“Not to drop in on the mother of a murderer.” Alice scans the emptying hall. “You’re making me late for my bus.”
“Paula says it’s not unusual for victims to meet the parents of the person who committed a crime against them. Yvonne Jessup might not even be surprised.”
“And how does Paula know it’s safe? His sickness was probably inherited! Mother Jessup could be a psychopath herself!”
I can’t tell Alice that, according to my research, no one knows exactly what causes someone to become a sociopath. While some contend it’s due to a genetic disposition in families—i.e., if one parent has it, you’re more likely to have it—others believe it’s caused by an emotional detachment in early life, resulting in a disconnection with society.
On the other hand, it could be a combo deal.
“Sociopath. Donald Jessup was a sociopath. Specifically, an amoral sociopath: the kind that doesn’t understand pain, and likes to torture animals, and has a vivid fantasy life where he is in control.”
“I don’t care if he was a sociologist! You’re not getting me in that house of horrors.” Alice swings her backpack over her shoulder and strides toward the lobby.
I chase her down the hall and block her way. “I need you, Alice. I can’t go alone.”
“You can’t go, period! I’ll call your mother and tell her what you’re planning.”
I grab her arm. “You would never do that.”
She shakes her arm loose and slips her hand up her coat sleeve.
“Please, Alice. You said you prayed for me. If you care at all, help me do this. This is the last time I’m asking.”
Alice blows hard through her teeth. “All right, I’ll go. But you have to promise me something. We talk to her from outside. I’m not stepping foot off her porch, or front step, or yard, whatever.”
I latch on to her arm and walk toward her waiting bus. The driver yells something unintelligible. I stop a few feet before the stairs. “She probably won’t even invite us in,” I reassure her.
“We won’t drink anything if she offers.”
“We’ll say we drank before we came.”
“We won’t eat, either,” she says.
“Clearly. That scone could be a shrunken head.”
“We should tell someone where we’re going.”
“That’s already taken care of.” It sure is. My call this morning alerting Paula was worth it, I tell myself. Quid pro quo. I can’t expect Paula to just give without getting something in return. Asking Yvonne one tiny question about visits made by Donald’s parole officer isn’t a huge deal. Paula promised a quick, painless interview that she probably wouldn’t use, would probably just be for her own “deep background.” And did my mother consent? Of course. We’re a progressive family, as you know, Paula. Concerned with justice, for all.
I won’t let myself be bothered by Paula’s suspicious number of probablys or my own blatant lies. Eyes on the prize.
“I’ll tell my little brother just in case too. As a backup,” Alice says.
“You will not tell your brother,” I say firmly. “You will be with me, and we will be fine. I’ll see you in two hours.”
Alice turns and faces the bus. “It’ll be hard not to say anything to anyone.”
“Friends do things for each other. I’ll owe you. Quid pro quo.”
She dips her chin and looks deeply into my eyes. “It’s not like that. You don’t owe me.” She rubs my arm awkwardly. “You’re my friend,” she says, and skips off toward the bus without looking back.
I spend the next two hours weaving a four-part lie that will keep Mom off my trail. It involves the Y, a mall visit, a stop at the deli, and bringing Alice dinner at the rectory, the sum of which would take at least three hours. That’s plenty of time for a visit—quick (as promised to Alice), and fruitful (as promised to Paula).
If Paula’s word is good, my reward comes later.
Donald Jessup’s house is six blocks away from Saint Theresa’s, a squat brown house on busy Washington Street with two doors in the front. Lawn chairs, the kind with fabric straps that fray, dot the front yard, along with a picnic table with a frosted plastic top and thumbprint dents; a wheel-less wheelbarrow, a cracked terra-cotta pot, and a faded plastic Santa holding a lantern. There is no backyard. Instead, the house backs up to another house. Alice parks her beat-up sedan on the street and we pick our way across patches of dead crabgrass.
“All this time he was right there,” Alice murmurs, fingering the zipper of her pink down coat. “Which door?”
“I’d go for that one.” I point to the one next to a lift-top mailbox stuffed with yellowed mail. We climb a few steps to stand on a rotting porch in front of a molded number 277 like black metal turds. Above the knocker, a sign written in red grease pencil reads: NO SOLICITERS & NO PRESS!
“We’re neither,” I remind a fidgeting Alice as I ring the doorbell. I listen, hear nothing, and ring again. We wait a minute. I pull off my glove and knock on the door.
“She’d have a car, right? Well, the driveway’s empty. That means she’s not home.”