Not Guilty (18 page)

Keely thought of Richard. He had survived his teenage years only to come to a violent end in his thirties.

“This is not the same thing as what happened to Richard, Keely. I just know it in my heart. Dylan will be all right.”

How can you be sure?
Keely wanted to wail. But she understood. Ingrid was just trying to help her to keep going. Trying to reassure her in spite of her own fears.

“I’m so sorry,” said Keely miserably.

“Never mind that. Now go get your things and get back to the hospital. He needs you there. Go on, before Abby hears you.”

Keely looked at her former mother-in-law quizzically. What had it
cost her to reserve blame? Ingrid suddenly seemed incredibly stoic in Keely’s eyes. “If I were you, I would blame me,” Keely said honestly.

Ingrid shook her head. “I don’t blame you. Even if I did, it wouldn’t do a bit of good. No good at all. You’re suffering the most. Now go on.”

Keely nodded. It wasn’t absolution. But she couldn’t have accepted absolution even if it was offered. She forced herself to her feet and began to trudge slowly up the stairs. She turned on the lamp on her bureau, then hesitated by the baby monitor, raising the volume. She could hear Abby breathing steadily, stirring in her crib. She turned it back down to low and went over to the closet.

Her overnight bag was on the top shelf. Keely pulled it down and set it out on the bed. She checked inside her toiletry kit and went into the bathroom to get the toothpaste. Mark’s toothpaste was still on the shelf beside hers—one of those things she had not been able to dispose of yet. She closed the door to the medicine cabinet and saw her own haggard face in the mirror. Her eyes were puffy from weeping, her skin tone was sallow. She felt as if she was on the verge of a collapse, but she also knew she could not give in. Not with Dylan lying there vulnerable and voiceless.

She removed what remained of her makeup, then changed into some comfortable clothes that she could sleep in. She shoved a sweater into her bag in case it was cold but didn’t bother to pack a change of clothes for tomorrow. She didn’t care how she looked. All she cared about right now was Dylan, being there when he woke up.

Exhausted though she was, she knew she would have trouble sleeping.
A book,
she thought,
just to keep me occupied.

She walked over to the nightstand on her side of the bed, lifted up a pile of books she kept there, and sat down heavily on the edge of the bed, planning to pick out one or two. As she sank onto the edge of the mattress, she saw, out of the corner of her eye, a piece of white paper flutter off the white pillowcase and land on the area rug.

Frowning, Keely pushed the books aside, bent down, and reached for it.

The paper was folded in quarters, and on the outside it said
MOM.
Her heart stopped for a moment as she realized what she was looking
at. It was Dylan’s writing, and it had not been there earlier. He had left it on her pillow, so that she would find it there . . . afterward.

It was impossible. It looked like one of the little apologetic love notes he used to make for her and leave on her pillow when she scolded him. But this was no valentine. These were his last words to her. His . . . suicide note.

Her hand was trembling. She felt as if she was going to be sick.

He had left her a note. She was afraid to read it. What if he blamed her? What if he had left behind a message of hate? A message that she could never erase from her mind, even if they were reconciled? Part of her wanted to tear it up into a thousand bits and flush it down the toilet. And the other part, the dominant part, had to know. Had to know because he was still alive, and if she was going to be any help at all to him, they had to be completely honest with each other. Time to reveal secrets. She had to know what had been in his heart when he decided to leave his life forever.

She steeled herself and unfolded the paper.

It was a piece of lined notebook paper, but when she flattened it out against the pillow, she saw that there was only one sentence written in the middle of the page. It read
I locked the gate.

What in the world?
she wondered. At first she felt almost furious with frustration.
Dylan, for God’s sake.
She didn’t know what she had expected, but it was not this. Was this some of kind of code, some stupid secret game he was playing when life and death hung in the balance? How could he do it? Leave her to wonder for the rest of her life?
I locked the gate.
Some adolescent cryptogram. What did it mean? What was he saying?
I locked the gate.
What gate? She had found him in the cellar. There was no gate down there. They didn’t even have a gate. Well, except for the gate that . . .

And then, all at once, the blood drained from her face.

He locked the gate. He did not leave the gate open. He was not talking about tonight. And it was not a code. He was talking about the gate around the pool. He was talking about the night Mark drowned.

What have I done?
she thought. As the meaning of his message sank in, her face grew hot with shame.

Ever since the night Mark drowned, she had assumed Dylan had left the gate open. She had dismissed Dylan’s protests and thought he was lying. No matter what he said. After all, his skateboard was by the pool, and he’d been angry and distracted when he came back to get it.

He hadn’t done it on purpose. Of course not. She’d tried and tried to keep him from feeling too guilty about his carelessness. After all, what was she constantly telling everyone? Accidents happen. It was nobody’s fault. But her underlying assumption had been crystal clear—that it was Dylan who’d left the gate ajar. It was the only reasonable explanation for what happened. No matter what he said.

No matter that he had said he didn’t do it. She had not listened. She had driven him to desperation. Tonight, as he’d faced the end of his life, he wanted her to know one thing. Not that he hadn’t done it on purpose.
He hadn’t done it at all.

I locked the gate.
Her world tilted on its axis as she understood for the first time what he was saying and began to realize what it meant.

A
t the nurses’ station in the emergency room, an aide told Keely that Dylan had already been moved. He gave her the room number and directions. Clutching the paper with the number in one hand and her overnight bag in the other, Keely found the elevator and made her way to the third floor. The hallways were quiet but still busy, the night staff pushing carts and exchanging cheerful banter in low voices as they went about their nocturnal duties.

Keely approached the lone nurse at the central desk to identify herself-and check about the cot. “I’m Mrs. Weaver. My son was just moved up here from emergency. Dylan Bennett?”

The nurse nodded. “He’s in 303.”

“Is it all right if I spend the night? The nurse in the recovery room said . . .”

“Yeah. We had one of the aides set the cot up for you.”

“Thank you,” said Keely, undeniably surprised but relieved by the lack of red tape and bureaucratic wrangling. “Thank you so much. How is my son doing? Did he come to?”

“He came out of it briefly. He was very groggy.”

“Still . . . that’s great,” said Keely, and the nurse did not contradict her. Keely picked up her bag and rushed down the hall toward Dylan’s room. Outside Dylan’s door, she came face to face with Detective Stratton, who had emerged from the stairway, followed by a patrolman.

“Detective,” Keely said. “What are you doing here?”

“I got a call about the 911 report from one of the officers who responded. When I heard it was Dylan—”

“This is unbelievable,” said Keely. “You’re still hounding him. Haven’t you done enough to hurt him? He’s just a boy.”

The detective’s expression was impassive. “Look, Mrs. Weaver. I realize this is a shock for you, and I don’t want to add to your troubles, but I am pursuing an investigation here for the D.A.’s office. Would you mind telling me what happened?”

“I wasn’t there when it happened,” she said stiffly.

He frowned. “I questioned the officers who arrived on the scene. And I confirmed this with the ER physician. Apparently, your son tried to cut his own throat with a utility knife. Do you know why he did that? Did he say anything or leave any indication?”

Keely stared at Phil Stratton and thought about what had happened, how his questions and his hounding of Dylan and her own lack of faith had caused them to be here in this hospital tonight. Part of her wanted to tell him everything, to wave Dylan’s note in his face and tell him exactly what he could do with his questions. She considered it for a second and then realized it would be futile. “Do we have to talk about this right now? I just want to be there when my child wakes up. Can’t you show a little compassion? Please.”

He gazed at her with narrowed eyes, and for a moment, Keely could see that he was thinking through his options. Apparently, he decided to pull back on the muscle.

“All right, Mrs. Weaver. I can come back. We can do this tomorrow.”

Keely did not bother to thank him or say good night. She pushed through the swinging door to Dylan’s room and left the detective in the hallway.

The sight of Dylan lying there was only slightly less jarring than when she’d seen him earlier.
It’s amazing how fast you get used to the worst realities,
she thought. She went over to the bed and reached for his hand. She leaned over and studied his waxy face. “Sweetie,” she whispered, “I’m back. I’ll be here all night with you.”

Dylan’s eyelids fluttered, and then, with a frown that was painful to behold, he opened his eyelids a crack, and his gaze swam up to her face.

Keely felt tears rush to her own eyes, but she forced herself to smile. “Hi, darling,” she said softly.

He made a noise in his throat.

“No, honey, don’t try to say anything.”

He made a slight movement of his head, as if to acknowledge that he couldn’t say anything if he wanted to.

“I know,” she said. “It’s terrible. But you’re going to be all right, Dylan. I’ve talked to the doctor. This thing in your throat is only temporary. You’re going to be fine. Good as new.”

For a moment, at the sight of her, there had been a slight gleam in those familiar eyes, but now it faded away, and a dull expression replaced it. His eyelids closed again.

Keely grasped his hand as if she was holding him back from falling.
Oh, God,
she thought.
Help us. Help me to help him. Give him the will to get better.

“Dylan,” she whispered urgently. She hoped his eyes would open, but they didn’t. She could still feel a slight pressure from his hand, though. It would have to do. “I’m here,” she whispered. “Mommy’s here.” And the pathos of his childhood name for her now caught in her throat even as it hovered in the air around his bed.

Part of her thought she should leave him alone then, just subside quietly into her chair and let him sleep.
God knows, he needs to sleep,
she thought. But something inside of her made her think that his sleep, in that abyss where he had tumbled, might not be restorative. He might not sleep easily until he understood what she now knew. She leaned over the bed and put her lips close to his ear.

“Sweetie,” she said in a low voice, “listen to me. I found your note. The note you left me on my pillow.”

His eyes opened abruptly this time, as if he had forgotten something and her words had reminded him.

“I didn’t understand what you meant at first. About the gate. I read the note, but I didn’t understand right away.”

His gaze had shifted to her face now. He seemed to be peering at her from a vast distance, but his attention was focused on her all the same. Keely licked her lips and then continued. “And then suddenly it hit me what you were saying.” She gazed at him steadily. “You were saying that someone else opened the gate the night th . . . that Mark died. Someone else did it. Not you. You’d tried to tell me before, but you knew I wasn’t hearing you.”

He closed his eyes for a moment and then opened them again and gazed at her intently.

“I heard you this time, darling,” she said fiercely, squeezing his cold hand in hers. “I heard you this time, no mistake. I kept saying it wasn’t your fault, and what I meant was that you had left the gate open accidentally. That you didn’t mean for anything bad to happen. But now I realize why you were so frustrated by that. Because you didn’t leave it open . . . at all. You knew you weren’t the one who had left it open—only nobody would listen. Not even your mother.” Her voice faltered and she had to take a deep breath to continue. “I hope you can forgive me for that,” she said.

His gaze did not waver, but she saw his eyes slowly fill. He blinked rapidly and a tear spilled over the rim of his lower lid. Keely felt relief surge in her own heart, and she was grateful. That tear seemed like the first drop of rain after a drought. The pinched lines in his face seemed to have eased.

Clutching his hand, Keely went on, her voice an urgent murmur in the dark room. “I don’t know who did it, but I’ll find out. I promise you that. I’ll find out how it happened. And everyone’s gonna know. Whether it was someone else’s carelessness or even Mark’s, I don’t care. I won’t have them blaming you anymore. Do you hear me? It wasn’t your doing, and I won’t have you paying the price for it. Okay?”

He nodded slightly and closed his eyes.

Keely swallowed hard. “And I only hope someday you’ll forgive me for being so unfair to you. I made a mistake, and I’m sorry. More sorry than you’ll ever know.”

His eyes remained closed, his pale, chapped lips set in a grim line.

“You sleep now, Dylan. I’ll stay right here with you. I promise,” she whispered fiercely. “I’ll never let you down again.”