There was a knoll that looked down on the church, and a gravel road if you knew how to find it. It bent through the trees and ended in a high glade with uninterrupted views of rolling hills and far mountains. In better times he’d gone there to be alone and think of all the good in the city. Things made sense then, the sky above and everything in its place.
But that was a long time ago.
He left the car under the canopy and moved through the grass until he could see down onto the fallen steeple and scattered cars. He knew people came to the church—the horsewoman, vagrants—so he knew someone would find the body. But it made him sick to see the police there. After so many years, the church was his special place. No one else could understand the reasons or its purpose, the void in his heart it filled so perfectly.
And the girl on the altar?
She was his, too, but not as much as the others he’d chosen, not with cops looking at her and touching her and speculating. She should be in the stillness and the dark, and he hated what was happening behind the shards of stained glass: the bright lights and jaded cops, the medical examiner going about his dull, grim business. They would never grasp the reasons she’d died or why he’d chosen her or the incentive to let her be found. She was so much more than they could ever understand, not a woman or a body or a piece of some puzzle.
In death, she was a child.
At the end, they all were.
*
Elizabeth went to the hospital and found that Gideon had been moved out of recovery and into a private room on the same floor. “How is that possible?”
“The cost, you mean?” The nurse was the same from earlier, a pretty redhead with brown eyes and a spray of freckles across her nose. “Your father asked for it as a charitable gesture. It’s a slow week. The hospital administrator agreed.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Have you ever argued with your father?”
Elizabeth struggled with the unexpected kindness, reminding herself that her father loved Gideon, too. “Is he here now?”
“Your father? He comes and goes.”
“How is Gideon?”
“He woke, once, but isn’t speaking. Everyone here is pretty much heartbroken for him. He’s such a tiny thing, and torn up over his mother. Everyone knows what he was planning to do with that gun, but it doesn’t matter. Half the nurses want to take him home.”
Elizabeth thanked her and tapped on Gideon’s door. There was no answer, so she went in quietly and found him asleep with tubes in his arm and under his nose. A monitor beeped with the rhythm of his heart, and he was so small beneath the sheet, the movement of his chest so barely perceived. In his whole life, the poor boy had never caught a break. Poverty. Borderline neglect. Now he was branded with this other sin. Would he forgive himself? she wondered. And if so, for what? That he’d tried to kill a man or that he’d failed?
Elizabeth stood for a long time, thinking how she might appear from beyond the open door. A stranger could misconstrue her love for the child.
Why? one might ask. He’s not even yours.
There would never be an easy answer, but were Elizabeth forced to offer reasons, they might sound like this: Because he needs me, because I’m the one who found his mother dead.
Yet, even that was not the whole truth.
Leaning closer, Elizabeth studied the narrow face and bruised eyes. He appeared eight more than fourteen, closer to dead than to living.
His eyes opened and filled with shadow. “Did I kill him?”
Elizabeth smoothed his hair and smiled. “No, sweetheart. You’re not a killer.”
She leaned closer, thinking he’d be relieved by the news. Behind the boy’s head, though, the monitor started beeping faster.
“Are you sure?”
“He’s alive. You did nothing wrong.” The monitor spiked. His eyes rolled white. “Gideon? Breathe, honey.”
The monitor began to scream. “Nurse!” Elizabeth yelled, but it was unnecessary. The door was already open, one nurse spilling in, a doctor on her heels.
The doctor asked, “What happened?”
“We were just talking.…”
“What did you say to him?”
“Nothing. I don’t know. We just—”
“Get out.”
She stepped away from the bed.
“Now!”
The doctor bent over the boy. “Gideon. Look at me. I need you to calm down. Can you breathe? Squeeze my hand. Good boy. Look at my eyes. Watch me. Slow and easy.” The doctor breathed in, breathed out. Gideon’s fingers were twisted white, his eyes fastened on the doctor’s. Already, the monitor was slowing. “Good boy…”
“You need to go,” the nurse said.
“Can’t I just…?”
“You can’t help anyone,” the nurse said; but Elizabeth knew that was not entirely true.
Maybe she could help Adrian.