Tattooed

by Pamela Callow

  McNally had ripped the tattoo gun across Billy’s cheek. Blood welled from the slash. “You son of a bitch.” He had dropped the tattoo gun onto the bunk. “I’m not straight edge.” His fingers curled into his palms. He wanted to crush that ugly Adam’s apple in Lyman’s throat so he could never laugh again. He pointed to the large spider’s web tattoo spread across the back of his skull. In the center was a death’s head. “You think this is fucking straight edge?”

  Lyman backed away. “Didn’t mean anything by it. Nothin’ wrong with not wanting to do drugs or booze.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I won’t say nothing about the tattoo gun. Or this—” He touched the cut. “It was an accident. Shaving. Trust me, you don’t wanna spend time in the hole.” Eight months later, McNally learned from bitter experience how right Lyman was.

  But then, just ten days on the inside, he shrugged and threw himself onto his mattress. He stared at the underside of Lyman’s bunk. He hated Lyman for lying to protect him from solitary confinement. He did not want to owe any favors.

  It would be so much easier if I just killed him. He could kill him the same way he had killed that girl who had taunted him at the bar. Just grab him by the throat and smash his head on the floor.

  McNally hadn’t inked any more tattoos on his upper torso after that first X. Partly to make it stand out; partly because it was a difficult angle to tattoo unless he used a mirror. Even when he got an additional two years for assaulting that jerk in the bar, he didn’t change the tattoo. The tattoo meant more than just the number of years he spent in prison. It symbolized his heart, his commitment, his willingness to do whatever it took to get Kenzie back with him.

  Aucoin whacked the loosely coiled belt against his thigh. “I don’t get you, McNally. You could be walking out of here. Instead, you stand there daydreaming.”

  What are you, the fucking Gestapo? McNally glared at him, pulling his own T-shirt over his head. Despite being sealed in a bag for two years, it didn’t smell so bad. The soft, worn knit slid across his skin. He wanted to close his eyes, savor the feel of his own clothing stretching across his body. The shirt strained at his shoulders, hung loosely at the waist. He didn’t care. It felt so damned good, he didn’t ever want to take it off.

  The CX whacked the belt again.

  As soon as McNally was dressed he was one step closer to leaving this behind him. One step closer to attaining something that had only been a fantasy. He reached into the plastic bag and removed his boxers and his pants. He stepped out of the prison jeans, then yanked down the worn underwear and kicked it away from his body. Tomorrow, someone else would wear his freshly laundered uniform.

  He slid on his boxers, the neon yellow that he’d worn when he was arrested appearing brassy and cheap in the fluorescent lights. His jeans were looser at the waist, snugger across the thighs. He held out his hand for the belt.

  Aucoin dropped it into his palm and watched him tighten the buckle. McNally shoved the T-shirt into his waistband. He picked up the plastic bag and scrunched the handle in his fist. His wallet was in the bag, as were his keys. The former was empty, the latter no longer relevant. He had stayed at a halfway house when he’d been out on parole. Lovett, his old band mate, had sold the house in which he had been crashing before his manslaughter conviction. He wondered if the new owners had changed the locks… .

  He tightened his grip on the bag and gave Aucoin a brusque nod.

  The CX led him out of the security areas and buzzed open the gate to the parking lot.

  McNally stepped through it.

  An early-morning mist hovered over the small patches of green that “naturalized” the parking lot. He breathed in, enjoying the cool damp on his face.

  Where was Lovett’s Mercedes? He knew Lovett would not come into the penitentiary. Not once had he visited in the twelve years McNally had spent there. He had built a real estate empire while McNally rotted away on the inside. It would hurt his reputation, he told McNally, for an upstanding member of the business community to fraternize with someone like him. McNally knew that wasn’t the real reason, but he wasn’t in a position to argue. At least Lovett had—reluctantly—agreed to help McNally return home to Halifax.

  McNally scanned the parking lot again, averting his face so the CX couldn’t read his expression. No sign of Lovett’s gleaming black SUV. Shit. Had he forgotten that McNally would be released today?

  He crouched outside the school, under an overhang. The rain poured in a sheet three inches in front of his face. He had stuck his tongue in and out of the stream, making patterns, watching the shifting globules of water. His mom said she would come after school. She had scooped him into a big hug and promised him. He had made her promise again. She had. But when he asked the third time—hoping that three promises would work better than two—she grew impatient and pulled his arms off her neck.

  He shoved his hands in his pocket. They were numb from wet. He wished he had a watch so he could tell how long he’d been waiting, but he still got confused with the little-hand stuff so it wouldn’t have made any difference anyway. All the teachers had left. So he knew it had been a long time since the bell went.

  He watched the water running in long cascades of silver. He was an explorer, he was hiding from the bad guys behind a waterfall. He flexed his thumb and forefinger in his pocket. He would shoot them if they found him. He would. Shoot them dead. He stared through the rain. The school grounds seemed to grow darker, the rain had mysteriously changed from silver to black. He needed to pee so bad. His sneakers were soaked. His legs were soaked, too. Would it matter if he just peed a little? No one would know… .

  A cab pulled into the parking lot.

  He exhaled. Why had he thought Lovett would personally come to pick him up? He should have known that wasn’t going to happen. Anxiety tightened his chest. He did not have enough money to pay for his trip all the way back to Halifax.

  Aucoin flagged the cabdriver. The cab eased over to where they stood. The cabdriver studied him through the windshield. He was having second thoughts, McNally could tell. He wished he had a ball cap to cover his death’s head tatt.

  “Oh, by the way, you received this mail.” Aucoin held out a FedEx envelope.

  McNally snatched it from him, relief overriding his anger that Aucoin hadn’t given him the envelope with his belongings in Admissions and Discharge. He tore open the envelope and shook out the contents.

  Lovett had sent a chit for the cab, a train ticket and some cash to get McNally started.

  He stepped forward to open the cab door—throwing a glance behind him. His cheeks flushed as his gaze met the CX’s.

  You’ll never stop looking over your shoulder, Aucoin’s eyes told him.

  McNally’s pulse pounded in his ears. He hated himself for the involuntary gesture, he hated himself for being so conditioned to the CX’s authority. Fuck you.

  Aucoin gave him a mock salute. “We’ll keep your bunk warm for you, McNally.”

  McNally’s jaw tightened. Just you wait, Aucoin.

  He jumped into the cab, tossing the plastic bag onto the floor. “Take me to the train station.”

  He leaned his head back against the car seat. Everything appeared dull: the cracked asphalt of the road, the modest homes that multiplied along the roadway the farther they drove away from the penitentiary. A large golden dog tied to a fence post barked. He smiled.

  Clouds threatened rain. But the air held its breath. Promising spring. Promising freedom.

  Promising.

  Kenzie.

  His heart pounded so hard he felt the X undulate under his shirt.

  He had lost twelve years.

  It was, at long last, time. Nothing would come between them now.

  He would make sure of it. Kenzie and he shared the same soul, traveled the same darkness. And this time, he would make sure that Kenzie never strayed again.

  Kate Lange would bring them full circle, back to the night when her sister, Imogen, should have been their fir
st victim. One Lange was as good as another.

  X marks the spot.

  2

  You would think that after surviving two near-death experiences in just over a year, you would be more prepared when death showed up at your door.

  That was what the undaunted optimist in Kate Lange hoped. But the logical part of her brain knew better. Despite her semi-celebrity status as the slayer of a serial killer, she had seen how random, how inexplicable death could be. What she didn’t know—didn’t understand and was afraid to ask—was why it kept searching her out.

  This time it appeared self-evident. Her client, Frances Sloane, was afflicted with a terminal disease: Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. Made famous by Lou Gehrig, it was a disease that attacked the motor neurons. For Frances Sloane, it appeared to have attacked everything and left a crumpled cage of bones and tissues. If anyone ever wondered about the role of motor neurons, all they would have to do was look at Frances Sloane.

  Though her body was clearly in a state of ruin, Frances’ sky-blue eyes remained the same: sharp and penetrating. As had happened in her youth, Kate found herself mesmerized by them. She could almost—almost—forget the elaborate motorized wheelchair, the hand controls, the torso that could barely hold itself erect—when she met Frances’ gaze.

  She fought to keep the pity from showing on her face. Knowing Frances Sloane, it was the last thing she wanted. Or needed.

  Frances Sloane’s helper, a middle-aged woman named Phyllis wearing the uniform of a professional caregiver, set the brakes on the wheelchair. She gave her client a quick nod and left Kate’s office.

  “Mrs. Sloane, nice to see you again.” It had been a complicated string of events—and emotions—that had led to this meeting.

  “Kate,” her client said, her once-crisp voice slurred and oddly nasal, “call me Frances.”

  Kate smiled. “It will be hard to break the habit. I’ve always thought of you as Mrs. Sloane.”

  Saliva pooled in one side of Frances’ mouth. Her hand rose, a tissue clutched in her grip, reminding Kate of a bird struggling for liftoff against hostile winds.

  That small movement, which was now a gargantuan effort, made Kate’s throat constrict. Frances Sloane’s independence and vitality had been her trademark. She had built her own award-winning architectural firm in a profession still dominated by men. Now, if Kate correctly understood her client’s circumstances, Frances was all alone. Just she, her caregiver and her wheelchair. Facing a terrible end.

  Kate thought of her elderly neighbors, Enid and Muriel Richardson. They, too, were a strong pair near the end of their lives, but the younger Richardson sister had been in a slow decline due to the effects of Alzheimer’s. Unlike Kate’s client, Muriel had the benefit of the caring companionship of her sister Enid. I haven’t spoken to Enid and Muriel in over a week. I need to call them tonight.

  Frances wiped her mouth, studying Kate. “You’ve been through a lot. I read about it in the papers.”

  “It appears we both have,” Kate said. “I’m sorry about your illness… .”

  Frances’ hand slowly made its descent to her lap.

  “I need your help, Kate.”

  The irony of this statement was not lost on Kate. She doubted it was lost on Frances, either.

  Frances must remember the last time they had seen one another. It had been at the funeral of Imogen Lange, Kate’s sister.

  Imogen had died in a car crash when she was fifteen—with seventeen-year-old Kate at the wheel.

  After Imogen’s funeral service, Kate had barely been able to look at Frances Sloane when she stopped in the receiving line to offer her condolences. Not because of her shame. Or guilt. Or grief.

  But because of her rage.

  Perhaps it was unfair. Frances, after all, had been out of the country when her daughter, Kenzie, hosted the party on the night of Imogen’s death.

  Surely she must have known her daughter would hold a party at their house in her absence?

  Surely she might have guessed that Imogen—who had begun hanging around Kenzie with puppylike eagerness—might be induced to join Kenzie’s well-known drug binges on her back porch?

  Frances must have read those questions in Kate’s gaze. Or perhaps they were the very ones she had asked herself after Imogen’s death, for she said, “Kate. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know about the party. I would have stopped it if I’d known.”

  Kate’s eyes had welled with tears. Frances’ words were a form of absolution; a recognition that the

  blame for Imogen’s death did not reside solely on Kate’s seventeen-year-old shoulders. And Kate’s rage melted into liquid warmth, spilling down her cheeks.

  She had nodded at Frances, unable to speak.

  Frances had moved onward to offer her condolences to Kate’s shell-shocked mother—leaving Kate to face Kenzie Sloane as the line of mourners passed by.

  Kenzie had averted her sky-blue eyes.

  And then she walked past Kate to the cathedral door.

  Frances Sloane had cast one last look over her shoulder and followed her daughter out of the cathedral, her bearing erect but her step slow.

  Had the disease been lurking even then?

  Focus, Kate.

  She stared at the file folder on her desk. It contained all the legal reasons why her client could not ask someone to help her kill herself.

  “Mrs.—I mean, Frances,” Kate said. “You are seeking an opinion regarding the legality of assisted suicide in Canada. Correct?”

  And it was as simple—and as complicated—as that.

  “Yes.”

  The hope, the determination—and worse, the desperation—in Frances Sloane’s eyes made it difficult to meet her gaze. “I’m sorry to tell you this, Frances. But there are no circumstances under which it is legal. The Sue Rodriguez decision made it clear.”

  Sue Rodriguez had put a face to both ALS and the matter of assisted suicide in 1993, taking her battle all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada.

  “That was an old decision,” Frances said. “And it was close.” Five to four, Kate had noted. Only one vote to change the entire course of legal precedent and redefine when and how one could legally end someone else’s life.

  Kate didn’t envy that judge.

  “Hasn’t anything changed?” Frances asked.

  Kate shook her head. “The decision was based on the fundamental tenets of our Charter of Rights. And those haven’t changed.”

  “But why can’t I choose how I want to die?”

  “You can.”

  A smile twisted her client’s face. “If I was able-bodied I could choose. But I’m not. It is discriminatory to say I can’t kill myself because I am physically unable.”

  “It was a close decision when the Supreme Court of Canada voted.” Seeing her client slumped in her wheelchair barely able to keep her head up, hearing her speak, watching her struggle to lift her limbs, it seemed unfair. But Kate couldn’t let her sympathy obviate the legal reality: “The Supreme Court felt that it was necessary to protect the interests of the vulnerable. It also wanted to preserve the sanctity of life—” her client’s lips twisted “—by ensuring that assisted suicide remain a criminal offense.”

  “The old slippery slope argument…” Frances grimaced. “Sue Rodriguez had the right question—Who controls my life? Me or the government? But the court gave the wrong answer.”

  Kate leaned forward. “Look, you aren’t the only one who feels that way. I think the court of public opinion is shifting. Right now, there are two different challenges to the law underway. Those plaintiffs are arguing that other countries do allow assisted suicide. Several states in the U.S. do, as well. The question is—Are you willing to go through the long and arduous process of mounting a challenge?” Would you even be alive by the end of it?