I'd Walk with My Friends If I Could Find Them (33 page)

In the stands Wintric rubs his hands together and hears a logging truck downshift beyond the outfield fence. His fingertips and scalp ache, and he shakes his head at the thought of forty tiny needles pressed into the skin along his vertebrae. Will he always yearn for the drugs? Even now, watching his boy play ball? If he could only leave his body somewhere else for a couple hours and come back to this place. He fights the thought, but he knows he can get the pills a quarter mile from the bleachers where he stands. He remembers the address. He saw the guy at the gas station two days ago. He has enough money in his wallet.

From two rows down, someone from Greenville says, “The kid meant to do it. Look at him. Didn't even say sorry.”

The mother of Chester High's third baseman says, “Come on. It slipped,” and glances back at Wintric and grins.

One of the counselors had bright orange hair, which annoyed Wintric, but the guy, Jeff, had been to the far bottom of heroin and back up and he talked straight and cussed, so Wintric listened. Jeff took Wintric on walks down to the American River, where they'd watch the whitewater rafters and where Jeff repeated his sign-up message: “Pain isn't a fucking choice. Neither are the flashbacks. They're there. Comfort, happiness, all that weird shit we say when we mean ‘not in pain,' that's a choice. A hard choice. If you ever stop choosing it, you're fucked. Optimists are deluded but sign up. You want in that club. Whatever it takes, sign up.”

To Wintric, Jeff's speeches came off as too simplistic, even juvenile, but the guy was adamant and would occasionally sneak him a Lucky Strike. Wintric didn't notice anyone else getting the American River treatment, and Jeff kept reminding Wintric that he was one of the blessed ones: a family waiting for him, not suicidal, no heroin or meth.

On the mound, Daniel wears his baseball hat low on his forehead as Wintric used to do when he was a boy playing Little League centerfield. Daniel licks his fingers and twists the baseball in his hand. The crowd has settled down, but everyone is anxious for this first pitch after the wild pitch. Was it really an accident? Has the pitcher lost control?

When Wintric returned home, Kristen told him to come to her at the supermarket and interrupt her whenever he needed help, but he holds on to the beginning of newfound pride in not having gone to her once since his return to town. If Kristen ever does ask him, he'll tell her why he'll never relapse. He'll tell her about his small group sessions, how he saw the whole spectrum from lifelong fucked-up meth heads to three-drinks-a-night country-club housewives. It didn't matter whose turn it was to speak; the stories all ended up at the same fear—being alone.

When he thought about what he would say to the group when it was his turn to speak, he expected to bring up the war, how much of the war he wasn't sure, but as he sat silently in the folding chair day after day, it dawned on him that his time in Afghanistan was nearly twenty years past. Something about the number twenty jarred him: twenty years of waking up, living, sleeping, repeat and repeat. Maybe it wasn't the war or the girl he shot or the rape or the foot, or maybe it was that, but twenty years of other shit as well. Maybe it wasn't cumulative, not twenty years, not even one year, perhaps just twenty-four-hour segments as they passed. Maybe an hour or a second or how he felt right then. How was he supposed to know? Where's the turn? The bottom? The point where things start getting better and always get better? Twenty years later and what's new? The hundreds of roofs he's nailed down, shingle by shingle. A son that's not like him in any meaningful way. A wife he loves threatening to leave him—he was at the sink washing tomatoes when she grabbed his arm, gently at first, then harder. Still in her Holiday market clothes; her mascara had run, and she wouldn't let him look away as she spoke.

The next batter, the cleanup hitter, a muscled boy who hit a double his first time up, walks to the plate and pauses outside the batter's box and studies the third-base coach. If Daniel hits this kid, there will probably be a fight.

When Wintric rose to speak to the small group in rehab, he didn't know what he'd say, but Jeff was there, and that helped somehow, and he heard himself confess: holding his son for the first time after his birth while high on Percocet. Loading up on Oxy before going to a party for Kristen when she was promoted to general manager at the Holiday market. Dropping pills before sex with her. These were moments when elation should have been enough, and may have been, if he'd just let them happen. As bad, he didn't know what hurting meant anymore. Sure, his back and hip had been giving him problems for years, even after the foot stopped, and sure, the flashes of war hit hard and unpredictably, but what was legitimate pain versus haunting versus routine? And he loves his wife more than anything, more than drugs or pain, and maybe it was only now that he understood that they were all linked, that he should have understood long ago. And he knew he was talking a good game in Sacramento, hours from home, coming clean, promising the world, but he feared what all of them feared. He now knew that the pain of the war, of the past two decades, of yesterday, would never recede all the way; the hurt simply finds new things to infect, things he has always loved—Christmas lights, interstate signs, hunting campfires, baseball games—but happiness and release also live somewhere among these things. He knew it was just a matter of finding them.

Wintric moves down the bleachers over near the Chester dugout and fingers, then squeezes, the chain-linked backstop. The outfielders have moved back, and the bruised boy at first takes two steps off the bag and waits.

Someone yells, “Throw strikes.”

The cleanup hitter steps into the batter's box and toes his Nike cleats up close to the inner line, right next to the plate, but then, in short scoots, works his way back, further back from the plate than the first two times he was up.

Wintric sees it: this boy on his heels, the horrible recognition that he's not in control, the safe space on the outer edge of the plate. And Wintric looks out to his son and wonders what he knows.

Where's the next pitch going, Daniel?

The good nerves in Wintric's body spark, and he doesn't question whether he's choosing this or how long it will last. He squeezes the fence and brings his face close and looks through the holes. He is close enough now to see Daniel's eyes underneath his hat, close enough to see Daniel pause and look at him. There's no nod or wink, only three seconds when his son's eyes meet his.

Northbound on Highway 32, two miles past Potato Patch campground during the summer season, Wintric and Daniel stare at an injured, thrashing deer blocking the road. Its back haunches smashed, the panicked doe scratches at the double yellow lines with her front legs, but she can't stand.

The man who hit the deer sits in his car with the windows up. The front left bumper is dented, but it's drivable. He rests his forehead on the steering wheel, unable to look.

Of the five stopped cars, only Wintric, Daniel, and a woman in a Chico State T-shirt stand near the animal.

The deer swings her head into the air and back down, making frantic attempts to gain momentum, but it's hopeless, and the three of them hear the slap of her head against the pavement, the scraping front hooves.

“Crap,” the woman says.

Wintric realizes what has to happen—knew soon after he got out of the truck and saw that the deer wasn't going anywhere. He'd hoped that the doe had been hit well enough to be on her last breath by the time he walked up, but the car had caught her back end, which meant working lungs and heart.

Wintric runs his hand over the pocketed knife that he's had for years. His cardiovascular system pounds inside him. He reaches out and touches Daniel's arm.

“Son,” he says.

“I know,” Daniel says. “Shit. I got nothing in my truck.”

“Nothing,” the woman says, and shakes her head.

“It's okay,” Wintric says. “I got something. It's not great.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls the knife out. He opens the three-inch blade and shows it to the woman, who purses her lips.

“It's okay,” Wintric says.

Another car pulls to the back of the southbound lane lineup, and a man gets out, takes in the scene, then gets back in his car.

The deer exhales in short, violent bursts, her black eyes huge in her head.

“Poor damn thing,” the woman says, still shaking her head.

“Dad,” Daniel says.

“What do you want me to do?” the woman says.

“One second,” Wintric says.

“What can I do?” says the woman.

“Dad,” Daniel says. “I can do it.”

Wintric looks at the deer, at the deer's neck, the fur there, and he can't remember the last time he sharpened his knife.

He had felt good today, not perfect, but good. As long as he keeps the car rides under two hours, he can manage. He could stop everything now and wait for someone with a gun, but who knows how long that will take, and already there are enough people stopped to make a scene. They may be in their cars, but they'll watch.

“She'll kick like hell,” Wintric says. “You two hold her.”

“Step on her?” Daniel says.

“We'll have to lean,” the woman says. “She's strong.”

“That's right,” Wintric says. “Lean on her. Get ready.”

He kneels down a few feet away from the doe, the knife light in his hands. Underneath him he sees the tons of tiny rocks that make the road. They dig into his knees. Black flies dart past his ears. While Daniel and the woman get into position he presses the knife against his left thumb, but it just dents the skin.

“Stay on the body,” Wintric says. “I'll go fast.” He clenches his teeth. “I'll go fast. Okay. Now.”

Daniel and the woman kneel on the deer's flailing body and Wintric presses his knee down on the deer's head and he feels the muscled power underneath him, the neck strong, trying to twist up, to breathe, lifting his knee, and him pressing back down with all his weight and his hand under the deer's jaw grabbing at the folds there, feeling the deer throb, and his knife already at the throat, sawing, sawing into the neck fur, the knife edge disappearing into the fold and the shit smell and he saws the blade deep, but there's no blood, and he presses harder into the animal, sawing the blade, and the deer heaves, and he searches for an opening where he saws, but there's nothing, and he yells “Shit” and with his right arm already tiring and his back flaring he drives the blade hard into the neck and the fur now opens, but only a little, and he yanks at the sliced fold but he can't grab enough to pull it back, and the sweat in his eyes and the black flies, and he saws hard and fast at the space there, and his arm is giving out and the deer yanks and bounces his knee into the air, and he yells “Shit” and slams his knee back down on the deer's head, and he holds the knife up into the afternoon and shakes his arm out, and “Fuck,” and he stabs at the deer's neck twice, and the first spots of blood appear on the road, and he saws, his arm and lungs and back giving out, and the shit smell everywhere, and his vision turns and he saws and feels the blade through the skin now and blood, warm blood on his hands, but not enough, not spurting, and the shit smell on him, and the blade against cartilage, and his arm numb and weak, and the sparks in his vision, and the breath he can't draw, and he looks over at Daniel, who slides to him fast and takes the knife from Wintric's hand, and Wintric lunges over the deer's body, straddling the thrash, pressing the front legs down, breathing in the shit, shoulder to shoulder with the woman, flies at his face, hearing Daniel's loud grunts, eyes focused on the road, the millions of rocks, the thrashing and wheezing underneath him, and Daniel grunting and a thin crack and Daniel yanking the deer's head back, and Daniel's voice, “Through,” and the rocks of the road, a stream of bright blood, a desperate whistle-wheezing and thrash, the woman's voice, “Can we get up? Can we get up?” and Daniel, “Yes,” and Wintric rises, and the deer's front legs scratch at the road and Wintric's hands are wet and dirty, he's wiping them on his jeans, and the deer's legs scratch at the road, then slow and stop, and Wintric looks at Daniel, at Daniel's blood-soaked hands, Wintric's knife in his hand.

Lately Torres has talked about his international speaking gigs, memories of Big Dax, the Denver Broncos, the weather, the Rockies, and his wife, but Wintric hasn't heard him talk about his daughter, Mia, in over a year. Wintric closes his bedroom door and lies on his bed, phone on speaker. Torres seems sober.

“I don't know about regrets,” Torres says. “It's the great thing about life. You don't know the alternative. Make your decisions and press on. Mia made her choices. She wants to raise that poor child on her own, let her. She wants to live in Cortez and do it alone, let her. When you walk away from family, you walk away. Life is hard, but some people like it that way.”

“Yeah,” Wintric says. “Doesn't make it easy.”

“Nothing's easy, I guess.”

“I don't know,” Wintric says.

“I thought she'd come back. It's been four years. I haven't seen my granddaughter. Most days I don't care, but sometimes I do.”

“That makes sense.”

“Does it?”

“It's family,” Wintric says. “Everything and nothing makes sense. It's your kid, doesn't matter if they're six or twenty-six.”

“They're not always your kid.”

“No?”

“Mia doesn't get that you have to choose to be in a family. After a while it's not guaranteed. If she were to show up right now, I don't know if I'd let her in. I'd like to think that I wouldn't. There have to be consequences. Listen, I don't pretend there's justice in the world. Only fools think that. She'll probably win the damn lottery or something.”