by Thomas Scott
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 he thought 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 on 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 honest law enforcement officials Virgil had 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? Will 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 be and no matter what anyone might have thought, Virgil felt like 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?”
At the mention of his parents, the boy stopped and turned. Virgil had narrowed the gap between them and they stood only a few yards apart, halfway up the hill. When Virgil asked him again about his parents, he simply shrugged his shoulders, his smile still in place. Virgil squatted down and kept his voice calm and peaceful. “My name is Virgil. What’s yours?”
“Wyatt.”
Virgil smiled at him. “Hey that’s a great name. We’d make a good team, wouldn’t we? Virgil and Wyatt.”
He gave a funny look and when he did Virgil realized he was referencing something the boy would have no knowledge of.
“What about your mommy? Is she around here somewhere?”
He tilted his head to the side and stared at Virgil’s face. Virgil had a scar that ran along his jawline, the result of an injury he sustained when pulled from the rubble during the house fire. It had faded over the years, but it remained visible, especially when he smiled and his skin stretched tight. Wyatt reached out with his hand and ran his fingers across the scar. His touch was soft and warm as the tips of his tiny fingers traveled along the side of Virgil’s face.
“Say, that’s a pretty fancy fishing pole you’ve got there,” Virgil said. “Did your daddy get that for you?”
Wyatt looked at the fishing pole in his hand as if he were only just then aware of its presence. He nodded at Virgil, then dropped the pole in the grass. “He was gonna teach me to fish.”
“Going to? You mean he didn’t?”
He shook his head. “No. He went away.”
“Where did he go?”
“I don’t know where it’s called. Can’t ‘member.”
“What about your mommy?”
He didn’t answer and instead turned and looked up at the top of the hill.
Virgil wasn’t quite sure what to do. He couldn’t leave this young boy alone in the park, yet at the same time, Wyatt wasn’t being very helpful or forthcoming about his mother or father. Virgil was about to suggest that he go with him back to the MCU. Once there, he’d be able to leave him in the hands of one of the detectives who could locate his parents. But what happened next defied almost anything Virgil had ever witnessed. The air had suddenly gone still and the birds and other wildlife went quiet as if they were suddenly nonexistent. The little boy leaned in close and ran his hand along Virgil’s scar once again then looked him straight in the eye and said, “Keep taking those pi
lls and you’re going to die.”
His words were like a slap in the face, and Virgil grabbed him by the arms. “What did you just say?”
Wyatt slipped away and ran a few steps up the incline and pointed at the top of the hill. “I said, keep walking up the hill and you can touch the sky!” Before Virgil could process what had just happened, Wyatt crested the hill and started down the far side.
By the time Virgil got to the top, Wyatt was nowhere in sight.
Virgil spent the next half hour looking for the little boy named Wyatt, but never found him. When he returned to the spot on the hill where they were before he ran off, Virgil noticed the toy fishing pole still lying in the grass. He picked it up, carried it to his truck and drove back to the MCU headquarters. He signed all the necessary forms for the state’s human resources department, answered a few questions that seemed to constitute something of an exit interview, then headed toward Ron’s office to offer an apology.
He’d realize later that he should have just gone home or to the bar.
Unfortunately, he did neither.
When Virgil walked into Ron’s office he found Miles wasn’t there, but Bradley Pearson was. He was talking on his cell while looking through Virgil’s personal belongings Ron had re-boxed. When Pearson realized someone was behind him he turned around. When he saw who it was, he ended his conversation in mid-sentence and slipped the phone into his pocket. His face lit up with a huge grin, something that happened about as often as a solar eclipse.
“Jonesy,” he said, as he reached out and offered his hand. Virgil shook his hand out of instinct, but what happened next was not one of his better moments. “Did you get your new fishing pole? I sent it via special delivery. I know it’s probably not as nice as the one I broke at your house—” And that’s as far as he got. Virgil still had Pearson’s hand in his own—they were only mid-shake—when he mistakenly concluded that the boy in the park had been part of a cruel hoax initiated by Pearson.
Virgil slapped him full in the face, a humiliating blow that snapped Pearson’s head sideways and caused his eyes to water. Then Virgil pushed him into one of the chairs, picked up his box of personal belongings, dumped it in his lap and smashed the open container bottom-down over his head. By the time he was finished Pearson looked like a Jack-in-the-Box with a bad set of springs. Virgil stared at him for a moment and then walked out the door.
He was about to get in his truck when he saw Miles turn into the lot and get out of his rental car. He walked over and said, “Hey, Ron. Listen…I was out of line. Everything seems to be happening sort of all at once for me and well, I don’t know…I just lost my shit for a minute. I’m sorry.”
Miles puffed out his cheeks. “Forget about it. And I’m sorry too. I mean, your job, Jonesy. Jesus.”
“Ah, it’s not like I need the money. I just liked doing what I do.” Virgil looked down at the rental car sticker. “You having car trouble?”
“Something like that. Listen, Jonesy, I’ve got to run. I’m late for a meeting with Pearson.”
“Yeah, he’s waiting for you in your office.”
“Great. What’s he doing in there?”
“Oh, you know…he’s doing what he does best.”
“What’s that?”
“He’s thinking inside the box. See you around, Ron.”
Thirty minutes later when Virgil walked into the bar, Delroy motioned him over. “Those two Red Stripes at the other end of da bar, mon, they say they need to talk to you. What you do, you?”
Jamaicans use the term Red Stripe for two things. One is their beer. The other is a slang term for police officers. “Probably something I shouldn’t have.”
That earned Virgil a sideways look. “Yeah, mon. There’s a lot of dat going around lately.”
Virgil glanced at the other end of the bar. Two uniformed city police officers were sitting very still and watching him through the mirror. The older of the two let out a heavy sigh before they both got up and made their way over to where he stood with Delroy. Virgil couldn’t recall the name of the older cop, but had seen him in the bar a number of times. He’d never seen the younger one at all.
“We’d rather not cuff you up, if you promise you won’t give us any grief,” the younger of the two said.
Virgil shook his head and fixed his gaze on the veteran. “Who’s the boot?”
“What did you just call me?” the young cop said.
“What dis about, now?” Delroy said.
The rookie turned and looked at Delroy. “This is about baldheaded island jerk-waters like you knowing your place. If that’s too complicated for you, let me put it this way: butt the fuck out.”
Delroy started to respond, but Virgil beat him to it. “You’re in our place of business. You’ll show some respect, or you’ll be shown to the door, badge or not. If you think I’m not serious, say something else to him or me and see what happens.”
The rookie took a step forward and the veteran cop drew his nightstick from the chrome loop on his belt. But instead of using the stick on Virgil he laid the tip across the edge of the bar and blocked the path of his trainee. “The man’s right. Show some respect. Do you know who you’re talking to here?”
The rookie cop suddenly looked very unsure of himself. “Isn’t this the guy we’re supposed to bring in? I thought you said this was him.”
The veteran looked at Virgil and then shook his head before he spoke to his partner. “Go wait out by the squad. I’ll be out in a minute. Don’t touch any of the buttons on the radio.” Then to Virgil and Delroy: “On behalf of the city of Indianapolis and the Indianapolis City Police Department, I’d like to apologize for my trainee’s behavior.” He scratched his forehead, then said, “I don’t know where they get these guys anymore. I really don’t. This kid’s a perfect example. He’ll be fired, or he’ll quit, or he’ll be dead on the job inside of a year. I guarantee it. No one knows how to do this work anymore.” Then, almost as an afterthought he said, “Your old man knew how though.”
“He sure did,” Virgil said. “Did they cut a warrant?”
The cop shook his head. “No. I don’t think they will either.”
“Look, uh…” Virgil glanced at the cop’s nameplate on his uniform. He still couldn’t remember his first name. “Officer Nagy…”
“Jim.”
“Ah, that’s right. Jim. Sorry. So let me ask you something, Jim. Pearson is the governor’s chief of staff. Why does he want city to roll on this instead of state?”
“Pearson? What are you talking about? I have no idea. I got the call on my cell phone, straight from central dispatch. It was Cora LaRue. She’s the one who wanted us to pick you up.”
Delroy looked at Virgil, then the cop. “You say Bradley Pearson? Ha. Delroy almost forget.” He walked behind the bar, bent down and then lifted a brand new cane pole from underneath and set it gently in front of Virgil. “He had it sent special delivery. It arrived ‘bout an hour ago, mon. Dat’s some nice pole, no?”
“Look, Jim, I know we don’t know each other all that well, but if I said that you have always known me to be an honest and straightforward cop, or at the very least a man of my word, would you be inclined to agree with that statement?”
Officer Nagy didn’t hesitate. “Absolutely.”
“Then I want you to know I mean you and your department no insult or disrespect whatsoever when I say this: No warrant, no ride downtown.”
Nagy thought about that for a half beat, then took out his phone and made a call. “No dice,” was all he said to the person on the other end before he closed the phone. He twirled his nightstick between his fingers with the precision and dexterity of a gunslinger before he slid the baton back into the chrome loop on his belt. Then he smiled at Delroy and sat down at the bar. “I’ve never been to Jamaica, but every time I come in here you make me feel like I’m right at home. Got any more of that chicken cooking back there?”
“Yeah mon, you bet we do.” Delroy turned to go get Nagy a p
late of jerk chicken, but then he stopped and said something that surprised Virgil. “Don’t you give up on dat rookie of yours.”
Nagy cocked his head to the side. “Why’s that?”
“Because it the ones we don’t give up on that make it in the end. Anyting less and you not only fail them, but worse, you disrespect yourself, you.”
Just then Virgil’s cell phone rang.
The caller ID said WORK. It was Cora.
When Virgil answered the phone she was already speaking. “…listen to me, Jonesy and you listen good. There is no excuse for what you did today. Do you hear me? None.”
“Cora—”
“Don’t interrupt me. I’m not done. I wanted to have this conversation in person, but I guess we’ll do it your way. In case you haven’t noticed, your life is spinning out of control. I’d like to know what on earth makes you think that it is even remotely acceptable that you can come into a state office, assault an official of the state and then walk out as if nothing happened. Would you care to explain that to me?”
“I don’t think I can. It obviously wasn’t one of my better moments.”
“That might be the understatement of the decade. I’ve somehow convinced Pearson not to file assault charges against you. I hope that wasn’t a mistake on my part.”
“Thank you.”
“Shut up. I’ve tried to be kind. I’ve tried to be compassionate. I’ve even tried to be your friend. Now I’m going to try the truth. You know what the difference between a victim and a martyr is? They both eventually go down in flames, except a martyr deludes himself into thinking that he’s done it on his own terms. By the way, I’ve got your final paycheck in my desk drawer. You’ll get it when you fish your badge out of that pond of yours. My God, you infuriate the hell out of me.”
