The Long Way Home (25 page)

“I hear that you’re a murderer.” The words came out as rapidly as machine-gun fire.

“What?”

“A murderer. That’s what you are.”

He tipped his baseball cap back and gave her a wide-eyed look. “Lady, I don’t know what you’ve been smoking, but I think you’ve got me confused with someone else.”

“You killed Rita’s daughter, Melinda.” She struggled to keep her voice steady. “You strangled her with her own scarf and then left her in the car like a coward.”

“Not true,” he said, but she could tell a nerve had been struck. Both of his hands curled up in fists, like he was trying to hold back.

She should have let it go, but she didn’t. “Murderer.”

“Stop it. That’s enough!” he yelled, startling Troy, who took out his earbuds and clutched at her arm. Around them, people stopped talking. “Who put you up to this?” Davis’s face flushed red. “Who’s saying these things?”

“Marnie, what is it?” Troy asked, clearly afraid.

“It’s okay, hon, don’t worry about it,” she said, shielding him with her body.

“You have a lot of nerve,” Davis said loudly. “You don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

Troy wouldn’t let go of Marnie’s shirt. “What’s going on?” he said.

Marnie turned away from Davis and said, “There’s nothing to worry about. This man killed a friend’s daughter, and I—”

“Bitch!” Davis screamed, jumping out of his seat. He stood over her, slapping her across her head and shoulders, blows raining down from above.

She ducked down, crying out in pain and trying to get away but trapped by the narrowness of the row and her seat belt. He landed a blow against her head that was so hard, she felt her brain snap against her skull; entire constellations glistened behind her eyes. Before she could recover, his hands went around her neck and she felt the unbearable pain of her windpipe being compressed. Marnie couldn’t breathe.

Troy got to his feet and yelled, “Stop it! Leave her alone!” while frantically trying to wrest Davis’s hands off Marnie’s neck.

The young male flight attendant came running and two young guys dressed in Wisconsin Badger T-shirts bolted from the back of the plane to help. It took, Marnie found out later, three men to pull Davis off her.

They were at the hospital in Milwaukee for a few hours getting Marnie checked out and answering questions for the police. Davis had been arrested as soon as the plane landed, and several of the passengers gave their account of what had happened. Marnie felt a bit foolish to have so many people—Troy, Jazzy, Laverne—hover around her bedside in the ER, while Jazzy’s brother, Dylan, their ride home, sat in the waiting room. She offered to let them go, but like true friends, they’d have none of it. They stayed.

When the ER doctor, a young guy with a narrow face and wire-rimmed glasses, asked about the stitches in Marnie’s side, for a moment she couldn’t remember how she’d gotten them. The rest stop encounter with Max, once so traumatic, seemed like a lifetime ago. Luckily, Laverne was there to fill in the gaps. “I was there and saw the whole thing,” she said, and launched into a colorful version of the story, with her role as hero the most important part of the tale.

Dark-colored finger marks were now evident on Marnie’s neck and would, according to Laverne, get even worse because, she declared, “That’s how bruises work. You wait and see. Tomorrow your neck will be a lot of different colors.”

It was easier to let other people talk, so Marnie didn’t say much.
This is what it must feel like to be in shock
, she thought. She put her hands up to her throat and probed the tender areas, the place where Davis’s thumbs had pressed into her windpipe. The attack had happened very quickly and was over just as fast, but that didn’t lessen the emotional trauma. She was completely shaken and jittery.

But looking over at Troy sitting on the edge of the bed, Marnie knew she had to pull it together and soon. She wouldn’t be able to go home and crawl into bed for a week. When you were responsible for someone else, you couldn’t be completely self-absorbed. Besides, she’d discovered there was more to her than she’d previously thought. It would take time, but Marnie knew she’d get through this.

As the doctor entered information into a laptop, he asked if she’d taken any medication in the last twenty-four hours. Marnie looked guiltily at Laverne and decided to confess. “I did take something. I have this fear of flying, and I took a pill for anxiety,” she told him.

The doctor looked up from his laptop. “I need to know the name of the drug and the dosage. Do you have the bottle with you?”

Laverne dug into her purse and pulled out the Ziploc, and Marnie cringed, imagining what the doctor would have to say about Laverne’s unauthorized plastic-bag pharmacy. “I gave her some of this,” she said, handing him a bottle.

He looked at the label and then handed it back to her. “We don’t put melatonin in the same category, but I’ll note it.”

“Wait a minute!” Marnie said. “That’s not right. Tell him what you really gave me.”

Laverne said, “That’s what I gave you. Melatonin. It helps me relax at bedtime, so I figured it would take the edge off.”

“No,” Marnie insisted. “I’ve taken melatonin before. You gave me something much stronger. I could feel it coursing through my blood. It took the fear right out of me.”

The doctor said, “It’s important that I know exactly what you took.” He peered at Laverne over the top of his glasses.

Laverne said, “That’s what she took.”

Jazzy spoke up. “It was melatonin, Doctor. I saw Laverne take it out of the bottle.” Seeing Marnie’s look of dismay, she added, “I swear on my grandmother’s grave, it was melatonin.”

“But that can’t be. I felt it…” Marnie said, stunned.

“The placebo effect is incredibly strong,” the doctor said. “You’d be amazed at the power of the human mind.”

In the car on the way home, Marnie, who was sandwiched in the backseat between Troy and Laverne, cried out, “Oh! We never called Rita to tell her what happened.”

“She knows. I called her when you were in the ambulance,” Jazzy said, turning around to reassure her. Dylan, serving as chauffeur, had sensed the seriousness of the situation and hadn’t said a word since they left the medical complex.

“What did she say?” Marnie asked.

“I think she was a little stunned, to tell you the truth. She felt terrible that you were attacked, but she was relieved to hear Davis is in jail. She said she’d call you tomorrow.” Jazzy pulled her hair over one shoulder. “She didn’t want to overwhelm you. She sends her love.”

She sends her love
. Such a heartwarming expression. The instant Jazzy said it, Marnie felt it. Love surrounding her from all sides. This, despite the pain, the stitches, the sore neck. Overcome with emotion, she sniffed. Troy gave her a concerned look. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“Never better,” she said.

When they pulled up to the curb in front of the duplex, Marnie stared dully at the house. They’d been gone only a few days, but living there felt as distant from her current life as a childhood home. And yet, it was exactly the same—red brick with white shutters, colonial-style pillars flanking the front stoop. Dylan unloaded the trunk and helped the women carry their luggage into the house. When Laverne unlocked her door and said goodbye, Marnie reflected on how much had changed in such a short time. Before, her neighbor had been the mystery woman downstairs. Now they were friends.

When it was time to part, Jazzy gave Marnie a hug and said, “Give me a call if you need anything. I can run to the store or whatever.”

“Okay, thanks.”

When she and Troy were finally home alone, she said, “So do you want a tour of the place? I promise you it won’t take long.”

He sat impassively on a kitchen chair, his backpack and duffel at his feet. Slouching, he looked much younger than his fourteen years.

“Troy? Is something wrong?”

His eyes glittered with tears. “When you said we were going home, I thought we were going back home.”

His meaning dawned on her instantly. She pulled up a chair and sat down facing him. “Oh, honey. I don’t live in our old house anymore. It doesn’t belong to me. Remember? Your mom hired a realtor and is selling it?”

“I knew that, I…” He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, embarrassed. “I just forgot. In my head I pictured us going in the door and me going up to my old room. I was thinking one thing and it turned out to be different.”

Marnie sighed. “I know how that is. A lot of life seems that way.”

That night, after the sun had gone down, Rita found herself leaning against the window frame in her darkened dining room. Just a few minutes earlier, she and Glenn had been viewing the news on TV when the anchorman, Spencer Spellman, announced, “A local woman was attacked by a fellow passenger on a flight from Denver to Milwaukee this afternoon.” Rita had been knitting, not really been paying attention, but at that point, she set down her needles and yarn and gave the TV her full attention. Just as she thought, the story was about Davis’s attack on Marnie. Rita and Glenn held perfectly still while watching the footage of Davis being escorted off the plane in handcuffs; another clip showed Marnie being transported by gurney into an ambulance. A reporter at the airport interviewed two other passengers, a middle-aged woman and her teenage daughter, both of whom said that Davis looked crazed. “It took three men to pull him off that poor lady,” said the mother. “He was like totally possessed,” the daughter said.

When the segment was over, Glenn muted the TV and gave her a sad smile. “How’re you holding up, hon?’

“I’m just glad Jazzy called and told us about this,” she said. “It would have been worse to find out on the news.” Before she could say any more, the phone rang. Rita would have let it go, but Glenn didn’t have the same instincts. He got up to answer it, and she called out after him, “I’m not talking to anyone.” She heard him in the kitchen speaking to her sister, Carolyn, who’d apparently seen the news and wanted to let them know. Rita didn’t know how to feel. She had so many contradictory thoughts and emotions swirling through her mind. Guilt was one of them. If only she and Glenn had been on that flight, maybe they would have been the ones confronting Davis, and Marnie would have been spared. How horrible it must have been for Troy to be right there and unable to stop it. That poor kid. She was truly sorry that Marnie had been attacked. But she was relieved too. Davis was in jail now and would go to prison, where he belonged. Best of all, the fact that he choked Marnie made him look guilty of Melinda’s death.
The same MO
, she thought. She hoped this would shine some new light on the case.

As Glenn continued his phone conversation, she wandered into the dining room, not switching on the chandelier above the table, but standing in the dark and looking out the window. The room was just big enough for the table and the china cabinet. A large picture window looked out over the backyard. It was one of her favorite rooms because nothing was ever out of order. The clutter on the kitchen counter—the not-yet-sorted mail, the rubber bands, and other odds and ends—never made their way into the dining room. The dining room table always looked impeccable, draped in linen and topped with a floral centerpiece. The contents of the china cabinet too stayed precisely the same, except for spring cleaning, when she pulled everything out for hand washing. The wood in the room smelled faintly of lemon polish, a clean, comforting smell.

Standing in front of the window now, she had a clear view of the backyard. A full moon hung overhead, the orb so small that she could cover it with her thumb. Funny that such a tiny dot could cast so much light. Once her eyes adjusted she could see beyond the patio to the vegetable garden along the back of the property. Earlier in the season, Glenn had helped surround the garden with chicken wire to keep the rabbits at bay, and so far it had worked.

The moon, she noticed, was surrounded by a slightly foggy halo, making her think of a saying Glenn had taught Melinda when she was a little girl:
Circle around the moon, rain or snow soon.
Maybe there would be rain; it was humid enough. She was glad Glenn had turned on the central air as soon as they’d returned home. The house was comfortable now.

When Glenn was done on the phone, he came looking for her and found her still at the window, enveloped in darkness. Hearing him fumble for the light switch, she said, “No, don’t turn it on. I like it this way.”

He came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. “You like being in the dark?”

“It helps me think.”

“Think about what?”

“I’m sorting out my feelings.”

“You feel bad for your friend,” he said.

“I do,” she admitted. “I feel terrible for what Marnie went through, and it makes me think about what Melinda went through…”

“Don’t think about that,” he said.

“I can’t help it. And I feel guilty that I’m happy Davis choked Marnie because it proves that he’s that kind of person, and it got him arrested. What kind of horrible person am I that I’m happy about something like that?”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself. It’s complicated.” He rested his chin on the top of her head.

Rita closed her eyes and rested against him, happy to have his support. Without Glenn she would have caved in from grief long ago. He wrapped his arms around her. She said, “I know it’s complicated. You always say I overthink everything.”

“Me? I say that?” he teased. “You must be thinking of someone else.”

“No, I’m not thinking of anyone else. It’s you.” She nudged him with her elbow. “But I know you’re right. I do have a tendency to overthink things.”

They stood together, not saying anything at all, their breathing harmonizing. Such an obliging man. She was lost in thought when Glenn whistled and said, “Would you look at that.” Opening her eyes, it took a moment to follow the line of his arm and see what he was pointing at, but when she did, Rita let out a gasp. It was a deer. A doe delicately walking over from an adjacent yard, as casually as a neighbor coming by to borrow a hose. She leaned closer to the glass. Glenn became alarmed and said, “If that thing goes near the garden—”

He jerked toward the door, but Rita stopped him saying, “Wait.” She felt a little notch of hope build from the pit of her stomach. The deer continued with dainty steps, bypassing the chicken-wire-enclosed garden and heading straight toward them. Rita had heard of deer seeing their own reflection and thinking it was another deer, crashing through picture windows, but this deer moved slowly and deliberately.

Glenn tensed up next to her. He was one inch away from bolting outside to shoo it away. He didn’t understand. Rita said, “It’s okay, Glenn. Just watch.” The deer leisurely walked onto the patio, facing them. Stopping a few feet short of the window, the doe stared straight at them, nodded, and twitched her ears forward, as if waving. Glenn whispered, “Well, I’ll be damned. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

Rita didn’t take her eyes off the doe. When the deer turned to go, it paused for only a second before bounding across the yard. In a moment it was gone.

Glenn shook his head, bewildered. “What was that all about?”

Rita said, “This is like what happened at the rest stop. Remember me telling you about the deer and Jazzy? That it was a message from Melinda?”

It was hard to gauge his expression in the dim light, but Rita was fairly certain he was skeptical. Given time and some thought, he might come around. In the meantime, it didn’t much matter if he didn’t believe the deer had special significance. The sign was meant for her. Things had happened as they were supposed to and she didn’t need to worry anymore.