by Martin Clark
Joel sighed and flipped up his palms. “I didn’t pay much attention to the details. I got the general theme and put everything away. To tell you the truth, I was more concerned about my wife leaving me.”
“What does he need to do, Sa’ad?” Edmund asked.
“This is most likely a good thing. If he’s insured, they pay, not Mr. King. And the insurer will probably provide him and the church with a lawyer.”
“Great. Their attorney. I’m sure he’ll really be hot to do all he can for Joel, take Christy and her vampires right to the mat. I want you to watch this for Joel. You keep an eye on this, Sa’ad. I don’t care about the cost.” Edmund’s mouth was drawn, and he pointed at his lawyer when he finished talking.
“Actually, Edmund, I’m sure the insurance lawyer will fight like hell— it’s their money. They usually try to keep it.”
“Whatever,” Edmund groused. “But you’re Joel’s lawyer as of right now.”
“Only if he hires me, Edmund. Not you.”
Edmund gave Joel a stern look. “Don’t cross me on this. I mean it. I’ll take care of Blacula here and you can pay me back or do somethin’ for me when your affairs settle down. Believe me, Sa’ad needs to look into this.”
“Edmund, I appreciate it, but it sounds like it might work itself out. I—”
Edmund leaned into him, crowding him with his face and shoulders. He didn’t say anything, just set his head with a slight pitch to it.
Joel paused. He considered Edmund’s offer and his consternation. “Hey. Okay. Why not? Thanks, Edmund. Okay. Sign me up.”
Edmund retreated back into his own chair. “You’re welcome.”
“I’ll see where matters stand,” Sa’ad promised. “And leave your divorce papers here, too. I’m not completely familiar with Virginia domestic law, but I’ll see if there’s anything obvious.” He hesitated, and the cadence in his voice briefly changed. “I’m technically not licensed in Virginia, so I’ll be working exclusively through an associate or local counsel. I’ll report to you and manage the case, but I’ll not be formally involved. The bar is very strict in these matters. It won’t cost you—well, Edmund—any more, and you can rest assured I’ll personally review every development. Plus, I suspect you’ll have insurance counsel very soon.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Joel puckered his lips for an instant, formed the rudiments of a smile. “So, Edmund, the insurance company may not be the bad guy in this piece, huh? They might be on the white horse, galloping to my rescue.”
“Or else they’ll try to wiggle off the hook and leave you to take the enema,” Edmund said. “You watch what I’m tellin’ you.”
“Maybe, but I choose to be optimistic.”
“I’ll tell you who should be optimistic—the capes-and-hats workin’ the sag on the other side of this. Talk about provin’ my point.” Edmund waved his hand, dismissing the whole subject. “I’m a piker compared to these scoundrels.”
Sa’ad rolled his wrist and checked his watch. “Well, Edmund, it would appear another accident has come your way. I trust that you’re not too badly injured.” Bemusement spilled from every word.
“It’s pretty severe. Almost constant pain, the car torn up.”
Sa’ad’s eyes were dancing a sly soft-shoe. “Let me guess. Let’s see. Let me put on the turban and explore the Ouija board. I’m feeling . . . a hit-and-run driver? In Virginia? Barreling down on you from the wrong side of the road?”
Edmund kept a straight face. “Key-recht, Sa’ad.”
“I’ll have one of the paralegals start the paperwork. Do you have time to take the car by Richard’s for an estimate?”
“Already phoned him,” Edmund said.
“How about a chiropractor?”
“I thought I’d see our buddy Doc Holton while I’m out here, then I’ve got a guy at home who’s on the team.”
“Excellent.” Sa’ad turned his attention to Joel. “How about you, Mr. King? Were you injured in the accident?”
“He was,” Edmund interjected. “Took a ferocious lick.”
Joel gave Sa’ad a good going-over, waited a minute before answering. “I have a little discomfort from the seat belt. That’s about it.”
“That can be quite a nuisance in some cases.” Sa’ad had emptied his face. “Is this something you’d like to pursue?”
“I don’t have any insurance,” Joel said.
“Ah, but Edmund does.”
“I don’t want to sue Edmund or cause him any problems.” Joel was distracted, simultaneously trying to talk to Sa’ad and also capture what was actually going on beneath the conversation.
“You wouldn’t need to. You’d sue the car that ran you off the road, collect from him.”
“It was a truck. Well, I guess it was a truck.” Joel cut his eyes at Edmund. “Let’s put it this way. When I woke up, there was a truck in sight. He never made contact with us, and I don’t know the driver’s name. So how would we sue him?”
“Joel, Virginia’s one of the rare states that allows you to sue your own policy when an unknown driver runs you off the road, even in the absence of contact between the vehicles. The claim would be against a John Doe driver, and you’d collect from Edmund’s insurance company.”
“How about that,” Joel said.
“You don’t need to know the driver’s name or anything, only a description of the vehicle.”
“I see.”
Edmund spoke up. “Check this out, Sa’ad. We have a witness, this guy who was passin’ through. He told the cop he saw the truck drivin’ fast and erratic immediately after it went by us.”
“Really?” Sa’ad seemed puzzled.
“Sure enough.”
“How’d that happen? I don’t get it.” Sa’ad’s features clicked into a look Joel hadn’t seen before.
“Hey, just a man tryin’ to help his fellow man. Talk about the luck of the draw—guy who stops at the accident looked like he was on his way to the bunker with his canned food and batteries, and of course he don’t like the police, and of course he doesn’t want me to get a ticket. Even offered to hold our dope and guns.”
“So he sees the truck—”
“Drivin’ like a madman.” Edmund finished Sa’ad’s sentence.
“Bravo, my friend.”
“It was a nice stroke of luck.”
Sa’ad checked his watch again. “So you see, Joel, you are very much entitled to collect for your injuries. There’s plenty of coverage and no downside for Edmund.”
Joel pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. He closed his eyes for an instant and dragged the tips of his fingers over his lids, rubbed back and forth. When he let the room in again, his vision was briefly contaminated with speckles of color and dark, heavy dots. “I think I’ll pass, if it’s all the same to you guys. I did see the truck after it went by us, if that’s helpful in the long run.”
Sa’ad and Edmund were quiet. “You’re sure, Joel?” Edmund finally asked. “I mean, you understand the situation here?”
“I understand.”
“Let me know if you change your mind,” Sa’ad offered.
“Not going to happen,” Joel said firmly.
Sa’ad abruptly stood up. “I can certainly respect that,” he said. “I’ll take care of your other matters and be in touch. Leave your contact information with the receptionist.”
Joel and Edmund left their leather chairs and followed him to the door. “Oh. The check from that South Dakota project arrived today,” Sa’ad said to Edmund as they were shaking hands. “You can pick it up with the other two. Jill’s got everything ready.”
“Wow. Huh. That’s good news. You’re a regular miracle worker, Otis.”
“I thought it would take longer, too. Got a new adjuster; that helped move matters along.”
Joel was on the verge of ill temper when he and Edmund arrived at the Cadillac. He got into the passenger’s seat but didn’t shut
the door. The desert heat was everywhere, blasting out of the car’s interior and rising in waves from the parched sand that encircled the city.
“You know, Edmund, I’m on probation. I go straight to jail if I get into trouble.” Joel was gazing down the street when he spoke, his feet outside the car, his back to Edmund. “I’m grateful for your efforts to help me, and I value our friendship. You’ve done a lot for me. Yes you have. I can understand to some extent what you do and why you do it. But . . .” He brought his feet into the vehicle, planted them on the floorboard and faced Edmund. “I don’t appreciate your involving me in something like this without my knowledge, and on top of that, if I’m reading this correctly— and I think I am—I’m not too thrilled about being driven into a tree. What if I’d been badly hurt? You had no right.”
Edmund hung his head and sighed. He ran his hand through his hair, leaving a few strands tousled when he finished. “Joel, I truly am sorry. I wanted to give you a boost the best way I know how. I’m sorry. I’ve made a mess of things.”
“I wondered why the heck we were off the interstate on some rural highway. And you’re not really injured, are you?”
Edmund kept his head down. “I apologize.”
He seemed so sincere, so disappointed, so chastised, that Joel found it hard to sustain any ire or disgust. “Don’t brood about it, just don’t get me into anything else. No more of your crazy schemes, okay?”
“You have my word.” Edmund was still slouched in his seat, subdued and embarrassed. He hadn’t cranked the car, and the heat was pulling out sweat on his brow and along the top of his lip.
“Good enough. I accept your apology.”
Edmund remained slumped and shamed, didn’t speak.
“It’s okay, Edmund,” Joel assured him. “Forget it.” The scorched air was making Joel light-headed; according to the thermometer at the bank across the highway, it was 104 degrees.
Edmund gathered himself. “Thanks.” His voice was quiet and pained. “You know, Joel, when you preached my daddy’s funeral and opened our church for the service, when you did that after those sorry bastards up in Maine wouldn’t give him a decent burial, I told you right then I owed you the moon and the stars. I’m just tryin’ to repay you.”
“I appreciate that. I do. So let’s forget about it and get on the road.”
“You’re sure? You’re not cross about it?”
“It’s behind us, Edmund,” Joel promised him. “I forgive you.”
“Okay then.” Edmund fit the key into the ignition. “You’re a good man to be so understandin’.”
“Why did you call Sa’ad ‘Otis’ when we were leaving?”
“You don’t think Sa’ad is his real name, do you?” Edmund asked. He didn’t seem caught unawares by the question.
“I hadn’t given it much thought.” Joel took a fast-food napkin from his pocket and patted the perspiration on his face and neck. “How about you, Edmund, is that your real name?”
“Names, names, names. What’s the difference? I’ve got lots of names. You need ’em in my occupation.”
“I guess so.”
Joel finished wiping and dabbing with the napkin. Even though he recognized the sincerity of Edmund’s efforts and had—for the most part— found their time together agreeable, he was glad they would be severed after a few hundred more miles, relieved he soon would be out from under his friend’s shady beneficence. “How long to Missoula?” Joel asked. “Can we drive it straight through?”
“I’ll sure bust my hump trying, if that’s what you want. Drive every cotton-pickin’ second I can,” Edmund vowed. “And I’ll put in the CD you like, that Al Green’s Greatest Hits. You take it easy and enjoy the trip. I’m gonna do whatever it takes to correct my errors where you’re concerned.”
four
Dr. Neal Baldwin Johnson was a piece of shit. At least according to his former wife, Dr. Johnson was a piece of shit. He’d abandoned a damn fine radiology partnership in Atlanta and talked her into packing for Missoula, Montana, to get away, he’d said, from the stress and the bustle and the rat race that kept him preoccupied so much of the time. As it turned out, the only rat involved was Dr. Johnson himself—“the aptly named Dr. Johnson,” she liked to note—who proved to be a beady-eyed fiend worthy of a crown and a toe dance through The Nutcracker, a true Rodent King. The piece of shit deserted her underneath an undeniably big and beautiful sky, took up with a sophomore from the university and moved to France. France. She always said it twice when she did the rehearsed version.
Dr. Johnson was more than double the scrawny bitch’s age when he decided to commit adultery, and when he hit the road, he left his wife with Baker, their five-year-old son. He also left her with everything they owned, all the money, furniture, stocks, land, pensions, cars—everything. And that just made it worse, made it harder to accept. What a slap in the face: he was willing to walk off a pauper if he could simply be rid of her and have his miniskirted nymph. It was a wicked generosity akin to a marital bribe—no price was too steep so long as he got to dump his threadbare wife, the graying yesterday’s news who’d brought him sandwiches when he was a poor, unshaven resident and stretched her stomach out of whack to carry his child. Enraged by the entire affair, his spouse of nearly two decades paid an extra twenty-seven dollars during the divorce to dispose of the one thing she hated most, and now she was Sophie Ellis King again, a mother whose school-age kid didn’t share her last name.
Sophie was three years younger than her brother, Joel. She’d always been attractive in a fashion men found comfortable and women considered unobtrusive, and she was smart, perceptive and mischievous, although it seemed to Joel, seeing her for the first time in many months, that the last couple years had sifted some of the cleverness from her face and bearing. She’d been a popular girl during high school—but not a cheerleader or club president, for goodness’ sakes—a history major at Ohio State who never seemed the slightest bit pressed by her studies, and a proud wife and complete mother who enjoyed both roles, content to preside over a home, love her husband and rear their baby boy. While watching a cupboard and tending to Baker, she also planted a vegetable garden every spring, kept a journal, published a long magazine piece on Millard Fillmore, painted a household’s worth of trim and molding, cooked for a horde of in-laws at Thanksgiving, taught herself conversational Spanish before a three-week vacation to Barcelona and managed to absorb far more about politics, plumbing, tax forms, child development and the world’s guts than did her golf-and-well-done-steaks husband. And this was the thanks she got, ditched a year and a half ago for no legitimate reason.
Sophie was in front of her house when Edmund and her brother arrived in the Cadillac. She was using a green garden hose to fill a child’s plastic wading pool, holding the hose high and letting the water cascade from around her chest. Baker was sitting in the pool, dressed in his white undershorts and nothing else, plopping his open hands into the water and whooping after every splash. Joel and Edmund had stopped only for gas, coffee, snacks and restrooms, had slept and driven in shifts and made the trip from Las Vegas without spending another night in a hotel. As promised, Edmund had stayed behind the wheel until he was exhausted, putting in the first ten hell-bent hours before allowing Joel to spell him.
Joel was surprised when he saw his sister’s home, nonplussed by where she was living. He recalled a Christmas photo and occasional snapshots that showed a sprawling log fortress on the banks of the Bitterroot River. He and Edmund had followed her directions exactly and were parked beside a small, low-slung house built mostly from painted cinderblocks with an aluminum-siding addition hitched onto the rear. The men got out of the car and headed toward Sophie, Joel waving at her with both hands.
She bent the hose shut, stuck the crimp under her foot and hugged her brother. Joel introduced Edmund, who said nice things in his charming way and immediately knelt to greet Baker. After only a few moments of encouragement, the child recited his entire name and slapped Edmund
a wet high five. The three grownups chatted briefly in the hot sun, and Edmund told a story about a midget he’d seen at a Vegas craps game, described how the wee man would belly-balance on the edge of the table and toss the dice. When she mentioned it, Edmund politely refused Sophie’s offer of a meal and a sofa. He carried Joel’s Kmart bag into the house, walked back to the Cadillac and took hold of the door handle.
“I apologize again for lettin’ you down like I did,” Edmund said as he and Joel were standing beside the car. “You know I think the world of you.”
“I know.”
“Well, all right then. I reckon this is it. I appreciate your keeping me company.”
“Thank you, Edmund, for bringing me here. And thanks for your friendship—even the misguided parts.”
Edmund smiled with half his mouth. “You’re welcome.” He still had a grip on the handle.
“Be careful. Be careful driving to Virginia, and be careful what you do. Don’t step too far over the line.”
“I try to stay right on it, Joel.”
“You sure you don’t want to spend the night here? You’re welcome to. A little beneath your standards, but we’d love to have you.”
“I’m goin’ to leave the reunion for you guys. I see a big steak and a hot bath in my future. I’ll find a hotel and take off in the morning.”
“Thanks again.” Joel stretched out his hand.
Edmund grasped it and squeezed and shook at the same time. He’d let go of the car so he could give their farewell its due. “If you ever need anything, I want you to call me. No matter what the request or how long it’s been, dial my number. Collect if you have to.”
“I will,” Joel promised him, breaking their handshake. “We’ll keep in touch.”
“Anything, anytime—you understand? And that’s the minimum I’d do for you.”
“I’d say we’re pretty even,” Joel remarked.
