Rick glanced at me, then away, just before I looked over the seat at Donald. “What do you mean?”
“Why didn’t he stay upstairs?” Donald stared at me as if I knew the answer and had refused to share it with him. “Why would you have your own cousin sleep in that terrible little space when you could just as easily put him up on the couch?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe it was just easier to—”
“Why? Why would you do that?”
“Donald, I don’t know.”
“I didn’t like that fucker,” Rick said.
“You don’t like anybody,” I reminded him.
He shook his head, the dangle earring dancing as if alive. “Nah, there was something about him, something not right. Almost like the whole thing with Bernard scared him.”
“Well shit, finding someone hanging in your basement is frightening stuff,” I said.
“I don’t mean like that. It was like he was scared having Bernard living there, so he put him down in the cellar, out of the way.”
“Why would he be afraid of Bernard? No one was afraid of Bernard.”
“What about this business with the Marines?” Donald asked suddenly. “Why would Bernard lie about such a thing? It makes no sense, I can’t figure it out.”
Neither could I, but I was relatively certain we wouldn’t solve it right then and there. I rubbed my eyes, a vague headache had settled behind them. “Listen, we all need some rest.”
“Yeah, I haven’t slept since yesterday afternoon and I have to work tonight,” Rick sighed. “Let’s hook up in a couple days and have dinner or something.”
“Sounds good.” I looked into the back. “You going to be OK, Donald?”
His eyes darkened and I wasn’t sure if I’d unintentionally struck a nerve or if there was something he wanted to tell me but for whatever reason couldn’t. “Of course.”
“Drive carefully,” Rick said. “Nasty out there.”
“See you guys soon.” I pushed open the door and darted into the rain.
A coastal town south of Boston, Potter’s Cove had once been a prosperous mill town, but as with the rest of its storied past, the economic affluence the town had once enjoyed was now little more than a vague memory.
Main Street housed an array of inexpensive eateries, independently owned shops and a number of empty storefronts. Several enormous buildings sat boarded up along the northern part of town—reminders of a former status only the elderly could recall with clarity. A clothing manufacturer and a national department store giant employed more than five hundred residents, but Potter’s Cove was mostly comprised of working-class folks who had no choice but to seek employment elsewhere.
I drove across town, turned onto the main drag and parked behind a local pizza joint. Once out of the car, I hesitated and looked out at the train tracks and water beyond—the cove, as it were. I watched a pair of ducks glide along the surface, oblivious to the rain, and was suddenly confronted with the memory of my mother. Before her death several years prior, we’d stood together on that very spot countless times, feeding the ducks and talking quietly about whatever came to mind.
I thought of her often in winter.
I climbed the battered staircase at the rear of the building and slipped into the apartment. The building itself was a two-story zoned for both commercial and residential occupants. One half of the first floor housed the most popular pizza place in town; the other had sat vacant for more than three years. Our apartment constituted the entire second floor, and while it was safe and passably comfortable, we’d lived there for more than a decade. It was to be our “first” apartment. Twelve years later we still hadn’t moved into our second, and unless we hit the lottery the idea of ever having an actual house was, at best, a wild fantasy.
The apartment was dark but for a lamp on an end table in the den. I put Bernard’s planner on the coffee table, shook rainwater from my jacket, hung it in the closet and went looking for Toni.
I found her in the kitchen standing at the sink, staring through the double windows overlooking the fire escape. I wasn’t certain she knew I was there, so I moved deeper into the room, my weight causing the floor to creak. Shadows wrestled with the sparse bright patches filtering through the windows, cloaking her profile in alternate bands of light and dark. She still hadn’t turned to look at me, but I could tell from her expression that she knew I was there. Her eyes blinked slowly; gazed at the row of clay pots on the fire escape.
“In a few weeks it’ll be spring,” she said, wiping her hands with a dishrag.
“Can’t come fast enough.”
“For me either.” She draped the folded towel over the faucet. “I’m going to plant some herbs this year. Parsley maybe. It’s been so long I can’t even remember what it’s like to have a yard… an actual garden, but…”
As her voice trailed off into silence I went to the cupboard, grabbed a mug and poured myself some coffee from what was left in the pot. “I can’t believe you’re giving me shit today. I do the best I can, Toni.”
She finally turned from the window and leaned back against the sink. “That wasn’t a slam.” Suddenly she was wide-eyed and innocent. “Not everything is, you know.”
I sipped my coffee. Lukewarm piss. “Think I’ll take a shower.”
“Do you want breakfast?” she asked. “I have to run to the store but we have some eggs.”
I glanced at my watch. It was only a little after eleven but seemed much later. “No, I’m all set. I just want to get clean and sit down, go through some of Bernard’s things I brought home.”
“Everything all right?”
“We’ve got some questions, but I suppose that’s always the case when someone takes their own life.” I reached around her and poured the coffee into the sink then put the mug on the counter. She smelled vaguely of coconut and some other soap-induced scent I couldn’t quite put my finger on. “You’re not surprised he did it, are you?”
She recognized it as more statement than question but responded with a subtle nod anyway. “I’m sorry he did it,” she said softly, “but not surprised.”
“Why not?”
“Sometimes life is harsh. Not everyone’s cut out for it.”
“You never really liked Bernard much.”
“I didn’t know him that well.”
I studied her eyes. “You’re an awful liar.”
She left the counter and strolled to the table. “Let’s not do this, OK?”
“You knew him for years too.”
“And I’m sorry he died, Alan.” She snatched her purse from one of the kitchen chairs, slung it over her shoulder and faced me. “But you asked me if I was surprised. No, I’m not. Bernard was a strange guy. He lived at home with his mother until she died, he never had a girlfriend or any sort of relationship I know of with a woman—a man or anything else for that matter. He sold cars for a living without ever seeming to realize he was a walking caricature of a used car salesman, and while he could be sweet and was never anything but nice to me we both know he had a penchant for stretching the truth and being evasive. There was something inherently creepy about him, Alan.”
She was right and I could think of nothing to say in his defense.
“He was also very sad,” she continued. “You could see it in his eyes, if you bothered to look for it.”
“Right,” I said, glaring at her now. “If only I’d bothered.” The nightmare had crept back into my mind and I was weakening against its resolve. I’d always had nightmares—even as an adult—but nothing like this, nothing that refused to let go even once I was fully awake. My hands were shaking again and I felt for a moment like I might collapse. I gripped the counter as casually as I could and felt my weight shift against it. Toni stood staring at me with those big brown eyes, the natural curves of her figure concealed beneath a baggy cotton sweat suit.