“Bathroom next? Please?”
“Lady, you are getting pushy.”
“Of course. That’s my Brooklyn attitude coming through. But seriously, I’d love to have it all done when Chris comes home.”
“Chris? Now that’s upping the pressure.”
I stopped smiling, though, remembering the event that would probably bring her home for a visit, well before the end of camp.
“She seems to like camp, except for worrying about you.”
“What?”
‘Yeah, she wrote to me.”
“She’s never mentioned that to me.” I could hear my own grumpy voice. “What could she possibly have to write to you about?”
“We got close when she was working for me. We talked. She’s a great kid and I think maybe she likes having a man’s point of view.” He patted me on the shoulder. “I can be that man, and even better, not come on as anyone’s parent. I’m an independent adult friend. No need to be miffed.”
“I’m not miffed!”
“Oh, sure. I can see that you’re not.” He had a perfectly straight face when he said it. “How are you otherwise? Life settling back down? Any new information about Rick?”
Suddenly my eyes stung. “It would take all evening to tell you, so much has happened.”
“Remember I’m my own boss?” he said gently. “I can take all evening if I want to.”
“But I can’t.” I blinked the tears away. “I have things to do. And I bet you’re lying, anyway. It’s your busy season. You probably have a whole list of stops to make after me…”
He nodded. “True. Only one or two hundred. How about over a late dinner? I’d even step us up from pizza. Steak frites and a bottle of Beaujolais?”
I was unnerved by the offer, and the kind expression on his face. He was the closest I ever had to a big brother, and I knew I could trust him with everything on my mind. He might tell me I was doing something stupid—in fact, he had already done that, and more than once—but he would be in my corner no matter what.
“Sorry.” I had some real regrets. “I have work to do tonight. A lot of work. I’m getting into some serious trouble on that.”
“Another time,” he replied without undue disappointment. “You know, one of the things Chris has confided is that she wishes you would have more of your own social life.”
“What? No way.”
He nodded slowly, with an expression I couldn’t quite read. “She seems to feel you need more to think about than her.”
“I have plenty to think about. Too much. School, house, supporting us, my future, her future. How could she….”
“What have you told her about that slick looking guy I met the other day?” Now I could see he was teasing. “See what she says then. Yeah, yeah, I know you said it was just business.”
“It is. So I have nothing to tell her.” Was my face turning pink? “And how is your current social life?” The best defense is to turn the tables.
He only smiled mysteriously. “I’ve got to get going.”
His crew left shortly after and the house was quiet. I dug myself in for a long evening of work, trying to smother any questions I had about Rick. Or anything. By the time my weary eyes started to cross, I had written a long memo for my boss, with attachments. I thought—I hoped—I had redeemed myself on that front.
***
The phone rang and rang, but when I finally got to it, it went dead. I squinted at my clock, three a.m., and looked in panic at the caller ID. Brooklyn. Leary I thought, but he did not answer when I called back and the machine did not pick up. I tried again. It rang and rang, and still no machine pick up. Then there was a kind of click and a hard breathing sound.
“Hello?” I said. “Hello?”
More gasping.
“Leary, is that you? Come on!”
More gasping and I finally realized he was groaning.
“Leary? Is that you? Are you all right?”
A whispered “Not all right.”
“Do you need help? Should I call 911?”
“No. Please come….” and the line went dead.
I swapped jeans for my pajama shorts, pulled a shirt over my tank top and was pointing my car toward his block almost before the thought had formed in my mind. Luckily for me some idiot had left the outside door of his building open a crack and I slipped in. Last time, pounding on his apartment door worked but this time I had no response to my fist or my shouting.
I heard a faint sound, a moan.
“Leary? Is that you? Open the damn door!” I was already fumbling for my phone, ready to call 911.
Another moan, then a whisper. Something I could barely hear. Door? Is that what he said?
I shoved the door and it opened. He was lying on the floor, his face bruised, his skin the color of paper and clammy to the touch. 911 it was
I was already dialing as I knelt beside him, ignoring the filthy floor. “Help is coming.” I said it softly but very clearly. “What can I do for you?”
He opened his eyes, seemed to struggle to focus and whispered, “Orange juice.” I jumped up to get it and he gasped, “Wait.” He finally forced the words out. “Add sugar.” He closed his eyes again.
Was he going to die right there? I poured the juice with shaky hands, ripped open coffee shop packets of sugar lying on the counter, and was back in the living room, holding up his head to drink, in a fast minute.
Holding onto consciousness by a thread, it seemed, he sipped slowly, and slowly, his color returned from this death-like pallor to something more like his normal unhealthy tone. His eyes began to focus. He gradually moved from looking almost dead to merely looking exhausted. It was a substantial improvement. I talked to him, trying to keep him from drifting off again, talked about anything I could think of. I asked questions and when he couldn’t seem to respond, I babbled. The weather, the park, my new kitchen.
He finally said something back, in a shaky whisper. “There were men. They wanted something. Don’t know….” He stopped, seeming too tired to continue. He flinched when the downstairs buzzer broadcast static into the room. I pushed the intercom button, a voice barked, “EMS” and I pushed the button that would unlock the lobby door. Thank you, I whispered to someone and went back to Leary.
He was trying to tell me more. “Just took my shot and didn’t get to eat. They got in—shoved me around. Hit me. Dunno…. something happened. Too much insulin.”
The ambulance crew burst in, I told them who he was, who I was, how I had found him, and then had to get out of their busy way. A few medical procedures later, they told me orange juice was what the doctor would have ordered.
“Lady, you might’ve saved his life,” were the exact words. They asked me a few questions I could not answer, but Leary was able to mumble, “In my wallet,” and they were off, talking to me over their shoulders as they wheeled him out. “Kings County Hospital.” “Don’t follow. You can call later.” “You’ll be in the way, and if you’re not family, no one’s talking to you anyway. We got HIPPA rules.”
I managed to tell them this had maybe been an assault and they said, “We already figured that.” Their voices disappeared as they entered the elevator, and suddenly all was quiet.
I sat down—no, I collapsed—onto his scary couch. When my heart finally stopped pumping so loudly I could hear it, I began trying to understand what had happened here.
Leary had a medical episode because some men interrupted his bedtime routine? He had too much insulin in his system, because he needed a snack? The men did something to him—the bruises on his face could not have come from a fall—and then what? Fled?
Or was he imagining some of it? All of it? Were hallucinations part of this kind of diabetic situation? I had no idea. But the EMS team had seen something to make them think there was an assault. Would the hospital report that?
I wanted to do something useful. Clean up here? I had a pretty strong feeling he would not like that. Pack him a bag for the hospital? I flinched at rummaging in his clothing. I could at least lock up when I left. Where were his keys? They did not seem to be near the door. I could try his dresser top.
The room was the same disaster as the rest of his apartment, and no keys were in sight. I would try his office.
One look at that room told me the mysterious men were no hallucination. His pristine files were all over the floor, drawers were open, and paper was everywhere. Oh, yes, someone was certainly looking for something. I wanted to look myself, but I knew better than touch anything. I could look, though, couldn’t I? Walk carefully into the room and see what they had focused on, if anything?
It was such a mess, this could have been completely random, not a search for something in the files, but a search for something else entirely. Drugs. Perhaps people had seen him with needles and misunderstood. Or money. Not that he appeared to have any, but who knew what a desperate, stupid, drug-addled criminal might think? This wasn’t the best neighborhood.
I tiptoed over the papers on the floor, squatted in the middle and looked without touching. I used a pencil to lift a few things and dropped them right back where they were.
Every file that I could see, meticulously labeled with subject and date, was from the early 1970’s. Damn. It was everything we had been talking about. So then, it was no random break in, and no hallucination, but it also made no sense. A retired reporter’s random notes, written a lifetime ago?
I left the room, very carefully, to collapse again on the sofa. Maybe my mind was racing, but my eyes still focused, and there were the keys, on the floor where I had found Leary. They must have fallen from his pocket.
What should I do now? If the hospital found signs of assault—and I was now sure they would—they would contact the police. They would talk to Leary and look at the scene, I thought, but I didn’t know how to tell them about the threatening phone calls Leary had mentioned to me
.
He said they were prank calls, harassment from young problem neighbors, but now I was sure they weren’t.
Suddenly I had to get out of this apartment, a creepy place even in normal times. I was alone in a place where, it seemed, someone had been attacked. Was I crazy to be here? I was. What if they came back?
It was still almost dark outside, gray pre-dawn. My hand was shaking so badly I could barely get the key into my car door. Even in my exhausted fog, I kept thinking about the files all over Leary’s floor, and the files he had given me. Was it possible that I had what they wanted? And could they know that? Whoever they were, these mad history-pursuing thugs, they were certainly thugs. Who beats an old man over old news stories? None of this made sense and all of it was scary.
I caught a parking space near home, as someone was leaving for an early morning job, all but ran inside and gratefully collapsed back into my bed.
The next thing I knew, bright sun was poking through my window shutters. I hid my head under a pillow, but last night came back to me and escape was useless. It was well into the morning. No. It was no longer morning at all.
I had barely made it to the shower when the phone rang. News about Leary? No. Dripping wet, wrapped in a towel, I took a call from Steven. Who I should have met that morning at ten for an update on my work. Damn.
“What happened? We were getting together, weren’t we? Breakfast and business? This morning?”
I briefly thought about saying he had the wrong morning. He sounded concerned in a polite way. Not angry about the missed meeting. Puzzled, perhaps.
“I had a crazy experience.” His polite tone made me feel like I needed to explain. I didn’t want him to think badly of me, and without ever intending to, I poured out the whole story. Sentence by sentence, his replies became warmer, until at the end, I felt like I was once again talking to the guy from the concert
.
Then he said something a friend really would say.
“Maybe it’s none of my business, but I’m thinking you’ve stumbled into something that is way over your head here. Any chance I’m right?”
“You aren’t the first person to say that. “
“That doesn’t surprise me. Can I help in some way? I could be a sounding board for you, someplace to talk it over. I am considered fairly bright.”
“I don’t…I have no….” I took a deep breath. I would not dither. “I don’t think so.” I hoped I said it firmly. “I am handling things.” Was that true? I hoped it was.
“I have no doubt about that.” Though the words were supportive, the tone expressed nothing but doubt. “Look. I am back in my office now, in downtown Manhattan. Can you come here, and have our missed meeting this afternoon?”
Another surprise, but I did owe him a meeting. I had to say yes, and we arranged it for late afternoon at his downtown office.
I called Kings County Hospital but could not get any information about Leary except that he could not yet have visitors. I could try again tomorrow. I needed to dress, eat, and hustle myself into Manhattan.
I have one business suit for summer and one for winter. It would have to do, with my one pair of business heels and the only intact hose I had. My neglected work could go with me on the subway. I didn’t get much done though, because I could not stop thinking about Leary. I would read a page or two, make a note, then remember his dreadfully pale face. I wondered with a pang if that was how Rick looked. I read a little more, and then started trying to make sense of what had happened to him. A complete exercise in futility, of course.