told you I went through all this with the police last summer. It was an accident, ok?”
“Vince,” Julie spoke up, “we’re not here to blame you. Its just there are so many unanswered questions I have. Vince?” she paused.
“Yeah?” he looked in Julie’s eyes for a split second before looking away.
“That was Davey that died,” she started to cry. “Remember Davey, Vince? Remember how much he looked up to you? Remember how he always made everyone happy? How he’d make you laugh impersonating all the crazy customers at Jiffy Lube? How he’d do anything for you? And, for Pat? And, Uncle Eric? I can’t live with just hearing it’s an accident. I can’t,” Julie pulled the long sleeves of shirt up.
“Jesus, Julie,” Vince said shocked. “Shit.”
“There has to be more to it,” Raven spoke up for the first time. “That’s why we’re here.”
Vince shook his head. “I swore I’d never say anything to anybody about that night,” he said looking down at his feet.
“Swore to who?” Jorge asked.
Vince kept shaking his head.
“Vince,” Julie said, “you’ll never be able to live with this if you don’t talk.”
“Believe us,” Raven said, “she’s telling you the truth. You don’t want to end up like the three of us. We couldn’t talk about we’d been through and now we’re in therapy with the crazies. It’s like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in there. Lobotomies, people drooling on themselves, it’s not a good scene.”
Jorge and Julie nodded in agreement.
Vince looked scared.
“It starts with nightmares, like you’re having now,” Jorge said, “then the nightmares start stalking you during the day, like the Grim Reaper with his scythe, only you’ll end up wishing he’d cut your head off, just to put you out of your misery.”
“Look,” Vince said quickly, his skin ashen and beads of perspiration across his upper lip.
“I held his hand after the boat flipped,” Vince began. “I was treading water and I took his hand and I placed it high on the bottom of the boat, right on the ridge that runs the length of it. I didn’t let go ‘til he had a good hold. Pat, he wasn’t far from me and Davey. Pat was talking to him, too. Telling him everything was going to be ok. That we’d be right back with a vest for him. Just to hold on. We’d be right back.”
“Where was my uncle?” Julie asked, her breath catching in between sobs.
Jorge reached over and took Julie’s hand and held it in his. Raven put her head on Julie’s shoulder.
“Where was Eric, Vince?” Julie asked again.
“I didn’t see him, Julie. Even though the moon was full and it was real bright on the water that night. I remember the ripples on the water when I was swimming back to shore, how the moonlight bounced off them.”
“You mean you didn’t see Uncle Eric when you and Pat were in the water with Davey?”
“No, I didn’t see him. I mean, we started taking on water and I remember Davey got sick and I told him it was ok, that it just happens sometimes, you know? I knew Davey was afraid of the water. Anyone who knew Davey knew that. But, it all happened so fast. The boat flipped and I swam right away to Davey. Pat, too. We were right there by him, I mean seconds after it happened, we were there. But, Eric must have took off to shore ‘cause he was gone. I’ve wracked my brain trying to find him there, there on the water with the three of us, and he’s just not there. He left us, man. Eric left us,” Vince said one more time, as though he still couldn’t wrap his brain around it.
“What happened next?” Raven asked.
“Me and Pat swam to the shore. We told Davey we’d be right back for him,” Vince’s voice broke. “To hold on, we’d be back. We’d almost made it to land when Davey started calling for us. But, it sounded garbled, like he was yelling under water. I hit the shore first and there was Eric, just standing there, watching the whole scene play out. I remember I yelled at him, `Eric! Do something, damnit! Davey needs you!’ Davey heard me say Eric’s name ‘cause he started calling for him, too.”
“`That little punk’ll pull you under if you go back out there.’ That’s all Eric said. I heard the sirens coming as Pat and I hit the water to go back for Davey, just like we’d promised,” he looked at Julie then. “We went back for him, Julie. We went back, but it was too late. Me and Pat dove and dove in that dark water trying to find him. I wasn’t giving up. Pat swam back to talk to the police, but I didn’t leave. I didn’t leave Davey ‘til they grabbed me and pulled me into one of the police boats. The police made me stop, Julie. They said if Davey was in the water, it’d been too long. And, they’d be looking for me next if I didn’t go back.”
“I never knew you tried to save him, Vince,” Julie said between sobs. “Thank you for trying to save my brother, Vinny. Thank you so much.”
Raven lifted up and took her hands and gently wiped some of Julie’s tears away. “You’re giving me a shower, Julie,” Raven said crying, too. “And I already had my shower today, girl.”
“I want to thank Pat, too, Vince,” Julie said still crying.
“You can’t get near Pat right now, Julie. He’s got a warrant out for his arrest. He got busted for shoplifting and then skipped out on the hearing. I heard all he took was a gallon of milk for his sister’s kids, but I don’t know. I haven’t seen him in months. Before that, that’s all we’d talk about: that night. If there was anything we could have done differently. If we had just stayed with Davey ‘til the police came.”
“But,” Jorge jumped in, “you didn’t know they were coming.”
Vince nodded. “But, still there had to have been something we did wrong, or could have done better, something. That’s what me and Pat did: sat together and went over and over and over that night. Pat’s just as tore up about it as I am, Julie,” Vince said. “I think he started to shoplift as a cry for help. I know it sounds crazy, but it was as though he wanted to get caught. Or, maybe he felt he should be punished for that night.”
“No,” Julie shook her head, “no, you and Pat stayed with him. You tried, Vince. You went back. I don’t hold you responsible, you or Pat. I just needed to hear from you what really happened.”
“I wish I could tell you it ended with me saving Davey, but we know that didn’t happen,” he said sadly looking at the three of them. “Julie?” Vince said.
“Yeah, Vinny?”“I always thought Eric called the police that night, that would explain why he left us out there, why I didn’t see him, even on the shore while we were in the water.”
“But you know someone else called, don’t you?” Jorge asked.
Vince nodded his head. “Eric never talked about that night with me or with Pat. He never said a word. We tried. Me and Pat both planned it all out a few times, just what to say to bring it up real gentle. But, Eric would get a whiff of it and tell us to shut up and get the hell out of his apartment. Then, he stopped answering the door when we’d go over, even though his Pontiac would be parked outside. He changed his number so we couldn’t call. Eric broke all ties with us, like we were to blame somehow. That did a real number on my head, too: knowing the truth, but pretending like that reality was false somehow. Like me and Pat were the crazy ones, not the other way around.”
“Eric never showed any remorse?” Jorge asked.
“No, none,” Vince said sadly. “And, the police ruled it was an accident even though Pat said when he heard Eric talking to the officers that night, he didn’t show any emotion then either.”
“I remember when Mom called over to him that night, right when we first got there, he just ignored her,” Julie added.
“Strange way for a guy to act who just lost his nephew, don’t you think?” Jorge asked.
Julie, Raven, and Vince all nodded
“So, what are we going to do about it?” Jorge asked. “Because I think this asshole needs to pay.”
“Me, too,” Ju
lie sniffed. “I don’t care if he is my uncle. I think he killed my brother,” she cried and a whole new barrage of tears followed.
“Vince?” Jorge asked. “You in on this with us?”
Vince nodded
“You feeling better, Vince, after talking?” Raven asked kindly. “You did the right thing, Vince, you know you did, right?”
“I feel like this big weight has been lifted off me,” Vince confided. “I wish Pat was here, too, that’s all. I wish he could have talked, too.”
“Whatever we do,” Jorge said, “we’re doing it for Davey. And, for my hermano, Tino, and for Raven’s aunt and for DSS for stealing her baby brother, and we’re doing it for you and Pat, too,” Jorge said. “And,” he said reaching for Julie’s hand again and taking Raven’s, “we’re doing if for the three of us.”
“Let’s give it some time, ok, Jorge?” Raven asked. “Let’s give ourselves some time to think about what we’re doing, to plan it out real careful like, and, not a word of this to anybody, right?”
“Right,” Jorge, Vince, and Julie said together.
“I mean to nobody. Not our moms,” Raven said looking at Julie, “not to a brother or sister, not even to God,” Raven said teasingly to Vince. “Not a soul knows of this except the four of us right here, right now.”
35
The Plan
“What did you guys come up with?” Julie asked as she and Raven plopped down on Jorge’s bed.
“We’ve been tossing around some ideas