See Her Run

by Peggy Townsend

  She went over and plucked up the keepsake box, put on some music—a little early Madonna for nostalgia’s sake—and went to the couch near the window. The day’s edges were beginning to soften, the light cooling, the shadows lengthening.

  She opened the box to the owl feather and the bracelet. She lifted the braided wristband with its single red stone and wondered where it had come from and why Hayley had consigned it to a box full of memories. It was a small detail, but it reminded her of how much there was still left to uncover.

  She reread the birthday card from Ethan and found an ultrasound photo with the beanlike image of a baby. “Our little tadpole,” someone had written in the margin. She quickly put the photo facedown in the box.

  She also discovered a note from Ethan that urged “fly on, Puma Girl,” a small pink-tinged seashell, a ticket stub for a lecture at UC Berkeley titled “Warm Jupiters Aren’t Lonely Tonight,” and another for an Alison Krauss concert, along with a gold medal for the first Cloudrunner race.

  “What was worth your life?” Aloa mumbled, closing her eyes and letting her mind go free.

  The ring of her cell phone brought her quickly back. She sighed, stood, and moved toward her desk, shoving the keepsake box into an open spot in the bookcase behind it.

  “Mark Combs,” the screen announced.

  She wrinkled her nose, accepted the call. “What?” she said.

  “The police report said you found the body of that mechanic in Dogpatch.” Combs’s voice had lost none of its arrogance.

  “Congratulations on your reading skills,” Aloa said. “Why do you care?”

  “Because I saw a short piece we did online and noticed the address was the same as that of Ethan Rodriguez and his girlfriend. The one you’re doing a story on.”

  If he expected her to congratulate him on his deductive skills, she didn’t.

  “Then I talked to the detective who caught the case, Quinn, and he said Ethan’s girlfriend was friends with the dead guy. He said you told him you thought the girl was probably murdered. Wouldn’t tell me anything else.”

  She didn’t answer.

  “I’m curious about what you’ve got.”

  Aloa remained silent.

  “What I’m saying is, I’ll share my notes. The ones you asked for.”

  “Too late.”

  “I’ve got other stuff too. Sources in the PD, an ADA in Reno I know. I don’t mind helping you out. I shouldn’t have said what I did.”

  Aloa knew what Combs was doing. She’d done it herself: ease yourself into your source’s good graces.

  “I don’t need your help,” she said.

  “I think you might, actually.”

  “And why is that?”

  “Because you aren’t exactly a poster girl for the truth, are you?”

  “I’m hanging up now,” Aloa said.

  “No. Wait,” Combs said. “Hear me out. All I’m trying to say is that I know you’re good, but the only thing any journo remembers is that you made stuff up. How about we work together on this? My name makes the story legit. I put you on as a contributing reporter, people see you can be trusted again, and there you go, you’ve got a foot back in the business. Maybe we could even do more stories together. That’s what you want, right?”

  “You’re saying you want me to do all the work while you get the credit?”

  “No. I’ll work on the piece with you. I’ve got some time right now.”

  Aloa could hear the tiniest bit of desperation in his voice. Were there changes afoot at the newspaper?

  “You know, Mark, as tempting as your offer to hijack my story sounds, I think I’ll pass.”

  An exhale of breath. “I thought you were smarter than that.”

  “I am,” she said, “which is why I’m turning you down.”

  “I don’t need you, you know.” Combs’s voice took on the ego-driven edge she remembered from the conference they’d attended. “Like I said, I’ve got sources. I know people in Nevada, plus T.J. trusts me. It’s game on, babe.”

  I’m not your babe, she started to say, but Combs had already hung up.

  Aloa swore, slammed her phone onto the desk, and then immediately picked it up again.

  She dialed Hayley’s mother and left a voice mail telling her another reporter might call but advising her not to talk to any other journalists. “Things are happening,” she said cryptically and hung up the phone.

  She hoped Emily would listen but also knew that Hayley’s mother would be among the first calls Combs would make. She thought he might easily break through Emily’s defenses.

  She would have to work fast.

  Aloa made a pot of French press coffee and returned to her desk. She stared at the timeline she’d sketched in her notebook and the list of questions that needed answering. It was way too long.

  She sipped from the mug of coffee and read Hayley’s workout journal another time and looked again at the crime scene list. Something tickled her brain but disappeared. She got up, took her coffee outside, and sat at the top of the Vallejo steps. Night had descended on the city, turning it into a montage of light and shadow, of quiet and noise.

  Do not think of Combs. Or, as her father used to say, do not let your eyes be distracted by the arrival of other birds. Keep your focus.

  She finished her coffee, her sight drifting upward to a scattering of stars. She picked out the Big Dipper, the only constellation she knew, and stared at it for a moment. She cocked her head.

  She was up and back in the house in less than a minute, powering up the giant TV and the computer and locating the photos she’d taken in Calvin’s shop. She scrolled through the images until she came to the shot she wanted: a photo of Calvin’s tiny living space.

  She moved the cursor, tapped more keys. There it was: a poster on the wall with an artist’s beautiful rendering of a cat’s-eye-like planet. The same drawing she’d seen on the ticket stub in Hayley’s keepsake box.

  She zoomed in again and read the text. A lecture on warm Jupiters would be presented by UC Berkeley Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics Roland Douglas with an introduction by his post-doc research assistant, Sayat Hunter.

  Hunter. The word Hayley had used in her workout diary entry. “The Hunter will have, the hunted will be safe.”

  A spike of adrenaline sent Aloa to her laptop where she looked up first Sayat Hunter and then Roland Douglas. She read up on their research, on the grants and accolades Douglas had received, and then turned her attention to the personal. Fifteen minutes later, she smacked her forehead.

  While there was no address listed for Sayat Hunter, Roland T. Douglas, professor of astronomy, lived in San Francisco. On Uranus Terrace.

  CHAPTER 32

  Aloa stood next to a corner market and stared down the short stretch of street in the Corona Heights neighborhood. Uranus Terrace. Calvin hadn’t been so crazy after all.

  She’d taken the bus to get here, knowing that finding a place to park at night in a residential neighborhood would be next to impossible. She consulted her notebook and began to walk.

  Lexuses and Priuses lined the street, the block a mix of Marina-style cottages and larger homes that spoke of new money. She searched out house numbers, passing an expensive Range Rover with a license plate that read DROPOUT, and stopped in front of a two-story stucco house with a Mexican palm out front. Four symmetrical windows lined the second story of the older home and two windows marked the first floor. A tiny garage with a Volvo parked in front was located on the other side of a gated breezeway. A bumper sticker on the car read WARNING: OBJECTS IN TELESCOPES ARE FARTHER THAN THEY APPEAR.

  Aloa approached the front door, a dot of light announcing the presence of a doorbell with a nameplate underneath it. DOUGLAS, it read in Times New Roman Bold. Beneath it was a small square of paper taped to the wall with the words S. HUNTER written in delicate black ink. She gave herself a silent high five.

  A man in rumpled corduroy and a sweater vest answered her ring. He wore s
lippers and looked to be in his fifties.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Is Mr. Hunter here?” Aloa asked.

  The man glanced at his watch. “Is he expecting you?”

  “Actually, I was just dropping by. A mutual friend died. I wanted him to know before he read it in the papers.”

  “Someone from the college?”

  “A friend of a friend.” Aloa would have to tread carefully.

  The man studied her. “It’s ten o’clock, you know how he gets.”

  “It’ll just take a minute.”

  A moment of hesitation, then: “All right. He’s in the cottage. Through the breezeway.”

  “Thanks,” Aloa said.

  The cottage sat in the far corner of a shallow yard and looked more shedlike than the title “cottage” would suggest. A slurred “enter” answered Aloa’s knock. Aloa wondered if that’s what the rumpled professor had meant by his warning: “You know how he gets.”

  Inside, the structure was hobbitlike, with a narrow bed and a single window on one side of the space. On the back wall was a miniature kitchen: microwave, sink, cupboard. Across from the bed, a Mongolian flag hung above a small rolltop desk and an upholstered purple chair in which sat a dark-haired man in his late twenties. A half-empty bottle of vodka was clutched in his hand.

  “Mr. Hunter?” Aloa said.

  “If you wish.” The man stared up at her. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Aloa. Aloa Snow.”

  “Ah, a woman who is also named for what comes from the sky.”

  The man’s brown eyes were shaded by an epicanthic fold that gave away his Asian heritage, while his dark beard and flannel shirt made him look like the grunge version of Genghis Khan.

  “I have also given myself a skyward name,” he slurred. “In my country it is Sayatshy or Sayat and then, for America, Hunter, because Americans must have more of everything. Even more names.” He smacked his lips and took a sip of vodka. “In Mongolia, you see, one name is enough. But in order to come here, I had to call myself something, and so I took the name of the noble art my father and others of the Kazakh practiced, a people who hunt with eagles.” He sighed. “But that is the failure. I am named after what I am not. But then my father suffered his disgrace so who is the fraud? Him or me?”

  Aloa wondered if he was already too far in his cups to be of any use.

  He looked at her. “Have you come to talk about my research?”

  She shook her head. “I’d like to talk about Hayley Poole, Mr. Hunter.”

  “Sayat, please.”

  “She was your friend, wasn’t she?”

  “She was. She has returned to the stardust from whence she came.” He settled the bottle on the floor next to his chair. “I see by the look on your face you don’t believe me, but it’s true,” Sayat said. “The cells inside us, all of us, were made in the cores of stars. So that is what we are and always will be: stardust. I’m an astronomer. I know these things. But in my country there is no money for science now, and so I became an alcoholic.” He gave a small burp. “Professor Douglas is trying to save me, but it’s probably too late.” A frown. “Who are you again?”

  “My name’s Aloa. I’m doing a story on Hayley. For Novo, a website.”

  “De novo. Latin. It means ‘from the beginning,’” Sayat said. “I like it. Please sit.”

  Aloa looked around and perched on the edge of the bed.

  “I was wondering,” Aloa said. “Did Hayley bring you something? Something for you to keep?”

  Sayat lolled his head back on his chair. “Ah yes, Hayley. The running woman, the lover of Ethan. Such a beautiful friend.” He waved a hand in the air. “He and I met in Ulaanbaatar. He was on an adventure. I was exploring the stars. I would do anything for him.” He closed his eyes and Aloa waited.

  “Sayat?” she said.

  The astronomer startled and sat up straighter in the chair.

  “Did Hayley bring something to you, Sayat?” Aloa repeated.

  The astronomer smacked his lips and rubbed a hand over his face. “Yes. Yes, she did.”

  “What did she bring?”

  Another slow blink of eyes. “Papers. She asked for understanding and also for protection. I don’t have much room, but I kept them for her, for Ethan, for my lionly friend.” His words were becoming even looser around the edges.

  “Do you still have them, the papers?”

  “Do I still have the papers?” Sayat tapped himself on the forehead as if trying to loosen the knowledge. “No,” he said finally. “No, I don’t.”

  A tug of disappointment. “What happened to them?” Aloa asked.

  He picked up the bottle. “The friend of Hayley came.”

  Had Tremblay beaten her to the punch? “Who was the friend?” Aloa asked.

  The astronomer took a long pull from the bottle and hiccupped twice.

  “It was the beautiful bartender. I gave them to her.”

  “Jordan Connor?”

  The astronomer nodded. “Yes. Her very good friend. We were speaking of Hayley and Ethan, and I told her of my promise. I did not want the papers anymore and she took them.”

  “Do you know what was in those papers?” Aloa asked.

  “Bad things.” Sayat shook his head. “Very bad things.”

  “Can you tell me what the bad things were?”

  Another slow close of eyelids. “Why do you want to know?”

  Aloa made a quick decision. “Because I think it may be connected to what happened to Hayley.”

  “It was not she who became infertile,” Sayat slurred.

  The same old reporter who’d taught Aloa about knock-and-talks had told her an open-ended statement would get you further than admitting ignorance. “That’s what I understood.”

  “It was the men.” Sayat opened his eyes. “The men would drink the powder to be strong and energetic and later find themselves unable to even summon their members to the task.” He took a pull of vodka, swishing the alcohol in his mouth before swallowing.

  “Erectile dysfunction?”

  Sayat leaned forward. “Worse. Not even desire. They were as babies. Sexless, weak, lying in bed all day.”

  “Omigod,” Aloa said under her breath.

  “Ah yes,” Sayat said. “The hawk has laid a very rotten egg.” He giggled to himself.

  “The hawk?” Aloa asked.

  “Ethan’s employer. RedHawk,” Sayat said. “Ethan was going to clip its wings. Then, Hayley.” His voice trailed off. He bit his bottom lip and shook his head. “The lie, you see, is the man standing before the tank in Tiananmen Square believing he can stop the gears of corruption. No, they will roll on. They will grind him up. They will eat his soul.” He touched his fist to his chest. “I know because that was what was done to Mongolia. To me.” His eyes filled. “It’s why I drink. Why I live in this closet of a home when I belong on the mountains of my country. I asked what part we play in the universe, and their answer was to destroy me.” A fat tear rolled down his cheek. “It is as it will always be.”

  He scrubbed his face with a hand and Aloa noted the neatness of his nails. “I said the same to the beautiful bartender, but she said she was not afraid. She is a lion of a woman as well.”

  “So Ethan was going to expose this rotten egg.”

  Sobriety seemed to be making its last call on the astronomer. “A book to rake the muck, to sound the whistle.”

  “And Hayley came to you?” Aloa said.

  Sayat gave a loud burp. “I have notes, notes in which I attempted to help her in her quest but failed, as is often my story, as is my life.”

  “May I see them?”

  “Even foul water will put out a fire,” Sayat said. “Even poison can taste like wine.”

  Aloa didn’t understand but decided to take it for assent.

  Sayat pushed himself to his feet. “A man stands up to a hawk and is plucked from the earth,” he muttered, swaying. “A friend will protect you, yes.”

  A
loa jumped out of the way as he stumbled toward the bed, falling facedown onto it, one bare foot still on the floor.

  He mumbled into his pillow. Aloa watched for only a second and then began her task. She went to his desk, finding a drawer of manila folders labeled neatly in his hand. CORRESPONDENCE. IMMIGRATION. EXPENSES. TRANSCRIPT. CV.

  In a folder marked IDEAS and filled with magazine clippings, scribbled notations, and a wrapper from a Mars candy bar, Aloa found a stapled four-page document. “Hayley P. project,” read the title.

  Aloa looked over her shoulder at the now-snoring astronomer, stuffed the notes into her pack, and left.

  Aloa read the astronomer’s notes on the bus ride back to North Beach.

  There were lists of tongue-tying chemical names and long equations along with records of scientific papers about endocrine disruptors, nonsteroidal estrogen, and mitochondria. Arrows linked effects like muscle building and energy enhancement to weight gain and profound exhaustion.

  Little made sense until the last page, where Sayat had written what appeared to be his conclusion: Six of eight male subjects exposed to a compound made by RedHawk Nutritionals (called Pro-Power 500) began suffering devastating effects after sixty to ninety days of use. At first, the men had a surge of energy and libido. Their muscles grew, their sexual stamina rose. Then, suddenly, their revved-up bodies seemed to crash in on themselves. Their sex drive disappeared, their testicles shrank, and debilitating exhaustion made it almost impossible to work or live a normal life. Their symptoms did not fade when they stopped taking the supplement powder. One of the subjects committed suicide (in front of his gym) and the other five participants seemed to disappear (apparently relocated to undisclosed cities).

  “Unknown structure-function relation of above ingredients,” Sayat wrote. “Chemical analysis needed. Possible contamination at manufacturing site?”