Detective Parachuk turned up in the late afternoon. His had a face creased look, probably from smoking, although I smelled no hint of tobacco as he sat across from me in our living room. He was handsome, I suppose. I imagined he was in his early sixties. He wore cologne I couldn’t identify. I watched him as he looked around the room. I wondered if he felt the same way the two young officers had felt, or the way I imaged they had felt: Privilege deserves heartache, too. We had a grand piano in the corner of the room and he stared at the pictures sitting on top of it—Truman at all stages of his short life. I watched the detective look at the photographs. I couldn’t look at them myself. I knew them all by heart: Truman in his crib sleeping; Truman standing in front of the house on his first day of nursery school; Truman at the piano pounding on the keys, his baby-white hair falling in his eyes as if he were imitating Van Clyburn; Truman in front of a Christmas tree and piles of toys; Truman in my arms, the three of us standing with Sandwich’s slice of ocean behind us; Truman with Carly Rodenbaugh on their first day of school in front of a yellow school bus, both of them beaming.
Finally Detective Parachuk’s brown eyes rested on mine. They had an intensity to them and I remembered thinking I wouldn’t want to be sitting across from him as a suspect. That suspicion gave me some hope that he would find whoever killed my Truman. But then I felt a wave of dread once again at the idea of my son dead forever.
The detective must have discerned my thoughts. He got up from the couch and moved to the grand piano and peered more closely at the photographs. He looked at one in particular, a picture of Truman during his black period. It had been short lived: dyed black hair, black eyebrows, mascara, black clothes, black shoes, black fingernails. Amy and I had decided not to say anything about this makeover. It lasted three months and then he had his mother crop his hair so that only his blonde roots returned. His eyebrows gradually faded.
“He’s a handsome boy,” Parachuk said. He referred to Truman in the present tense.
“It was a stage he went through,” I said, my voice defensive.
“My son went through the same thing when he was in high school. Some rebellious thing because his old man was a cop, I guess.”
“Truman had no reason to be rebellious. We accepted him for who he was.”
He looked at me closely, looked again at the photograph and then walked back to where he’d been sitting.
“The trooper you were with yesterday told me your son was gay.”
I laughed.
“I imagine you only had to listen to the news to know that fact. Where do they find these things out, I wonder?”
“Did your son get threats from anyone?”
“Not that I know of. Not that he ever told me. He was a private boy, so I can’t be sure. He was a brave person.”
“Why do you say he was brave?”
“Because he stood up against the conservatism in this town. He didn’t care what these people thought.”
Parachuk studied his hands. They were manicured. I noticed for the first time that his shirt had been starched. Something about his sartorial attitude made me like him.
“What do they think, Mr. Engroff?”
I hadn’t expected that question. Persia was so familiar to me that I thought everyone saw it like I did—saw everyone sharing identical world-views, the conservatives and the few liberals alike. The town is first-generation upper-middle class, acquisitive, clinging to the religious views their parents instilled in them before they sent them off to college and before they moved to Persia—the first in their family to get so far in the world.
“They think Truman chose to be what he was. They think he was making a statement: ‘I am different.’ He has never been like other kids his age. He has never cared what other people…what other kids thought of him.”
I stood up and walked to the piano and picked up the picture of Truman in his
black
period.
“This is my son.” I felt my voice begin to quaver. “They murdered this lovely boy!”
I brought the picture back to where I’d been sitting and held it in both my hands. Tears dropped on the glass.
After a long silence, Parachuk asked, “Who in particular do you think hated the way your son was?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know how anyone could hate this boy.”
“Was Truman bullied in school? Did he ever come home and tell you kids were picking on him?”
I shook my head. I had asked Tru the same question often. He always assured me he wasn’t teased or bullied. It was a concern I had harbored since the earliest times of his life. He had always been bossy with kids his own age, always looking for their oddities and then using that as a tool to make them defensive. He didn’t do it out of meanness. But I also knew his bossiness was a weakness, a way of protecting himself from his differences, and kids can zero in on that, find the weakest in the pecking order. Amy and I had talked about it a lot over the years. Initially it was the genesis of arguments; I worried that he was picking on kids, and was doing it out of a nasty streak, but Amy was convinced it was just one more layer of Truman’s complex personality. She happened to be right. He did it to us, reminding one of us about some infraction he was sure would incense the other, and I realized after a time he was doing it only to see what the result would be. We were a united front, however, and he had a hard time weakening our resolve. For a time he used his homosexuality as a tool, mostly with us, but it radiated outward, to see what kind of emotional reaction he could foment—but it was brief. I think mostly because he was so sad that he wasn’t straight.
“No,” I finally said, “that never happened that I know of. He was popular up until the last few years. And then it was his choice that he no longer had a lot of friends. Carly was the only one who remained his friend.”
Parachuk pulled a notepad from his sport jacket and a pen from his shirt pocket. “Who’s Carly?”
“Carly Rodenbaugh. They’ve been best friends since nearly the time they were born. She lives two houses down from here.”
“How did you feel about Truman’s homosexuality?”
“He told me even before he told Amy. I think he was afraid she wouldn’t accept him in the same way after she knew.”
Parachuk looked out beyond the room into the hall that led to the study and the kitchen.
“When we spoke on the phone, I was hoping that your wife would be able to join us.”
“I haven’t seen much of her,” I said flatly. “I told her you wanted her here. I don’t think she can talk right now. My brother sent for a doctor yesterday and the doctor may have given her something to help her cope.”
“How did your wife react when she learned your son…when she learned Truman was gay?”
“She reacted just as I thought she would. If it’s possible, she loved him even more. She saw him as somehow more fragile, more like a wounded bird.”
“What about you, Mr. Engroff? How did you view this news about Truman?”
I eyed him for the first time suspiciously.
“I told you, he was my son. I didn’t care what his sexual proclivities were as long as he was safe…I thought he was, mostly.”
“Why did you think that? Why did you think he was safe?”
I thought it was a stupid question and I wasn’t sure why he asked it. I think he was attempting to get some read on my temperament.
“As I said, detective, I was vigilant about Tru’s treatment by other kids. He wasn’t ostentatious, not physically anyway. He didn’t act effeminate. He just seemed like a normal kid. I think that’s why it was a shock to me at first. I mean when he first told me.”
“I want to get his computer and cell phone, Mr. Engroff. I want to see what kind of text messages he had, what kind of phone calls he made in the last few days. I want to look through his room.”
“Tru had a laptop and I imagine his cell phone was with him. He didn’t go much of anywhere without it.”
“It wasn’t with him. Is there any chance he left it in his room?”
“I doubt it, but you can check.”
“How old was Truman, Mr. Engroff?”
“He was seventeen last September.”
“Did he drive?”
“No, he didn’t. Amy and I were always surprised about that. He never showed any interest. He wanted to go to a school in the city when he graduated. He said there was no reason to get a license.”
“Did he go into the city often? Did you and your wife take him in?”
“We did when he was younger, but the last few years he went in on his own. I think he had a few friends who were going to Columbia.”
“Do you know their names?”
“Amy would know. I think they’re freshmen there. That’s all I remember.”
“I’m going to have to speak to your wife, Mr. Engroff.” His look told me there was no negotiation on that issue.
“I don’t think she’ll be able to talk to you today, detective.”
“Look, Mr. Engroff, I know you and your wife feel like you didn’t do enough to protect your son. That’s a normal reaction. But now you can do something for Truman. You can help us find whoever did this to him…but I need your help.”
“I don’t think you’ll be able to see her today,” I said again.
He was right. In the past twenty-four hours I had not been able to still the thoughts that I could have done more. I should not have let him go out without knowing exactly where he was going and when he’d be home. But Amy and I had been convinced that Tru always did the prudent thing. We never worried about him when he stepped out the door. Amy and I had been sitting in the kitchen drinking wine, and Tru’s last words to us, the both of us together, were, “I’m going out. See you guys later.” He’d walked over to his mother and kissed her on the top of her head, then he’d kissed my cheek. I can still feel that kiss. I don’t know if that touch will ever disappear. I hope that it doesn’t. But I know also that Amy and I were relieved he was leaving us for the evening. All the actions of the day had kept stabbing at a desire by both of us to make love and it was always a more intimate time when Tru was out of the house. We always felt as if he knew what we were doing even though he was such a private kid and honored our privacy as well.
“Do I have permission to search Truman’s room…to take his electronic equipment?”
I knew it was impossible to deny him access to Truman’s private world. It was a secretive world; the older he got, the more he protected it. I knew they would see and listen to things that I would never want anyone to hear or see. He loved us both tremendously, and even we were only allowed to tread into a narrow part of his life. Now I felt as if I was about to allow someone to maraud his privacy. Had Amy and I been foolish all those years we’d allowed him to draw up his own rules, rules that often excluded us from any negotiating power save our unquenchable love for him? We had been mildly ridiculed by our close friends—or at least Amy had been; she was much more social than I—but we had deferred to our son because we trusted him. We had known early on that to some degree we were going to be spectators…and from afar, even with his upbringing.
Parachuk opened his notepad again, took out a piece of paper and unfolded it. He handed it to me.
“It’s a form saying you’ll allow me to remove those items from Truman’s room. I already listed the items I need to look at, Mr. Engroff.”
He pointed to a list: computer, laptop, BlackBerry, cell phone, diary, notebooks.
I did a cursory read of it and then signed it and handed it back to him. I already knew that Amy would be angry with me, but even though I didn’t know this man I trusted him. I wanted him to find the people who had killed my Truman.
Parachuk got up from the couch and put out his hand.
“I expect you to find whoever…” I couldn’t complete the words. My vision became glazed and I had to turn my face from him. For the second time in as many days a police officer put a hand on my shoulder.
“I will do my best, Mr. Engroff.”
I knew he couldn’t make promises, but I also knew police in small, affluent towns usually found murderers. As I walked him to my son’s room I made a vow that if they didn’t find who did it, I would. I figured it was the only way I could ever get Amy to forgive me for what I hadn’t done as a father.
Amy
Four days after Truman’s death
I wanted to swat them away like those nasty gnats that hover around the face. Everyone was, of course, dressed in black, with expressions of sadness fixed on their faces. I did the obligatory thing: I let them hug me, let them rub my back as if I were ailing, or hold my face in their two hands or kiss me on the cheek, all the time with Truman or non-Truman just to the right of me and behind Ethan. Closed casket! If only I hadn’t had to leave the house, but Ethan had started to cry and of course I couldn’t have him do that.
They had me on Klonopin and the doctor had told me sternly, “Under no conditions are you to drink, Amy.”
Who was he to say what I was to do or not to do? I never liked Dr. Bowstock. He had a white, very trimmed mustache and I never, ever trusted men with mustaches. Why would they grow hair in that tiny spot above the lip and below their nose unless they wanted you to concentrate on that rather than what they were saying, or what they were doing or thinking? And naturally I didn’t tell him I had to drink or else I would float away like those men on the moon but for their secure lines. I would be gone for good, never to see my darling Truman again. I didn’t tell the doctor because he would have put me in the hospital. I’ve lived long enough in this town to know exactly how they think.