she’s not even here. She had a ladies’ auxiliary meeting.” Vince had gotten the call from that southern girl—Mary Lou—on his cell phone after he’d dropped Charlie at the church. “I can’t stay long. I just wanted to stop in and make sure you’re all right.”

  “I’m all right.”

  Yeah, if all right meant wearing an aluminum foil hat and living in a closet, Donny was stellar.

  “Last time we were here, you told me you were taking your pills,” Vince told his grandson as mildly as he possibly could. “Now, you know I’ve never judged you, Donny. I’ve never blamed you and I’ve never told you how to live your life. I’ve never done anything but be here in case you need me. So why would you want to tell me something that’s not true?”

  Tears welled in Don’s eyes. “I can’t let them know,” he whispered. “Shh. Shhh. They got to my pills and switched them with their pills. But I found out and…Don’t think it, don’t think it or they’ll find out. Don’t think it…”

  Beneath his aluminum-covered hat, Donny was starting to lose his hair. He was approaching forty, a beefy bear of a man, with about thirty extra pounds sitting around his waist.

  Vince could remember him at five. At ten. A shy kid with wide, worried brown eyes who only laughed if you really worked to entertain him. At fourteen, his focus in life was getting A’s in school. He stayed in his room and studied as if he were chained to his desk, and everyone told Tony and Sheryl how lucky they were to have such a good son. By sixteen, though, they all knew something was very wrong with Don. By seventeen, he’d stopped leaving the house.

  Medication worked well enough at first for him to be able to attend college. But instead of getting better, getting
strong, he crumpled under the intense stresses of college. He got worse. And he went back home to live.

  Which marked the official beginning of the end of Tony and Sheryl’s already rocky marriage. Vince’s youngest son and his wife had been struggling to stay together for years, and having to deal with a seriously mentally ill child broke the so-called camel’s back.

  Sheryl had moved with Donny here to California. Bought this little house, and then proceeded to die of cancer, breaking everyone’s heart. Especially Tony’s.

  Charlie and Vince had wanted Donny to move in with them after the funeral, but Donny refused. And then surprised the hell out of them all by revealing that he’d been investing in the stock market via the Internet for years. He had enough money—a small fortune—saved to support himself in this little house for the rest of his life.

  “Don’t think it,” Donny was still repeating.

  A change of subject was in order. “Joanie—your sister—is in town.”

  The rocking stopped, and just for a moment, Don sat up a little taller. “Yeah, she E-mailed to tell me she was coming out to San Diego for a few weeks.”

  It was the brief glimpses of normal beneath the aluminum-covered hat that were sometimes the hardest to bear.

  “She works for the president,” Don continued. “She said the Secret Service makes sure that the aliens can’t get to anyone in the White House. I need to ask her how they do that.”

  Of course, normal never stayed around for longer than a glimpse.

  Vince glanced at his watch. He was going to have to scoot soon in order to get back to the church to pick up Charlie on time. “Joanie told me they all take this special pill that keeps them safe.” He was glad Charlie wasn’t here, because it drove her crazy when he played to Donny’s illness. “How about I call her and ask her to bring you some?”

  Donny started rocking again. It was pretty close to a nod yes.

  “She’ll come tomorrow morning,” he told his grandson. “And if she’s busy, I’ll go to her and pick up the pills and bring ’em over myself. How’s that?”