Make them Cry (8 page)

Johnny hurried to the closet, took out Peter’s winter jacket, and threw it on. “I left my coat at St. Clement’s, and my keys were in the pocket. I’m locked out of my room.”

“You walked all the way from the other side of the lake without a jacket or anything?” Peter asked. Even if Johnny had taken the Whopper Way shortcut, it was still a fifteen minute trek. They were predicting snow for that night.

Johnny nodded. Still shivering, he sat down on the edge of Peter’s bed.

“Are you nuts? Why didn’t you just turn around and pick up your coat while you were still there?”

“I had a fight with this guy, and I didn’t want to go back.”

“A fight-fight with fists?” Peter asked.

“It almost got that way,” Johnny muttered. “I’m hoping he cools off by morning. Then I can go back and pick up my coat—if you let me borrow a sweater or something.”

Peter nodded. “Sure, no problem.”

“Can I crash here tonight?”

“Well, yeah, sure, no problem,” Peter said again, shrugging.

Immediately, Johnny threw off the jacket, then he stripped down to his white briefs. “Which pillow can I use?”

“The blue striped,” Peter said. He reached back to lock the door, but hesitated. “Don’t you need to pee or anything?”

“I peed outside, before I came in.” Johnny jumped under the covers. “This okay? Am I taking up too much room?”

Peter just shook his head. For a moment, he stood at the foot of the bed. He felt a bit overdressed in his T-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms—considering his friend wore so little.

Johnny squinted at him. “So—are you coming to bed or what?”

Peter nodded a few more times than necessary. “Oh, yeah, sure.”

A minute after he settled under the covers and rolled away from Johnny, he sensed some movement at the tail of his T-shirt. Suddenly, a chilly hand glided up the center of his back. His whole body automatically flinched. “Feel how cold I still am,” Johnny whispered, laughing.

“Yeah, no shit, Sherlock,” Peter said. “Cut it out.”

This only encouraged Johnny to rub his cold feet against his. And that icy hand continued to work beneath his T-shirt, roaming up and down his back, cold skin on warm skin. Peter started to get an erection. He didn’t want Johnny to know. “Hey, I said you could bunk in with me. I didn’t say you could molest me.”

Laughing, Johnny pulled away. Peter tugged at the covers and shifted a bit. He still had his back to him. “Who’d you have the fight with?” he asked.

“A sophomore, Rick Pettinger. You don’t know him.”

“What did you guys fight about?”

“Oh, it’s stupid. I’d rather not go into it.”

“How come you never talk about these guys?” Peter asked. “This bunch of sophomores, they’re like your secret friends or something.”

Johnny didn’t say anything.

“You awake?” Peter rolled over on his back and glanced at him.

Staring up at the ceiling, Johnny sighed. “Do you really want to have this conversation?”

“Sure, why not?”

“Because some of what I have to say might gross you out. Huh, I’m getting pretty sick of it myself.”

“Sick of what?”

“I’ve been screwing around with these three guys from St. Clement Hall. They don’t know about each other. I think if they did, I’d be a dead duck. I was taking money from them—at least that’s how it started. Now I don’t know how to stop it.”

Peter half sat up. “You were having sex with
guys?
For money?”

Johnny frowned. “You just don’t understand. Your folks have money coming out of their ears. They send you a check every month. With my sister and I, things are different. It’s tough on Maggie, trying to make ends meet. I feel shitty taking money from her.”

“But you seemed to have enough money the last couple of summers.”

“That’s because I had something going on at the country club,” Johnny whispered. “How do you think I got all that dough? Not on the golf course, that’s for sure. Remember how I was doing yard work for the Chantlers on Monday afternoons two summers ago?”

Peter nodded. He’d caddied for Mr. Chantler—not a great tipper, but a nice enough guy. An ex-jock gone to seed, he was about fifty—with a little potbelly and a deep tan. Johnny was always going on about his wife, a slim brunet in her midthirties with beautiful legs and a big smile. She was always flirting with him.

“The first time I went over there, Mr. Chantler wanted me to help him clean out their garage,” Johnny explained. “I wasn’t even working ten minutes, and I found a stash of porn magazines in this box. Now that I think back, I bet he planted them there. He told me I could take some of them home, because he was only going to throw them out. Anyway, we started looking at the magazines together. Most of them were of guys and girls together, a few of them were gay. I think it was a setup, y’know? Because for the next couple of hours, while we were working, he was telling me about all these sexual adventures he had before he got married—guys, girls, twosomes, threesomes, orgies, sex clubs, you name it. And he went into details. I’m telling you, Pete, it was like one of those letters to
Penthouse
. The weird part is, I was really creeped out, but kind of turned on at the same time. Anyway, it was hot that day. So he said, before I go, why didn’t I cool off with a dip in the pool? He said, ‘We’re very informal here. No need for any swimsuits. The neighbors can’t see….’”

Reclining on one elbow, Peter listened intently.

“Anyway,” Johnny continued, “I knew he was coming on to me, so I told him, ‘Thanks all the same, but I’ll just take my twenty dollars and hit the road.’ That’s when Mr. Chantler said to me, ‘How would you like to leave here with
one hundred
and twenty dollars? Mrs. Chantler and I would like you to stay.’”

“Holy shit,” Pete murmured.

“Yeah,
Mrs. Chantler
, too. Well, he took me around to the pool, and I could hear someone splashing in the water. He called her, and she swam over to the shallow end, where the steps were. And she came out of that pool, all wet and naked, smiling at me. I mean, I instantly got hard. She had these perfect little white breasts against her tan, and her nipples were erect. And her legs, God…” He let out a little laugh. “Anyway, she undressed me, and we messed around in the pool.”

“What was Mr. Chantler doing?” Peter asked.

“Mostly, he was just watching us and playing with himself.” Johnny shrugged. “Anyway, they must have had a good time, because I went home with a hundred and twenty bucks that afternoon. And Mr. Chantler asked me back for the next week—and the week after, and so on.”

“Jesus,” Peter whispered.

Johnny made a sour face. “The third time, Mrs. Chantler wasn’t there. It was just Mr. Chantler and me. That’s the way it was from then on, a hundred and twenty bucks every week. Mr. Chantler had me meet him at this hotel near the Space Needle.”

Propped up on one elbow, Peter stared at him. “So—do you think you’re bisexual?” he asked.

“Hell, I don’t know,” Johnny said. “Maybe. I like girls. I always have. But I got pretty heavily involved with this guy here. I can’t talk about it. He’d kill me if I ever blabbed to anyone about us. Anyway, it’s pretty much over now. Doesn’t matter.”

“Is he one of the guys at St. Clement Hall you were talking about?” Peter asked.

Johnny smiled a bit. “No, he’s not one of them.”

“How did you meet these guys?”

“I got to drinking with a guy over there from the third floor one night, and I mentioned how I made that extra money last summer. And he said he’d pay, too. So we went somewhere and messed around. He gave me thirty. He said he knew two other guys on his floor who would probably pay, too, both of them closet cases. Isn’t that crazy? Practically half of the guys at this school are gay, humping away in their rooms with their buddies. But there are still guys here who don’t want anyone to know. They’d rather go to some secret, isolated place to have sex. And they’ll pay for it—gladly. It’s like they want to suffer or feel guilty.”

Peter knew exactly what Johnny was talking about. If there was someone like Johnny, and he could go to a secret place with him, where they could get naked and touch each other, he’d pay for that. Even with Johnny lying beside him, baring his soul—and most of his body—Peter couldn’t admit to his friend what he really wanted.

Johnny stared at the ceiling, a tormented look on his face. “So I started working on these guys, Rick and Ted. Right off, I could tell they were gay. I don’t know who they were trying to fool. Their classmate, Terry, had them pegged. They’re from rich families, on the same floor as him in St. Clement’s. Anyway, I’ve always been safe. But you’d be surprised at all the weird places off and on campus that I’ve had sex with these guys.”

“You mean like an orgy?” Peter asked.

“God, no, it’s always one on one, very secretive. Anyway, I’m fed up. It’s not very fun. I don’t think it ever was. At this point, I’d pay to have them leave me alone. That’s what the fight with this other guy was about tonight. It’s a real mess.”

“Why not just tell them you don’t want to see them any more?”

“I’ve tried,” Johnny answered. “But I might as well be breaking up with some nutcase girlfriend.
Fatal Attraction
times three.”

“Does Father Murphy know?”

“What? About me whoring around? Are you nuts? I’m not telling Father Murphy, no way. You’re the only person I can tell this to, Pete. Nobody else.”

“Why is that?” he asked. He wondered if Johnny knew how much he was like these closeted gay sophomores who were in love with him. Peter felt his whole body tense up, and he shifted slightly to put some distance between Johnny and himself. “Why tell me and nobody else?” he pressed.

“Because you’re my best friend, stupid.”

Peter let out a stunned little laugh. “Well, you’re my best friend too.”

Johnny gazed at him sheepishly. “Still? Even with what you know about me now?”

“Doesn’t change anything,” Peter reassured him.

He lifted his head from the pillow, and before Peter knew what was happening, Johnny kissed him on the lips. “Thanks, Pete,” he whispered.

Stunned, Peter said nothing.

Johnny mussed his hair. Then he settled back, gave his pillow a punch, and tugged the covers up around his neck. He rolled over on his side, his back to Peter.

“You going to sleep now?” Peter asked quietly.

“Yeah, I’m tired.” He reached back and patted Peter’s hip. “G’night, Pete.”

“Good night, Johnny,” he replied. Peter slid under the covers. He knew he wouldn’t sleep a wink.

In the weeks to come, he’d occasionally ask Johnny about the sophomores across the lake. Johnny would just shake his head, and say, “It’s still a mess.” Clearly Johnny didn’t want to talk about it. As for the good-night kiss, neither one of them ever mentioned it. But that was all it took for Peter to become even more infatuated with his best friend.

He didn’t wash that blue-striped pillowcase for several days, because he could still smell Johnny on it. He’d hold that pillow through the night—as he wished he could have held Johnny.

That same familiar scent now lingered on Johnny’s blue shirt. Peter clung to it, knowing the smell would soon fade.

He climbed off the bed and went to the window, Johnny’s shirt balled up in his hands. He stared out across the lake, at the buildings on campus. He could just make out the rooftop of St. Clement Hall.

Those sophomores Johnny had been seeing all lived on the third floor. Peter knew their names. He also knew one of them was a murderer.

SORRETTO, J
was printed on the buzzer. According to the phone book, the neglected, dark wood-frame duplex was Jonie’s current address. Jack stood on the front stoop, where someone had left a large open bag of kitty litter. Old bedsheets hung in the first-floor window in lieu of curtains.

In his hand, Jack held his green, pocket-size notebook. The first ten pages were now full of names and ideas. The name he’d written down most was Rick Pettinger, the seminarian who had denied knowing Johnny, then suddenly left school. Rick’s former lover had called him “dangerous.”

Did Jonie know about Johnny’s other relationships? Had she ever heard of Rick Pettinger? Jack had wanted to ask her yesterday, but couldn’t bring it up in front of Maggie.

He hadn’t phoned Jonie in advance. It was 11:30 on Sunday morning. She was probably pulling herself out of bed just about now.

Jack put the notebook in his pocket and pressed the buzzer. He waited a minute, then pressed it again.

“Whozit?” was the response over the intercom.

“It’s Father Murphy, Jonie. Can I come up?”

Silence.

“Jonie?”

“Be right down,” she replied.

Jack waited. And waited. At least three or four minutes passed. He thought about walking around the house to see if she’d ducked out a back way. He was about to buzz again when the door flung open.

“Yeah, what do you want?” Jonie asked, half hiding behind the door. She was dressed in black jeans and a ratty black pullover. Her dyed platinum hair was pinned up in back. She smoked a cigarette. Her black cherry lipstick left a mark on the filter.

“I’d like to ask you a couple more questions,” Jack said.

She rolled her raccoon-painted eyes. “I really don’t have time right now.”

“It won’t take long,” Jack assured her.

She sighed and blew out a stream of smoke. “Okay, what?”

“Did Johnny ever mention a friend named Rick Pettinger?”

She quickly shook her head. “Nope. I told you yesterday, he never talked about any of his friends except for what’s-his-name—Peter. And I already told you yesterday everything I know about him.” She took a drag from her cigarette. “Now, is that it? Because I’m meeting a friend to go up to Vancouver, and I’m late.”

“Please, just one more minute, okay?” Jack said. “Has anyone else come to you about Johnny? The police or anyone from the faculty of Our Lady of Sorrows?”

“No. You and his sister are the only ones.”

“Then why did you keep saying yesterday that you weren’t supposed to talk to us?”

“I don’t get what you mean,” Jonie replied, frowning.

“You said it two or three times, ‘
I don’t think I should be talking to you
.’ Did someone tell you not to talk with us?”

“Yeah, Johnny,” she said, impatiently. “Shit, I already explained that to you. He wanted to keep it a secret about us.” She glanced at her wristwatch. “Hey, look. I gotta go.”

She turned and ran up the stairs to her apartment. But she’d left the door open. Jack stepped in and listened to her stomping around. It sounded like she was alone up there. In less than a minute, she scurried back down the stairs, carrying a black leather jacket and her purse.

“Jesus, I thought we were through,” Jonie grumbled. She closed the door this time and locked it. “Listen, I’ve already told you everything I know.”

Jack followed her to her car, parked on the street in front of the duplex. “Jonie, you know what really happened to Johnny, don’t you? Did somebody kill him?”

Jonie fumbled with her keys, then unlocked the car door. “I gotta go,” she muttered. She ducked into her car, then started up the engine.

Jack stepped aside as she pulled away from the curb. Its tires screeching, the car picked up speed.

Frowning, he watched the blue Volkswagen bug peel down the road.

Peter sat at one of the white plastic café tables by the side entrance to the Stop ’n’ Fuel-Up Mart. It was a combination gas station, convenience store, and snack bar on the edge of town. The hot food they served was limited to items from the microwave or burgers and hot dogs that had been under heater-lights for about six hours. Peter bought a Super-Sip twenty-four-ounce Coke, which tasted a little funny, like they’d used too much soap to clean the machine, but he sipped it anyway.

Though the sun had come out, Peter still felt cold, so he kept his jacket on. He watched cars pull up to the self-serve pumps, but none of the customers looked like anyone from the college. Nobody recognized him, and nobody was following him.

“Hey, partner.”

Peter turned and smiled at him. He never seemed to see Anton coming. This time, Anton had appeared from around the back of the squat building. He wore a thin sweatshirt and track shorts. A V-shaped stain of perspiration seeped through the front of his pullover, and he was a little out of breath. He flopped down in the other plastic chair. “I jogged over,” he announced. “How are you doin’? That bump on your forehead doesn’t look so bad. Can I have a gulp?”

Peter started to nod when Anton grabbed the twenty-four-ounce container and drew from the straw. “Tastes soapy,” Anton commented. “So, hey, did you tell anybody about meeting me here today?”

Peter shook his head. “You told me not to.”

“Cool,” he said, glancing around. “Did anything happen since yesterday? Anything I should know about?”

Peter shrugged. “Nothing. Zip.”

“Well, I’ve been busier than a mosquito in a nudist colony,” Anton said. “I checked five rooms in my wing last night and two more this morning. No sign of that lumber jacket. Maybe it’s stashed someplace else. As for the car, a junior over in St. Matthew Hall owns a silver-gray VW bug. His name’s Larry Blades, and I’ve seen him hanging around with some of the guys from my floor. He’s one of the few guys who has a car—”

“No,” Peter cut in, shaking his head. “The car I saw was light blue.”

“You sure? Light blue and gray are pretty close—”

“No. This was light blue. I’m positive.”

Anton sighed, then took another swig of Coke. “Well, I’ll keep looking,” he said. “Maybe one of the locals has a light blue Volkswagen.” He pulled up his sweatshirt to reveal a money belt. He unzipped the side pouch and fished out a fistful of quarters. “Ready to make a few long-distance calls?” he asked, spilling the coins across the tabletop. He reached back into his pouch and drew out a piece of paper with a phone number written on it. “Do you remember what you’re supposed to tell him?”

Grimacing, Peter nodded. “I’m a little nervous.”

“Then c’mon,” Anton replied, getting to his feet. “Let’s get it over with. Sooner the better. Grab that change, will ya?”

Anton picked up the Super-Sip, and they walked around the corner to the pay phone. The call had to be made from a pay phone so it couldn’t be traced to them. “You know, I’d make the call myself,” Anton said. “But he might recognize my voice. Just hang up if he’s not home or you get an answering machine.”

Peter grabbed the receiver. Anton read him the number, and he punched it in.

Anton sipped his Coke and leaned closer to him.

Peter counted three ring tones, then someone picked up. “Hello?”

“Rick Pettinger?” Peter asked, trying to make his voice gravelly.

“Who’s calling?”

“Rick, I need to ask you something,” Peter said. “After you drowned him, what did you do with John Costello’s clothes?”

Rounding a curve in the track, Jack glanced over at the old cemetery. The little plot of land looked particularly eerie at night with those decrepit statues and headstones, and the dark forest looming beyond it.

Jack usually didn’t run in the evenings, but he hadn’t had any real exercise in a while. He needed to work off the tension. All day, he’d felt frustrated and irritable. And he hadn’t accomplished a damn thing.

Going to see Jonie Sorretto had been a waste of time. He thought about consulting Father Garcia, telling him about Jonie. But he didn’t trust Garcia anymore. The school’s head of administration had originally been so keen on digging for the truth. Now he seemed bent on covering up everything connected with John’s death.

Jack wasn’t even sure Garcia had actually checked that blood sample from the grave marker down in the crypt. Was it really someone else’s blood type? Garcia could have lied to him about it.

Jack spent the afternoon hunting down Father Stutesman in the science department. When he finally got a hold of Stutesman on the phone the science professor confirmed Garcia’s story. He’d examined the blood scrapings. And yes, it was a bit peculiar that Father Garcia had brought him the sample in a handkerchief. But the tests showed the blood type as AB, no mistake about it. And didn’t the seminarian who drowned have type O blood?

Jack thanked Father Stutesman and hung up.

He also talked to Maggie. She’d phoned, asking if there were any new developments in the investigation. He felt so lame, admitting to her that he had nothing.

“Nothing at all?” she’d asked. “No leads about the twenty-two hundred dollars or anything?”

“I’m sorry. I’ve been running in circles today. It’s been very defeating.”

“Well, Johnny’s funeral Mass is on Tuesday. It’s going to be here in Seattle, Jack. I was wondering if you could deliver the eulogy. I know Johnny would have wanted you to. And I want you to.”

She took him by surprise. “I’d be honored, Maggie,” he managed to say. “Of course I will.”

But later, as he tried to write the eulogy, Jack drew a blank. All he could think of was that he’d been responsible for Johnny, and he’d let him die.

So Jack had put on his sweats and his running shoes, then taken to the track. He poured it on as he tallied up his seventh lap around the playfield. Perspiration covered his face and neck. Jack was so focused on pushing and punishing himself that he didn’t see anything except the asphalt track in front of him.

He didn’t notice that someone else was out there.

“Father Murphy?”

Jack almost stumbled when he caught sight of a man, silhouetted by the lights of St. Bartholomew Hall. He slowed down and tried to get his breath back. He approached the shadowy figure. “Yeah?” he said. “Who’s over there?”

As he came closer, Jack recognized Tom Garcia. The priest stood with his hands in the pockets of his overcoat. He was frowning. “Get cleaned up and dressed, Jack,” he said. “I’ll meet you in front of St. Bart’s in five minutes.”

“What’s this about?” Jack asked.

Garcia turned and started walking away from him. “Five minutes,” he called over his shoulder. “Wear your clerical clothes.”

Jack took a thirty-second shower, then quickly donned his black suit and his clerical shirt and collar. He wondered what Garcia wanted. Had Father Statesman given him away? Jack was sweating again by the time he stepped out of St. Bartholomew Hall’s front entrance.

Smoking a cigarette, Tom Garcia leaned against a shiny, black Lexus parked in the driveway. When he saw Jack, Garcia tossed aside his cigarette, then he nodded toward the car’s passenger door. “Get in,” he said. “We have at least an hour’s drive ahead of us. There’s a social call we need to make down in Everett.”

Jack ducked into the passenger side and noticed the leather seats. The car still smelled new. It didn’t make sense that they couldn’t get computers for certain freshman classes, but the school’s head of administration had to drive around in a forty-thousand-dollar automobile.

Jack waited until Garcia had situated himself behind the wheel and fastened his seat belt. “Would it be out of line for me to ask what all this is about?” he said finally.

Garcia started up the ignition. “We’re going to see Rick Pettinger in the hospital. He asked for you.”

“What’s he doing in the hospital? Is he sick?”

His eyes on the road, Garcia shifted gears. “Rick Pettinger’s in the hospital because he tried to commit suicide this afternoon.”

With the Pettinger dollars at work, Rick had been given a private room at Everett General Hospital, with a beautiful view of Everett Bay. For the Pettingers, the hospital staff also bent visiting hours a little, especially since the visitors were a couple of priests.

Jack and Father Garcia arrived at 9:35. Mr. Pettinger had been waiting for them and obviously had been giving all the nurses a hard time. He was a cold, tightly wound gray-haired man in his midfifties. Pouring on the charm, Father Garcia took Pettinger down the hall for coffee while Jack went in to see Rick.

He looked pale and emaciated in that hospital bed. His black hair was unwashed. It appeared as if he’d been deprived of sleep and nourishment in the two days since Jack had last seen him. They had Rick on an IV for dehydration, and there were bandages on his wrists.

He’d made the cuts with a paint-scraping razor that he’d smuggled from his father’s basement workroom to his own bathroom on the second floor. Rick’s sister had heard a thud upstairs. She’d discovered him, passed out in a pool of blood on the bathroom floor.

“You want to hear something funny?” Rick asked. His hospital bed had been adjusted so he was sitting up a little. He didn’t move his head from the pillow, but he gave Jack a weary smile.

“Sure,” Jack said quietly. “I could use a laugh right about now.” He pulled a chair beside Rick’s bed and sat down.

“They had to give me a transfusion when they first brought me here. And I guess my father made a big stink about the blood supply. He wanted to make sure no ‘queers’ were donating blood, because of AIDS and all. Isn’t that funny?”

Jack shrugged. “Maybe you’ll be able to educate him—in time.”

“I doubt it.” Rick sighed.

“You never know,” Jack replied, patting his shoulder. “People can change. For example, only two days ago, you were telling me that you didn’t associate with ‘queers’.”

“Yeah, that was a pretty shitty thing to say, I guess.”

“The point is, I know it took a lot of guts for you to confide in me just now. I appreciate your honesty, Rick.”

Rick tugged at the bedsheets, rearranging them. “When you almost die, it makes you reevaluate things. Putting up a front isn’t so important anymore.”

“So, are you ready to tell me about John?” Jack asked gently. “Is that why you asked for me?”