Running from the Law (13 page)

He shook his head and waved me on. “Not tonight. Keep it moving, lady.”

“But I’ll be late if I take the detour.”

“You can’t get through. There was a shooting and the perp took off. You wanna run into him?”

“A shooting? Where?”

“Lady—”

I felt my pulse quicken. “On Ninth? My father has a butcher shop on Ninth.”

He looked down at me. “Which one?”

“Morrone’s. The little one.”

His face fell. “Pull over, honey,” he said quietly, and waved the other cars past me.

14

R
ight this way,” said a woman cop, as she led me down a corridor in the basement of the hospital.

I felt drained. I had cried all the tears I could cry. My head was pounding. The only way to get through it was not to experience it. Keep it at a distance. And my emotions, too.

“You okay, Rita?” the cop asked, turning back as she walked. She had short brown hair, tight features, and no makeup. A hard face but for the kindness in her expression.

“Fine.”

“It’ll be over soon.”

She picked up the pace and I followed. The floor slanted down, like a ramp. Down, then doubling back, and going farther down. We reached the very bottom of the hospital and passed through a wide brown door that swung shut behind us. morgue, said a sign on the door.

“Hey, Jim,” the cop said to a man in a white coat like a butcher’s. “You ready for us?”

I stood behind the cop to shield myself from the room. A formaldehyde stink filled my nose. The air was chilled. A chalkboard hung on the wall and it read, inexplicably: HEART, RT. LUNG, LT. LUNG, LIVER, SPLEEN, RT. KIDNEY, LT. KIDNEY, BRAIN, PANCREAS, SPLEEN, THYROID.

“All set,” said the man, who stood beside a long table made of dull stainless steel. The table had slats across the bottom and a large round drain peeked from underneath them. I didn’t want to think about what went down the drain. Next to the table was a scale with a steel tray hanging underneath its clocklike face. A butcher’s scale.

“Cold in here,” the cop said.

The man in white wanted to reply but thought better of it. He punched up his steel glasses with a deft movement, his arm a clinical blur of white.

“You want another Coke, Rita?” asked the cop.

I shook my head. No. This wasn’t happening. None of it was happening. The man left for the adjoining room. There was the sound of a door being unlatched, a metallic
ca-chunk
, then a heavy slam as it sealed shut. I knew those noises from the shop. It was a freezer.

The man reappeared pushing a gurney. A steel bar surrounded the gurney and a black tarp was slung between the bars. On the tarp rested a white nylon bag with a zipper down the middle. The white bag was lumpy and formless. Smaller than I expected. I hadn’t realized he was so short. Oh God.

“Why do I have to do this?” I asked them, fighting not to cry. “We know it’s him. It has to be him. They saw.”

The cop touched my shoulder. “It’s procedure,” she said.

“Actually, it’s state law,” said the man in white. He began to unzip the bag with a care that suggested he feared something would catch on the inside.

I covered my mouth and turned away. Behind me was a black counter and underneath it a bank of ugly green cabinets. The zippering sound reverberated off the cold walls. Then the noise stopped suddenly and there was silence.

“Miss?” said a professional voice. The man in white.

I wondered how many times he’d said this, and to whom. To mothers and fathers and daughters and friends.
Miss?
Look at the body of someone you loved. Or someone you know. Or someone you hardly knew but who has no one else to mourn him, or even to identify his remains.
Miss?

“Is this him, Miss?”

I made myself turn back.

It was a dark face that shone under the harsh white light, framed by the white body bag. He looked like a black child, sleeping in a snowy receiving blanket. He was a black child.

“Is this LeVonne Jenkins?” the man asked.

No, it’s not LeVonne. LeVonne was only in tenth grade, so it can’t be him. It shouldn’t be him. I nodded, yes.

And began to cry.

Later, I waited in the ultramodern waiting room with my head against the cold glass wall, slouching in a mauve chair that promised more comfort than it gave. The waiting room was empty except for a TV, and
Rescue 911
was returning from commercial. A woman, drowning, screamed for help. I felt raw inside, exhausted. I drew my jacket closer around my shoulders.

The operation had started an hour ago, and they told me it would be a long one. Difficult. A surgeon gave me the odds, like a gambler, and they weren’t good. I picked up a battered magazine from the glass coffee table, looking for distraction.
Highlights
, a children’s magazine. Hippos wearing Hawaiian leis danced across the cover, at an animal luau. I opened the magazine.

At midpage was a comic strip. GOOFUS AND GALLANT, said the title. In the panel, a young boy climbed a set of porch steps. In the middle of the steps was a roller skate.
Goofus leaves his toys on the step
, said the caption. The next panel showed another young boy rolling a bike down the sidewalk, heading for the garage.
Gallant puts his bicycle away, so no one trips over it.

I got it. You could have a lobotomy and still get it.

I looked up. Nothing was there, except a face. Not
Rescue 911
or the chairs or the receptionist at a desk in the hallway. Just his face.

In life it was the face of a young boy, growing into a man. A boy with none of the glaring faults of a lout like Goofus, a boy with none of the bogus suburban qualities of Gallant. A boy who would have burst into laughter at the absurdity of Goofus and Gallant, even though he was a boy who rarely burst into laughter. Who would have learned nothing from this inane pair, and who could have taught them volumes. I threw the
Highlights
across the room, startling the receptionist.

LeVonne.

LeVonne had died at the hospital almost as soon as they wheeled him off the ambulance. Two bullets had torn through his chest, one shearing the aorta. If my father lived through his operation, the first thing he would do is ask about LeVonne. Then the news would kill him.

“Rita,” called a man’s voice.

I looked up. Herman Meyer was thundering into the waiting room, in madras shorts and a thin white T-shirt. A bewildered Uncle Sal scurried next to him, almost identically dressed, supported by Herman’s tanned arm. Cam Lopo was right behind them, holding a bouquet of sprayed mums. I got up to meet them and hugged Sal, whose bony back felt like a wren’s in my embrace.

“He’s gonna be all right, isn’t he?” Sal asked.

“What happened?” Herman said. “They operating?”

“What’d they say?” Cam asked.

I released Sal and regained my composure. It was almost worse, their being here. Seeing how upset they were, Uncle Sal especially. “I don’t know more than I told you on the phone. He got shot in the chest, it hit his pulmonary vein. They’re going to stitch him up.”

“You said nicked it, on the phone. Nicked it. That doesn’t sound too bad,” Sal said.

Jesus. How to prepare him? I couldn’t even prepare myself. “It’s a serious injury. He’d lost a lot of blood by the time they got him here.”

“All I know is, they better catch the guy who did this to him,” Cam said.

Sal blinked sadly. “He killed LeVonne. I can’t believe it.”

Herman shook his head. “The bastard. If the cops don’t get him, I will. I swear it.” They stood together, forming an aged phalanx of determination, but I didn’t want to think about retribution just yet.

“Let’s hope Dad gets better,” I said.

Herman nodded. “Right, first things first. Did you see the resident yet?”

“No.”

He scowled. “He shoulda been here. Or one of the fellows at least.”

“What fella?” Sal asked, looking up nervously at Herman.

Cam gave me a hug, the flowers went around my back. “Rita, honey. How you holdin’ up? We woulda been here before, but Herman wanted to get flowers. So stupid, flowers.” He stepped back and tossed the stiff bouquet onto the coffee table but it rolled off the edge and onto the rug.

“Camille, what are you doin’ throwin’ the flowers around?” Herman said. He bent over with a grunt and retrieved the bouquet.

“Since when you care so much about flowers?”

Herman brushed off the mums. “They’re Vito’s flowers, not yours. Don’t throw them on the ground.”

“Vito don’t even like flowers,” Cam said.

“Get outta here, look in the shop window.” Herman’s voice rose. “Vito, he’s got a plant, right there in the window. A green plant.”

“Where?”

“In the window, you seen it. Under the pig.”

“Which pig?”

“The pig, the pig—there’s only one pig.”

Cam stepped back. “Vito don’t have no plant in the window.”

“You wanna bet? He’s got a plant right there in the window.”

“What is it with you tonight? Flowers and plants. What is it with you?” Cam said, but I was coming to understand what was with them. If they were old women, they would have wept. But they were old men, so they bickered.

“Bet me, Camille,” Herman said. “I need the money. I wanna go to the Deauville this winter like my brother.” He turned to me. “Doesn’t he, Rita? Doesn’t your father keep a plant in the window?”

“I don’t remember.”

Herman stamped his orthopedic shoe. “You remember. The front window. Underneath the pig. With the tail goes like a curlicue.”

“No,” Uncle Sal said, sinking slowly into a chair. “No plant.”

“See? No plant!” Cam said.

Herman shook his head. “What’s Sal know? He don’t know.”

But I was watching my uncle, who was muttering to himself. Cam heard it, too, and we exchanged a look. “What’d you say, Sallie?” Cam asked, bending over and putting a knobby hand on Sal’s shoulder.

“No plant,” he said again.

Cam patted him. “Okay, Sal, we got it. No plant. If you say there’s no plant, there’s no plant.”

Uncle Sal didn’t seem to hear. “In the window Vito got a sign about the fresh sausage homemade daily,” he said, counting on spindly fingers. “Then he got a picture of Rita at her college graduation, then he got a little stand-up calendar from the insurance company, then he got a sign about WE ACCEPT FOOD STAMPS, then he got a donkey made out of straw with a hat on his head. The hat is straw, too.” He reached five fingers, then began knitting and reknitting his hands. “And there’s no flies in the window ‘cause Vito don’t like that, when they have flies in the windowsills. It shows it’s not a clean shop, Vito says.”

Cam sank slowly into the chair next to Sal and put his arm around him.

“Pop used to say the same thing,” Sal said. “No flies.”

I realized then that Uncle Sal would surely die if my father did, like a domino effect, starting with LeVonne. One after the other in tragic succession.

Only Herman had any heart left. “Still no resident? Who’s running this place, nuns?” He turned on his heel and locomoted to the receptionist in a wobbly beeline. The three of us watched numbly as he barked at her, then hustled back. “This place stinks,” he said, even before he reached us. “They don’t tell you nothing here. Now Hahnemann University, that’s a hospital. My nephew, Cheryl’s boy, he works there, in the OB. They shoulda brought him there.”

“It’s not the same thing,” Cam said, but Herman planted his hands on his black leather belt.

“I know that. You think I don’t know that?” Herman looked at me and clapped his rough hands together. “Now. Rita. Did you eat dinner?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You should eat something. I could get you from the cafeteria.”

“No thanks. I’m not hungry.”

“They must have a cafeteria in this dump.” Herman squinted around him as if a cafeteria would materialize. “They should have a sign. Right here, where you need it. At Hahnemann, they got signs everywhere.”

“It’s okay, I’m not hungry.”

“Everywhere you look, there’s signs. If you’re sittin’ in the waiting room and you decide you want a cup a’ coffee, you get up and go. For Essie’s gall bladder, we were in the cafeteria all the time.”

“She’s not hungry, Herm,” Cam said.

“The portions were big, too,” Herman continued. “They gave you a lot. This place is for the birds.” He took off toward the receptionist again.

Cam laughed softly. “She’s gonna kill him. Christ, I’m gonna kill him.”

I couldn’t laugh. I didn’t want to think about anybody killing anybody. I sat down on the other side of Uncle Sal and rubbed his back through his thin, short-sleeved shirt.

“Vito’s gonna be okay,” Sal said, still playing with his fingers. I watched him make a rickety church and steeple, then look inside.

“Hey, Rita, isn’t that your … boyfriend?” Cam asked.

“What?” I looked up. Standing at the reception desk was Paul, the last person I needed right now. He was shaking Herman’s hand, then Herman pointed at us. Paul turned and his eyes met mine behind his glasses. He looked upset, concerned, and guilty as hell. Good.

“Is that him?” Cam said again, standing up and hitching up his Sansabelts with a thumb. “I haven’t seen him in years. Full head of hair, still. He’s a good-lookin’ man.”

For a cheater. Paul walked toward us, wearing a striped dress shirt, a charcoal sports jacket, and loafers without socks. He’d evidently had time to change; I hoped he’d had time to move the fuck out.

“It’s Paul!” Sal said, rising to his feet unsteadily. He had only seen Paul a handful of times, but the tone of his voice told me he was grasping for all the family he had.

“Rita,” Paul said, “how are you? Dad and Mom send their love.” He grabbed me and hugged me, but I stepped out of his embrace stiffly.

“How did you know—”

“The police called the house. Your father had your name in his wallet for an emergency.”

“Hey, how you doin’!” Sal said, then practically threw himself at a somewhat startled Paul.

“Sal, it’s all right. Sal,” Cam said. He put his hand on Sal’s shoulder and gently pried him free.