A Measure of Blood (5 page)

“Wait. Wait. Okay, let me help you get to the hospital. One way or another, you shouldn't be alone.”

The man eyes Matt warily. He puts a hand to his pocket, checking his wallet, then says abruptly, “Let's go. But I'm not going to just abandon you there. You have to be with someone. My car is outside. It's the silver Hyundai.”

Matt follows him to the car. The man keeps looking at him, trying to figure him out.

A
LAW AND
ORDER
EPISODE
is on now but Nadal, not quite watching, is replaying what he has been replaying off and on all afternoon.

What are you doing here?

I came to see him. I have rights.

Don't you touch him, don't you go near him. He's not yours.

But I can see he is.

Oh, you're wrong, wrong, wrong.

He knew she was lying.
Well, I am going to get to know him. I'm taking him for a day, two days. A father and son should know each other.

Matt! she cried. Matt, leave the house. Go. Go now. Run. Go to a neighbor. Just run.

He heard the door slam behind him. You bitch, telling him to run. From me.

She grabbed his arm, hard. Yes.
You're acting really funny. Are you … Are you on something?

No. Stupid. Why can't I talk to him?

He's not yours.

I'll find him. I have rights
. He shoved her and one of the pans on the counter behind her vibrated and fell to the floor. He moved to the door, thinking he would chase down his son wherever he went. She came after him. She was holding a kitchen knife.

Please leave us alone.

You're lying.

No.
She looked to a table near the door where there was a cell phone charger. But he saw the phone wasn't there. She blocked the door. She still had the knife.
I went to New York. I went to a clinic.
He tried to grab at the knife hand because she was holding the knife out toward his gut. He grabbed the knife from her.

He got it, he got the knife.

The hateful way she looked at him—

Then he had blood on him. She slumped to the floor. He grabbed a kitchen towel and pulled at the stain on his shirt, wiped his hands. He had to get out of there. He descended the stairs from the second floor to the first floor and out the door. He wound around the building, all the while looking for his boy. He looked everywhere, quickly. Down the street maybe … He walked down Morrowfield, passing one man talking to his own little boy, passing an old woman pulling a wheeling cart of groceries.

He couldn't stay. His car had been parked around the corner on Murray in front of the Russian store that had caviar signs in the window. He got in, still wiping at his clothes.

Up ahead was a little boy. Matt. His head throbbed. He started up and drove down the block but when he got there, he saw it was another kid, older. He was so weak he wondered if he'd been stabbed, too. He drove a block to the parkway and found himself taking the Monroeville ramp. The car seemed to decide. Murraysville, Route 22, State College.

His mother looks at him, smiles, almost a question.

BEFORE THE ELEVEN
O'CLOCK NEWS
on Sunday night, Colleen is collapsing in front of a TV with John Potocki. They're at her place, exhausted, and she's cradled in his arms. They need to sleep soon so they can get back to it at five in the morning, fresh. There are no leads at all except what the little boy told them. They can't even be sure the killer is the same guy who bothered Maggie Brown at the grocery store.

Some cases aren't ever solved. Ever. The man might have been asking for her wallet.

Potocki sighs and changes position. He wants to resolve their living situation, either move in here or find a house they can both agree on. “I feel like I'm living out of a suitcase,” he said last night. “I don't even know what shirts I have over here.”

She still wants to have the possibility of her whole house to herself. He worries, she knows, that she's still in love with Christie. But that's done, that was fantasy, not real, just Christie having his Christie effect—the ultimate strong, square father figure, thoughtful and plain old charismatic. Her phone rings; she sees the ID and picks up. “Hey Boss. You must have something.”

“The boy has disappeared.”

“Oh … Oh my God.”

“He's not at the Panikkar place. We're combing the neighborhood. I've called the kid's friends and he isn't there. I called Sasha. He isn't there. Apparently the kid has a thing about running off, according to Sasha. That's the hopeful part. But I'm going to need you to … help look.”

“I can call the media.”

“I already did that.”

“I'm going for my car as I speak. I can take this part of Squirrel Hill. His grade school and all that. There might be other friends. Potocki can do other parts of Squirrel Hill.” She breaks from the phone to say, “We have to look for the boy. He's gone.” Then she tells Christie, “We're both on it,” and hangs up.

Potocki is putting on his shoes. He has muted the TV. They leave it that way, don't even bother to turn if off. “Is it an abduction?” he asks Colleen.

“We don't know much of anything yet.”

They go in two separate cars. Colleen leaves hers running to walk around the playground of Minadeo Elementary. She tries all the doors of the school building. Locked. She peers out at the neighborhood.

Would
he just run off? Or has he been snatched? Such a beautiful little boy.

Hospital, Colleen thinks. Hospital. His mother.

She calls Christie to tell him to try the hospital.

“Great minds,” he says. “I'm on my way there now. I called Marina. She says it topped the eleven o'clock news. So the word is out. That's good.”

She drives slowly through the neighborhood, looking, looking
.

Her phone rings ten minutes later. “You were right. He … thought his mother might still be alive.”

“I'll come to the hospital.”

“Thanks.”

She calls Potocki and tells him he might as well go back to his place, where he can at least find his remaining clothes.

“WOW,” SAYS THE
ANCHOR
to the sub-anchor. The anchor is a woman with a tight cap of blonde hair. The new guy is a young man of extraordinary good looks—hazel eyes, dark hair, and a bone structure that would make anyone envious. They're on commercial break and she is fiddling with her earphone and making notes. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to close with it. Wow. What a story. Heartrending.”

“Heart rendering,” the sub-anchor jokes. “What happened? Am I going to be in on this bit, too? Do I get to comment?”

“No, probably not enough time. I'll take it. No time to explain. It's a good ending. It's a happy note.” She considers. “Happy-­slash-sad.”

HE STOOD UP
and took out his car keys.

“Stay the night,” his mother begged. “I'll make you a good breakfast.”

“Gotta go. I have work tomorrow and I have to prepare for class.”

“I thought class didn't start yet.”

“I have to study anyway.”

“But you'll be driving all night.”

“Not all night.”

“Nadal, Nadal,” she said. She pulled his sleeve and hugged him as he pushed past her. He hated his name, hated, hated his stupid girl name. His father's idea. And when Nadal argued with him …

Of course I know you are Catalan. Your mother showed me Catalan names! I chose your name.

But in Puerto Rico, it was a girl's first name. Thank God for the tennis player giving it heft these last years.

It's melodious. Names are epicene these days anyway, said his father, stupid Arne Brown.

At school he signed everything Nate.

“Let me make you a care package. At least a sandwich.” She hurried to the kitchen. He could hear her taking things out of the refrigerator.

He messed with the TV remote again. News. He froze before it.

“Good news on the case of the missing boy,” said the anchor. “He was found only a few minutes ago. He had started to walk to the hospital, convinced his mother was still alive. When asked about it, he talked about the miracles he saw on television programs.” The anchor made a sad face and paused for what felt like a long time. “There are no new developments in the homicide case. But police are working around the clock. And the child has been found. He's safe.” She sighed, looking down.

He switched the channel.

His mother handed him a bag of food.

IT WAS A
LITTLE AFTER MIDNIGHT
when Christie opened the door to a hospital conference room and let Colleen in.

They'd been talking in the hallway about how to proceed.

“Unfortunately, it hit the news,” he said. “The judge is going to jump all over us for not notifying Child Services from the start.”

“He could have run away from anywhere.”

“You know it. I know it. She might not. I thought to call the Pocusset Safe House for tonight, but I'm going to let Oopale Panikkar take him back. She's in our corner with Child Services. I can put a patrol cop outside their door. The kid isn't going anywhere tonight. Plus, he only came here to corroborate the reports that his mother is really dead. And pretty soon—”

Colleen wiped angrily at tears that had sprung up. “Sorry. I can't stand it.”

“I know. Let's go in.”

The room was pretty much a square with a rectangular table and six chairs. It was meant for the sort of conference doctors had with families when there was bad news to be delivered. In one corner of the room was a coffee machine, its carafe crusted and dirty. On the other end of the room was a small, square box of a TV, vintage 1980.

Oopale Panikkar was sitting with the boy.

Matthew squirmed.

“I understand you want to see your mother,” Christie said.

Oopale looked worried.

“Yes.”

“Matthew, you got yourself the whole way here, so I know how badly you must want to see her. I explained that to the doctors and they're going to allow it.”

Matthew nodded.

“The doctor is going to come back for us. I think he was on his way down the hall. I'd like to come with you. Okay?”

Matt nodded again.

Moments later the doctor came into the room. “Okay, we're as ready as we can be.”

What had they had to do? Tidy her up a bit, put her in one of their least messed-up rooms? “Show us the way,” Christie said.

Christie walked with the boy down the hall. He wanted to put a hand on the boy's head, but he resisted.

A few moments later, the doctor halted in front of a room. He stooped down in front of Matt. “I want to be sure this is what you want. You'll be able to see her at the funeral home tomorrow or the next day,” the doctor says.

“Where will that be?”

“Whatever funeral home your family chooses. Where people go to pay their respects. But I'll let you see her here if it's what you want.”

“I want to,” Matt says.

MATT FOLLOWS THE
DOCTOR IN.
The room is like the ones on TV with machines everywhere and trays with implements on them.

It's his mother all right, lying there. Some kind of padding makes the sheet lift up over her chest where the wound was.

“Can I go closer?” he asks the doctor.

“Yes,” the doctor says.

It's just him and the doctor and that detective he talked to earlier. They all move closer. His mother's long hair is spread out as if she is sleeping. Her eyes are closed. She's still. Very still. Matt touches her arm. It's hard and cold and doesn't move back. Like a bug. Like the squirrel he poked at in their yard. But then he sees her breathe. Yes, her chest is moving. His own breath catches. The longer he looks, then, the more she might not be dead. He keeps holding her arm and then, bravely, shakes it a little, trying to see the movement again.

“Matt?” the detective says. He feels the detective's hands, strong, one on each shoulder.

“I think she moved.”

“It sometimes looks like that. It isn't happening but our eyes trick us. Doctor, tell me, isn't that right?”

The doctor says, “It's exactly right.”

Matt wants to be sure nobody is lying to him. “Mom?” He smooths his hand over her arm. “Mom?” She doesn't moan, nothing. “Can she hear me?” Matt looks to the doctor.

“No, I'm sorry,” the doctor says. “She can't.”

Finally, he lets them take him away.

The detective says, “You must be getting tired.”

“No.”

“We'd like to get you to bed.”

Matt sits down in the conference room again. He wonders why they have a TV if isn't on. She breathed and then she didn't. They
said
she didn't. They said …

MATT WAS ASLEEP.

Christie lifted him. “It's okay. I'll take him in my car. If I don't remember how to lift a sleeping kid, I don't remember anything.”

“Yours are that age?” Oopale asked.

“No. Older now.” He lifted the boy and carried him out to the hallway. Colleen followed behind. She was on her phone. He said to Oopale, “I'll follow you, I'll carry him into your place.”

“Thanks. Thank you.”

They kept walking down the sterile hallway where a janitor paused, watching them to be sure he could bear witness if they were characters up to no good.

They got outside to the car.

Oopale pointed to a small red Nissan. “That's mine.”

Christie laid the boy in the backseat of his car. Colleen caught up with him. She was looking at her watch. It was something close to one.

“Go home,” he said.