Me for You Page 10

  He breathed in deeply and continued toward his car, a breeze cooling his forehead. His wife’s practicality seemed to follow beside him now, and his fist loosened around the satchel filled with sheet music. This morning, he’d woken late after his poor night’s sleep. He’d showered, donned the tuxedo, which always made him too warm, grabbed his coffee out of the coffeemaker without stopping for his usual rye toast spread with cottage cheese. No wonder he was light-headed and off-kilter.

  Now there was work to be done. The detective needed his help. All-business Jensen. Rudy dug into his suit jacket pocket for the card the detective had coolly handed him. It was made of thick, stiff paper, with simple Helvetica type—masculine, savvy, in the know. Before reaching his Volvo, Rudy turned back toward the mall. What if it was Jensen who had paged him? Perhaps there’d been an important development in the murder case. It was no time to flee like a child! What was the matter with Rudy! Well, what wasn’t? And what did he care at this point? He opened the car door, tossed his music into the back seat, took off his jacket, saw sweat stains creeping toward his waist, slid back into the hateful top layer, and relocked the car.

  People stepped out of his way as Rudy jogged back through the mall, this time grabbing a doughy pretzel and Coke, not even caring that he was a sweaty, middle-aged man in a tuxedo scarfing mall junk food and running red-faced past Victoria’s Secret. Escalator, that fancy tea shop where the tea tasted like air freshener, the circle of leather chairs where people collapsed as though they’d been shot. He took long strides into the department store, brushing crumbs from his lips and straightening his posture. Just past the restrooms on the second floor he found customer service and then the tall counter where the employee relations woman stood watch outside the company offices.

  “Pardon me.” Rudy drew air through his nose to catch his breath. “I am Rudolph Knowles, one of the store’s pianists, and my name was called . . .” He pressed his palm to the countertop, grateful that his hands had stopped wobbling. “I’ve been paged, it seems. What shall I do?”

  “One moment.” The woman pointed a long eggplant-colored fingernail through her coiffed hair to scratch at her scalp. Her hair was alarmingly red, with an amber stripe through it—one long highlight that made a dramatic swoop across her forehead. She was dressed in a crisp white blouse and black pencil skirt. She picked up a telephone and punched in two numbers. “Mr. Rudolph Coal is here? He’s been paged?”

  “Knowles,” Rudy corrected her.

  The woman nodded, covering the receiver with her long white fingers. “Sorry,” she mouthed to him. “Rudolph Knowles? He’s our pianist!” She said this last word with a reverence that touched Rudy. “Yes. Knowles. Rudolph Knowles. No? Hunh. Okay. Perhaps he misheard. Thank you.”

  “Gosh, Mr. Knowles,” the woman said apologetically, replacing the receiver and throwing up her hands. “They say they didn’t page you.” She smiled, and Rudy thought of all the effort it took for a person just to arrive to work at a place like this—the unwelcome alarm clock, finding a white shirt without a splotch, tights or stockings without runs, the coiffing and caffeinating and the this-won’t-be-forever pep talk as you trudged along at twenty miles an hour merging in a funnel onto the freeway.

  “Ah, well thank you so much.” The fluorescent lights buzzed like cicadas in Rudy’s head. He tried to smile at the woman, realizing she was probably barely thirty.

  “You know, I wish I’d never quit my piano lessons,” she mused. “You play so beautifully.”

  “Everyone always wishes they’d stuck with it,” Rudy said a bit bashfully. “But it’s hard to imagine people notice the piano that much here,” he added, his eyes wandering up to the industrial fluorescent lighting above.

  “Oh, people love it,” the woman cooed. “It kind of makes you feel like you’re at a party, you know. Like maybe you’ll pick up something special and fun.”

  “That seems to be the idea,” Rudy agreed. “Well then. Good day, I must be running.” He wanted to ask the woman everything about the paging system. But he forced himself to make Jensen his top priority.

  He waved to her as he headed toward the elevators. They were hidden beyond gift wrap and returns and lord knew what else. He jogged toward the escalator instead.

  Then on the way back down the escalator he almost did a double take when he heard it again, “Rudolph Knowles, Rudolph Knowles. Keep moving.” Well yes! Obviously! But where to? Or just in general? Time for a change? Or speed it up to solve the mystery of his wife’s . . . he could not even think the word. He forced himself, pressing his lips together to form an em sound. “Murder,” he whispered to himself. He did not want to know.

  “Rudy Knowles . . .” Rudy reached the bottom floor, turned, and broke into a run past the Lancôme counter and out the store. He would have liked to throttle the PA system woman and her velvet, amber-honey voice. It was smoother than the automated telephone ladies, than the bossy GPS ladies, than any person he had ever known in his life. And yet, with so little to say!

  “Rudolph . . .” He covered an ear with one hand, and as he tried to bring his other hand to his head, he hit a sign on a stand announcing some kind of store sale and kept running as it slapped the floor behind him. He passed the coffee cart near the store’s entrance, the usually pleasant smell of coffee making him gag now. As he burst out the door of the damn store leading to the proper outside of the mall, back into the heat of the day, the bright sun scorched an immediate headache into his forehead. He saw a garbage can ahead and had the overwhelming and unsavory urge to bury his head inside it, escaping from the sights and sounds of this awful day.

  He would drive straight to the detective’s office and tell him about being paged by the phantom PA lady. He’d tell him every single detail. He didn’t care if Jensen thought he was crazy. Maybe this was a clue of some kind! The voice was as clear and calm as every single one of the pages Rudy had heard before. There continued to be an undeniable certainty to it. Maybe he was losing his mind. Who cared? That was the thing about losing the person you loved most. There wasn’t much to lose after that.

  12

  Detective Jensen’s office was in a low, concrete building beside the main police station. Inside, the air was chalk-dry and smelled of photocopier ink, burned coffee, and stale take-out food. The brown-and-tan checked floor felt gritty beneath Rudy’s loafers. Suddenly the industrial, outdated feel of this place made him appreciate the department store’s glamour—even if it was fabricated.

  A woman at a desk in the appointed “ROOM 353” slid open part of the Plexiglas window surrounding her to greet Rudy. Jensen was ready for him. Rudy was perspiring already, even though he’d showered after shedding his work tux and changed into a cool cotton dress shirt and khakis. He was relieved when the receptionist led him into Jensen’s normal-looking office and not some sort of interrogation room from a TV detective show. Rudy had been to a number of places he didn’t want to be since Bee left him—the funeral parlor, a cheesy hotel bar on an Internet date—but this had to top them all.

  Jensen stood, shook Rudy’s hand across the desk.

  “Thank you for coming in.” His hand was warm but dry, his handshake firm.

  “Did I have a choice?” Rudy thought of Jensen’s stacked-up phone messages. How just the sight of the business card the detecive had presented at the store gave him heartburn. Murder. He took one of the two chairs before the big faux wooden desk.

  “Your cooperation is helpful.” To be fair, Jensen seemed gentler in his own surroundings. Maybe it was the mortification of having a detective show up at your place of work that had made him seem more severe upon their first meeting. In front of Sasha, the Prada ladies, and a sea of strangers and well-dressed mannequins.

  Jensen’s office had thin, worn, pine-green carpet and cinder-block walls that had been painted an institutional Silly Putty color. The one window in his office looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in a year. Through it lay a view of a driveway, a chain-link fence, then
a park.

  “Nice place ya got here.” Rudy was not a sardonic person by nature. But it was all he knew to say in this outrageous situation.

  At that moment the woman from reception came in to offer them coffee or Cokes.

  “The two staples of our diet.” Jensen smiled. “I’d recommend the Coke at this hour.”

  The receptionist agreed to get them two Cokes. She quickly returned with cans and straws, and Rudy had to admit the cold beverage soothed his nerves. He realized now that his agitation had made him clench his jaw to the point of a headache. He massaged his temples with one hand, while the other gripped the cold Coke.

  “I’d just like to ask you a few questions about your wife, about her work.” Jensen leaned forward, elbows and arms on his desk, hands clasped.

  Rudy nodded. How about I ask you a question or two? he thought, the dialogue from random cop shows replaying in his mind.

  “Did your wife like her job?”

  “Loved it. Was great at it. Was beloved in return by everyone in the hospital.” Rudy felt irked by the fact that Jensen didn’t know this.

  “Of course,” Jensen agreed mechanically. “Did she ever say anything about a fellow coworker who seemed troublesome?”

  Rudy shook his head. “I don’t believe so, no. She was funny, you know.” He felt his voice speed up with defensiveness, defending Bee’s stalwart honor. “We always traded stories about our days at dinner. Bethany’s stories were often funny. But her humor . . . it was never at the expense of others.”

  “Sure,” Jensen said, seemingly disinterested. His concern was a little too cool, too robotic. Had his line of work just numbed him into placidness as bland as the slightly lumpy, oatmeal-colored cinder-block walls surrounding him? “But did she ever express concern? Maybe if you think back, you’ll remember something you didn’t take seriously at the time.”

  Are you a human being, god damn it? Rudy wanted to shout. Rudy could not help the anger that coursed through him, slamming his Coke on the edge of Jensen’s blotter before him. He hadn’t meant to do this, the arm and hand just flailed and pounded on its own, causing Jensen to jump back in his seat a little.

  “You asked me a question,” Rudy said through gritted teeth, “and I answered it. I don’t recall her being worried about any particular employee. She was head pharmacist; she trained many pharmacy techs and cashiers. It’s a very difficult and detailed job. Some of the kids were surly, sure. But she was not a person anyone, anyone, would want to harm.”

  “I get that perfectly,” Jensen assured Rudy. “But we are talking about a sociopath or a psychopath here. You must understand that I am not implying that your wife was in any way a target due to a flaw of hers. Or that either of you missed any warning signs that would have changed the outcome. Ironically, an admirable, lovable person may be a target in a situation like this. And we don’t even know if that is the case.”

  “Great. It pays to be an asshole.” Rudy gulped from his soda, anger making it feel as though his blood were bubbling in his head.

  “Was there any troublesome employee in particular? In the last year she worked there?” Jensen looked a little desperate the more he leaned over his desk. “I’m not interrogating you. Please. I’m asking for your help, with anything you can remember. Anything that sticks out.”

  Now Rudy did remember. “Some kid with a cowboy name and an attitude. He was a good worker but a handful. You know, she shared that on one particular bad day that she had.”

  “Bad day?”

  “Bad day,” Rudy snapped. “Ever had one?” Help, he tried to tell himself.

  Jensen rubbed his face. Rudy imagined this was a grueling day for the detective, too. The guy looked tired. Circles under his eyes, puffy and brownish and droopy all at the same time. There was a Texas-shaped stain of something on his tie. Lunch at his desk, probably. One of those deals where you try to blot it out and it just gets bigger. Rudy wasn’t sure why, but it was the thought of Jensen trying to get his lunch off his tie that made him feel for the guy. And the photos—turned at an angle so that Rudy could see—of a wife and kids. Three kids, all under the age of teenagers, it looked like.

  Rudy picked up the photo closest to him, of the whole gang and looked at it. Tears pricked the corners of his eyes. Jesus, was it possible to be any more emotional? Wanting to flip this guy’s desk over one minute and crying at a family of kids with dubious haircuts the next?

  “These yours?” he asked Jensen, his voice lowering.

  “Yep. My wife, oldest boy, and the Irish twins.”

  “Just imagine . . .” Rudy tried to keep his voice even and calm. “Just imagine that your wife didn’t wake up one morning. She seemed fine, then you couldn’t rouse her, then paramedics are busting into the joint. Then she’s dead.”

  Jensen nodded slowly.

  “You get through that. Through the nightmare daymare eerily unreal days. The funeral, casseroles, condolence cards, flowers, and then, then—” Rudy’s hand involuntarily smashed the desk again, the side of his pinky finger feeling bruised and broken—a pain that shot to his heart, equally bruised and broken. “Then come the platitudes. AT LEAST SHE DIDN’T FEEL ANY PAIN! AT LEAST SHE DIED PEACEFULLY! HAVE YOU EVER SEEN A DEAD PERSON?”

  Jensen nodded, of course he had. The receptionist peeked in. Jensen gave her a nod to say everything was okay.

  “THEY DO NOT LOOK PEACEFUL!”

  “I know,” Jensen agreed. “I know. Even a death causing zero exterior trauma to the body. I know. I’m sorry. Your wife seems like she was really, really lovely.”

  “She was.” Rudy massaged his fist-pounding hand, unable to look up at Jensen, not wanting him to see the tears—tears, always betraying him!—creeping down his face, catching in the stubble on his chin.

  “I didn’t realize she managed the entire pharmacy.”

  “What are you doing then if you’re not gathering that kind of info?” Rudy looked up, quickly wiping the tears away with his fingertips.

  “We are looking into every aspect of this suspect’s life—place of residence, family, work history . . .”

  Rudy nodded. Outside, a whistle rang out, and there was the cheer and chatter of children in the park beyond the fence. Rudy had finished his Coke. With his good hand he crunched the can.

  “Listen, I know this isn’t easy.” Jensen rocked back in his chair, a tilting thing on wheels.

  Rudy wanted to tell Jensen that he did not know, could not—but somehow he sensed now that the man across the desk had seen enough to know death all too well. And he was not a platitude guy.

  “Especially given that it’s a week away from the anniversary of your wife’s death. Of Bethany’s death.”

  It was? A year? Rudy was flustered. He studied the big calendar tucked into the blotter on the desk. He wanted to see the whole year, but there it was in big squares—the month of June, when Bee died. The cheerful California poppies blooming again, as though nothing had ever happened. The neighborhood kids with towels slung around their shoulders heading for the community pool swim-team practice as though nothing had ever happened.

  “It is?” Rudy stared at the calendar as though imploring it to speak to him.

  Jensen nodded.

  It was. Eight days until June 6. One year. Bee wasn’t out of town at a pharmacists’ convention. She wasn’t at her sister’s in the Midwest. She wasn’t at work that afternoon, wouldn’t be home for dinner.

  “Oh.” Rudy’s rage gave way to heaviness upon him. A leaden blanket over his shoulders, quicksand around his legs, his arms as heavy as logs, his hands burning and aching from hitting the desk. A fog rolled into the office, making the beige walls blurry. Beyond the window the kids had been herded in from the park, dark clouds and asphalt taking their place.

  Jensen bent his head to meet Rudy’s eye. “Listen, I’ll have more questions about this one fellow your wife found difficult, but not today. I have a lead into what he’s been up to that might help, and I want to explore that first.
The fact that you made that connection to him was very, very helpful. I think you are speaking of the same fellow.”

  “What’s the kid’s name?” Rudy’s urge to kill this employee, murder him right back, had been reconstituted as sheer despair.

  “I can’t divulge that, but we have him in custody, so there’s no need for you to worry.”

  Worry. Rudy wasn’t worried. He was sick. He had the flu. He wanted to crawl under the desk, under the 1950s-style tile floor, and sleep until forever.

  Jensen reached his hand across the desk. As Rudy rose to shake it, he held on for too long, using it as leverage to get up out of the soul-sucking chair. They exchanged goodbyes, Jensen repeating sorry and thank you and promises to get to the bottom of all this.

  Rudy nodded in response to each of these statements, the magnet under the floor too strong to allow for speech. One year. Bee gone. He had raged into the place like a lion and was going out like a lamb. Like an ox. He plodded out of the detective’s offices and slowly down the grim hallway, the double doors at the other end too far away, too far away from his bed, which was all Rudy could think of now. His side, Bee’s side, all of their pillows and the duvet. He missed being married. The living with your best friend part of it. The finishing each other’s sentences one moment and angrily zinging Scrabble tiles perilously close to your partner’s eye the next. Sharing the secretly winging-it fear of parenting with whispers in bed at night.

  “She got her period today,” Bee had informed Rudy late one evening.

  “She what? She’s twelve!”

  “Girls are starting a little younger now, they say. Hormones in the milk, improved prenatal care, who knows.” They were watching a terrible comedy on television, talking during the commercials.