Miracle Man (21 page)

Walterberg gave Bobby a choice of several candidates. The one selected by Bobby was a woman in her early forties named Susan Corwin. She was five foot three, weighed somewhere in the vicinity of one hundred seventy-five pounds, and had short light blonde hair styled in what was at one time politely referred to as a “gentleman’s haircut.” She dressed in loose fitting slacks, simple blouses and flat shoes. Her face was round, her facial features small, and her fair complexion was made even lighter by her pale face powder which contrasted sharply with her rouge and deep red lipstick. While her job recommendations touted her efficiency and organizational skills, it was her outgoing, bubbly, up-beat personality and sarcastic sense of humor that were the deciding factors for Bobby. Susan was fearless and full of life and Bobby loved that. She was outspoken and didn’t hesitate to say what was on her mind, even if that could be impolitic at times. Susan was a very strong woman, but it hadn’t always been that way.

Life had not been easy for her. When she was sixteen years of age, she left home against her parents’ wishes to move-in with her lover, a man twelve years her senior. He promptly impregnated her, and by age nineteen, Susan had two children by him, a son and a daughter. The beatings began before her twentieth birthday. He terrorized and demeaned her daily. By age twenty-one, no remnants of her self-esteem or confidence remained. When the children were old enough to open the refrigerator, he put a lock and chain on it—and food could be removed only with his permission. It often was hard to obtain permission from someone who had passed out drunk, so it wasn’t unusual for the kids to go to bed hungry. It didn’t take long for them to realize that their mother was an abuse victim, as he raped and beat her with regularity. They heard her sobs and pleading through the bedding under which they would bury themselves trying to stifle the noise. When her son, Richard, was eleven, he made a stand to defend her, but his father pummeled him about the face and head so severely that Susan was afraid he had suffered brain damage. By the time Susan was twenty-eight, she had become an alcoholic and was beginning to eye drugs to further enhance her mental refuge.

It was in a supermarket, armed with coupons and too few dollars clutched in her hand for groceries, that Susan met the person who would change her life forever. Anna saw her standing in the dairy section, looking glazed over as she tried to compute whether or not she had enough money to buy eggs. Anna saw the young woman’s hands trembling, the watery vacant eyes, and sensed the despair of a life being crushed. At the time, Anna was thirty-five years old. She was five feet seven inches tall and weighed
over two hundred pounds. Her hair was silverish and styled in an Elvis Presley cut. She wore a black leather jacket, loose fitting dark colored jeans and black Doc Martin boots –the kind that have steel tips and are popular with punk rockers and motorcyclists. She thought Susan was adorable. Wounded but adorable.

After two cups of coffee in the diner with Anna, Susan began to realize that she and her children didn’t have to live the way they had been living. There was a better life out there. A life without him —that mistake she had made when she was sixteen. Anna said she would help her. She would take control because Susan was hopelessly incapable of doing that. Back then, Susan didn’t know that Anna would eventually become the love of her life. Anna accompanied Susan back to Susan’s apartment. She saw the drunken bum sleeping on a decrepit lounge chair in the living room. She pulled him up to his feet and woke
him by delivering a beating that was so punishing that he had to be hospitalized for two weeks. Anna broke four pieces of living room furniture over his head. She said to Susan, “Don’t worry. It was lousy stuff anyway. That’s why it broke so easily when I hit the fuck with it. He was lucky. If it had been good stuff, he’d be dead.”

Susan and the kids moved in with Anna and they lived together as a happy family unit in the
rent-controlled apartment that Anna had grown up in. When Bobby hired Susan, her kids were already young adults. Richard was a young man—succeeding in the Army, and Susan’s daughter, Grace, was a vivacious young woman, about to graduate from secretarial school. Susan and Anna’s love affair was fifteen years deep and counting. As Bobby got to know them, he was inspired by the devotion they had to each other. Their love was as vibrant as it had ever been. When Bobby asked Susan about how she had switched from loving a man to loving a woman, Susan said, “Ever since I was eleven I knew I was attracted to women but it terrified me. I felt ashamed. Like something was wrong with me. If I went that way, I thought my parents would never forgive me. And I wanted kids- how was I going to do that and be with a woman? So I had to bury it—very deep. I ran away with the first man who seemed interested. I didn’t know he would turn out to be the world’s biggest asshole. But every time he beat me, I felt like I deserved it. I had betrayed myself.”

32

I
t had been five days and no one had seen or heard from him. Finally, Bobby showed up unshaven and looking like he hadn’t changed his clothes in a week. Fast on his heels, Susan followed him into his office and closed the door.

“Bobby, where the hell have you been?”

“Relax Mom. I just needed some time off.”

Susan’s face was flushed and she spoke quickly. “You’re so irresponsible sometimes. It wouldn’t kill you to call and let me know you’re still alive. For such an intelligent guy, I don’t know what’s wrong with you. You’re going to get yourself in some real trouble one of these days.”

“Oh yeah?” said Bobby
as he kicked off his shoes.

Susan wasn’t about to let up. “You hang out God knows where. With some bimbos I’m sure. Where were you sleeping? What kind of clubs did you go to? Those places can be dangerous. You’re not exactly a tough guy, you know.”

“I can handle myself.”

“I could kick your ass down the block, and Anna— forget it.”

Bobby laughed as he sat down on the sofa and pulled off his socks. “Well that’s not fair. Anna could win the world heavyweight championship.”

“Watch it, sonny.”

Bobby smiled as he looked up at Susan who was standing over him. “Calm down, Susan. I know what I’m doing. And the young ladies whose company I enjoy are hardly bimbos—they’re libidinous creatures with impeccable powers of discernment.”

Susan threw her hands up. “Good choice of words—creatures. Bimbos, like I said.”

Bobby grinned. “Are you implying that only promiscuous floozies are interested in me?”

Susan shook her head and sat down next to Bobby. “If you’d give nice girls a chance –girls of the caliber you should be going out with, of course they’d be interested. But you have this craziness in your head about ‘no relationships,’ so you limit yourself to these harpies of the underworld. Maybe one day, you’ll stop with the BS and accept that you’re worthy of being loved.”

“Now you’re kicking below the belt. You’re such a ball buster, Susan. I’m your boss—remember?”

“And I’m quaking with fear. Now go into the apartment and clean yourself up. When was the last time you ate?”

“I don’t remember.”

“I thought so. I’ll make you some bacon, eggs and coffee. Jesus. You boys are all the same. Doesn’t matter how smart you are. You still got no sense. How much have you been drinking?”

“More than you could ever comprehend,” he said.

Picking up Bobby’s shoes, she waved him into the apartment. “Into the shower—and then put on some nice clothes. Remember, you have a staff that looks up to you. You’re not supposed to look like a bum.”

When Bobby reappeared, clean shaven, hair shampooed and brushed, Susan was once again struck by how good looking he was. This was particularly apparent when he came back rejuvenated after one of his “mini-vacations,” as he called his descents into dissipation.

“Now look how handsome you are when you’re all clean and shiny. Sometimes I almost wish I wasn’t gay,” she said.

“I still got some left,” he teased.

Susan laughed. “Oh, shut up. You’re so crude.”

“My best personality trait,” Bobby said, playfully planting a kiss on top of Susan’s head.

Bobby dove into breakfast and Susan watched him like a doting mother. Clearing the dishes away, she paused to pour herself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. “You were gone five days. What’s up with that?”

Bobby glanced away and then rested his chin in his left hand as he leaned into the table. Looking into Susan’s eyes, he said softly, “The nightmares. They’re really bad. I had to turn them off. This is the only way I can.”

“Can’t you wake yourself up when they happen?”

“I do—all the time. And then I’m afraid to go back to sleep because they’re waiting for me.”

Bobby looked down at his cup as he sipped
his coffee. “Susan—if I show you something, I don’t want you to think I’m crazy.”

“I’ll never judge you, Bobby. Except when it comes to your choice of women, your drinking and your being a slob,” she said.

Bobby didn’t smile. “I can’t have you thinking I’m nuts. I have a lot of work to do in the future and I need you to be at my side.”

He went into his bedroom and came back with several sketch pads, one of which he handed to Susan. “Sometimes when I get up in the middle of a nightmare, I try to sketch what I’ve seen in my dreams while it’s fresh in my mind. Take a look.”

Susan put the pad on the kitchen table and cautiously opened it. She slowly examined the first two pages of his detailed drawings.

“Oh, my God,” she said. She sat down and pulled the pad toward her face as she continued to look at the sketches carefully, page by page. The images were gruesome, bizarre and other-worldly, and the context of it all was death, physical decay and mayhem. Interspersed among the images of misery was Bobby’s face—apparently at different stages of his life.

“These are horrific. I don’t know what to say.”

“And imagine it with sound and action like in my dreams,” he muttered.

“Has it always been this bad?” she asked.

“It’s always been terrible— ever since I can remember. But it gets worse. It constantly gets worse.”

33

T
oward the end of their second year together, Bobby called Susan into his office and closed the door. “Susan, I need you to do something and I can’t go into details right now as to why. You have to be at your discreet best on this —it’s private and I need it to stay that way.”

“Of course, just tell me what it is,” Susan said, as she took a seat in front of his desk.

“I need you to hire a private detective. Use your own name,” he said, pulling on his chin. “Actually, don’t use your name, make one up and pay him in cash. You’ll ask him to find a certain person and report back with a detailed dossier as to this person’s whereabouts —assuming he’s alive—- health, job, finances, marital status, family, the works.”

“Wow, that’s weird. Who is the guy?”

Bobby walked to his desk and picked up a sealed envelope which he handed to Susan. “His name and the details that will help the PI find him are in here. The contents are for his eyes only. I appreciate your respecting my privacy on this.”

Susan stared at him. “Bobby, are you in some kind of trouble?”

Combing the advertisements in the Boston telephone directory, Susan picked the Bay Colony Detective Agency because it offered “national services and had assisted clients across the country.” At the company’s headquarters, she was escorted to the office of one of their investigators, Rollie Carter. About thirty five years old, he was tall and wiry and had a blonde crew-cut that was stiff and shiny from too much styling wax. His compact GI Joe facial features, restless blue eyes and an ever present smirk completed the picture of someone who had been the perennial wise-guy in high school.

“You’ve come to the right place, Miss Jones. We can find anyone, anywhere. It’s just a question of cost and time. I defy anyone to elude us. We are the best.”

“And how much does the best charge?”

“Do you want us to just locate him—an address, or do you want more?”

“Mr. Carter—I want the works. Address, phone number, photographs, background info, financial info, what he’s been doing since he was born. To be blunt, I want to know how often he has a bowel movement and how firm or loose it is.”

Rollie half-smiled. “So you want what we call the ‘deluxe package
.
’ That can mean travel expenses. But, to minimize that, once we locate him—if he’s out of state, we can get a local agent to do the footwork.”

“So how much are we talking about here?”