Eden in Winter (29 page)

Adam felt this revelation lead to others: that his mother and brother had lied to him and to the police; that – at least on this point – Carla Pacelli had told the truth. ‘Why didn’t you tell that to the police?’

‘Because I knew that Mother hadn’t. She told me she was afraid that could make his death look different than what it was – an accident.’

Adam tried to envision Clarice suggesting this, further complicating his sense of who she was. Quietly, he asked, ‘Because she believed that? Or because that’s what she needed other people to believe?’

Teddy rubbed his temples. ‘I can’t be sure. See, I concealed the truth from her, as well. She still doesn’t know that I went to the promontory.’

‘This family certainly has a gift for candour, doesn’t it? Tell me when you went there.’

‘After she called me.’ Teddy’s voice became harder. ‘That son of a bitch had tormented me for years, and now he was humiliating our mother. So I decided to confront him.’ His words came in a rush now. ‘He was standing there like he had a thousand nights before, staring at the fucking sunset like it was the last one in human history, and he was there to bear witness.’

Just imagine not looking at this
, Ben had said to their neighbour, Nathan Wright.
Can you
? ‘Maybe he was,’ Adam said. ‘After all, the man was dying.’

‘I didn’t know that. All I knew was that he treated her like dirt.’ Teddy shook his head, voice thickening with emotion. ‘God help me, I wanted to push him off that cliff, just like I’d imagined ever since I was a kid. Instead, I just stood there waiting for him to notice me.

‘When he finally did, he gave me this look – not disdainful like normal, but more puzzled. “What are you doing here?” he asked. “You hate this place.” It threw me off guard – suddenly he had the tone and manner of an old man, and his face looked ravaged. My idea of him was so strong, I hadn’t noticed he’d become his own ghost.

‘“I’m here for my mother,” I told him. “For years I’ve
watched you degrade her in private, humiliate her in public, and exploit her fear of being abandoned. She’s the only parent I ever had. You were just a sperm donor, and even that makes me want to vomit.” He tried to muster that supercilious smile, but even that was a ghost. “Then go ahead,” he told me. “Just keep it off my boots. They’re new.”’

Adam tried to imagine the ferocity of will that made his father, dying, still prefer hatred to pity. But Teddy seemed transported back in time. ‘“Maybe I’ll push you off this cliff,” I told him. He just kept looking at me, almost like he was curious what I’d do. Then he spoke in a strange new voice, tired but completely calm, “If you hate me that much, do it for your mother. Or better yet, yourself.”

‘He sounded like he didn’t care, that he’d be willing to die if that would make me feel whole. All at once, I saw him as he was, this aging husk of a man. I couldn’t move, or fight back the tears.’ Briefly, Teddy closed his eyes. ‘Looking back at me, he seemed to slump. “Jesus,” he said in this heavy way I’d never heard before. “What have I done to you, Teddy? Did I make you like this?”

‘I don’t know whether he meant gay, or too weak to act in my own behalf. Then he finished, “To come to the end, and face this. It’s not your fault you could never be like Adam. It was foolish of me to want that.”’

For a moment Adam could say nothing. Then he said softly, ‘He certainly had a gift, didn’t he? Only he could issue an apology meant to cut you to the quick.’

Teddy continued as if he had not heard. ‘I started toward him. He just watched me, not moving, when suddenly his eyes rolled back in his head. Then he kind of collapsed like he was too tired to stand, and sat there in the mud near the
side of the cliff, his eyes as blank as marbles.’ Pausing, Teddy looked into Adam’s face, as though recalling he was there. ‘He was utterly defenceless. But killing a helpless man is what he would expect from me. So I grabbed him by the wrists and dragged him to the rocky area, where at least it wasn’t muddy. Then I sat there, studying his face as though he’d gone to sleep, trying to remember when I’d loved him.

‘Suddenly his eyes snapped open. He looked at me, surprised, then said, “I passed out, didn’t I? It’s happening more often.” Then he asked in this quiet voice, “Why didn’t you kill me, Teddy?” I gave him the only answer I could think of: “Too easy.”’

Someday people won’t read you anymore
, Adam remembered telling his father.
You’ll be left with whoever is left to love you. It’s not too late for Teddy to be one of them
. Finally, he asked, ‘How did he react?’

Teddy swallowed. ‘His eyes seemed to focus, like he’d never seen me before. Then he sort of croaked, “I’ll change things, Teddy. At least those things I still can help.”’

‘The will?’

‘Maybe,’ Teddy answered. ‘But I didn’t know about that, and I’m sure Mom didn’t either. So what I imagined him saying was that maybe he wouldn’t leave her.

‘Suddenly I felt exhausted – not only by what happened between us, but by being in that place. Without saying another word, I left him there. I never saw my father again.’ Teddy looked at Adam intently, finishing with lacerating bitterness, ‘For all I know, he jumped or fell. Whatever happened, the son of a bitch fucked me one more time. Instead of fixing the will, he made me the prime suspect in a murder I could only fantasize about.’

Silent, Adam struggled to distance himself from Teddy’s story and his desire to believe it. Finally, he asked, ‘Why did you call your ex-boyfriend?’

‘Jesus, Adam – wouldn’t you call someone after an experience like that? Or would you just pour yourself a drink and switch on the Red Sox game?’

‘I really don’t know. But I might have told Sean Mallory what you just told me, instead of framing myself for murder. Assuming, of course, that anything you’ve told me is true.’

A moment’s anger flickered through Teddy’s eyes, and then he looked away. ‘You’ve met Mallory,’ he said in a dispirited tone. ‘I took one look at him, and knew he wouldn’t believe me. I don’t think George Hanley would, either. All I’d do is get myself and Mom in trouble.’

‘Instead of just yourself,’ Adam rejoined. ‘But now you’re right to protect her, I suppose, given what you say she doesn’t know. A sudden recollection of her phone call might not help either one of you.’

Looking up, Teddy met his brother’s gaze. ‘Do you believe me, Adam?’

Adam weighed his answer. Too much of Teddy’s story was implausible. But it had the virtue, at least, of accounting for the evidence Adam had siphoned to his lawyer – suggesting its essential truth, or more likely, his brother’s considerable ingenuity. A jury might not – probably would not – believe him. But Adam could not bring himself to reject the story outright. Then it struck him that, if Teddy’s account was true, and Ben had resolved to revise his will yet again, Carla Pacelli might have had reason to kill him. But this assumed that Carla had come to the promontory, and that Ben had
told her. An assumption that, as of now, was as unproveable as the other indispensable assumption: that Carla had known about her inheritance.

‘It doesn’t matter what I believe,’ Adam said at length. ‘Your story covers the evidence as I know it – except for the button. Tell me how that came off his shirt.’

‘I have no idea,’ Teddy insisted. ‘I never touched his shirt. For all I know, the button was already missing.’

Adam considered this. The button had not been missing; Adam had found it at the scene, and the hair on Ben’s shirt suggested closer contact than Teddy admitted. But if his brother were telling the truth, then someone else – perhaps Nathan Wright’s elusive figure – had ripped the button off. And only Adam knew that.

Watching his face, Teddy said, ‘You don’t believe me, do you? I’m pretty sure my lawyer doesn’t, either. I guess that’s what happens when he gives you a lie detector test, and it comes out inconclusive. All I could tell him is that my fantasy was so strong that sometimes I
feel
like I killed him. Doesn’t inspire much confidence, does it?’

Adam did not answer. ‘Just keep our mother out of this,’ he instructed. ‘Including what I know about her not-so-small lapse of memory. At least until I figure out what else to do.’

Teddy stared at him. ‘You sent my lawyer those documents, didn’t you?’

Adam stood. Then he had smiled a little, placing a hand on Teddy’s shoulder. ‘What documents?’ he replied, then returned to their mother’s house, his expression as he said goodnight to her seemingly placid and untroubled.

*

Arriving at the house, Adam sat in the driveway.

In hindsight, he had been as innocent as Teddy. He had not known who his father was, or that Jack had killed the man, Carla’s lover, whom Adam had hated as a son. Now he was part of that, as guilty as his father.

The next morning was chill and leaden, with sheets of wind sweeping off the grey roiling waters of the Vineyard Sound. Thoughts in turmoil, Adam knocked on Charlie Glazer’s front door.

Answering, the psychiatrist gave him a cheerful grin. ‘Glad you made it back.’

‘Me, too.’

Charlie beckoned him inside. As they went to his living room, his expression became inquiring. ‘So this part of your life is done?’

‘Only in Afghanistan. I haven’t decided about the job.’

‘It seems we’ll have enough to talk about. You like your coffee black, I remember.’

Adam took a chair near a window that framed the white-capped sea. Returning with two mugs, Charlie sat across from him. ‘How is it to be back?’

Adam sorted through his thoughts. ‘Confusing. For whatever reason, I was expecting to die. But when the moment
came, I did my damnedest to survive, and killed some Afghans in the bargain. I’m not sure I’ve processed it all yet. But here I am, and this place is every bit as complicated as when I left.’ He shook his head in dismay. ‘As you said, I’m living in compartments. Too many.’

‘Such as?’

‘Carla, for one. I saw her last night.’

Charlie’s blue eyes betrayed interest and concern. ‘How was that?’

Wondering how to express this, Adam described what he had learned from her emails, and from the evening before. ‘She’s like a kaleidoscope,’ he concluded. ‘Moment to moment, I see something different. Ben’s lover; a mother desperately fighting to save a baby who may be doomed; a scarred and complicated, but deeply honest person; this woman I seem to want, and who wonders if she wants me; a fantasy of the future whose image kept coming back to me when I was fighting to survive. And I don’t even know what all that means – or should mean.’

‘Still worried about your capacity to love?’ Charlie enquired gently.

Adam accorded the therapist a somewhat sour smile. ‘I really missed you, Charlie. We could have worked that one out by now.’ He took a sip of coffee. ‘As it is, too often I still experience the same detachment, this wanting to withdraw when I sense someone getting close to me. Even with Carla – no, especially with Carla. Every time I imagine her with Ben, anger and revulsion bubble up. And when I try to get her to talk about it, she won’t.’

Charlie raised his eyebrows. ‘Are you surprised? No doubt she’s smart enough to imagine all the feelings that might
open up. Maybe she’s wondering whether it’s safe to trust you – for good reason, as you admit. But neither of you seems emotionally prepared to make the first move.’ Charlie’s voice softened. ‘Not even physically, I gather, given the precariousness of her pregnancy.’

‘She’s pretty pregnant,’ Adam said dryly. ‘In the best of worlds, the logistics would be tricky.’ When Charlie merely looked at him, he confessed, ‘You’re right enough about our dynamics. But there’s something else that I can’t shake.’

‘Concerning?’

‘The medical examiner’s inquest.’

Charlie’s eyes narrowed. ‘I know you’ve worried about your clandestine operations, as it were. But I thought Jack put all that to rest.’

‘Not so. When I left here, I hoped that the hearing had buried all that – and Ben with it. But George Hanley’s still poking around. Along with a tabloid reporter who thinks all of our testimonies – my mother’s, Teddy’s, Jack’s, and my own – were shot through with lies.’

Charlie pondered this. ‘I won’t ask what really happened,’ he said at length. ‘But I suspect this may be not only a problem for you, but potentially destructive to any relationship with Carla.’

Hearing this spoken aloud depressed Adam further. ‘This is nothing you can help me with, Charlie. Trust me about that.’

‘Still,’ the therapist persisted, ‘what you’re implying suggests something pretty loaded. You didn’t kill Ben – that much everyone knows. But it’s clear you’re still carrying your family on your back, at whatever cost.’ Leaning forward, Charlie continued, ‘Seems you’re in a quandary, Adam. You’re
dealing with a near-death experience most men would find traumatic. That raises basic questions about the purpose of your life – by itself, more than enough reason for reflection. Instead, you’re coping with the web of secrets arising from Ben’s death. And whether Carla Pacelli is Ben’s last taunt from the grave.’

Fighting back despair, Adam said, ‘Not a pretty picture. But we have to start somewhere, don’t we?’

‘True enough,’ Charlie agreed crisply. ‘Where should we begin?’

‘Maybe with my work,’ Adam responded in a pensive tone. ‘Conceptually, I don’t regret anything I’ve done. We’ve prevented another 9/11 by decimating the leadership of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. That was my job, and I’m more than okay with it.’ Adam took another swallow of lukewarm coffee. ‘But challenge and danger become addictive. I’m not sure what else I’d do, or whether I’m suited to the life most people want – that
I
used to want. Now that seems like a long time ago.’

‘It was, Adam. And a lot has happened to you since then. Mind telling me how you got wounded?’

For the next few moments, Adam complied, trying to drain the emotion from his account. When he finished, Charlie gazed out at the sound, his tone and manner reflective. ‘When I look at dangerous waters, I often think of Ben. He’d sail in damned near any weather. What he was most afraid of, I came to think, was acknowledging his own fear.’ Pausing, he faced Adam. ‘I always thought you needed to live up to that – to find out if you’re as brave and resourceful as he was. Few men would’ve taken on the work you did, and fewer would’ve survived it. In the process, you saved
the man who rescued you. That’s a lot to know about yourself.’