Voodoo Moon (10 page)

She turned back the cuff of her white shirtsleeve. First the left one. Then the right one. She'd done a pretty good job of it. Somebody must have found her in time and gotten her to a hospital. She had pale skinny little-girl wrists, and the razor scars were sad and lurid and ugly.

"What's that all about?" I said.

"I got real depressed a while back."

"Apparently."

"Maybe I won't want to have sex tonight."

"That's all right."

"If it gets real rough for you, I'll give you a hand job."

I smiled. "Boy, you
have
changed." Then, "You going to tell me about your wrists?"

She looked over at me with her sweet little waif face, glassy tears in her eyes, and shook her head.

I didn't push it.

T
he shadows, and the darkening sky, and the chill drop in temperature, lent the land around the burned-out asylum a forlorn quality I hadn't sensed in full daylight. The songbirds in the fading tree light were melancholy, and even the dogs down the hill near the horse meadows sounded lonely. It was true. You could almost hear the screams of those who'd died in the fire.

"You mind if I just walk around a while and not talk?"

"Fine."

"I mean alone."

"No problem."

She walked around alone. No problem. I watched a mother raccoon in a tree try to get one of her babies down from a topmost branch. The baby was swaying back and forth and making fear sounds. The mother moved with great delicacy and picked the kid up by the back of the neck and brought it back to safety. In the midst of all this desolation, it was a life-affirming act.

The moon came up. A half moon, it was, clear and radiant as the finest diamond, its luminosity ancient and brand-new at the same time, a marker of our entire brief span on this world that would never quite be ours. It was fun sometimes to think of what species would eventually replace us; sometimes, it was fun; other times, it was scary.

"Damn," she said, sitting down next to me on a fallen tree.

"What?"

She put her small hand on my arm. "You mean you haven't figured it out yet?"

"Figured
what
out yet?"

She hesitated a moment. Then, "You remember when we worked together on those two cases? I had genuine psychic visions
."

"You sure did."

"I was the one who found the bodies."

"You sure were."

"So you didn't doubt my abilities at all."

"Of course not. Remember, toots, I was the one who sent you to Quantico to meet the paranormal unit."

Another pause. "I lost it."

"Lost what?"

A barn owl burst into night song. Dismay and loneliness filled the forest around us, his call that plaintive.

"I lost my powers."

"I didn't know you could lose them."

"I tried to cash in. That's what Laura and I fight about all the time. The agreement we had when I started the show was that there wouldn't be any fakery or showbiz bullshit. You know?"

"Sure."

"Well, they were ready to dump us after three episodes. The ratings were terrible. So Laura and Noah decided that we needed fakery and showbiz bullshit right away. And the more the better. I fought against it, but I eventually went along because I was getting used to the life."

"The life?"

"You know. Being a celebrity. Limos everywhere. Flying to London and Paris. Having a very nice bank account. For our parents' fiftieth wedding anniversary, we were able to buy them a nice new house and get Mom a housekeeper twice a week. I even made the tabloids. They had me paired off with this rock singer I'd never even heard of before. But it was all pretty cool stuff for a small-town girl like me."

"I'm sure it was."

"Laura and Noah moved us away from people with real paranormal powers. They weren't very dramatic on TV. I mean, I had to admit that myself. There was this crippled woman from Boston, for instance, and I think she really had the power to heal people. Not all people, not all the time. But I think she was genuine. I wanted her on the show. I insisted we tape a segment with her. She was a very sweet, middle-aged woman in a wheelchair, but she had these facial tics. And when I saw the tape of her, I had to admit it was bad TV. She'd make the audience uncomfortable. So we ended up with this 'healer' who used to be a stage magician. It was total bullshit and the people who claimed he'd healed them were all lying. I suppose he paid them. But our ratings quadrupled. Then Laura suggested alien abductions. And then Noah said how about past lives. And then the show started getting into spirit possession and ghosts—none of it legitimate study, which would have been fine, but just showbiz crap."

"Well, your show certainly got popular."

"Right. So popular that by our third season, there were ten other cable shows just like it. And they all took away bits and pieces of our audience. So here we are in our fifth season and our ratings have fallen again. They're talking about canceling us."

"I guess I still don't quite see where I fit into this."

Moonlight made a silver mask of her gentle, freckled face. She looked up at the moon for solace, the same way our genetic ancestors had millions of years ago.

"We need you to find the real murderer," she said. "I don't have my powers left. I sold them out and abused them and God took them away from me."

"You really believe that?"

"I really believe that. I'm being punished for ruining a gift that very few people have."

"And my part in all this?"

"We need you to check out Rick Hennessy's background. Show how he changed over the past couple of years."

"In other words, how he became 'possessed.'"

She paused. "Yeah, I guess that's it."

"You really think he's possessed?"

"I think it's a possibility."

"That doesn't answer my question."

She sighed. Stared up at the moon again. "I don't have to sleep in your bed tonight. I mean, if you don't want me to."

"Knock off the bullshit and answer my question. You really think this kid is possessed?"

"Probably not."

"But you need me and my background report on him to lend your story credibility."

"That's the plan, I guess."

"It kind of pisses me off, Tandy."

"I told Laura it would."

"My word is all I've got. If I get involved in some stunt like this, who'll want to hire me?"

"So you're saying no?"

"I'm saying no."

"Fuck," she said.

I didn't say anything.

"You're really pissed, huh?"

"Yeah."

"I don't blame you."

I didn't say anything.

She walked up toward the burned ruins. Then turned back to me. "I can't believe what I've become. I blame Laura and Noah all the time. But I'm just as guilty as they are. I don't want to give up the life, either. I'm just as bad as they are."

"Maybe not as bad as Noah."

"I know you don't like him. I admit he's kind of a peacock, but he's not such a bad guy."

"Why'd you bring me out here, Tandy?"

She came back and sat next to me on the toppled tree. "I thought you might bring me luck."

"What kind of luck?"

"I thought with you here, I could walk around the grounds and maybe something would happen. Rick used to come out here all the time. I thought maybe I could make some kind of telepathic contact. See if there really were malevolent spirits out here."

"Then you've really contacted spirits before?"

"Oh, sure. That part I believe in completely. I've contacted spirits several times over the years, in fact. I mean, back when I was holy."

"Holy?"

"I know that's kind of a funny word. But that's how I felt. When I was young and was aware of my power. I was in touch with God and with myself and I felt a great peace, and a kind of wisdom. Like when my dad got cancer that time. I was really able to comfort him. And I think that helped him recover completely. I really believe I played a part in that, a part I don't even understand myself. I would go into church and make the stations of the cross and then kneel in front of the votive candles and look up at Blessed Mother and I felt—holy. That's the only way I can explain it, Robert. Holy."

"And you don't feel holy anymore?"

She shook her head. "Not at all."

"And when you were walking around up here tonight—"

"Nothing. No kind of spiritual contact at all."

The owl got busy again. This time he didn't sound plaintive; he sounded triumphant. There was something regal now in his cry. "Thanks for telling me the truth, anyway."

"Laura's going to kill me."

I took her hand. "Maybe you should think about quitting."

"A has-been at twenty-eight."

"Maybe you'll find your powers again."

"I've thought of that, actually."

"You really were helpful to people, Tandy. And you really were holy."

She took my hand and touched it to her cheek. "Tonight? Am I still invited to your room tonight?"

"Absolutely." I tapped my wristwatch. "Now I need to get back."

"Oh, yes," she said, laughing. "I forgot. It's bowling time."

T
he taverns were all fired up and ready to go. There was a block of them. When we'd left town, there'd been only a few cars parked slantwise in front of them. Now both sides of the block were lined with pickups, vans, and cars. Some of the vans still bore traces of the seventies and eighties in the form of heavy-metal drawings on their sides. In the taverns tonight, as every night, there would be bumper pool and lottery tickets and fistfights and adultery and young love and old weary love and loneliness, lots and lots of loneliness in the neon shadows of beer signs and jukebox glow.

The streets were mostly empty. It was that limbo time when teenagers were actually at home stuffing food in their faces, fortifying themselves for the night ahead. Soon they'd burst forth in a rumble of glass-
pak
mufflers and rock music and hormones, and ignite the night into an explosion of joy, lust, cosmic ache and cosmic confusion and cosmic arrogance and cosmic terror, and lust
lust
lust
.

As I drove into the parking lot, I saw, at the far end, the green Ford that I'd seen outside Iris Rutledge's office. I drove past it.
Empty. I wondered where the big man was. The motel looked shabby in the soft lights of the parking lot, the prairie sky filled with stars now. I pulled into a parking spot near my room.

"I'm glad I told you," Tandy said.

"I'm glad you did, too."

"I don't blame you for not wanting to be involved."

She
slid
her arm around me as we stood in front of my door. Hugged me. I seemed to represent a mixture of Daddy, brother, and lover to her, and the combination made me uncomfortable.

"See you," she said, and walked to her own room several doors away. She gave me a tiny wave and inserted her key and went inside.

I went in and got the light on and took care of my bladder and washed my face and hands, and then the phone rang.

"Hey, pal. What exotic
place're
you in this time?"

Brady. Chicago cop. Friend of mine from my bureau days. I'd called him earlier this afternoon but he'd been busy.

"Brenner, Iowa."

"Wow. They got indoor plumbing?"

"Next year."

"Well, we all have to have our dreams."

"How you been?"

"Other than a teenage son who may be doing drugs, fine."

"Damn. You really think so?"

"His mother says the
signs're
all there. I wouldn't know. I rarely see him. I was a really shitty father to him when he was growing up—we had joint custody but I rarely took him on weekends—and now he's paying me back. Won't even return my phone calls most of the time. So I'm working on spending a lot of time with the younger kids."

"I'm sorry."

"Hell, even the commander's kid got into the drugs last year. Been in and out of two substance abuse programs already."

"It's everywhere."