“Are you getting help?” That’s what Cathy had asked him the previous night before she’d driven the girls away. “Because you should, Dan,” she’d said, one hand on the open driver’s door. “You really should.”
“I am,” he’d told her. “And it’s working. I’m feeling much better, Cathy.”
“That’s great,” she’d said, giving his arm a squeeze. “God, that’s so good to hear.” For the first time since they’d met at breakfast Daniel had believed the honesty of her emotion. So maybe she really did want him back? Maybe he could make his promise to them true, and sooner than he’d hoped?
It had been a lie, what he’d told Cathy. But also not a lie. He was feeling better, and he had been getting help, just not the kind she’d meant. But it was still help. The combed vineyards patching the hills. The river mists and sea fogs. A red-tailed hawk lifting from a tree. He’d got as far as finding out about the local veterans’ charities, and he’d seen their bumper stickers too, advertising their work with “heroes.” But Daniel didn’t feel like a hero. And he didn’t feel like a veteran either. That was the problem. The military was like a family, that’s what they told you. Until you left. One minute you’re on the inside, the next you’re out. Ever since college it was all Daniel had known. He’d spent a third of his life flying, and now suddenly he’d found himself grounded. Like Colonel Ellis had said, he’d upheld the American Airman’s Creed—My Nation’s Sword and Shield, Its Sentry and Avenger. And what had they done in return? Pushed him out the door as fast as they could.
Without flying Daniel felt lumpen, clumsy, as if deprived of one of his senses. He felt stripped, too, of everything else it had brought: authority, identity, purpose. Even through his time at Creech when he’d flown from a ground control station, not a cockpit, he’d still thrived on the sensation. Which is why he’d kept the veterans’ charities at bay. Because if he couldn’t have his military life then Daniel wanted to forget it, and he knew those charities would mean talking, remembering. And remembering would mean seeing too. Which was also why he’d fashioned his own kind of help in Sonoma rather than seek it elsewhere. Because of what he might see again if forced to remember. He’d seen too much already, of that he was sure. He’d looked for too long, until he’d wanted his eyes to rot. So yes, he’d lied to Cathy, but it was for the right reasons. If he wanted to get back to her, to the girls, then he knew he’d have to find his own route. For now, that meant staying out west, Sonoma, working at Sally’s. And it meant the letters too, the letters he’d been writing to Michael.
―
“Okay, reckon that’ll do.” Sally pushed herself off the fence and began walking back to the farmhouse, her two dogs lifting themselves from the dust to follow her. “There’s some pellets in the feed bin,” she called to Daniel over her shoulder. “Give her a handful. But not too much, now.”
―
Daniel had picked up other jobs, other routines, during his time on the coast — working on the grape harvest, helping out in a fishing harbour — but it was only when he’d come to Sally’s that he’d felt ready to write to Michael. When the words had finally come, they’d come quickly and he’d written that first letter in one sitting; Dear Mr. Turner, I understand this is a letter you most probably do not want to receive…When he’d finished it, he’d read it through, put it in an envelope, addressed it to Michael’s publishers, then got in his car to mail it from San Francisco. He wanted to make contact. He wanted to be known. But that hadn’t meant he’d wanted to be found.
The only address Daniel put on his letter was that of a mailbox in the Bay Area. Not that he expected Michael to reply, at least not in the form of a letter. Perhaps he’d publish Daniel’s name online, or go to the papers. It would be a story, after all, his writing to him. But whatever he did Daniel found it hard to imagine Michael would write to him directly.
This uncertainty about Michael’s response meant in the weeks after he’d written to him Daniel had woken each morning washed through with a nervous anticipation. What were the consequences if Michael went public? What would be the military’s response? But at the same time he’d also woken feeling relieved. Because he had finally done it. He’d completed the circle, and it was the only way forward, he was sure, regardless of what it might bring.
When, eventually, Michael did write back, Daniel wasn’t just surprised to receive the letter, but also to open it and read his asking him for more. There’d been no blame, no recriminations, no anger even. Just questions. In a list. About himself, his family, his work. And about the day he’d killed his wife.
At first Daniel hadn’t understood. He had confessed, he’d stepped out of the shadows. Wasn’t that enough? But as he’d worked at Sally’s that day, clearing out the stables, restocking the kitchen, cutting back the ferns along the brook, he’d come to see that no, it wasn’t enough. To confess and leave was easy. But to confess and stay, to remain circling over your deed, to hunger after the detail of it, that was something else. He of all people should know that. So perhaps it was a form of punishment, these questions? Michael’s way of making him pay through recollection, through offering up his life for dissection? A way for him to reap some kind of a victory from his loss; a victory through knowledge.
―
Opening his fist to reveal a handful of pellets, Daniel flattened his fingers and let the mare nuzzle into them, working her lips against his palm. As she did he ran his other hand along the muscle under her mane. The sun was warm against the back of his neck. He could hear the sound of a shower through the open window of one of the guest rooms. For the first time in what seemed like years, he felt content, calm.
―
Today Daniel would send his third letter to Michael. Having replied to his first Michael had sent Daniel another set of questions. Some asked for clarification or more detail. Others, though, were entirely new. Daniel understood Michael was a writer, but at the same time he couldn’t imagine what he might do with the answers he was giving him. But despite this uncertainty, or perhaps because of it, Daniel had still decided to reply. And now, in response to a third letter from Michael, he would reply again today. Partly to pay his dues to the husband of the woman he’d killed, but also for himself. Because that’s who else Daniel was writing these letters for now, himself. As a form of focused remembering, of purposeful recollection, and as a way to trace, through his answers to Michael, the convoluted paths that had led to what happened.
―
“I said not too much!”
Daniel, his hand already digging in the bin for more pellets, turned to see Sally behind him.
“It ain’t about reward, remember. You want her instinct to work for you, not her goddamn hunger.”
She was leading another horse out of the yard into the field. “Feels good, though, eh?” she said, as she passed him. “To have that connection? Without even touching?”
Daniel held the mare’s jaw as she nudged under his arm, searching for the pellets.
“Yeah,” he said, although Sally was too far away to hear him. “It does.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
IT WAS TWO months after Michael and Josh had gone jogging on the Heath that Samantha told Michael her husband had left. They were in a café in South End Green, its French windows drawn open to the pavement. An overcast day had broken, its vanilla sunlight suggestive of autumn. A couple of buses were parked up nearby, casting shadows over their table.