Laura called me Tuesday morning. Woke me up.
Hi, Rick. How are you holding up?
Not great.
I’m sorry, Rick. Stupid question.
I didn’t reply.
I felt that I was being mean. But I didn’t have the energy to be polite.
Listen, she said, there are a couple of things I’d like to talk to you about.
I’m all yours. Ears. I’m all yours and ears.
I think it would be better to talk in person.
Her voice was soothing.
Okay, I said. Whatever. How about lunch?
I’m not sure I have time for lunch. Can you come by the morgue?
Hard to pass up that invitation.
I’m sorry. It’s just the office to me. Sometimes I forget.
No, no. Just joking. Sometimes I think of my office as a morgue too. Come to think of it, most days.
She didn’t laugh. She had a sweet soft way with a laugh, and I wanted to hear it.
But I thought I heard her smile.
I promised to show up.
It took a few minutes of concentration to remember. What the last few days had brought. What the day would bring.
I shook my head. It hurt. I contemplated turning over. Putting the pillow over my head. Going back to the soft and unpredictable world of dreams. Who knew what wonders might await me there? But. I had an appointment. At the morgue. Jesus.
I hauled myself out of bed. I dragged myself into some barely presentable clothes. I opened the pill drawer. At least I didn’t have to lock them up anymore. Life was handing me small consolations.
I took twice my normal doses. I didn’t bother calling Sheila to ask. A little self-medication. Nothing wrong with that. I’d only get her endless voice mail message anyway. And I had to do something, to get me through this glorious day.
I left the house.
When I got to Laura’s office, she was not alone.
Rick, she said, nodding to a rumpled gray thing on the couch, you know Detective Harwood?
Yes, I said, we’ve met.
He nodded. I nodded. He didn’t extend a hand.
There’d been a change since he’d been at my house. His hostility had grown. Thrived. I saw contempt. Something had tipped him over.
The fluorescent light didn’t flatter him. He had the pasty skin, the bored demeanor of the lifelong cop.
The couch had seen better days too.
You didn’t tell me we’d have company, I said to Laura.
An effort to lighten the suddenly somber mood.
Laura smiled uncomfortably, shuffled some papers on her desk. I tried to see what they were, but the angle wasn’t good.
The metal desk was gray. Like the metal chair in which I sat. Like the feeling in the room.
We have some results we’d like to share with you, Rick. From the autopsy.
I didn’t want to hear. Whatever it was that had killed Melissa made no difference to me. Overdose, heart attack, ennui. She was gone. She’d never really had a chance. Whatever those demons were that she’d so skillfully concealed from me had gotten her in the end.
Fire away, I said.
Well, the first part is what we thought, Rick. What you thought.
Yes?
Alcohol, 0.4. Off the charts, for you and me.
Speak for yourself, I said, half-heartedly attempting another joke.
She didn’t smile.
Not unusual in a long-term alcoholic, she said. But there was lots of other stuff.
She began to read from the report. They’d put together the blood results with the pharmacological detritus. Pill containers. When she’d got them. What was left in them. They figured she’d ingested, at a minimum, 50 milligrams of Xanax; 800 mg Effexor; 100 mg Ambien; Adderall 225 mg.
A listener less inured to the ways of the chronically addicted might have marveled at the quantities. Wondered how she could have stayed alive long enough to take it all.
But I knew better.
That doesn’t sound like all that much, for her, I said. Laura looked at me sadly.
Well, we don’t know that, Rick. And even if it were, it’s rolling dice. Every day your body survives that kind of abuse is a minor miracle. One day it can catch up with you. It will catch up with you.
It would have been depressing, if I wasn’t already as down as a man can be.
My extra doses weren’t doing a thing for me.
But, Laura continued.
But?
There was something else. That wasn’t enough?
There’s no easy way to put this, Rick, so I’ll just say it. Please do.
There was semen, Rick. Semen?
This was not a word I had expected to hear.
What? Semen? Where?
Where you’d expect it to be, Rick.
Her incessant repetition of my name was beginning to get on my nerves. I knew it was meant to soothe. To placate. Establish rapport, empathy. But it was pissing me off.
That’s impossible, Laura, I said sharply. Come on. Lab contamination or something. We haven’t. We hadn’t. In years. Jesus. Two or three at least.
Yes, she said. I understand that you had said that. Actually, that’s why it seems to be an issue.
I didn’t remember telling anyone that. But then, I didn’t remember much about that day. Nor, I suddenly remembered, about the night before that day.
Something vague and ugly came back to me. But no. No way. That had been a dream. A drunken hallucination.
Not one that I was about to share, with my good friend Harwood in the room.
So what the hell is this? I said. How is this possible?
That’s something we might have to look into, Rick.
Jesus, I said. Jesus H. Christ. She didn’t have a boyfriend. She didn’t have the energy to have a boyfriend. She could barely get off that goddamn couch. For Christ’s sake, she never even left the house.
Laura didn’t respond. The weary eyes of Detective Harwood fixed on mine. I hung my head. I couldn’t return his gaze. I felt an unaccountable guilt. Or maybe it was shame. Because something was going on here. Had been going on here. And I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t have a goddamn clue. And it had been my job to know. I’d let Melissa down. Again. I was only beginning to learn of all the ways I’d let her down.
Or maybe. No. Not that. It couldn’t be that. Jesus. I was a happy drunk. Depressive, sure. But homicidal?
Laura finally spoke. Not you then, Rick?
I lifted my head. I was very, very tired.
No, Laura, I said, with as much dignity as I could muster. Not me.
And you have no idea who?
Jesus, Laura.
I slowly shook my head.
Harwood hadn’t taken his eyes off me.
And, said Harwood.
It was the first word he’d spoken.
I turned to face him. He had that sardonic look. The one that grizzled cops habitually wear. You’re going to lie to me, it says. Everybody does. Always.
He looked at Laura, raised his eyebrows.
Laura cleared her throat.
And, she said. There were signs of…
Signs of what?
Signs of… forcing.
She said the last word softly.
What? Forcing? Rape?
Forcing. I’d rather say forcing. Rape has all sorts of
…connotations, that aren’t necessarily apparent here.
A strange calm descended over me. I’d reached my limit. My emotional life shut down. It could not take any more assaults.
It gave me a certain clarity.
I don’t understand, Laura, I said. I just don’t understand. There was no evidence of…
No. No forced entry. No broken furniture. No disarray.
Except the disarray that was Melissa’s life. Our lives.
Kelly was there, I said.
Upstairs. Yes. In her room.
So, how? How could something have happened?
If we knew that, Rick…
Harwood turned his hound-dog eyes on me again. Jesus, I said, shaking my head.
It was a calculated response. Harwood’s stare was unrelenting. I felt obliged to be as convincing as possible.
So, Harwood said. We need to do some further investigation.
Yes, I said. I understand.
Harwood lit a Marlboro. The smoke made me choke. I coughed. He lifted his eyebrows. As if some comment was expected of me.
I couldn’t think of one. What was the appropriate thing to say, I asked myself, in this situation? They didn’t teach you that in law school.
We need your permission for a few things, said Laura.
Sure, sure. Whatever.
There was a long pause. Harwood smoked. I wheezed. There was something intensely irritating about his passive smoke.
Like what? I asked. You’ve already ransacked the house.
You know, DNA things.
DNA things? You’re kidding me, right?
I’m sorry, Rick. I was trying to get to this gently. We’d like a DNA sample from you. We could get it in other ways, of course. But I thought it better to be upfront about this.
You’re kidding me, right? Laura? You’re kidding?
I felt foolish at my stammering.
Harwood chimed in.
She’s not kidding, Rick.
I tried to remember when I’d asked for his opinion. When I’d told him he could call me Rick. He’d said it with distaste. A curl of the lip. Too much emphasis. She’s not kidding, Rick.
I looked straight into his eyes for the first time. They were yellow, like his face. He blew some more smoke at me.
Clearly this was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Fuck you, Harwood, I said.
I hadn’t meant to say it. Just to think it. But it came out.
He didn’t flinch. I guess he’d heard worse.
It won’t be hard to get a warrant, he said, in a bored tone.
I may not have been much of a criminal lawyer, but I knew enough to figure he was right. Cherchez l’homme.
I turned to Laura.
This is really humiliating, I said.
I know it is. Listen. It’s just routine. You know how it works. We want to eliminate you as a suspect. Officially. Get on to the real investigation. No distractions.
Suspect? It wasn’t even clear there’d been a crime. Jesus, I thought. There must be something else. Something they’re not telling me.
Harwood didn’t look like a guy who wanted to eliminate me as a suspect. He looked like a guy who wanted to beat me with a rubber hose.
He got up and left the room, treating me to a sardonic smile.
I’m sorry, Laura, I said. I can’t do that right now. It just doesn’t seem right.
Laura shook her head.
Rick, I don’t really understand why you’re doing this. But I’m not going to argue with you about it. I know you’re going through a lot.
I appreciate that.
She changed the subject. We talked a few minutes about the old days. But my heart wasn’t in it.
I wasn’t even sure my heart was still in my body.
I took my leave. Laura got up to escort me to the door. I could feel the tension in her as she walked me out. She wanted to commiserate. To give me a reassuring hug. But she couldn’t do it.
Wouldn’t be professional.