By the time Webster and Koenig slide Randall onto the stretcher, the cop has the rig waiting, the back door open. “I can feel the guy shivering right through the stretcher,” Webster says. “He’s in shock.”
Webster climbs in back with the patient and starts a line, the first of two. He can hear Koenig calling it in. Webster warms the IV liquid and jacks up the thermostat.
The guy is shivering so much, he can barely make himself understood. Webster wants to keep the guy talking and awake.
“So why did you do it?” Webster asks.
“Girlfriend.”
“Randall, stay with me. Look at me. You with me?”
Randall nods once.
“What about the girlfriend?” Webster asks.
“She died.”
It’s an answer Webster wasn’t expecting. “I’m sorry for your loss,” he says in a loud voice. “How did she die?” he asks while taking the man’s vitals.
“She killed herself,” the man says.
“Really,” Webster says.
“She jumped.”
Oh God.
Webster feels it coming on and tries to suppress it. The more he tries to suppress it, the worse it gets. A deep, cosmic laughter rumbles up through his chest.
He turns away from the patient just in time. Facing the back corner of the rig, Webster opens his mouth wide, suppressing the sound as best he can. Tears run down his cheeks, and he wipes them with his sleeves. The laughter stops. Webster catches his breath. Thinking it’s over, he starts to turn, and then has to whip back around. He puts an arm over his mouth. He can’t stop himself. He bites on his sleeve. He puts his forehead against the padding. The guy behind him says something unintelligible, which sets Webster off again. He pounds his fist into his palm to make himself stop. He keeps it up until he’s good to turn around again. Koenig pulls into the bay, Webster opens the doors, and he can see an ER nurse running toward him. Tears still in his eyes, he gives his report as quickly as he can. He motions with his head for Koenig to go in with the stretcher.
When Koenig comes out, Webster is in the passenger seat.
“What the hell happened to you?” Koenig asks. “I couldn’t believe my eyes.”
“Oh God,” Webster says. “I asked the guy why he tried to kill himself, and he said his girlfriend died. So I asked him how she died, and he tells me she jumped. And…” A high-pitched sound escapes him. Koenig shakes his head and starts laughing. Webster pushes the heel of his hand hard against his knee. Koenig snorts.
After a time, they stop.
“That was awful,” Webster says.
“That was pretty bad. You might be losing it.”
“I am losing it.” He remembers Rowan with the hose.
“We don’t ever have to talk about this again.”
“No, we don’t.”
Koenig puts the rig in gear and heads back to Rescue.
Chelsea seems to Webster to be a maze of industrial, abandoned, and triple-decker residential buildings. He makes his way to a water tower at the top of a hill and drives by what appears to be a hospital straight out of the First World War. When he passes the fire station, he searches for an attached building for Rescue, but can’t see one from the street. He drives past a church called Saint Rose and a number of flat-roofed buildings on a busy road.
In spite of his MapQuest directions, Webster can’t find the address. He’s sure he’s circled and recircled the same teal and brick school. Because he needs gas anyway, he pulls into a Mobil station and asks the guy there if he has a local map for sale. There are no Chelsea street maps in the stack, but the man asks him what he’s looking for and Webster gives him an address. The man, with the name Peña embroidered on his pocket, draws out the directions for Webster. Webster tries to thank the guy with a five, but he won’t take it. Webster buys a coffee and a doughnut.
Webster follows the new directions, paying attention at every turn, and finds himself driving up a residential hill. He spots the sign he wants and then the correct house number. He parks across the street.
The house is a triple-decker with asphalt shingles: pink on top, gray on the bottom. The building runs right up to the sidewalk with only a chain-link fence holding it back. He takes a long sip of the coffee and then a bite of the doughnut. The sun is high. From where Webster is parked, he can see that whoever lives in that house has a terrific view of the Boston skyline and of a large body of water. Boston Harbor? The Mystic River? On his side of the street, in front of a pale green vinyl-sided house are a pair of Virgin Marys cemented onto concrete pedestals that form a front gate. Adjacent to that house is a dwelling with a Santa in a fake well. It’s the last week of May. The porch is covered with linoleum tile.
Finding Sheila was easier than Webster imagined. According to the Internet, there were twenty-two Sheila Websters in Massachusetts, but only six Sheila Arsenaults, one of them in Chelsea. He couldn’t be sure that one was his ex-wife; maybe there was a large clan of Arsenaults in the city. And for all he knew, Sheila could have settled in New York or California. It would be nearly an eight-hour drive round trip, and Webster wondered if it was worth going just to find out he had the wrong Sheila. He thought of calling to make sure, but he didn’t want his first contact with her to be over the telephone. They had to see each other face-to-face.
He thought of calling McGill over at the police station and requesting a search through their records, but then they might discover an outstanding warrant for Sheila Arsenault that could cause her all sorts of problems. What was the statute of limitations on vehicular assault, anyway? Webster wanted only to see Sheila. Ever since Rowan came home drunk, he’s felt that she might be able to help him with his daughter. The plan isn’t well thought out—he’s come on an impulse, the urge to see Sheila strong. What does he think she can do? See Rowan? Talk to her? He can’t really imagine either.
Long after the coffee in the cup is cold and he’s finished the plain doughnut, he steps out of the car and walks over to the porch. There are three residences in the building, each with its own buzzer. The third buzzer has the name Arsenault beside it. He rings the bell.
He hears footsteps coming fast down an interior stairway. He braces himself. For all he knows, the cop from Chelsea might open the door.
“I wondered when you were going to come in.”
It’s Sheila, and it isn’t. He feels the same as he did at his twentieth high school reunion, seeing hidden faces within faces, features morphing as he watched. Only this time, the sensation is so interior that he feels he is observing himself change in a mirror.
“Sheila,” he says.
The hair is long and dark brown and gray near the temples. She must be forty-two now. She has on jeans and a plaid shirt, both paint-splattered. No shoes. There are crow’s-feet around her eyes, but the mouth is precisely as he remembers it. She’s slim but not athletic-looking.
“What are you doing here?” she asks.
Webster puts his hands in his pockets. “I came to talk to you about Rowan.”
There is no thought of shaking her hand or embracing her.
“You came from Vermont?” she asks.
“I did.”
She says nothing.
“Can I come in?” he asks.
She stands aside so that he can step over the threshold. He takes in the dark interior, the steep staircase, the stained glass in a side window.
She gestures with her hand toward the stairs. “Third floor,” she says. “All the way to the top.”
“You saw my car,” he says when he reaches the landing.
“Well, it’s a different cruiser. How many have you had?”
“Since the first, three.”
Since she drove away in the first.
“I thought it was an undercover stakeout. Then I saw the license plate.”
The scent of turpentine is strong. Webster follows Sheila into a large room with several windows on three sides. The sun makes rectangles against the white walls. There’s
a long wooden table that has on it paintbrushes in glasses, old rags, bottles of turpentine and linseed oil, a palette, dozens of squeezed tubes of color, and various rags. On the floor, all along the perimeter, are canvases of different sizes, each facing the wall.
“You’re a painter?” he asks.
She spreads her hands.
He knows nothing about the woman in front of him. They spent nearly three years together and fifteen apart. Though everything about her is somewhat familiar—her stance, the sound of her voice, her body, her gestures—she’s a stranger to him.
“I came to talk about Rowan,” he repeats.
“Is she all right?”
“She is, and she isn’t.”
“Is she sick?”
“No,” he says.
Sheila stands at the other side of the room, her arms crossed over her chest.
“Could I get a glass of water?” he asks.
She gives him a dull look, but walks past him. He follows her to the kitchen, cluttered but not unappealing. The table and the chairs have come from an older generation. The walls retain a printed wallpaper, definitely a relic from years ago. Utensils are lined up on hooks near the stove. Along another wall are bookcases, one shelf filled with cookbooks.
“You live here alone?” he asks.
She nods, turns on the tap, and lets the water run. She pours him a glass of water and sets it on the table. He reaches for it.
“You still living with your parents?” she asks.
“They died years ago,” Webster says.
“I’m sorry,” she says, and she looks as though she means it.
“I still live there,” Webster says. “I inherited the place.”
“My sister sold me this house for a buck. I grew up here.”
Webster is amazed at their civility. Shouldn’t they be screaming at each other? Weeping? Throwing things?
From where he stands, Webster can see planes coming in to Logan. That he would enjoy. Watching the five o’clock rush hour from that balcony out back. A beer in hand.
“What are you doing here?” Sheila asks again.
“I thought it might help. To talk to you about Rowan. She came home drunk a few nights ago. She’s not herself. She seems to be spiraling off the rails.”
Sheila is silent.
“Rowan’s changing. And not for the better.”
Sheila bites the inside of her cheek.
“She’s beautiful, Sheila. She looks just like you. She’s been a real good kid—up until now.”
Every cell in Sheila’s body has changed since he last saw her.
“Are you sober?” he asks.
“I am. Ten years.”
He’d taken a chance. He might have found a drunken Sheila.
“I assume we’re officially divorced,” she says.
“We are.”
“On what grounds?”
“Abandonment. It was all I had. My lawyer tried to find you, but you weren’t in the system anywhere.”
“What year was this?” she asks.
“Ninety-eight?” he replies, not quite sure.
“I was in Mexico.”
“I don’t think he tried very hard,” Webster says.
She twists her hair in the back and lets it fall onto one shoulder. It’s a gesture he remembers, and it startles him. It’s Rowan’s gesture now.
“So you’re not married?” he asks.
“No. Are you?”
He shakes his head. He points to a gold ring on the middle finger of her left hand.
“It belonged to someone I once loved,” she says.
Once loved.
A threadlike pain moves from one side of Webster’s chest to the other.
“I’m sorry,” Sheila says, “but I can’t do what you ask. I know you came all this way for a good reason. But you don’t know me anymore. You don’t know me at all.”
The silence in the kitchen lasts so long that Webster finds his breathing shallow. “She’s seventeen,” he says.
Sheila shakes her head.
“She thinks she’s an alcoholic. Or maybe I think she thinks she’s an alcoholic.”
“Is she?”
“She’s acting out, and it’s dangerous.”
Sheila winces. He notices that her hands are trembling.
“This is a shock. Your coming here.” She pauses. “I was her mother,” Sheila says, “and then I wasn’t. You of all people should know that. I severed the mother-daughter tie the minute I got in the car drunk with Rowan in the back.”
Webster thinks of reminding Sheila that it was he who sent her away, but he doesn’t want to argue about who is to blame. He sees no good outcome to that conversation.
“Will you at least think about it?” he asks.
“Meeting her?”
“I suppose so, yes.”
“You came all this way for nothing.”
“But you’ll think about it.”
Sheila was silent.
“May I see a painting?” Webster asks in desperation.
Sheila seems confused by the abrupt request. When she leaves the kitchen, Webster follows her. In the front room, she turns a painting around. It’s of an old wooden table, an aged plaster wall behind it, a shiny blue and white bowl on top of the table with a red chili pepper in the foreground. It’s beautifully executed. He recognizes the blue and white bowl. It used to be his mother’s, but she gave it to Sheila.
One by one, Sheila turns all the paintings around. He watches as she bends, handles each item with care, and then leans it against the wall.
Each is a domestic scene, painstakingly rendered. Another picture shows three bowls against the backdrop of the horrible flower-print curtains they had in their apartment. Another is of a cut lemon, so realistically painted that one can almost taste the juice. The background is the wallpaper in Sheila’s kitchen. Another is of a chair against a table, a trio of apples, and a book.
“They’re called sharp-focus still lifes,” Sheila says.
“Where did you learn to paint?”
“In Mexico.”
“You paint from memory.”
“I do.”
“They’re really very good,” Webster says.
“Thank you.”
There is a long silence between them. What does he hope? That she’ll change her mind right here?
“Well,” he says. “I’d better go.”
Reluctantly, he walks to the door. He examines Sheila for another few seconds. He wonders if this will be the last time he’ll ever see her. Her hands are tight fists. Her entire body is rigid.
He won’t beg. He won’t try to negotiate. In a way, he gets it.
“I shouldn’t have come,” Webster says.
Sheila opens her mouth and then closes it.
He jogs down the steps and shuts the front door behind him.
He drives furiously out of the city, having no idea where he’s going until he comes to a sign that reads, ENTERING QUINCY, which he knows is south of Boston and not where he wants to be. He pulls the cruiser onto a side road. He’s lucky he didn’t get a ticket.
He rolls down the window and breathes in metallic air.
He takes out his cell phone and punches in his daughter’s number. She picks up on the second ring. “Hello?” she whispers.
“Rowan, it’s Dad,” he says.
“I know.”
“I just wanted to see how you’re doing.”
“Dad?”
“Yup?”
“It’s twenty past one.”
“OK,” he says.
“I’m in history class. If I don’t hang up, Mr. Cahill is going to kill me.”
“Oh, sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
“You OK?” Rowan asks, still in a whisper.
“I’m fine. Talk to you later.”
Webster leans his head back and shuts his eyes. He decides he’ll stop at the first decent restaurant he finds and eat a proper meal. Then he’ll find a map and drive like a normal person ba
ck to Hartstone.
Caddyshack is in the DVD player for the hundredth time. The probies watch it over and over during their first three months. They need the mindless laughter to calm their nerves.
The radio sounds out the tones at 3:10 a.m. Powell, a probie who has the haircut of a marine and the skinny frame of a geek, pops up from the couch like a jack-in-the-box.
“Attention, Hartstone. We need a crew at 35 High Street. Fifty-one-year-old female, difficulty breathing and severe chest pain.”
Webster responds: “602 and 704 in the building. Any other info?”
“Patient made the call. Appears to be alone.”
“You drive,” he tells Powell as they run to the rig.
It’s Webster’s first shift with the kid, and he needs to monitor him as well as take care of the patient. Webster glances at the speedometer. “You want to push it as high as you can without danger of causing an accident. Almost all rig accidents take place in intersections.”
The probie is memorizing acronyms. Webster can see it on his face.
“Remember how to get to each call, not only because you might be called back to the same place, but because it’s the best way to learn the geography. Though you should be studying the maps, too. You studying the maps?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Name’s Webster. We don’t do sir.”
“Understood.”
“Where did you train?”
“Saint John’s Hospital. This was the only job I could find.”
“You move here?”
“Yes.”
“Family?”
“No.”
Webster shakes his head. The guy’s probably renting a single room in someone’s home. Bathroom down the hall. A probie’s salary is grim. “You ever had a code ninety-nine before?”
“Just in training.”
The house is at the end of a driveway badly in need of a regrade. Powell has to slow down for a massive bump.
The probie takes the backboard and his jump kit. Webster has the med box and a flashlight. They walk straight in and find a middle-aged woman sitting forward on a kitchen chair, a large cooking pot by her feet. Webster can smell the vomit.