Deceived (35 page)
Rocky wanted to cry out.
Do not die
,
no
,
not before we make things
right
,
not before we have one last chance.
But she thought words like that might pierce the thin tissue of connection he was obviously trying to make.
They sat in silence for a long moment. He was on the sofa, propped against pillows, looking gaunt. His pipes were in their carousel, looking cold. The tobacco smell in the house was stale.
Finally, he said, “I’m afraid of it.”
“Of what?” Rocky said.
“Dying.”
It was the first vulnerable thing he had ever said to her that Rocky could remember. A hairline crack in the hard-shell enclosure of his emotions. She could hardly speak, then heard herself using the old name. “Daddy,” she said, “you’re not going to die. Not yet.”
“I have to say something.” His face held torment. Rocky thought he must be suffering discomfort of some kind.
Or
,
please
,
no
,
not another
stroke.
“What is it?” Rocky said. “Can I get you something?”
“Listen to me.”
Rocky leaned forward.
“If I don’t say this, I might go to purgatory or something.”
Purgatory? Where had that come from? He wasn’t a religious man.
“I don’t know what’s out there,” he said. “I’m afraid of it. But I have to try to say this. I have to try . . .” He looked straight at her then. His eyes were damp.
“Go ahead, Pop. I’ll listen.”
Another long, leaden moment passed. Rocky felt a sudden loss of breath, as if she had to expend all her strength to keep the channel with her father open. Or else the door would slam shut too soon.
Then her father said, “I didn’t fix the fence.”
“Fence?”
He took a deep breath. “The dog got through. The dog. I knew he could get into the yard. I didn’t fix the fence. I didn’t . . .”
And then he was full-on crying. An old man, aging before her eyes, face wet, voice weak.
The dog. The dog that had mauled her.
It was clear to her in that moment that this was his plea for absolution. He had carried the guilt of her scars all these many years. He had hidden behind a rock wall of denial and, at times, neglect. It was why he had not wanted to be with her. It was why he had withheld his love.
It was both a shock and relief. To finally know why he had treated her the way he had. And it was devastating, too, all the lost years. She saw instantly how bitter she really was about it. Now here was his confession. And she could choose to give him what he asked for or leave him to die in his remorse.
She went to him, put her arm over his bony body, and rested her head on top of his. She let him cry it out, and by the time he was finished, she found she was embracing him, and he was letting her.
She took his hand. His grip was firm, as if holding onto life itself.
They stayed that way for a long time. His breathing normalized. Then he said, “Do you still sing?”
“Yes, Daddy. In fact, I do.”
He nodded, like he was trying to remember something. “You did when you were little. You liked to. I remember that.”
“I still like to.”
“Would you sing something for me?”
“What, now?”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
She swallowed. Her throat was dry. She was amazed he was asking this. “What . . . do you want me to sing?”
“Anything.”
“ ‘Anything Goes?’ ”
He smiled then. “That’s a good old song. You know it?”
“I can give it a try.”
“Please try,” he said.
Softly, Rocky sang.
10:57 a.m.
“I just acted,” Mac said. “I just jumped. It was the wrong thing to do.
I should’ve kept talking to her.”
“You haven’t got a whole lot of time to consider your options when somebody has a gun to her head,” Pastor Jon said.
They were sitting in front of Mac’s place. The sun felt good on Mac’s back. The events of the last three days had left him feeling cold inside. As if a dark, cool void had taken permanent residence in his chest.
Now, warmed by the sun and his pastor, the cold was slowly melting away.
But not all of it. There was still Liz.
“She went away right before my eyes,” Mac said. “Like there was a place inside her brain where she was going to take up residence. Not exactly like being in a coma, but close.”
Jon nodded, steepling his fingers. “This is a spiritual battle, first to last,” he said. “I have a friend, a guy I went to seminary with, who is a psychiatrist now. Ray Vickers. I’d like him to come see Liz. He recognizes the spiritual. He’s kind of a rebel that way, in his profession. He has a theory he calls ‘sin dissociation.’ ”
“Sounds heavy.”
“He explained it to me once. Sin’s real, even if you don’t believe in it. And it affects the mind. If you ignore it, you dissociate, you try to compartmentalize it. But the guilt seeps through, and if you don’t turn it over to God, it will turn on you.”
“How?”
“If it’s bad enough, it makes you paranoid, for one thing. Full-on mental illness in extreme cases. It can result in conduct you try to justify in your own mind. You begin to think anything you do is all right, that you’re entitled. So if you get caught, you withdraw. Into your own little world, so you can still be in control.”
Mac thought about it, about Liz’s almost lifeless eyes. “I have to see her,” he said. “I have to let her know I’m here.”
10:39 a.m.
Tito Sanchez was almost laughing over the phone. “They’ve suspended Gordon Slezak immediately, pending review.”
“You have got to be kidding,” Mac said.
“Not me,” Sanchez said. “I’m the most serious guy in the world. But this has me, I don’t know, just laughing.”
“I’m glad I could brighten your day.”
“That girl, what’s her name?”
“Rocky. Roxanne.”
“Rocky Roxanne?”
“Just Rocky.”
“She’s awesome, what she did. She could be up for an Oscar for best documentary. I e-mailed the video straight to the Department of Corrections’ oversight office. They called me back in an hour. They pleaded with me not to release it to the news. I think that might not be a bad idea, to get — ”
“No,” Mac said. “I don’t want you to. Let them handle it. The guy’s going to suffer enough.”
“But this is the way it’s done now,” Sanchez said.
“It’s not the way I want it done. Are we clear?”
“Okay. You’re the client. Speaking of which, the child-custody papers. I filed them on Friday.”
Mac said nothing. He felt nothing.
“You okay with that?” Sanchez said.
“I’ll let you know,” Mac said.
When he clicked off, Mac sat for a long time, looking at the wall.
11:02 a.m.
“You’re welcome to stay, you know,” Geena said.
Rocky kissed her cheek. “I know. But it’s time to get back to my own place.”
“What about Boyd?”
“I’m not afraid of Boyd. I don’t even think he’ll come around.”
“And if he does?”
“I’ll take care of it then.”
“Maybe your boyfriend can throw him out on the street again.”
“Geena . . .”
Geena smiled. “Come on. You hauled in a criminal together. He’s just right for you, he’s — ”
“Stop. Okay? Just stop. And don’t vibrate about it. Don’t visualize or verbalize or any other kind of -ize. Just leave it alone.”
“There are some things you can’t control,” Geena said. “Some things just happen.”
1:28 p.m.
Mac sat across from Liz, looking at her through the visiting-room glass at the Century Regional Detention Facility in Lynwood. Her eyes were empty. Vacant.
Or maybe looking at something so far away that only she could see. She was in a jail-issue, neon orange jumpsuit. Her hair was stringy.
“I came to see how you’re doing,” Mac said.
Liz took a breath. “You look weird,” she said.
Mac smiled, trying to reassure her. “But how are
you
?”
“There’s fire.”
“What?”
“Fire.”
“Where?”
“All around. It’s in the trees and the birds.”
Gripping the handset, Mac prayed silently and said, “Liz, I want to say something to you, okay?”
“It’s in the rocks.”
“Liz, just listen.”
Her eyes met his.
“Do you remember being baptized?”
She said nothing.
“Do you remember saying you wanted it?” Mac said.
Silence.
“You can call on the name of Jesus, Liz.”
A low candle flame flickered in her eyes. “It’s too late,” she said.
“No, it is never too late.”
“Arty knows. He knows what I did.”
“Arty forgives you.”
She shook her head. “It’s too late. You can’t go back. You are what you are. Never change. Can’t.”
“No,” Mac said. “You can choose, right now. You can choose — ”
“Too late!”
Liz screamed. Her face twisted. She threw the handset at the Plexiglas and stood up, defensive, as if Mac was going to bust through and grab her.
Two female deputies rushed over, and that was that. They dragged Liz, literally kicking and screaming, from the visiting room.
Just before she disappeared through the door, she caught Mac’s eyes once more.
They were wide with a kind of fear that reminded him of something.
Then he knew what it was. It was like that Iraqi kid soldier who had screamed
I love you!
as the Marines tied him up.
4:29 p.m.
“Bedford – Mulrooney.”
“May I speak to Athena, please?”
“Who’s calling please?”
“Mac.”
“May I tell her what this is regarding?”
“Aurora.”
Pause. “One moment.”
Classical music. Then: “Mac, I’m not supposed to talk to you. My lawyer said — ”
“You won’t need the lawyer.”
“What?”
“I’m not going through with it.”
“Do you mean that?” Athena said.
“I don’t want Aurora to be in the middle of a war.”
“Mac, I . . . I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything. I know she doesn’t even know who I am.”
Athena was silent.
“Is Tony a good father?” Mac said.
“He’s a very good father,” Athena said.
Mac took a long, deep breath. He closed his eyes.
“I’m glad,” he said.
“I believe you,” Athena said. “I really, really do.”
7:31 p.m.
“This is strange,” Mac said.
“What is?” Rocky said.
“Not feeling afraid that somebody could show up at any time and try to knock my head off. They haven’t given me a new PO yet. I almost don’t know what to do.”
Rocky smiled and almost said the same thing. She and Mac sat with feet up on the outside deck of the Canyon Grind. The evening was warm, only a hint of a breeze through the mountains.
The lights of the city were spread out as usual, way down below. They still comforted Rocky, still offered up a hopefulness that once she had only pretended to believe in.
“Are you going to see Liz again?” she said.
“If she’ll let me,” Mac said. “They put her on suicide watch.”
Rocky shook her head. “I should hate her.”
“But you don’t.”
“What’s going on in her head must be pretty bad.”
“It is.”
“Insanity defense, you think?”
“No doubt.”
He reached over and took her hand. That surprised her. She saw his face in the light of the table candle.
He said, “You did good.”
“Lucky, I guess.”
Mac shook his head. “The insurance company for the stones, they’re going to love you. They’re not going to think it’s luck.”
“I might pick up a file or two out of it.”
“Maybe you’ll need some help,” he said.
“You looking for work?”
“Anything to keep me in crocuses.”
Rocky smiled and looked out again at the valley. A plane was starting its descent into Bob Hope Airport in Burbank. Blinking lights, smooth line. People coming back home.
She kept hold of Mac’s hand. He didn’t let go.
8:19 p.m.
They want you to eat this.
Poison.
Don’t do it.
They won’t get to me.
It had to be this way.
Step by step
,
I had to do it all.
Arty
,
stop it! Get away.
If I hit the wall and bleed
,
that will be good. I can go to sleep that way.
I can bleed.
2:34 p.m.
This was not why Larry Mesa went into medicine.
He wanted to heal. He wanted to spend time with the sick. He wanted to be a doctor who made a difference.
What he didn’t want to be was part umpire, part politician, part circus ringmaster.
And only occasionally a doctor of medicine.
Dr. Larry Mesa had chosen LA County – USC Medical Center, with its fading green walls and yellowing ceilings, precisely because he could be where he was needed most: among the poor of the city, the ones most citizens would rather forget.
Here were the John and Jane Does, the homeless, and yes, even the gangbangers. He wanted to heal them all without judgment.
The higher-ups would not make it simple. Especially when there was a big county screwup. And especially when they told you, a doctor of medicine, how to handle a coma patient.
That was the game, when the politicians and lawyers got involved. They could crush you if you didn’t play.
Dr. Larry Mesa played, because he wanted to keep his job.
But all those concerns went away, for one sweet moment, when he saw his coma patient fluttering his eyes.
“Hello there,” Dr. Mesa said, hope swelling in his chest. To pull a patient out of a coma was one of the most awe-inspiring things a doctor could do.
The eyelids fluttered again.
“I’m Dr. Mesa. Can you hear me?”
The eyelids slowly opened, closed, opened again.
Dr. Mesa forgot all about potential lawsuits and politicians and life’s disappointments, and whispered a silent thanksgiving to God.
Right now, everything seemed worth it.