My mother steps into the room and straightens the already straight pillows on the bed. Then she shakes the gauzy curtains so that the evening light spills through them. It’s spring light, frail and silver-gold.
“There are some new graduate programs at the university,” she says. “Your father and I want you to live here. If you find a degree you like.”
I don’t know what to say. Behind every delicious meal and chat about the new bike path has been this unspoken question: Why don’t you stay here?
Why don’t I?
A fly buzzes out from the window, huge for this time of year, and we both watch it. The black body loops and settles back against the pane. Ever since I arrived home, Kim Lord’s death has receded behind the avalanche of a new homicide. Laci Peterson, a missing and pregnant California woman, washed ashore in Richmond in April, within miles of the beached body of her unborn son. Picture after picture of her life layers the media now: pretty at Christmas, holding her belly. Handsome husband with his strong chin, his arm squeezing his wife.
Meanwhile, Kim is not forgotten, not replaced. She has simply faded as another victim takes the spotlight. Before long, another lovely murdered face will rise beside Laci’s, and Laci, too, will move to the background with the other victims of homicide. We’ll talk about her case as solved or unsolved, as if knowing who killed her and dumped her body explains anything about why her life had to end. Eventually the reason she died will frame her whole existence—and not the infinite reasons she deserved to live.
My mother sighs at my silence. “I’m afraid there’s something back there that won’t let you go,” she says. “I don’t think it’s Greg anymore.”
“It’s not Greg,” I say.
“Then what is it?” She’s almost in tears. “Why do you get involved in this stuff? You don’t have to.”
I shake my head, wishing I could explain. Instead, my dry eyes follow the fly, imagining slapping it, and the way its grotesque body would open, spilling its guts, smearing the glass. It crawls up the window until it reaches a ledge, then pauses, tenderly rubbing its legs together.
The next morning even our distant Vermont newspaper is covering the Laci Peterson case. The husband’s lawyers are floating the idea that a Satanic cult kidnapped and killed her, which of course has spawned a juicy headline to make people once again wince over her story, her curving belly, her huge, happy smile.
I go outside to help my mother spread compost on her future strawberry garden before she plants. The work is tedious and a bit smelly, but the softness of the soil promises that summer is coming and takes my mind away from the image of another mutilated female body. It’s also good to labor alongside my mom, who becomes so intent on her gardening, bending and plucking, it’s like she’s having a private conversation with the earth. I could learn from this. I could heal.
When it starts to drizzle, I go inside and call Yegina. We gossip about the explosion of visitors to the Rocque, and Jayme’s return from Hawaii, her stories of swimming with dolphins. As we talk, I can feel Yegina’s L.A. filling my childhood bedroom: her favorite Korean barbecue place, her date with Hiro to the silent-movie theater, the Chilean singer that the public radio station is playing. I can see Yegina’s yellow Mazda in a long line of cars streaming to downtown, the sunlight already glaring off her windshield, as she passes signs for wide avenues that run for miles.
“But the big news is that J. Ro strong-armed that big collector into donating all of Kim Lord’s paintings from her first shows,” says Yegina. “So the Rocque now owns her entire collection and we’re building a special gallery in his name. Steve Goetz.”
“It should be in Kim’s name,” I snap.
Yegina makes a surprised noise. “You ended up admiring her, didn’t you?”
There’s a sinking sensation in my gut, like I’ve arrived at an important occasion far too late, and everyone is already there, staring at me. I was so focused on my own shame at losing Greg to Kim that she became a specter of my own self-loathing, and I couldn’t acknowledge the real Kim Lord. I wish I could have met her again, in a different year, and that we had become friends. I might have liked to see her and Greg’s child, even if it hurt. But most likely, I would have been happy to stay a stranger, to know her through her paintings alone, to appreciate the next stunning work she made. “I’m grateful Janis does,” I say. “It’s great news for the museum.”
“The press release had typos,” Yegina informs me. “When are you coming back?”
“Soon,” I say.
“They’ll stop asking you,” says Yegina. “I’ll never stop, but others will.”
My mother is standing in my doorway, holding a large padded envelope, a dubious look on her face.
“It’s from someone named Ray in L.A.,” she says when I hang up the phone. “Didn’t he visit you at the hospital?”
“He was working on Kim Lord’s case,” I say.
“Well, what does he want now?” She continues to clutch the package and I have to grab it from her. It feels light, like there’s very little inside.
“We were sort of friends, too,” I mumble.
I wait until she’s gone, and tear the envelope open. A black object spills out. A digital recorder, like the one Jay Eastman had, Detective Ruiz had. The size that could fit in my fist.
A piece of tape is attached to it, a note in a man’s handwriting:
Got this for you, but they said you’re not back. Sending it along in case.
A gift to replace my old broken one. In case I don’t return. In case I never see him again.
A meter indicates that there’s a short recording on it already.
I shut my bedroom door, press play, and hear Hendricks’s voice:
You want to know why we lied. You might have found your own reasons by now, but I owe you mine. You accuse a famous killer of trying to murder you, and you can never be yourself again. You’ll be in the trial, the newspapers, TV, you’ll be the one who escaped, but your life won’t be yours. It’ll be hers.
Don’t let her have it. Make your life about the things and the people that matter to you, the ones worth saving. Keep them well, and let the dead go. The dead already know their ending.
And then nothing for a long moment, and the recording stops.
Hard as I listen, the words don’t sink in. I play it again, trying to understand if it’s an apology or warning. Or both. Finally I rewind to the end of Hendricks’s speech and just listen to his silence. It makes me remember my first night in the hospital. I can see it clearly now: Hendricks sitting by my bedside, his bandaged hand on my hand, his eyes on my damaged face. How the closeness would have ended if either of us had spoken. How in that moment there was nothing to say, no words that could explain yet how we felt. How we both were waiting.
31
When the rain stops, I go down to the kitchen to ask my mother if I can take a drive with her station wagon. It’s gotten warm today, almost sixty-five, and I can’t stay inside anymore, but I don’t want to wander my parents’ land either.
“Need company?” she says, handing me the keys.
“Not this time,” I say.
“Where are you going?” she asks, trying to sound casual.
I tell her I don’t know. She grips the counter. I hug her until her shoulders relax. “I won’t be long,” I say.
She nods.