Seeing Edwina, the raft of drugs she depended on, I had a rare opportunity. For once I was here before — not after. It felt worth five minutes of my time to chip away, however slightly, at future indignity.
Also, I hate a mess.
I lined the can with the CVS bag and put it beneath the sink.
“I meant what I said,” she called. “I don’t know where he’s at. That’s honest. Not like you.”
I rejoined her in the living room. “Even if you did know, I wouldn’t blame you for not wanting to tell me.”
“You just tryin to sugar me up.”
“I’m gonna suggest one last time that we call a doctor.”
“I don’t have a primary.”
“Someone else, then, to keep an eye on you,” I said. “A neighbor.”
That got a snort.
“What about your daughter?”
She started. I’d done my research.
Then, as if giving up, she pursed her lips and faced away.
“We could call her together,” I said. “Maybe she knows where Julian’s at.”
“Ask her yourself.” Her voice was a hard matte shell, hinting at the terrible loneliness inside. “I ain’t even tryin to know.”
“Believe it or not, I’d like to help your son.”
She smirked.
“You’ve heard that before,” I said.
“Oh yes I have.”
“From the police.”
“Police,” she said. “Lawyers. Social services. Everybody’s so helpful. The folks from the experiment, they wanted to help, too, and you see what that got him.”
“I understand.”
“Oh you do, do you?”
“Maybe I don’t,” I said. “Help me out, then. Tell me about him.”
She looked at me. “Tell you what?”
“About Julian.”
She fell silent for a moment. “I don’t know what you expect me to say.”
“You know him. I don’t.”
“Yeah, and?”
“And maybe you share with me a little about who he is, what he’s like, I can do what I can to keep him safe.”
“He’s in danger.”
“He’s out there,” I said.
“You think he did something.”
“I don’t know that. Don’t know him.”
“I don’t know him, either,” she said. “Not anymore. Maybe I never did.”
“Does he have friends? A girlfriend?”
“Girlfriend? Be real, now.” She shook her head. “You ask me as many times you want. The answer’s still the same: I don’t know where he’s at. I ain’t seen him in forever.”
“What’s forever?”
“Ten years,” she said. “More.”
I said, “Back when he was living with you.”
“He got out and had no place to go.”
“You took him in.”
She stared at me. “He’s still my child.”
“All I meant was, you did right by him.”
“You definitely sugaring.” But she didn’t seem to mind.
“How was it, having him home?” I asked.
She shrugged.
“Did he have a hard time adjusting to life on the outside?”
“Julian had a hard time adjusting to everything,” she said.
Her anger wilted as quickly as it had come; she unballed her fists and began fiddling with her cuticles. “I know God has His reasons, and He gives us each our gifts. And I know I ain’t the greatest mother in the world, but I tried, I was trying. You need to realize, I wasn’t like you see me now. I didn’t sit here like this, I could get around. I had him young. Two kids and two jobs. I was tired all the time. I don’t know what I did, to make him act like that.”
“You have a recent photo of him?”
She rolled her eyes. “No.”
“All right,” I said. “When he left, ten or so years ago, did something happen to make him take off? You two have a fight?”
“Wasn’t like that. When he first came out he wouldn’t do nothing. Just sat and watched TV. Reverend Willamette, bless him, he started coming round. He took Julian under his wing. He got him a job, helping part-time over at the church. You know — touch up the paint, whatever. He was doing all right. Then one day I wake up, and he’s gone.”
She bit off a hangnail. “I ain’t seen him since. And that’s the truth.”
She held the water glass out to me.
I took it to the kitchen, refilled it, calling, “The reverend’s a good man.”
“Yes he is.”
“Where’s he preach at?”
“Dwight Baptist.”
“That’s your church?” I said, coming back to the living room.
“I go when I can,” she said.
I handed her the glass. “Lemme ask you about something else: those people from the experiment.”
Her face pinched. “What about them.”
“You said they wanted to help.”
“That’s what they said. They came to the high school, passing out flyers. Julian was all excited, begging me, ‘Can I please, Mama.’ I said, ‘What these people going to do to you?’ I didn’t want them giving him electric shocks or nothing.”
“What did they do?”
“He told me he got to play video games,” she said. “He says he goes and does this experiment and also they gonna help him with his homework. You know, tutoring. He needed the help. The school already made him repeat the year. So, okay, I said.”
“He played video games, and they gave him help with school? Anything else?”
“That’s what they said they were gonna do. But I didn’t see none of that. Later I heard that the man, he said there was two groups, one got the tutoring and the other didn’t get nothing. I say that’s some bullshit.” She paused. “They fed him, though.”
“Fed him.”
“He said the man got him a burger. He liked that.”
Rennert passing out McDonald’s bags: life at Tolman Hall had improved since the days of free Oreos. “Nice of him.”
She stared at me incredulously. “You think a hamburger makes up for what they did?”
I was quick to agree that it did not.
“It was them made him crazy,” she said. “He was normal before that.”
She seemed to believe it, too. A game had driven her son to violence. Because that was easier than the alternative, that a terrible crime had spilled forth from some poisonous well within his being.
Either way, she wasn’t denying he’d done it.
I said, “After he got out, did he ever talk about the people from the study?”
“Like what?”
“Was he mad at them? Talk about wanting to get revenge?”
“Julian didn’t get mad,” she said. “He got scared.”
“Scared of what.”
“Himself,” she said. “People look, they see that big body of his and think the wrong things. I never seen a boy so scared his own shadow. I get scared, too, thinking about him out there, on his own. I just pray God keeps him safe. Nothing more I can do.”
“Is that where you think he is? On the street?”
She shook her head, dejectedly. “I don’t know.”
She yawned twice. “I’m tired, Mr. Edison. You made me tired.”
I stood. “I’m leaving you another card. Maybe you’ll like it better than the first.”
The barest smile. Another yawn.
“Ms. Triplett, if you remember anything, think of something else that might make it easier for me to find Julian and help him, please give me a call.”
“Coroner,” she said. “You sure he ain’t dead?”
“Definitely not,” I said. “We do other things, too.”
She said, “Hmm.” Reached for the remote control.