April & Oliver (23 page)

She pushes open the door. The blinds are drawn, the room shrouded in dusky light. Everything is still except for the drip
of the IV. Oliver sits beside the bed, head cradled in his arms on the mattress. His elbow touches April’s upper arm. They
are asleep.

Bernadette brings her hand to her mouth. What she can see of Oliver’s face is ashen, his hair disheveled. Though sleeping,
there is tension around his eye. Crumpled atop the hazardous-waste bin lies his bloodstained shirt, a yellow polo she gave
him for his birthday. Against the lemon fabric the blood is shockingly dark, almost black. Oliver wears a blue hospital gown
over his jeans like an expectant dad in a maternity ward. April’s face is turned away, her dark hair fanned out across the
pillow. Bernadette’s gaze circles back to his elbow, April’s arm, the meeting of bare skin.

Bernadette considers the right thing to do. Her hand on his shoulder might be enough to rouse him. She imagines him jumping
from his chair, embracing her. She pictures him saying,
Oh, Bernadette, thank God you’re here.
She knows Oliver, guileless and candid. Yet if she leaves now, continues on her way to the petting zoo, he will spend all
day in that chair without a thought of her. She knows him. She knows Oliver.

It is April she’s not sure about. Bernadette has discussed it many times now with her mother over tea, April’s coyness at
the funeral, Oliver’s sleeping at her place, the scene at the picnic. “Can’t you see the obvious?” her mother said, setting
down her teacup.

“Apparently not,” Bernadette said flatly.

“He needs someone to rescue.”

“I’m not sure, Mom. This April, she may have problems, but she’s no Fay Wray.”

“All the better because she doesn’t want to be helped. That makes for a powerful chemistry. You’ll have to play this right,
Bernadette.”

“It’s not like they’re flirting, Mom. Just the opposite. They’re downright snappy to each other.”

She frowned, dabbing her mouth with a napkin. “They have something to work out, Bernadette. If you bad-mouth her, he’ll only
feel protective. If you criticize him, you’ll make him defensive. Just ride it out, sweetheart. Be her friend. Who knows?
The worst may already be over.”

Bernadette stares at them sleeping.
No,
she thinks,
not by a long shot.

The room is quiet. It takes her a moment to notice that their breathing is synchronized. Bernadette’s eyes brim. She wants
to hate the tranquil beauty of the room. Instead, she is entranced.
It’s going to be okay,
she tells herself.
Oliver is a good person. Nothing bad will happen.

If she doesn’t leave soon, she’ll be late for the kids. What’s the point of waking him? Bernadette goes over, caresses Oliver’s
shoulder and back, and when that doesn’t work gives him a solid shake.

W
HEN APRIL TRIES TO OPEN HER EYES
, white-hot light pours into her skull. She hears voices, first Oliver’s, then others she does not recognize. Latex fingers
lift the sheet, poking around at her side. She feels a stab of pain and looks down at where she’s being prodded. Her vision
blurs. There’s something pinching her skin. Stitches? Then she notices she’s wearing a blue gown. She tries to focus on the
person touching her, a nurse.

“Hard to believe she drove a car like that,” a voice says.

“Can I talk to her now?” says another.

“I’d rather not disturb her,” says the nurse.

April opens her eyes, blinking at the painful light. “I’m awake,” she says. Her throat is parched. The sound of her voice
sends reverberations through her skull. “What hospital is this?”

“Jamaica,” says the nurse. “Not yet, darlin’.” She puts her hand on April’s shoulder. “The doctor will let you know when you
can sit up.”

“April,” Oliver says, bending close. The cadence of his voice is deeply familiar, comforting in its nearness, yet faraway;
she is trapped in a well, his words floating down to her. “Just relax. You don’t have to talk to anyone until you’re ready.”

“I’ll talk,” she says, struggling to focus. Oliver’s face is pale, eyes ridged with exhaustion, his hair tousled as when they
were kids.
What have I done to him?
she thinks. He backs away, fists balled, and gives someone his seat.

“I don’t understand why you need to question her,” Oliver says. “We know who did this.”

“Do we?” the man answers.

Squinting, April sees the familiar dimpled chin, olive skin. He’s lost the leopard-print tie and is wearing a tan chamois
shirt. “Arredondo,” she says, licking her dry lips. “You’re out of your precinct.”

“Thought I’d pay you a visit,” he says, patting her hand.

“How did you know I was here?”

“Give me some credit. I’m a detective.” He smiles. “So how you feeling, doll?”

“Never better.”

Arredondo smirks at Oliver. “A regular Joan of Arc.”

Oliver doesn’t return the smile.

“So, want to tell us what happened last night?” Arredondo says.

“I’d just gotten out of my car. He came up from behind me,” she says, trying to shift in the bed. It feels like she weighs
a thousand pounds. “Do you mind if I keep my eyes closed?”

“Suit yourself. I’ll do the listening.”

“He put his arm around me like we were old chums, pressed the knife against my ribs so I could feel it, and said,
‘Give me your purse or I’ll cut you in half.’
I thought that was a strange way to put it, like he’d actually take the time to saw all the way through. Houdini, the mugger.
I almost laughed. It’s a bad habit of mine, laughing when I shouldn’t.”

“Did you see what he looked like?”

“Dirty-blond, short, mid-thirties. He smelled like anisette.”

“Okay, keep going.”

“I told him he could have the money but I needed the purse.”

Arredondo frowns. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that’s the wrong answer?”

“I have a picture of my brother in there, his First Communion. There are no other copies.”

“Go on.”

“He called me a crazy bitch and started pulling the purse. Then I realized someone had come up behind us. It was T.J. He had
a gun, the same one as before, small and silver. He told the guy to drop the knife.
‘Idiot,’
the guy said.
‘Now I need to kill you both.’
”
She blinks open her eyes but the light still hurts. “I’m not sure what happened next. I heard the shot. I guess the guy came
down on top of me between the parked cars, because that’s where I was when I woke up. I don’t know how long I was out. I came
to when the car next to me started up. The driver never saw us. I thought he was going to run right over me, but I rolled
out of the way in time. He crushed the dead guy’s hand, though. Never stopped to see what he’d run over. When I got up the
first thing I did was throw up. I don’t know why. I thought I’d better call an ambulance, even though I could see the guy
was dead. I called from the pay phone at the station, and then I just got in my car and drove. I saw the ambulance pull in
as I was pulling out. I knew I’d have to talk to the police, but I figured I could do it in the morning. I wasn’t thinking.
I felt so bad. I just wanted to be with my grandmother.”

“It didn’t occur to you that you might need some medical help?”

“I didn’t know I was hurt. I mean I felt the pain, but I thought it was from the fall. When I was in the phone booth some
people walking by stared at me. That’s when I saw the blood, but I thought it was his. Once I was at my grandmother’s house,
I realized I was bleeding, but by then I wasn’t sure I could get up off the couch, and besides, I didn’t want to scare her.”

Arredondo raps his fingers on the metal bed rail.

“She was in shock,” the nurse puts in. “It’s not unusual.”

“What about Desole?” Arredondo asks.

“I told you, I passed out.”

“And he didn’t call you an ambulance, a gentleman like him?”

April opens her eyes and looks up at the ceiling, which appears to pulsate. “I don’t know,” she says. “Maybe he thought I
was dead.”

“Sure,” Arredondo says, raising his eyebrow. “Did he contact you again since you called me last week?”

She glances behind Arredondo to where Oliver stands against the wall, his arms folded tightly in front of him. “He showed
up at my uncle’s house yesterday. I was going to call you in the morning, it being a holiday and all.”

He shakes his head.

“Look, T.J. didn’t do this.”

Arredondo glances back at Oliver. They exchange a dismayed look.

“I’m not defending him,” she says. “I’m just saying it was the other guy who stuck me.”

Arredondo says, “Where do you think he is now?”

April looks to the window, Oliver staring out, hands clenched in his pockets. The subdued light framing his silhouette transfixes
her.

“April?” says Arredondo.

“I don’t know. Like I said, he wanted to go to Wichita.”

“Until we find him, I want you to have someone with you all the time, understand?”

She nods, which only makes her headache worse.

“You get any more out of her, give me a call.” He hands Oliver his card. “He may not have done this, but he’s still wanted
for murder.”

“He didn’t do that,” April says. “It was a suicide.”

“Still a true believer, eh, sweetheart?”

“What he needs is detox,” April says, “counseling, rehab, a different set of parents, a single foster home instead of a dozen.
Not jail.”

“Boo-hoo,” says Arredondo. He extends his business card between his fingers like a cigarette. “Hold on to it this time,” he
says. “You hear from him, I expect a call.”

She takes the card.

Once the detective is gone, Oliver sits beside April, his eyes narrow and pained. “I don’t understand,” he says. “How could
you defend him?”

She doesn’t answer because nothing she could say would satisfy him. Instead, she closes her eyes, turning her face away. “Oliver,
I’d like to be alone for a while.”

“Oh, well,” he says, standing. “By all means.”

She looks at him. His skin is sallow, his eyes dark. Sleeves rolled up. A bandage in the crook of his right arm. April jolts,
wondering if Oliver has given her blood.

“You can have all the solitude you want,” he says.

He starts to leave then turns back suddenly. “You knew, didn’t you, about the dead wife.”

She turns her face away.

“It’s a sickness, April. Only a deranged person would date a murderer.”

She doesn’t argue.

“What is it, the melodrama? Adrenaline? What do you get off on? Maybe you want him to kill you so you don’t have to deal with
your screwed-up life. Then we can remember you with pity and say
poor girl,
instead of seeing you alive and saying,
what a mess
.”

She closes her eyes, trying to sandbag the rush of emotion.

“It wasn’t your date who gave you that lip after the barbecue, was it.”

She looks out the window, mentally folding herself up like a seedling in reverse, curling back into the shell, underground,
where his voice can’t reach her.

“You couldn’t have told someone he was back? What kind of idiocy is that?”

She tries to sink deeper, insulate herself, but it’s not working. What Oliver doesn’t understand is that she doesn’t fear
T.J. because he can’t hurt her. Only Oliver can do that.

“The sicker they are, the more you love them, is that it? And this won’t be the end of it, either. There will be another one
out there—the most vicious, pathetic, hard-luck case in all of New York, and by God you’ll find him. You’ll love him until
he breaks every little bone in your body.” Oliver’s chest heaves, his eyes wide and startled. “I’m washing my hands, April.
I can’t take it anymore.”

He leaves the room.

April clenches the sheet. She hears a roar in her head, a river breaking its banks. The pain tears at her stitches. It hurts
not because she is a failure, but because he finally sees so.

T
.J.’s
FIRST AWARENESS IS OF THE PAIN
in his neck. Next, his need to urinate. He has fallen asleep in his truck. He sits up stiffly and blinks at the unfamiliar
scene. Skyscrapers appear to shoot straight up, piston-like, out of the river before him.

It is an hour or so before daybreak, the blackness of the sky just beginning to thin. He makes out the shapes of the Chrysler,
Empire State, and the wedge-roofed Citicorp. Closer still is Battery Park, the Woolworth building, and the empty space where
the Trade Towers stood. He has never seen Manhattan from this side, which he figures for Jersey.

He gets out to pee and the wind hits him like an unblocked punch. He holds on to the car door for balance, hears the loud
clanking of flagpoles, and looks around to see that he is in a huge, desolate place, littered with blowing trash. The air
smells like last night’s fireworks.

He looks for somewhere to take a piss, but there is nothing except grass and gravel and distant buildings he does not want
to go near. He walks to the river, lined by a wide cement walkway and heart-shaped viewing binoculars rocking in their stands.
He tries to pee into the river, but the wind blows it who-knows-where. His hand shakes as he zips. He wonders if there’s anything
left in the bottle under his seat in the truck.

As he turns back, he sees a shape rising up out of the river, taller than possible, the green folds of her cloak cemented
in the hard wind. He sees the sharp prongs of her crown, the raised torch. Her back is to him, her face turned toward open
water.

He saw the statue in person once before, he must have been five or six, aloft on his father’s big shoulders, his father’s
hands circling his ankles to keep him from falling. Together they climbed the narrow stairs to the top and looked out at the
world through the windows of her crown.

The wind causes his eyes to water. He stands until color begins to spread on the water beneath the far-off expanse of the
Verrazano. Ferries rock in their berths. He remembers the Lady Liberty key chain he kept through his twenties, finally lost
in a sewer drain.