Angel of Darkness (12 page)

I stared at the wall behind him until, with fear, I realized that Parker was staring straight at me.
He could see me.
He looked momentarily startled, opened his mouth as if to ask who I was, then abruptly shut it again.

I thought I knew what had happened. Whatever power fed him, it had recognized me as its enemy. It had recognized that it had enemies beyond those who walked the earth in human form. And though it was not rational, though I feared few things in my afterworld, a feeling of overwhelming dread overcame me. I was, quite simply, terrified to be in its presence.

The room had grown quiet. The orderlies were looking at one another, having never known Parker to pass on the opportunity to run his mouth. They did not trust his silence. Parker seemed to have forgotten what it was Maggie had asked. He just stared beyond Maggie and Calvano to where I sat, unsure of what to do.

‘Well then,' Maggie said, rising. ‘We'll be in touch soon.'

Parker regained his composure. ‘Next time you want to see me, go through my lawyer. He has a few surprises for you.'

Maggie stared Parker straight in the eye. ‘Don't even try it,' she said. ‘You are not getting out of here. Not in your lifetime and not in my lifetime. Believe me when I say, I will never let it rest.'

The white orderly was smiling at Maggie with admiration. I had a sudden vision of him throwing Maggie over his shoulder and taking her far away to a pirate ship where she would dress like a wench, and bring him jugs of rum as they sailed the high seas together. What was it about the orderly that made my mind want to wander into such fanciful territory? There was something odd, yet almost jolly, about him, as if he thought it a great, good joke to be here among us.

Maggie was ready to call it a day. She had known she would get nothing useful out of Parker. That had not been the purpose of her visit. She simply wanted to get a feel for the man, and how crazy, or how dangerous, he might be.

‘Is he always shackled like that?' Maggie asked the orderlies as she chanced a glance with Calvano and gathered her things to go. ‘Even when he's with the general population?'

‘Not yet,' the white orderly answered. ‘But we're working on it.'

EIGHTEEN

M
aggie and Calvano left Holloway, intending to get a few hours of sleep. But there was something about Otis Parker that always made me want to check on my son, just to make sure he was safe.

The moment I entered Michael's ward, I could smell Connie's sauce. She made it the old school way, with beef and veal and pork, bathed in red wine and cooked all day in a rich tomato sauce. She had set out plates on the table in the common room, and had brought enough to give out samples to anyone who asked. She was the mother of two teenage boys: she knew what joy the simple act of being cooked for could bring to a young person – and that some of the kids on the ward had never experienced that joy.

A vivid memory came to me of one of Michael's birthdays when he was young. I remembered Connie bending over the birthday cake, cutting slice after slice for the boys running and shrieking around her, being careful to give each child an icing flower so that everyone got the same portion. Now, she was ladling out noodles and sauce with the same precision, taking pride in the way the teenagers before her transformed from suspicious and angry to younger, more buoyant versions of themselves.

Michael did not touch his at first and I suspected it was because he was waiting for his friend Adam to join them. A few minutes into this rare communal meal, Adam appeared in the doorway and Michael instantly relaxed. His friend meant a lot to him.

Connie made Michael and Adam sit at a table and served them like a waitress in a family restaurant. Once they were all set, she announced that she needed to get home to see to Michael's brother. She probably didn't. Sean was a pretty independent little cuss, but Connie was smart enough to know that the last thing Michael wanted was his mother fussing over him while the other kids watched.

The evening sky had grown dark and I followed her out to the front lawn, acutely aware that the safety of Holloway had been shattered by Vincent D'Amato's death. Despite the orderly's murder, my friend Olivia sat at her customary spot in front of the fountain staring at the tumbling waters. The crime scene tape had already been removed, a testament to the soothing power that the fountain had over many of the patients. It had been important to reopen the spot.

Connie noticed Olivia sitting on the bench and went over to her, taking a tentative seat at the other end. ‘You must really need to be alone if you're sitting out here in the dark,' Connie said. ‘I'm sure you must know what happened here earlier today. Is it safe for you to be out here alone like this?' Her voice was kind and without rebuke.

Olivia glanced at Connie, but did not recognize her from their earlier encounter by the fountain. I was not surprised. Olivia lived in her own private world. ‘I don't think they know I'm gone,' Olivia admitted. ‘I just slipped out. I had to.'

I hid behind the fountain to watch. I realized that I was looking upon two of the most important women in my strange world, yet neither one of them knew it.

Olivia glanced at Connie again, comforted by her silence. ‘Sometimes I wonder if I'm ever going to get out of here,' she told Connie. ‘Sometimes I wonder if I will ever have the strength to do it.'

‘I know,' Connie agreed. ‘There are mornings when I wonder how I'm going to get out of bed, when I think of all the things that are expected of me, and how many people need me, and how much must be done to take care of them. And then I think of all the things I once thought I would do and now know I'm never going to do. Sometimes I wish I could go away to someplace quiet and let it all pass, until I have a clean slate and can start over.'

‘You have a family?' Olivia asked.

‘Two boys,' Connie said. ‘And last month I told a man I would marry him.' She said no more, but Olivia could read between the lines.

‘And now you're not so sure?' she asked.

Connie nodded. ‘My husband has been dead a little over a year.' She hesitated. ‘I won't lie – it was a hard marriage. I was usually the only person in it. He did a lot of things to destroy himself. He did a lot of things that destroyed
us
, although I like to think he did not mean to do them, rather that he did not understand what he was doing to me.'

I thought my heart would break.

Olivia was nodding. ‘It's hard to see someone you love destroy themselves,' she agreed. ‘I had a husband like that too, you know. He was brilliant, everyone said he was, but he always walked away right before he was about to finish something. It didn't matter whether it was painting a room, building a bird house, planting a garden or, worst of all, committing to a career. All he had to do was turn in his doctoral thesis, but he never could finish revising it. It was never good enough for him, never defensible enough, and the more I tried to persuade him to get it done so we could move on with our lives, the more he felt it needed changing.'

‘What happened?' Connie asked.

‘We had a child together.' Olivia's voice faded. ‘But it all sort of fell apart.' She was silent and seemed to draw into herself. Connie did not press her for details.

‘Why are you sitting here?' she asked Olivia. ‘So close to where that man was killed?'

‘I just wanted to remember him for a few moments,' Olivia said. ‘He was my friend. His name was Vinny. He played the bass guitar and had a rabbit named Stu and an old motorcycle he was restoring.'

Connie's face told Olivia what she suspected and Olivia hurried to reassure her. ‘Not that kind of a friend,' she said. ‘Vinny would never have hit on me. He just liked to look after me. He was a very kind person, even when he wasn't feeling well and that was often. He was sick, but he never complained about it. He was always too busy asking how you were. All the patients loved him and I think the supervisor was jealous of that. She said she was going to report him for being too close to the patients, but he would never have done what she was implying. He got transferred to another unit, but he used to see me sitting here on his way to and from his building and he'd always stop to talk. About a week ago, he told me he didn't think it was safe for me to be alone so much.'

‘What did he mean by that?' Connie asked, knowing he could have meant it in any number of ways.

Olivia stared at the spot where Vincent D'Amato had died. ‘He said there were too many unpredictable people here at Holloway, and I was too beautiful to be safe, and that there were bad men in the world who could never be kept behind enough fences. He even used to sit under those trees over there when he got off work, reading, and he wouldn't leave until I went inside and he knew that I was safe.' She hesitated, unsure of whether to say what she was about to say. ‘I'm afraid maybe he got killed because of me. That he was coming over here to check on me and make sure I was safe when someone killed him.'

She looked up at Connie, unsure of whether she could trust her but badly needing to tell someone. ‘I was here last night,' Olivia said. ‘I couldn't sleep. I needed to sit by the water for a while. That's all. I thought the sound of it might calm me. I was only outside for fifteen minutes and then I went back in. What if he got killed keeping someone away from me?'

Connie was silent. They stared at one another and I knew that Connie was trying, without success, to gauge how much of what Olivia had said was true and how much was imagined guilt from a troubled mind. ‘I'm so sorry about your friend,' she finally said.

‘People around me always die,' Olivia whispered. ‘It's me. I'm not safe.'

‘Will you do me a favor?' Connie asked her in a voice as kind as any I had ever heard. My wife was like that. She had the gift of being able to understand a person's sorrows and she often took the sadness on willingly in order to give the other person a break. It was one of the things I had loved most about her when we first met.

Olivia was looking at her suspiciously. ‘What kind of favor?' she asked.

‘My son is in that building,' Connie pointed to the short-term unit. ‘He's in the adolescent ward. I just brought him a home-cooked meal.' She smiled. ‘He's embarrassed to be babied by his mother, so I had to leave. But I'm worried about him. I'm worried about him being here, and I'm worried about the reasons why he had to come here in the first place.' To my astonishment, Connie started to cry. Olivia waited while Connie struggled to regain her composure. If there was anything Olivia understood, it was tears.

‘I was a terrible mother,' Connie said. ‘I spent so much time worrying about his father and then hating his father for the way he left us. I didn't pay enough attention to my son and, suddenly, here we are, in this place, and he said to me earlier today that he'd rather stay here than come home with me. I've been a terrible mother.'

‘You should be glad he wants to stay here,' Olivia said fiercely. ‘It means he cares enough about himself to want to make his life better. You should be glad.'

Connie looked startled. ‘I guess you're right,' she said.

‘What did you want me to do for you?' Olivia asked. Something about Connie's tears had evened things between them. I'd never heard Olivia sound so strong before.

‘I can't stop worrying about him. He's my son,' Connie explained. ‘Do you have children?'

‘I did,' was all Olivia said.

Connie's face fell as she realized why Olivia was probably at Holloway. ‘I'm so sorry,' she said and her tears returned as she thought about what Olivia must be suffering.

Olivia moved closer and patted Connie on the back. ‘It was a while ago,' she told Connie. ‘I'm going to be OK.'

Connie tried to stifle their tears, dabbing her eyes and sniffling in that way she had that made her sound like a little girl. ‘I'm a mess,' she admitted and Olivia laughed.

‘Promise me you'll go back inside now?' Connie asked. ‘I'm worried about my son and I just can't take worrying about you on top of that.'

That Connie would worry about a stranger did not seem odd to either one of these women. I had a rare glimpse into their world, a world where you did not question who you cared for or why, you just took on the burden and did.

‘I promise,' Olivia said. She stood. ‘It's getting a little chilly anyway.' She held out her hand, it was pale and slender and the gesture itself was incredibly graceful. ‘My name is Olivia,' she told Connie.

‘I'm Connie,' my wife said. ‘Thank you so much for understanding.'

Olivia smiled her goodbye and hurried back down the path, toward the bright lights of the entrance to the long-term unit. I followed her until she reached the safety of the building. I imagined her hurrying up the steps and taking a right into the common room.

I glanced up, waiting for her shadow to pass in front of the window – and that was when I saw Lily, the little girl with monsters who lived in her head. Lily was staring out the window and there was something about her posture that ignited fear deep in my core. She looked terrified. Not of me, though. She was staring at a spot on the lawn where a stand of trees curved in and partially hid the heavily enclosed maximum security unit from the view of the other buildings.

I followed her gaze and saw nothing, but my sense of dread increased. I knew now that Lily's monsters were real. At least some of them.

I can almost always feel evil when it is near. I believe that the nature of my strange existence gives me that gift, in part because the plane I wander in is evil's battlefield, the point at which it enters the hearts and minds of humans, the point at which it can be driven out by those who pay attention.

I could feel the presence of evil now.

Connie was walking down the brick path that led across the lawn to the pedestrian bridge linking Holloway with the parking garage across the street.