“You’ve been here a while…”
“My whole career,” the woman said. “But short of letting you see the class of 1967 yearbook, I don’t know if I can be of much help. As I said, records are confidential.”
“Well, I don’t really need her school records,” Ricky said, removing his phony cancer treatment center letter from his pocket and handing it to the lady. “I’m really searching for anyone who might know of a relative…”
The woman read the letter swiftly. Her face softened. “Oh,” she said apologetically. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize…”
“That’s okay,” Ricky said. “This is kind of a long shot. But, then, you have a niece who’s this sick, you’re willing to take any long shot there is.”
“Of course,” the woman said rapidly. “Of course you would. But I don’t think there’s any Tysons related to Claire left around here. At least not that I recall, and I remember just about everyone who passes through these doors.”
“I’m surprised you remember Claire…,” Ricky said.
“She made an impression. In more ways than one. Back then I was her guidance counselor. I’ve come up in the world.”
“Clearly,” Ricky said. “But your recollection, especially after all these years…”
The woman gestured slightly, as if to cut off his question. She rose and went to a bookcase against a rear wall, and returned in a moment with an old, faux leather-bound yearbook from the class of 1967. She passed it across to Ricky.
It was the most typical of yearbooks. Page after page of candid shots of students in various activities or games, buttressed by some overly enthusiastic prose. The bulk of the yearbook was the formal portraits of the senior class. These were posed shots of young people trying to look older and more serious than they were. Ricky flipped through the lineup, until he came to Claire Tyson. He had a little trouble reconciling the woman he’d seen a decade later with the fresh-faced, well-scrubbed almost adult in the yearbook. Her hair was longer, and tossed in a wave over her shoulder. She had a slight grin on her lips, a little less stiff than most of her classmates, the sort of look that someone who knows a secret might adopt. He read the entry adjacent to her portrait. It listed her clubs-French, science, Future Homemakers, and the drama society-and her sports, which were varsity softball and volleyball. It also listed her academic honors, which included eight semesters on the honor roll and a National Merit Scholarship commendation. There was a quote, played for humor, but which to Ricky had a slightly ominous tone, “Do unto others, before they have a chance to do unto you…” A prediction: “Wants to live in the fast lane…” and a look into the teenage crystal balclass="underline" “In ten years she will be: On Broadway or under it…”
The principal was looking over his shoulder. “She had no chance,” she said.
“I’m sorry?” Ricky replied, the words forming a question.
“She was the only child of a, uh, difficult couple. Living on the edge of poverty. The father was a tyrant. Perhaps worse…”
“You mean…”
“She displayed many of the classic signs of sexual abuse. I spoke with her often when she would have these uncontrollable fits of depression. Crying. Hysterical. Then calm, cold, almost removed, as if she were somewhere else, even though she was sitting in the room with me. I would have called the police if I’d had even the slightest bit of concrete evidence, but she would never acknowledge quite enough abuse for me to take that step. One has to be cautious in my position. And we didn’t know as much about these things then as we do now.”
“Of course.”
“And, then, I knew she would flee, first chance. That boy…”
“Boyfriend?”
“Yes. I’m quite certain she was pregnant and well along at that, when she graduated that spring.”
“His name? I wonder if any child might still be… It would be critical, you know, with the gene pool and all, I don’t understand this stuff the doctors tell me, but…”
“There was a baby. But I don’t know what happened. They didn’t put down roots here, that’s for sure. The boy was heading to the navy, although I don’t know for certain that he got there, and she went off to the local community college. I don’t think they actually ever married. I saw her once, on the street. She stopped to say hello, but that was it. It was as if she couldn’t talk about anything. Claire went from being ashamed about one thing right to the next. The problem was that she was bright. Wonderful on the stage. She could play any part, from Shakespeare to Guys and Dolls, and do it wondrously. Real talent for acting. It was reality that was a problem for her.”
“I see…”
“She was one of these people you’d like to help, but can’t. She was always searching for someone who could take care of her, but she always found the wrong people. Without fail.”
“The boy?”
“Daniel Collins?” The principal took the yearbook and flipped back a few pages and then handed it to Ricky. “Good-looking, huh? A ladies’ man. Football and baseball, but never a star. Smart enough, but didn’t apply himself in the classroom. The sort of kid who always knew where the party was, where to get the booze, or the pot or whatever, and he was the one who never got caught. One of those kids who was merely slipsliding through life. Had all the girls he wanted, but especially Claire, on a string. It was one of those relationships you are powerless to do anything about, and know will bring nothing but sorrow.”
“You didn’t like him much?”
“What was there to like? He was a bit of a predator. More than a bit, actually. And certainly only really interested in himself and what made him feel good.”
“Do you have his family’s local address?”
The principal rose, went over to a computer, and typed in a name. Then she took a pencil and copied down a number onto a scrap piece of paper, which she handed over to Ricky. He nodded a response.
“So you think he left her…”
“Sure. After he’d used her up. That was what he was good at: using people then discarding them. Whether that took one year or ten, I don’t know. You stick in my line of work, you get pretty good at predicting what will happen to all these kids. Some might surprise you, one way or the other. But not all that many.” She gestured at the yearbook prediction. On Broadway or under it. Ricky knew which of those two alternatives had come true. “The kids always make a joke along with a guess. But life’s rarely that amusing, is it?”
Before heading to the VA Hospital, Ricky stopped at his motel and changed into the black suit. He also took with him the item that he’d borrowed from the property room of the theater department back at the university in New Hampshire, fitted it around his neck and admired himself in the mirror.
The hospital building had the same soulless appearance as the high school. It was two stories, whitewashed brick seemingly plopped down in an open space between, by Ricky’s count, at least six different churches. Pentecostal, Baptist, Catholic, Congregational, Unitarian, AME, all with the hopeful message boards on their front lawns proclaiming unfettered delight in the imminent arrival of Jesus, or at least, comfort in the words of the Bible, spoken fervently in daily sessions and twice on Sundays. Ricky, who had gained a healthy disrespect for religion in his psychoanalytic practice, rather enjoyed the juxtaposition of the VA Hospital and the churches: It was as if the harsh reality of the abandoned, represented by hospital, did some measure of balancing with all the optimism racing about unchecked at the churches. He wondered if Claire Tyson had been a regular church visitor. He suspected as much, given the world she grew up in. Everyone went to church. The trouble was, it still didn’t stop folks from beating their wives or abusing their children the remaining days of the week, Ricky thought, which he was relatively certain that Jesus disapproved of, if He had an opinion at all.