She touched my lips.
“I mean it. You keep your life inside like little secret creatures. All of us do, I guess, but it's different now, we're different, what it means to me is different.”
She touched my chest over my heart.
“How many secret creatures do you keep?”
“I'll find Ben, Luce. I swear to God I'll find him and bring him home.”
She shook her head so gently that I almost did not see.
“No.”
“Yes, I will. I'll find him. I'm going to bring him home.”
Her sadness grew to an ache so clear that it broke my heart.
“I don't blame you for this happening, but that doesn't matter. All that matters is that Ben is gone, and I should have known it would happen.”
“What are you talking about? How could you know?”
“Richard is right, Elvis. I shouldn't be with you. I shouldn't have let my child stay with you.”
My belly cramped with a sour heat. I wanted her to stop.
“Luce—”
“I really and truly don't blame you, but things like this—like what happened in Louisiana and last year with Laurence Sobek—I can't have those things in my life.”
“Lucy. Please.”
“My son had a normal childhood before I knew you. I had a normal life. I let my love for you blind me, and now my son is gone.”
Tears gathered on her lashes, then fell along her cheeks. She didn't blame me; she blamed herself.
“Luce, don't talk like that.”
“I don't care what that man said on the tape, but I could hear his hatred for you. He hates you, and he has my son. He hates you so much that you can only make it worse. Leave it to the police.”
“I can't walk away; I have to find him.”
She gripped my arm and her nails cut into my skin.
“You're not the only person who can find him. It doesn't have to be you.”
“I can't leave him. Don't you see?”
“You'll get him killed! You're not the only one who can do this, Elvis; you're not the last detective in Los Angeles. Let the others find him. Promise me.”
I wanted to help her stop hurting. I wanted to pull her close and hold her and feel her hold me, but my own eyes filled and I shook my head.
“I'm going to bring him home, Luce. I can't do anything else.”
She let go of my arms, then wiped her eyes. Her face was as dark and hard as a death mask.
“Get out.”
“You and Ben are my family.”
“No. We're not your family.”
I felt impossibly heavy, like I was made of lead and stone.
“You're my family.”
“GET OUT!”
“I'll find him.”
“YOU'LL GET HIM KILLED!”
I left her like that and went down to my car. I couldn't feel the chill anymore. The sweet scent of the jasmine was gone.
Joe Pike
Elvis got into his car, but sat without moving. Pike touched a leaf out of the way, better to see. When Cole's cheek caught the light, he saw that Cole was crying. Pike took a deep breath. He worked hard to keep his moments empty, but that wasn't always easy.
After Cole drove away, Pike left the rubber tree and slipped through the shadows alongside the bungalow and into the adjoining yard. He worked his way up an alley until he was a block behind Fontenot, then crossed to Lucy's side of the street. He moved in the shadows and passed within fifteen feet of Fontenot's car, but Fontenot did not see him. Pike slipped behind the birds-of-paradise, then up to Lucy's door. Fontenot was out of the picture. The building blocked his view.
Pike stood well back from the peephole. Lucy had been uneasy with him since the Sobek business, so he wanted her to see him before she opened the door. He knocked. Soft.
The door opened.
Pike said, “I'm sorry about Ben.”
She was a strong, good-looking woman, even wrung out the way she was. Before Lucy and Ben moved from Louisiana and before the Sobek thing, Pike had joined her and Elvis at a tennis court. Neither Pike nor Elvis knew much about tennis, but they played her just to see, the two of them on one side against Lucy on the other. She was quick and skillful; her balls snapped low across the net just out of reach. She laughed easily and with confidence as she cut them to pieces. Now, she looked uncertain.
“Where's Elvis?”
“Gone.”
Lucy glanced past him at the street.
She said, “When did you get back from Alaska?”
“A few weeks ago. May I come in?”
She let him enter. After she closed the door, she waited with her hand on the knob. Pike saw that she was uncomfortable. He wouldn't be staying.
“I'm across the street. I thought you should know that.”
“Richard has someone outside.”
“I know about him. He doesn't, about me.”
She closed her eyes and leaned against the door as if she wanted to sleep until this was over. Pike thought he understood. It must be terrible for her with Ben missing. His own mother took the punches meant for him. Every night.
Pike wasn't clear why he had come or what he wanted to say. It was good to be clear. He was unclear about too many things these days.
Pike said, “I saw Elvis leave.”
She shook her head, still with her eyes closed, still leaning into the door.
“I don't want either of you involved. You'll only make things worse for Ben.”
“He hurts.”
“Jesus, I hurt, too, and it's not your business. I know he's hurt. I know that. I'm sorry.”
Pike tried to find the words.
“I want to tell you something.”
The weight of his silence made her open her eyes.
“What?”
He didn't know how to say it.
“I want to tell you.”
She grew irritated and stood away from the door.
“Jesus, Joe, you never say anything but here you are. If you want to say something, say it.”
“He loves you.”
“Oh, that's too perfect. God knows what's happening to Ben, but it's all about him to you.”
Pike considered her.
“You don't like me.”
“I don't like the way violence follows you; you and him. I've known police officers all my life, and none of them live like this. I know federal and state prosecutors who've spent years building cases against murderers and mob bosses, and none of them have their children stolen—in New Orleans, for God's sake, and none of them draw violence like you! I was out of my mind to get involved in this.”
Pike considered her, then shrugged.
“I haven't heard the tape. All I know is what Starkey told us. Do you believe it?”
“No. Of course not. I told him so. Jesus, do I have to have that conversation again?”
She blinked, then crossed her arms, holding tight.
“Goddamnit, I hate to cry.”
Pike said, “Me, too.”
She rubbed hard at her face.
“I can't tell if that's a joke. I never can tell if you're joking.”
“If you don't believe those things, then trust him.”
She shouted now.
“It's about Ben. It's not about me or him or you. I have to protect myself and my son. I cannot have this insanity in my life. I am normal! I want to be normal! Are you so perverted that you think this is normal? It isn't! It is insane!”
She raised her fists as if she wanted to pound his chest. He would have let her, but she only stood with her hands in the air, crying.
Pike didn't know what else to say. He watched her for a time, then turned off the lights.
“Turn them on after I'm gone.”
He let himself out. He slipped down the stairs and through the shrubs, thinking about what she had said until he was alongside the Marquis. The windows were down. Fontenot was hunched low behind the wheel like a ferret peering over a log. Here was P
ike, ten feet away, and Fontenot didn't know. Pike hated him for it. Fontenot had seen Elvis come out of Lucy's apartment, and Pike hated him for having seen his friend in such pain. The empty moments that swirled around Pike filled with rage. Their growing weight became a tide. Pike could have killed Fontenot ten minutes ago, and thought about killing him now.
Pike moved closer to the Marquis. He touched the rear door. Fontenot didn't know. Pike slapped the roof, the sound as loud as a gunshot. Fontenot made a startled grunt as he jumped, and scrambled under his jacket for his gun.
Pike aimed at Fontenot's head. Fontenot went completely still when he saw Pike's gun. He relaxed a bit when he recognized Pike, but he was too scared to move.
“Jesus Christ, what are you doing?”
“Watching you.”
Fontenot's face floated at the end of Pike's gun like a target balloon. Pike tried to speak, but the wave of heavy moments drowned his voice into a whisper and threatened to carry him away.
“I want to tell you something.”
Fontenot glanced up and down the sidewalk like he expected to see someone else.
“You scared the shit out of me, you motherfucker. Where'd you come from? What in hell are you doin'?”
Pike emptied the moments as they washed over him. He fought the wave back.
“I want to tell you.”
“What?”
The moments emptied. Pike had control. He lowered the gun.
Fontenot said, “What is it you wanna say, goddamnit?”
Pike didn't answer.
He melted into the darkness. A few minutes later he was once more in the rubber tree, and Fontenot still didn't know.
Pike thought about Lucy and Elvis. Cole had never told him very much, either, but you didn't need to ask if you looked closely. The worlds that people build for themselves are an open book to their lives—people build what they never had, but always wanted. Everyone was the same that way.
Pike waited. Pike watched. Pike was.
The empty moments rolled past.
12
Family Man
His name was Philip James Cole until he was six years old. Then his mother announced, smiling at him as if she were giving him the most wonderful gift in the world, “I'm going to change your name to Elvis. That's a much more special name than Philip and James, don't you think? From now on, you're Elvis.”
Jimmie Cole, six years old, didn't know if his mother was playing a game. Maybe it was the uncertainty that made him so scared.
“I'm Jimmie.”
“No, now you're Elvis. Elvis is just the finest name, don't you think, just the finest name in the world? I would've named you Elvis when you were born but I hadn't heard of it yet. Go ahead and say it. Elvis. Elvis.”
His mother smiled expectantly. Jimmie shook his head.
“I don't like this game.”
“Say it, Elvis. That's your new name. Isn't it exciting? We'll tell everyone tomorrow.”
Jimmie started crying.
“I'm Jimmie.”
She smiled at him with all the love in the world, cupped his face in her hands, and kissed his forehead with warm, sweet lips.
“No, you're Elvis. I'm going to call you Elvis from now on and so is everyone else.”
She had been gone for twelve days. She did that sometimes, just up and left without saying a word because that was the way she was, a free spirit she called it, a crazy head case he had heard his grandfather say. She would vanish and her son would wake to find their apartment or trailer or wherever they were living that month empty. The boy would find his way to a neighbor where someone would call his grandfather or his mother's older sister and one of them would take him in until she returned. Every time she left he was angry with himself for having driven her away. Every day while she was gone he promised God he would be a better boy if only she'd come back.
“You'll be happy being an Elvis, Elvis, just wait and see.”
That night, his grandfather, an older man with pallid skin who smelled like mothballs, waved his newspaper in frustration.
“You can't change the boy's name. He's six years old, for Christ's sake. He has a name.”
“Of course I can change his name,” his mother said brightly. “I'm his mother.”
His grandfather stood, then sat again in a wide tattered chair. His grandfather was always angry and impatient.
“That's crazy, girl. What's wrong with you?”
His mother pulled and twisted her fingers.
“There is NOTHING wrong with me! Don't say that!”
His grandfather's hand flapped.
“What kind of mother runs off like you, gone for days without a word? Where do you come up with this crazy stuff like with this name? The boy has a name! You should get a job, for Christ's sake, I'm tired of paying your bills. You should go back to school.”
His mother twisted her fingers so desperately that Jimmie thought she would pull them off.
“There is NOTHING NOTHING NOTHING wrong with me! Something's wrong with YOU!”
She ran out of the tiny house and Jimmie ran after her, terrified that he would never see her again. Later, at their apartment, she spent the evening working with a small oil paint kit she had bought at the TG&Y, painting a picture of a red bird.
Jimmie wanted her to be happy, so he said, “That's pretty, Mama.”
“The colors aren't right. I can never make the colors right. Isn't that sad?”
Jimmie didn't sleep that night, fearful that she would leave.
The next day she acted as if nothing had happened. She brought Jimmie to school, marched him to the head of his first-grade class, and made the announcement.
“We want everyone to know that Jimmie has a new name. I want all of you to call him Elvis. Isn't that a really special name? Everyone, I want you to meet Elvis Cole.”
Mrs. Pine, a kindly woman who was Jimmie's teacher, stared at Jimmie's mother with a strange expression. Some of the kids laughed. Carla Weedle, who was stupid, did exactly what she was told. “Hello, Elvis.” All of the kids laughed. Jimmie bit his tongue so he would not cry.
His teacher said, “Mrs. Cole, may I speak with you, please?”
During lunch that day, a second-grader named Mark Toomis, who had a head shaped like a potato and four older brothers, made fun of him.
“What do you think you are, a rock and roll greaser? I think you're queer.”
Mark Toomis pushed him down and everyone laughed.
Three months earlier, his mother disappeared in the middle of summer. Like every other time she went away, Jimmie woke to find her gone. Like all the other times, she did not leave a note or tell him that she was going; she just went. They were living in a converted garage apartment behind a big house then, but Jimmie was scared to ask the old people who lived in the house if they knew where his mother was; he had heard them yelling at her about the rent. Jimmie waited all day, hoping that his mom hadn't really left, but by dark he ran crying to the house.
That night, his Aunt Lynn, who spent a lot of time on the phone whispering to his grandfather, fed him peach pie, let him watch television, and snuggled him on the couch. She worked at a department store downtown and dated a man named Charles.
His Aunt Lynn said, “She loves you, Jimmie. She just has her problems.”
“I try to be good.”
“You are a good boy, Jimmie! This isn't about you.”
“Then why does she leave?”
His Aunt Lynn hugged him. Her breasts made him feel safe.
“I don't know. She just does. You know what I think?”
“Uh-uh.”
“I think she's trying to find your father. Wouldn't that be great, if she found your daddy?”
Jimmie felt better after that, and even kind of excited. Jimmie had never met his father or even seen a picture of him. No one talked about him, not even his mom, and no one knew his name. Jimmie once asked if his grandfather knew his dad, but the old man had only stared at him.
“Your stupid mother probably doesn't even know.”
Jimmie's mom stayed gone five days that time, then, like always, returned without explanation.
Now, all these months later, that evening after her twelve-day absence and the announcement of Jimmie's new name, Jimmie and his mom were eating hamburgers at the tiny table in their kitchen.
He said, “Mommy?”
“What is it, Elvis?”
“Why did you change my name?”
“I gave you a special name because you're such a special little boy. I like that name so much I might change my own name, too. Then we would both be Elvis.”
Jimmie had spent most of the past twelve days thinking about what his Aunt Lynn told him that summer—that his mom was searching for his daddy when she went away. He wanted it to be true. He wanted her to find him and make him come home so that they could be a family like everyone else. Then she wouldn't go away anymore. He worked up his courage to ask.
“Were you trying to find my daddy? Is that where you went?”
His mother stopped with the hamburger halfway to her mouth. She stared at him for the longest time with a harsh cast to her eye, then put down her hamburger.
“Of course not, Elvis. Why ever would I do something like that?”
“Who's my daddy?”
She leaned back, her face playful.
“You know I can't tell you that. Your daddy's name is a secret. I can't ever tell anyone your daddy's name and I won't.”
“Was his name Elvis?”
His mother laughed again.
“No, you silly.”
“Was it Jimmie?”
“No, and it wasn't Philip, either, and if you ask me every other name that ever was I'll tell you no, no, no. But I will tell you one special thing.”
Jimmie grew scared. She had never told him anything about his father, and he suddenly wasn't sure he wanted to know. But she was smiling. Kinda.
“What?”
She slapped the table with both hands, her face as bright as an electric bulb. She leaned close, her face playful and gleaming.
“Do you really want to know?”
“Yes!”
His mother seemed alive with an energy that she could not contain. Her hands kneaded the edge of the table.