Set Free (11 page)

“Will you leave me?”

It was all over. Everything. The trial. Our time as Mikki’s parents. Our marriage?

Any couples counsellor will tell you that the key to a strong relationship is communication. Sometimes that’s bullshit.

Particularly throughout the trial, talking to each other—rehashing, arguing, pointing fingers, building suspicions, tearing them down, second guessing—would have destroyed us. As it was, we had more than enough communication coming at us from other sources: lawyers, friends, family, workmates, neighbors, media, media, media. The quiet world we shared when we were finally home alone at night was a refuge, a silent bubble where we could convalesce.

It wasn’t as if we were completely ignoring each other. We spoke enough to make life happen. “What do you want for dinner?” “Red or white?” “I’ll pick up the dry-cleaning.” “You shower first.” We weren’t sexually intimate, but we sat next to each other on the couch when we watched TV, we slept in the same bed, we walked into court hand in hand. Ironically, we were probably kinder to each other the deeper we got into the house of horrors. We’d do small things for each other, like holding open a car door, fetching the other one a sweater if it was chilly, preparing a favorite dessert after a particularly brutal day, running interference with phone calls from well-meaning but nosy relatives.

Somehow, we made it through.

Then, when it was finished, a new struggle began.

The respite of silence was over.

“Do you
want
me to leave?” I replied to Jenn’s question.

We were together in our living room—we used to call it the family room. Jenn was on the couch, laptop on thigh, glass of wine at the ready. I was in the adjoining chair, attempting to read a book—the same one I had been trying to read for six months but had never made it past the first chapter. It was Friday night; another weekend loomed. They were the worst. Without the structure of a workday, endless hours yawned before us like a chasm. Inevitably, Jenn would head into the office anyway, and I’d sit in front of my computer accomplishing nothing.

“God, no, Jaspar. I love you. I’m just afraid that after all of this, after…what I did…that you don’t love me anymore.”

As usual, we’d allowed the room to grow much too dim as afternoon slid into evening, the only light coming from a fish tank—home to Mikki’s favorite pet goldfish, who seemed intent on outliving all of us. Normally I’d get up and switch on a few lamps, but not this time. This time I preferred the indistinct, blurred figures we’d become. For this conversation, low visibility was preferable.

“I love you, Jenn,” I told her with certainty. “I’m just not sure how to forgive you.”

Her breath caught. A lone tear, reflecting the fish tank’s somber light, slid down her gaunt face like a silver bullet. “I know,” she whispered.

“It’s just going to take some time, you know? If I could pull myself away from the emotions of it, if I could pretend I’m the writer and you’re my heroine, I can almost figure it out, draw you as an empathetic character. But sitting here, as your husband, as Mikki’s dad, I just can’t. Not yet. You have to understand that.”

A single nod. “I do.”

“But if we can get past this somehow, Jenn, if I can get past it, there’s nothing I want more than to get back to us.”

“Jaspar,” her tone was contrite, her voice a raspy wisp, “I don’t think that can ever happen. There is no us anymore. What we were—you, me, Mikki—it’s gone, dead, there’s no going back. And we can’t go back to the two of us before Mikki. We have to figure out if we can be the two of us after her. That’s going to be really hard to do.”

She was right. That was going to be fucking hard to do. Maybe impossible.    

In the end, it was easier to pretend to stay together than to actually pull apart.

A month later, I was packing for Morocco.

After what one or both must have decided was a respectful period of time following the trial, my agent and publisher invited me to an expensive downtown lunch under the guise of “just wanting to know how you and Jenn are doing.” In reality, it was a pitch meeting. They were impatient for me to deliver a follow-up to
In The Middle
. I was being encouraged to “put my pain on paper.” Aside from my agent and publisher being shit-eating, money-grubbing, insensitive assholes, it wasn’t such a bad idea.

I couldn’t blame them for bringing it up. Their jobs were to advise me, to look after my best interests, to make me money so that they could make money. I balked at the idea and told them to forget it. I lied and promised I was working on something else that was going to blow their socks off. I went home and began writing the story they wanted.

Almost immediately, I knew it wasn’t going to work. There were too many gaping holes. Mikki was never found; the man we believed kidnapped her had escaped prosecution and left town; our lives were in shambles; the end. I’m not a writer who necessarily believes every story has to have a happy ending, but this one had
no
ending. It was an impossible book to write.

In the end, I concluded that I would simply do what I had promised to do: I’d write something that was going to blow everyone’s socks off.

Suddenly I was the Amazing Fucking Kreskin. Once again, a very clear message came to me. I could not do it.

I finally had to admit it: I’d lost it. I’d lost the passion to write. Words flowed, but when I read them back, I was stunned to find them less than mediocre, exceedingly melodramatic, and ultimately good for only one thing: a shredder. A generous reviewer had once cleverly anointed me the Rumpelstiltskin of literature, claiming my prose to be “as captivating and alluring as spun gold.” But now, every word I wrote immediately tarnished like tacky brass.

I needed inspiration. I needed escape—from Boston, from my life, and although I’d never say the words out loud, from Jenn. In the past, travel had always proven itself a reliable antidote for whatever ailed me, and ultimately drove me to excel. I began to research possibilities—privately at first. When I was ready, I brought the idea up with Jenn. Before I knew it, tickets were booked, bags were packed, and I was gone. Then, in a quirk of fate, so was my life. Everyone outside of the rectangle believed I was dead.

Only one person knew the truth. Asmae.

On the day of my great escape, I waited patiently for her. Unlike countless times before—when I’d hover by the door anticipating her arrival like a lovesick puppy, anxious for her company—I was now a predator, and she my unsuspecting prey. I planned as best I could. I’d been stockpiling non-perishable foodstuffs, a few days’ supply of bread, and a canteen of water. I’d packed my meagre collection of personal belongings—toothbrush, soap—and a treasured souvenir: a chip off the stone pedestal on top of which I’d spent countless hours with Mikki, and then Asmae.

For several days I argued with myself about whether to make my big move during her morning visit or evening. Evening offered the protection of darkness as I made my getaway. If there were guards watching the rectangle, they were less likely to be vigilant late at night.

A morning escape had the potential advantage of giving me a greater head start. A young Berber woman living in the Atlas Mountains likely lived with family—maybe even a husband—or friends who looked after her wellbeing. If Asmae was to disappear, the alarm would be raised—but not until her routine was broken. Since she’d been staying with me, sometimes far into the night, to make love, anyone Asmae had in her life was used to her evening absences.

I could reasonably assume that Asmae’s accepted daily schedule typically kept her from home until late. It wouldn’t be until she failed to come home to sleep that someone would eventually notice.

I had no idea who Asmae really was. Although we’d become intimate and I’d grown fond of her, without the benefit of exchanging words we could only get so far in getting to know one another. For all I knew, Asmae could be Mrs. Hun, in on the whole thing. I hadn’t seen either Hun since they’d dropped me off here. But that didn’t mean they weren’t out there somewhere, still pulling the strings that ran my life and ensured my imprisonment.

On the other hand, Asmae could be an innocent village girl who had inadvertently discovered me abandoned in my rectangle prison and decided to save me.

The truth was something I’d likely never know.

Like pretty much every one before it, the day I chose to liberate myself was stiflingly hot, the sky searing blue, the air as still as pond water. The sole access point into or out of the rectangle was the door through which Asmae arrived and departed. It locked on the outside. The only time the door was left unlocked was when Asmae was with me. During one of our first sexual encounters, I’d found the key hidden in a pocket, deep in the folds of her colorful kaftan, and stored the information away for later use.

I’d settled on an evening escape. I was counting on there being no one on the other side of the door. The way I figured it, why would it be locked if there was? If I was wrong, it didn’t really matter. They’d kill me just as easily, day or night.

Hearing the telltale sounds of Asmae’s approach, I quickly hid the rucksack I’d fashioned from old towels, and stood by the door in greeting, as I often did.

She smiled warmly when she entered. It nearly broke my heart to know I would soon break hers.

We wandered into the lean-to, where she laid out my meal—tonight a fish
tagine
with potatoes, tomatoes and green peppers, and a honey cake for dessert. After preparations were complete, Asmae’s habit was to either leave immediately or she would sit. If she sat, which she now did more often than not, it was a sign that she intended to stay, and the evening would eventually lead to her joining me atop the pedestal.

I breathed a sigh of relief when she lowered herself to the ground. If she hadn’t, I’d have had to make my move instantly, swiftly, and with greater force than I hoped would be necessary.

My plan was to gain my freedom that night with the least possible cost to Asmae. Only if she surprised me—with a show of resistance or a heretofore concealed weapon—would I be driven to commit the unthinkable. I had considered this for many anguished hours. How far was I willing to go to win back my liberty? If she stood in my way, would I turn to brutality? Would I murder the hand that had literally fed me?

My decisions that evening will haunt me for the rest of my days. Should I have done what I did? The way I did it? Should I have accepted the generosity of her provision in eating that last supper, the generosity of her heart in accepting her love? As we lay entwined one last time atop the stone pedestal, a mellow bath of moonlight melting over our naked bodies and drawing out hues of umber and cayenne from her skin, I found myself resisting the next step. I put off the inevitable by kissing the top of her head, her cheeks, her breasts, her soft shoulders. I watched, breath bated, as she found the spot where I’d chipped out a chunk of the rock as a keepsake, her tiny fingers questioning the imperfection in an otherwise smooth surface. A small frown passed fleetingly across her face, but she said nothing.

I questioned my resolve.

But there was no other way.

If I could have made her understand the words, “Will you come with me?” would I have spoken them?

I’ll never know for sure.

Instead, as she closed her eyes for a brief rest, I pulled the key from the fabric of her dress, which we’d used to soften our nest. With one last, urgent kiss, like Prince Charming’s awakening gift to Sleeping Beauty, I made my dastardly intentions known.

She opened her eyes.

I held the key aloft, its gold metallic edge catching the light.

Her reaction was startling, immediately plain and clear, and wholly probable and true to her noble, selfless spirit.

Slowly, with great assurance and wordless bounty, Asmae nodded her assent.

Perhaps she’d been waiting for me to do this exact thing all along. Perhaps she’d even told me to do it in words I didn’t understand…or didn’t want to understand. Perhaps this was the secret she had been trying to share with me all this time: Jaspar, you are set free.

Sitting outside the modest but charming brownstone in suburban Boston, Katie Edwards was torn. The move she was about to make was a no-brainer. She had to do it. No question about it. But it wasn’t going to be easy—not after all they’d been through together over the past months. She knew friendship and career were uneasy bedfellows; sooner or later, one had to crawl on top of the other.

The weather was bitingly cold. She adjusted the heater in her little car to its highest setting. Along with post-Christmas, mid-winter blues, January had brought with it spitefully low temperatures and almost daily snowfall. Katie blew warmth into the icy cocoon of her hands as she eyed up the house, unobtrusively perched in its peaceful neighborhood. You’d never know that less than six months ago the same lawn had been crawling with cameras, lights, reporters, and gawkers, the surrounding streets clogged for blocks by news vans and police vehicles. You’d never know that this was the home of arguably the most famous—and infamous—couple in all of Boston right now. The celebrated author and his lawyer wife (and Katie’s friend) had been thrust into the glare of ceaseless media attention, thanks to the unthinkable abduction of their thirteen-year-old daughter, followed by an attempted murder shocker and a sizzling, scandal-a-minute trial. Every second of it with Katie Edwards as its public face.

And now this. It was unbelievable, really.

She had to go in there. But how? As friend? Reporter? Both?

Switching off the engine, she tightened the scarf around her neck and straightened the beret on her head. Grabbing her purse, Katie exited the car. She dashed up the familiar walkway and rang the bell.

Jennifer Wills looked awful. Her face was a pale, blotchy mess, her ordinarily smartly-styled blond hair struggling to stay in a topknot. She wore makeup, but today it looked as if it had been applied by a visually-impaired chimpanzee.

Like a marionette let loose from its strings, as soon as she saw Katie, Jenn crumpled into her arms and erupted into tears. Katie gently urged her friend inside, closing the door and bad weather behind them.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d heard yet.” Katie’s voice was muffled by Jenn’s heavy sweater. It smelled of her friend’s favorite perfume and the warm mustiness that comes with being worn over and over again and, quite possibly, slept in more than once. “I came as soon as it started showing up on the news services.”

Jenn pulled back and searched her friend’s face. “What do you know? What
is
happening? The cops—or somebody—called, but they said they couldn’t tell me much.”

“Come on, let’s sit down,” Katie urged, drawing the other woman into the dim front room. A TV was flashing images of the breaking story, recounted by a young female reporter Katie recognized. Sinking to the couch, hands clasped together, the women listened.

“A local man being held captive in the North African country of Morocco has been identified as thirty-six-year-old Jaspar Wills. Wills is the author of the bestselling novel
In The Middle
, which inspired the critically acclaimed movie of the same name.

“Earlier today, Maghreb Arab Press, Morocco’s official news agency, and the English language online newspaper, Morocco Newsline, were simultaneously contacted by someone claiming to represent Wills’ kidnappers. Senator Richard Crawley’s office has confirmed that the senator was informed of the abduction by the FBI.

“The kidnappers are demanding the release of Qasim Al-Harthi. Al-Harthi was sentenced to life in prison following a 2012 Marrakech bombing in which thirteen people were killed, including two Americans. Well known Islamist militant organization, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, also known as AQIM, were widely blamed for the bombing. Al Qaeda denied responsibility for the blast, and allegations of Al-Harthi’s connections to the organization were never proven.

“Tonight a U.S. State Department representative is calling the kidnapping a “very grave matter” and says “we are keeping Mr. Wills’ family informed of any developments and taking every appropriate step.”

“What does that mean?” Jenn cried, frustration seeping through every word. “They haven’t informed me of anything. What appropriate steps are they talking about?”

“It’s difficult to say,” Katie responded, knowing that the first thing that leapt to mind was not what Jenn needed to hear: the United States government did not negotiate with terrorists. “It probably means they’re trying to contact the kidnappers to figure out how to end this.”

“We all know how well that goes!” Jenn spit out, her bitterness as sharp as claws. “Look at what ‘trying to figure it out’ did for Mikki. We lost her! And now I’m going to lose Jaspar too. Christ, Katie, why is this happening to us?”

Jenn buried her head in her hands. She hated the sound of her own voice. She was a lawyer, for God’s sake. She was used to being the calm, collected one in times of high stress and tension. She was usually the one laser-focused on facts, logical next steps, resolution techniques. Now, instead, she was being weak, a blubbering mess, withering under pressure at a time when she most needed her wits about her.

“Jenn,” Katie murmured, “we’ll get through this.”

Once again the two women embraced. It was far from an unusual stance for them. Since September, when Mikki was taken, Katie often found herself in the role of comforter—at first alongside Jaspar, and then in lieu of him during the fiercest days of the trial.

Glancing about the shadowy, sullen home, dread and grief pulsating from its walls, Katie thought about how many pots of tea she had brewed here, how many bottles of wine she’d brought over, and pizzas, and tub after tub of ice cream—whatever it took to calm the frayed nerves and anesthetize the anxiety of its inhabitants.

After a few minutes, Katie gently repositioned Jenn so that she was lying back against a pillow. Getting up, she retrieved a blanket from the back of the sofa and covered her friend, who was shaking as if she’d been left outside in an arctic storm. “I’ll make some tea. And where’s the thermostat? It’s freezing in here,” she lied.

“Why would they take him?” Jenn was not yet ready for warmth. “Why Jaspar, of all people? First our daughter is kidnapped, and now him? Is this some kind of crazy cosmic joke?”

Katie shrugged. “Why not him? He was in the wrong place at the right time. Traveling alone. American. Whoever the kidnappers are, they don’t care about Jaspar, or you, or what the two of you have been through. They just care about getting what they want.”

“What do they want? Why take an American? This man the kidnappers want released, he’s Moroccan, in a Moroccan prison. What does that have to do with us? The U.S. can’t do anything about it.”

“Obviously they think we can. Pressure from the American government speaks loudly anywhere in the world. Maybe they’re looking for vengeance, fame, political attention paid to their cause. By involving the U.S., they’re guaranteed exposure. Who knows what they really want? It could be anything.”

“They’re not going to get it, though, are they?”

Their eyes held. The truth was unspeakable.

After a moment, Katie whispered, “I don’t know.” She watched as the other woman disappeared into a ball, knees braced against her chest, face buried in the quivering folds of her arms. “Do you still love him?”

Jenn looked up, her face puffy and patterned with the weave of her sweater. “Of course I do. Why would you ask that?”

“I just thought…with him leaving so suddenly…I thought maybe you two were...”

“Separating? Getting a divorce?”

Katie looked away. She knew it wasn’t the best time for this conversation. But she was a reporter. Good reporters never shy away from asking tough questions in difficult situations, even when extenuating circumstances sometimes dictate they should. Like maybe now. Jenn was in pain. She needed Katie the friend, not Katie the reporter. But, damn it, she and Jenn never tiptoed around each other. It was probably one of the reasons they got along so well.

In the end, Jenn made the decision of whether or not to keep going down this road for both of them. “Because of what I did?” Jenn made it sound like a challenge. “You think Jaspar went to Morocco because I slept with Scott Walker?”

“I don’t think anything.” Katie made a move for the kitchen. “I’m going to get that tea.”

“Wait, Katie. You need to know that I love Jaspar. With all my heart. I have since the first day I laid eyes on him. That’s not the problem. The problem is…I’m afraid…I’m afraid he may stop loving me. He says he understands what happened between me and Scott.” She attempted to hide a nervous laugh by swiping at her nose with a raggedy Kleenex. “But I don’t know how he can.
I
don’t even know what the hell I was doing, or why. I just…I just went a bit crazy for a while.”

“A lot was going on.” Katie abandoned the kitchen run, but remained standing, looking down at her friend.

“A lot was going on for him too,” Jenn said, “but he didn’t go out and have sex with a neighbor.”

“It sounds like he forgave you.”

Jenn’s head moved back and forth, eyes blindly pinned to the TV screen. “No. He didn’t. But he was trying to. He just needed to get away from all of this. That’s why he went to Morocco. To clear his head, get back to writing. That’s all he was trying to do. And look where it got him.”

A shrill ring ripped through the room, an unwelcome intruder demanding attention.

“It’s them,” Jenn said, staring at the telephone, her voice deadened. “I can tell. It’s like before. They’ll never stop calling.”

Katie knew “them” also included her. The media had caught wind of the news. It had been months since Mikki’s disappearance and the sensational trial that followed it. Everything about the child’s kidnapping had been meaty and juicy, like a plump, well-marinated tenderloin, spitting and hissing atop a piping hot grill. Eventually, as with any story, the smorgasbord had come to an end. Newshounds directed their attentions elsewhere, looking for something fresher and tastier. But now, what a twist: Abducted girl’s famous father kidnapped! Impossible to resist.

“Do you want me handle it?” Katie asked.

Jenn nodded, massaging her throbbing temples as another talking head on TV breathlessly described to a rapt audience the developing details in what was sure to become a major news bonanza.

As Katie reached for the telephone, mentally preparing to take on the familiar role of family spokesperson, her eyes were drawn to the screen. Audiovisual experts had already pulled up an impressive array of stock photography and video—Jaspar being interviewed following Mikki’s kidnapping, Jaspar’s most recent book jacket head shot, Jaspar on a national talk show—the story all the more enthralling because it involved a celebrity, one who was young, handsome, and tragic. Katie knew what sold in the world of TV. This was going to be pure gold.