Bloodroot (36 page)

“I gotta talk to you,” I said. “Something important.”

Kelsey set the glass and plate on the coffee table. She sat beside me on the couch. “You promised me some time.”

“I’m sorry. These days time is something I don’t have.” I lit a cigarette. “At the game, Whitestone said you were leaving in a matter of weeks. As if you wouldn’t be here in the spring.”

Dragging hard on my smoke, I waited for her to fill in the blank. She didn’t speak and she didn’t look away. She tried keeping her eyes light, even cheery, but a hard swallow pulsed down her throat and the rich, warm blood fled her face as if something or maybe many things inside her were trying to run and hide. For both our sakes, I preempted the coming lie.

“You’re leaving early,” I said. “Were you even going to tell me?”

“It’s not what you think,” Kelsey said.

“How do you think I’d feel if come December you just up and disappeared on me?”

“I’m not going to disappear,” she said. “I’m not your brother. It’s true I told Whitestone I’m not teaching in the spring. I’m not. I can’t stay at Richmond, it’s not nearly enough for me.” She smiled. “But Chicago in the winter? Not the best time to move.”

“They have winter every year,” I said. “The weather’s not what we’re talking about.”

“Of course not,” she said. “The weather’s nothing to be afraid of.”

“Then what
are
you afraid of?”

Because fear was what we were talking about. Not teaching, not grad school, not long-held or suddenly fluid plans, and certainly not Chicago winters. I remembered what Danny had said about fear. That its true consequences came not through lack of action but in what it made people do. Fear made them run away, for instance. Run away from the future, from the truth. From the people who might hurt or betray them, from the people who might love them and want to be loved back.

I knew it well, Kelsey’s fear. I had felt it my whole adult life every time I got somewhere that anything real—my future, my heart, my beliefs—was at stake. And so in my infinite wisdom I’d done the only logical, safe thing. I’d fallen in love with a woman just like me, who ran away from the same things I did. A woman who, as she sat there beside me, knew everything I was thinking because she was thinking the same things. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, Danny had said as I’d left the car. I had a feeling falling in love made that list. I’d decided when confronting my folks about Danny that my time to be brave had arrived. Were these strange days Kelsey’s time, too? What would she decide?

Kelsey’s hand moved up my arm. Her fingers glided back and forth across my shoulder blades. “I love your shoulders,” she said. “You seem like at any moment you might sprout wings, like you can barely hold them inside.”

“Maybe one day they’ll just bust on out of my skin,” I said. “Stick around, it’ll be spectacular when it finally happens. They might be big enough for the both of us. You’d be surprised what love can do to people.”

Her hand stopped moving. I felt her fingertips press hard against the back of my neck. “Kevin.” She licked her lips. “I don’t want to leave you. I don’t. I want us to be together. I do love you.” She looked around the apartment. “But building a nest isn’t enough. I need some wings of my own. If you’re up for that, then we’re good.” She turned to me. “Are we good?”

“We were never anything but,” I said.

IN THE DULL PREDAWN GLOW OF KELSEY’S KITCHEN, I WASHED
last night’s rum-reeking glass and made enough coffee for us both, her share staying warm in the pot. When she awoke in a couple of hours, I had every intention of delivering her first cup of the day to her bedside. Outside of the office, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d made coffee for someone else. That’s how alone I’d been. But that’s all over now, I thought, as I carried my coffee to the table.

Through the window over Kelsey’s kitchen sink I watched the sun spill its first feeble attempts at light through the potted sage and rosemary on the sill and then over the stainless steel and granite of the counter. I sat at the table, both hands wrapped around my mug, waiting for the coffee to cool. I’d already burned my tongue once. The sunlight crept like a pool of blood across the floor toward my bare feet. I’d only slept for a couple of hours.

My eyes fluttered closed then snapped open as I fought nodding off, my head hanging over the mug. My body begged for the bed, reminding me in a whispery voice of the cool, soft sheets and the warm, supple female body that slumbered there. Didn’t my body deserve it? Just a few more minutes, it whispered. Kelsey will protect us. My brain, on the other hand, had no interest in going back to sleep and so forced me to deny my body its simple, reasonable desires.

I’d awoken startled, the pillow sweat-damp, my brain fleeing a vivid nightmare of malformed children buried chest deep in the dirt, flies crawling over their eyes and mouths. My brain, no matter what my body said, wasn’t taking the slightest risk of going back there. Frightened and depressed is no way to start my first day in love, my heart said, jumping into the argument. Deal with it, my brain answered. Selfish prick, my heart said. Then I passed out.

At the bleating of Kelsey’s clock radio alarm, I came to a couple hours later facedown on the table. Wiping the drool off my chin, I heard Kelsey roll over, groan, and hit the snooze button. I got up from the table and poured her coffee, added a dash of half-and-half, the color of a paper bag was how she liked it, and carried the steaming mug to her bed. Mine was cold and I left it at the table.

I sat on the edge of the bed, watching her sleep, watching her breathe. I tried not to think about anything at all as I waited for the minutes in between alarms to tick away. When the bleating began again I fought the urge to smash the clock radio to pieces. Kelsey killed the alarm and fell back on the bed, one arm draped over her eyes. She rolled over onto her stomach, her face still buried in her elbow, and reached across the bed with her other arm, searching for me.

“Goddamn,” she said, grabbing a fistful of sheet. I watched the knuckles of her fist turn white.

“I’m right here,” I said.

Kelsey pushed up on all fours, looking over her shoulder at me through her wild hair. I used to sleep like that, so deep that waking felt like rising from the bottom of the sea. I’d forgotten what that was like. I handed her the coffee. She scuffled around on the mattress until she sat cross-legged and leaned back against her mound of pillows. Holding the mug in both hands, she slurped and sighed.

“Thanks,” she said. Life rose in her eyes like the sunlight had moved over her kitchen. “You’re up early.”

“Bad dream,” I said. “I’ve only been awake long enough to make coffee.”

She sipped again. “You got it exactly right.” She blinked at me, rubbed the last of the cobwebs from one eye with her fist. “Been an awful long time since someone brought me coffee in bed. It was worth waiting for.” She wiggled deeper into the pillows. “Hey, let’s play hooky today. We’ll go into the city or something. A teachers-only field trip.”

“Kind of obvious, don’t you think? The two of us skipping out on the same day? Whitestone’ll go berserk. I want to stay off his radar.”

I crawled across the bed and sat on my knees beside her.

“Scaredy-pants,” Kelsey said, pouting. She glanced at the clock. “We’ve still got time to enjoy our coffee.”

“Mine needs a warm-up,” I said, climbing out of bed. I craved a cigarette. It was the first time since I’d started again that I’d wanted one in the morning. “And I left my cigarettes in the living room. I’ll be right back.”

When I turned from the couch, lit cigarette between my fingers, Kelsey stood in the doorway brushing her brown hair. She looked so pretty, her eyes fully awake now, her cheeks flushed and puffy from sleep. Her camisole hung crooked, revealing the white skin atop one breast and hiding all of the other. One strap fell off her shoulder. I could see the scrapes on one knee through the hole in her pajamas.

Kelsey Reyes was a beautiful accident. A glimmering angel cast upon a dirty wall by sunlight streaming through a broken window. Standing in that doorway, Kelsey was a perfect moment that couldn’t last. I could see that clear as day. None of that convinced me she was a bad idea. Hell, I’d thrown my lot in with Santoro, at least for a while. Compared to him, Kelsey didn’t seem like that great a risk. And one with a payout that far eclipsed any number of stacked Ben Franklins.

Looking at her, I felt I could understand what Washington felt when he watched the sun ignite over the Virginia hills, what Jefferson felt when he read that final draft of the Constitution by the dying light of the fireplace. The perfect moment couldn’t last. But hope, promise, independence, those things would remain in its place.

“Let me get my coffee,” Kelsey said. “And I’ll join you.”

I held up my hand. “Don’t. Just stay right there. Please.”

Confusion crossed her face but she didn’t move. She held her hairbrush at her side, tapping it against her thigh. She waited almost a full minute before she turned into the bedroom. It was enough. I wouldn’t forget.

In the bedroom, the phone rang.

“Let it ring,” I said. “They’ll call back.” I picked up my watch off the coffee table. It was after nine. If we were going to work, we needed to get moving. The phone had stopped ringing.

Kelsey appeared in the bedroom doorway. She held out the phone. “Kevin, it’s your brother.”

I jumped up off the couch. He’d found something good, something we could use. It was all but over. I took the receiver from Kelsey. We were gonna be free and clear and pretty close to rich. “Top o’ the mornin’, Dan.”

“We gotta move,” Danny said. “Now. Today.”

“Move? Move what? I gotta go to work today.”

“No,” Danny said. “Not today you don’t.”

“C’mon, Danny,” I said. “I can’t just drop everything. Not today. What’re you doing calling here? I said no one calls here. You said we were gonna watch and wait. You said I was done.”

“Wait for what?” I heard Kelsey ask. “What’s going on?”

“This,” Danny said, “is the most important phone call you’ve ever gotten in your life.”

“You know what? You sound high. That’s what I think. You need a chauffeur? Is that what this is about? Find someone else this time.”

I would’ve hung up but Danny started laughing, a crazy laugh that stopped my heart.

“Shit,” Danny said. “I wish I was high. What’s happening now? It’s so much worse you wouldn’t believe.” He breathed heavy into the phone. “But you and me? We’re gonna make it right. Believe that.”

Kelsey grabbed my arm, her eyes wide with fear and anger. “That black car just slammed to a stop out front. I think someone got out.”

I ran past her into the kitchen. Looking out the window I saw Al’s Charger idling at an angle in the middle of the street, the driver’s door flung open. I didn’t see Al but that didn’t matter. I knew where he was going.

Danny’s tinny voice called to me from the phone. I put it back to my ear, rushing back into the living room.

“What the fuck is Al doing here?”

The front door buzzer sliced through the room. Kelsey yelled my name from the bedroom.

“Get in the car with him,” Danny said. “I’ll explain everything when you get here. Lives are at stake. Many, many lives. Trust me.” He hung up.

The buzzer sounded again. I threw the phone on the couch.

From the bedroom: “Goddamn it, Kevin!” I heard Kelsey slamming drawers, rushing to get dressed.

I hopped around the living room, trying to get my pants on.

Kelsey stormed out of the bedroom, still in her camisole and pj’s, a chrome .38 in her right hand. She strode to the door and leaned on the intercom button. “You better run, motherfucker! I’m calling the cops! They’re not here in ninety seconds and you are, I’ll shoot you myself!” She walked toward me, her free hand extended. “Gimme the phone.”

I raised my hands. “Wait.”

Kelsey wouldn’t; she grabbed the phone off the couch. I caught her arm. The look on her face, I thought she might shoot me.

“You can’t call the cops,” I said.

“Oh, I’m doing better than that.” She tried pulling her arm free. I wouldn’t let go. “I’m calling
the
Cop. The one downstairs, Waters. He’ll straighten the fucker out.” A pause. She stopped fighting me. “Kevin, let go of my arm.”

I didn’t. The buzzer again. I’d gotten one leg into my pants.

“Go back to the intercom and tell him I’ll be right down,” I said. “No cops. I’ll handle this.”

“That’s brave, Kevin, but I heard he was a drug dealer or something.”

I would kill Danny for this. If he was high, I was done with him. Forever. “It’s okay. I know that guy out there.” I held out my hand. “Give me the gun.”

Shock stole Kelsey’s breath away. I waited with my hand out while she mouthed the air like a beached fish. “You
know
him?”