The Closing: A Whippoorwill Hollow novel (The Whippoorwill Hollow novels) (27 page)

“She was right, Ma.”

She brushed away tears. “You don’t understand how humiliating it was. There was such a big ruckus, those loud sirens and flashing lights. A crowd followed the ambulance to the house, hoping to see some sort of tragedy, I suppose. I told the two young men I could walk to their truck if they’d just give me a little help, but they were as stubborn as Clara. They insisted on lifting me onto a gurney and rolling it through that big crowd of gawking strangers, people who hear the sirens and chase down ambulances to catch sight of blood and gore. Vultures. Busybodies and gossips. Of course, they couldn’t wait to tell everybody about poor old Mrs. Abbitt, so feeble and weak she fell down and couldn’t get up. By now the whole county knows I’m too old to help myself.”

Nate’s mother cried. He placed his hand on her shoulder. After a while, she cried herself out. “I suppose some good came from this ordeal. It forced me to face up to my age. I can’t live alone forever.”

Nate was struck by how old she looked. For so long, she’d defied her mortality with good health, vigorous exercise, and an indomitable spirit, but that morning she looked depressed and defeated. For the first time in Nate’s memory, she looked her age.

“Do you still want me to move into that rest home you spoke to me about?”

“I don’t know. Are you considering it?”

“I guess so. I’ve been a stubborn old woman for too long, I suppose. If you still want me to, I’ll take a look at that place. I want you to look at it again, too, when you get out of here. I’m not saying I’ll move in, but I’ll think about it. You and I will discuss it and we’ll decide together what I should do.”

“All right, Ma. If that’s what you want.”

She folded her hands on the table, sat up straight, and seemed to gather herself. “Nathan, there’s something I want to talk to you about.” She stared at her hands. “I’ve kept a secret for many years. I’ve kept the truth from everyone, including you. I’ve told myself it was best for you that you didn’t know the truth, but that was a lie. It was best for me, but not necessarily for you. My fall forced me to think about my secret in a different light. Only one other living soul knows the truth, and I realized that when I die the truth may die with me and that’s not fair to you. You deserve to know the truth, no matter how much it may hurt me to tell you.”

Nate knew what was coming. He steeled himself.

“You brought up the subject of your father’s death when you came by the house—”

Nate cupped his mother’s hands in his hands. “Don’t, Ma.”

“What?”

“Don’t do this. There’s no need.”

“You don’t know what I want to tell you. You have a right to know—”

“I don’t want to know.”

“But Nathan—”

He put his fingers over her lips. “Whatever your secret is, it doesn’t matter now.”

She pushed his hand away. “You don’t know what I want to tell you.” She frowned. Awareness dawned on her face, quickly followed by shock, and then fear. “Did you learn the truth somehow? Do you know?”

“I know you and Dad took good care of me and raised me right. I know you both loved me.” He hesitated long enough to be sure his voice wouldn’t quaver. “I know I loved Dad and I love you.”

Abigail broke down. She wept for a long while. When she stopped crying, they sat together without saying anything for another long time. When she left the prison that day, the tension between them was gone.

For the last few weeks of his sentence, Nate spent most of his time in a room with other sequestered prisoners in front of a television, but he didn’t see the shows that played on its screen. He saw the people he loved.

He saw his father. He tried his best to recall all the precious memories. His father was unfailingly kind and loving, from Nate’s first memory of him until the day he died. He was gentle and soft-spoken. He never lifted a hand against Nate in anger or frustration and never once raised his voice.

Nate saw his parents together and thought about his lifelong puzzlement at an apparent distance and coldness between them. They were polite to one another. They talked to each other when required to deal with the practical logistics of living together. They dined together at the supper table every night, but there was very little meaningful conversation between them. For the most part, they talked to or about Nate. They weren’t angry or sarcastic or cruel to one another and he never heard a cross word between them, but he could recall no evidence of genuine affection between them either. He never saw them kiss, not even a peck on the cheek. He never saw them embrace or hold hands. He searched his memory for a single instance when they touched each other in an open expression of affection, but no image came to him.

As scenes on the television screen played on, Nate saw his mother. He felt her hand flinch when it rested on his hand at the kitchen table the day he told her about the judge’s deathbed promise to his father. He saw her pause when he asked her about the friendship between the judge and Nate’s father. He saw her avert her eyes. He heard the strain in her voice when she answered.

Nate saw Judge Blackwell on the prison’s television screen, too. He thought about all the good advice and counsel the judge had given him. He recalled the many kindnesses and favors with nothing asked in return. He saw the judge sitting beside Nate’s bed when Nate regained consciousness the night of the car accident. He remembered the tears the judge shed as he sat there. He heard the judge’s voice. “Thank God, son. I was afraid we’d lost you.” He thought about the felonies the judge committed to protect him from indictment. He recalled the judge’s response when Nate questioned his relationship with Nate’s father. The judge said, “We were good friends once before you were born.” Nate remembered that all Wiley Rea could find out about the judge was a vague rumor about an affair with a married woman and a broken heart.

Nate remembered a debate in a sociology course he took at Jefferson State. The issue was whether genetic traits or environmental circumstances exerted greater influence over a person’s actions in life. He favored the environment at the time, but during his last days in prison, he wondered if psychological weaknesses were passed along in genes. It would be less painful for him to think he betrayed Christine because he was programmed from birth to do so. It would be less devastating to have lost everything he cared about if his genetic makeup precursed him to make the pivotal mistake of his life. A belief in genetic predestination would have eased Nate’s conscience, but in the end he knew he couldn’t escape responsibility for his failings. His environmental influences were too strong and too good.

As he gazed at the television screen, Nate saw Christine when she told him about her deathbed conversation with his father. “Your father said you brought more joy to his life than he deserved. He said you are the proudest achievement of his life. He said he loves you.” And later, “He said he feared there would come a time in your life when you might doubt him, when you might need to be reassured about how much he loved you.” That moment had come during Nate’s sentencing hearing before Judge Blackwell. Nate’s father’s love remained an enduring truth. It had survived an untold story of conflict and turmoil and heartbreak. It had survived his father’s death. And it had survived Nate’s discovery of the truth. Having lost everything else that was meaningful to him, Nate clung to his father’s love during his final days in prison.

Nate’s last day of incarceration was May 16, a little more than a year after he first met Kenneth Deatherage in Visit A – Max Sec. He awoke that morning after dawn and lay in his bed thinking about his release. He approached it with a sense of dread. He didn’t know what he would do when he got out. Returning to the practice of law did not appeal to him. As a defense lawyer, he had regained much of what he had lost. His work on the Deatherage case restored his reputation in the legal community. He had climbed a long steep road back to integrity, respectability, and sobriety, but the prize he treasured most was not at the summit when he arrived there. Without that prize, his achievements were empty, worthless.

At nine o’clock, a guard came to his cell, returned his civilian clothes to him, and waited for him to change. As the guard walked Nate down a hall to the last checkpoint, Nate thought he might return to the base of the steep hill and rest there. He might go back to the run-down hotel on the edge of the slums in Hayesboro. He might crawl inside the bottle and numb his pain and mark time until his time was all used up.

A guard at the counter in the lobby stared at Nate’s scar. Then he said, “You got all your clothes, right?” He referred to a checklist. “Jacket, shirt, slacks, drawers, belt, socks, shoes. You got everything?”

Nate nodded.

“Personal belongings,” the guard said. “Let’s see.” He rummaged through a wire-mesh basket. “Wallet. Sixty-eight dollars cash. Money clip. Watch. Ring. Here you go.” He shoved the basket across the counter. Nate put on his watch and pocketed his wallet and cash. He looked at his wedding ring and then put it in his pocket, too.

“Is that it?” the guard said.

Nate nodded again.

The guard handed him the checklist. “Sign here.”

Nate signed his name.

“Okay. You’re done. You’re free to go. Good luck.”

Nate looked at a door with an Exit sign above it. Returning to the run-down hotel in Hayesboro suddenly seemed foolish. There was no point in going back there. It was a dead end. There was no point in going anywhere. There was no point in living.

“You’re all done,” the guard said again.

“I don’t know where to go,” Nate said under his breath.

“Aren’t you going with the lady?”

“What lady?”

“The lady who came to pick you up. People who come for the pick-ups aren’t allowed to wait in here. I told her to wait in the parking lot.”

Sunlight poured in a window beside the exit door, its mullions casting neat rectangular shadows on the linoleum floor. Nate went to the window and looked outside. An asphalt parking lot stretched away from the building. The lot was bordered on its far side by a forest of white pines. Five or six cars were strewn around the lot. To the right of the prison door about thirty feet away sat Christine’s pickup truck. She was leaning against its front fender, looking down at the ground, her arms folded over her chest.

Nate went to the door. It was made of metal, painted battleship gray. A chrome bar sliced across it waist-high. Nate put his hand on the bar. It was smooth and cool to the touch. He pressed the bar down and pushed the door open. Sunlight washed over him and fresh air rushed into his face. The scent of pine floated in the air and the faint sound of birdsong came from the forest.

Christine looked up at Nate. Her eyes glistened and her mouth was pinched into a tight line. The wind blew a strand of raven hair across her face. She pulled it back behind her ear. Nate stepped outside, let the door close behind him, and walked toward her.

My heartfelt thanks to Meghan Pinson of My Two Cents Editing for her expert guidance, advice, and encouragement. She is smart, thorough, fearless, and great fun to work with.

The cover is adapted from
Double Sunset, 2009,
a photograph taken in Virginia by my daughter, Devon Oder.

Thanks to Jono and Anne Marie Singer of Singer Design Studio for their good work on the presentation and appearance of the book, and to Skipjack Publishing’s Nicole Hutchins, who has been a champion of this book.

Thanks to those who consented to read and critique my story in its various stages of development, especially Jack, Mike, Nancy, Daniel, Josh, Devon, and Chelsea, whose enthusiastic encouragement spurred me on.

Stanley Klein provided extensive advice and insight about the laws, procedures, and courts of Virginia. Thanks to Mike Holleran for convincing Stan to fit me into his busy schedule. Virginia’s laws have changed significantly since the late 1960s, especially regarding divorce proceedings and the removal of judges. I did my best to set the story within the framework of the laws in effect at that time, taking liberties with the rules in a few instances to advance the plot more efficiently. Any and all errors are my fault.

Last but not least, I greatly appreciate the time and energy that fellow author Pamela Fagan Hutchins and her husband Eric Hutchins devoted to my book. Their two key suggestions changed the tone and quality of the story so much for the better.

Ken Oder was born in Virginia in the coastal tidewater area near the York and James Rivers, where military installations during World Wars I and II fueled the growth of urban centers like Norfolk, Hampton, and Newport News. His father worked for the Navy Mine Depot in Yorktown and later as a Hudson dealer until he heard his calling to preach. When he became the minister at Mount Moriah Methodist Church in 1960, the family moved to White Hall, Virginia, a farm town of about fifty people at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The mountains and the rural culture were a jarring contrast to the busy coastal plains, but once the shock wore off, Ken came to love it there. The mountains and hollows are spectacularly beautiful. The people are thoughtful, friendly, and quietly courageous. White Hall became his home, and his affection and respect for the area and its people have never left him.

Ken and his wife moved to Los Angeles in 1975, where he practiced law and served as an executive until he retired. They still live near their children and grandchildren in California, but a piece of his heart never left White Hall, and that place and time come out in his stories.

Visit www.kenoder.com for updates on Ken’s latest projects.