Chapter Five

The next morning I vacuumed the broken glass from my car and taped up the window with plastic. Then I went back inside and folded my laundry. I found the crumpled remains of Rachel's business card in the bottom of the dryer. It was unreadable, and I couldn't remember the name of the salon she worked for. I cursed and went to get the phone book. There was no listing for Rachel Bentley, though I did see her sister Beth's number. I checked the yellow pages for hair salons but there were two pages of listings.

It was Twelve-Fifteen, and I was already late for lunch at my mother's. She had planned this a week ago, complaining that she never saw her son anymore. I grabbed the wine from the fridge and left.

I never looked forward to these lunch dates with my mother. It had nothing to do with the fact that my mother, like my father, was a constant reminder of a life I just assume forget. After Glenn was killed, my mother and father both consumed themselves with their grief. There was room for nothing else, surely not each other, or life as they knew it, or their one remaining son. I learned early on that grief was selfish. But I understood why they had cut me out of their lives after Glenn's death. I, too, had known the grief of death. And I, too, had cut people I loved out of my life so I could revel in the joy of the pain. No, what made me dread lunches with my mother was not so much the past as the present. My mother was surely the most well-adjusted of our little clan, in fact she now had more than made up for not being present when I was younger. She called me weekly, and made it a point to get together with me at least twice a month. But when we got together, we both went right to work, and what work it was. There were so many things that we both knew were best left unsaid, so many lines we knew we couldn't cross. We were masters of small talk, my mother and I, never speaking in depth on any subject. Lunch with my mother was exhausting.

"It's been so long, Shawn. How have you been?" She asked as we sat in the living room, sipping the white zinfandel. She always talked as if we hadn't seen each other in months, when in reality I had taken her to lunch just the week before. I always played the game, though.

"Not bad. Yourself?"

She smiled the fake smile of mother's accustomed to lying to their children. I had seen that smile often growing up, had watched it put out for display more than once for my brother just before he died. And for me just after. "I went down to see that banker you told me about."

"And?"

She rolled her eyes. "And he's no better than the others. Fees for this, fees for that. He acted as though he was doing me a favor by taking my money and storing it in his precious little vault. No thank-you."

I reached for my glass of wine. "You mean to tell me you still haven't deposited that money?"

"No, and why should I? All those bankers are crooks. By the time they get through with all their fees there won't be a dime left."

I returned my wine glass to the coffee table, already half empty. "Mom, it's not safe to keep that kind of cash in your house. In this case they are doing you a favor. Someone's going to break in here one night and that'll be the end of that."

"And why should you care? You're the one who gave it to me because you just couldn't take it." There was a dull challenge in her eyes, and as usual I was roused to that challenge when it came to my mother.

"I care because it's dangerous! I could care less about the money!You've had it lying around the house for six months now!" My attack was short and furious, and I regained both my wine glass and my composure together. "Take it to the bank."

"It hasn't been lying around the house. I've got it hidden in a safe place."

"Take it to the bank, mom."

She wrinkled her face at me, a look as adept at deflecting emotions as portraying them, and took a sip of her wine.

"Have you been to the cemetery lately?" she asked.

She crossed the line, and I was caught off guard.

"Just last week," I lied. I drained my wine glass and got up. "What's for lunch?"

I walked into the kitchen. I wondered if she was going to let it go at that, if she would let me escape so easily. She came into the kitchen behind me.

  "Lemon pasta," she answered. "Do you want to eat in the living room?"

"Yeah, I'll get the plates."

We sat on the couch with our plates on our laps. I turned on the television as a deterrence to further conversation. We ate in silence, watching Wheel of Fortune reruns. As I ate I looked around the living room at all the pictured she had of Glenn on the wall. My heart suddenly stung for her, but just briefly.

"I have a date tomorrow night," she said as I was washing the dishes.

"A date!" I exclaimed in feigned excitement. She smiled at me.

"Yes, a date. I met him at the racquet club."

"I thought that after the last date you might still be having second thoughts about men."

"This guy seems nice."

I finished the dishes and dried my hands.

"Good," I said. "But this time, no leading with your left. Give this guy a chance. We're not all that bad, you know."

I grabbed my coat from the closet.

"Leaving already?" she asked.

I should have stayed and asked her all about her upcoming date. I knew she wanted me to, but I had to get home and make a phone call, to Rachel's sister, Beth. I sensed deep inside that this was why things had fallen apart between Jane and I near the end, that I was never there when people really needed me. But since I was in the habit of running away from all that, I fled my mother's need that afternoon.

"I have to get home. I might have a date, too." I gave her a hug. "Next time, lunch at my place. I'll call you."

She stood in the doorway and watched me as I drove away.

When I got home, I greeted Heidi hastily and went for the phone book. I flipped the pages quickly. There it was. Beth's phone number. That's when I stopped. I still had misgivings about Rachel Bentley. But then I remembered the look she had given me at Shabooms. There was something wrong, and she had reached out to me. To me!

I dialed and sat at the kitchen table.

"Hello." The voice was Beth's, but its tone was somehow different.

"Hi, Beth. This is Shawn. Shawn Foster."

There was silence and for a moment I thought she had hung up on me.

"Shawn? Hi!" Her voice suddenly regained its familiar candor. "It's been so long. How are you?"

"Good, Beth. Yourself?"

"I'm good."

"Beth, the reason I called is that I saw Rachel last night and I didn't get a chance to talk with her and I was wondering if you maybe had her number."

I said it quickly. I was conscious that perhaps I said it too quickly.

"Sure," she said. "Hold on."

She came back on the phone a moment later.

"So you didn't get a chance to talk with her?"

"No. She left before I could even say hello, but I thought I'd give her a call."

I started fidgeting with the plastic salt shaker on the table.

"I can give you her work number," she said.

"Do you have her home number?"

"Her phone's been disconnected."

"Oh."

"Well, more like pulled off the wall."

I heard a change in her voice, a reversion to that strange tone.

"Pulled off the wall?"

"Yeah. Her boyfriend ripped it off the wall. Seems too many guys have been calling her, or the other way around."

"He sounds like a real winner."

I wondered if he was the man I saw Rachel with at Shabooms. I also wondered what I was getting myself into.

"He's been in and out of jail, Shawn. Mostly for drugs."

I put down the salt shaker I had been holding.

"Jesus, Beth. Could Rachel be in some sort of trouble?"

"If what I've told you isn't trouble, then I don't know what is," she said, matter- of-factly.

I picked up the salt shaker again and squeezed it tightly. The bottom popped off and salt poured onto the table. "Shit," I said, and put it down in annoyance. "Doesn't she want to leave this guy?"

"I don't know. I guess she thinks she's in love or something. I haven't talked to her in over a month, ever since Cory threatened Jeff."

"Cory?"

"The asshole. He put Jeff through a window for not minding his own business. I mean he really beat the shit out of him. You should've seen him."

"What did Jeff do?"

"What could he do? His sister is living with this drug dealer, and she didn't at all make it too clear that she wanted to leave him, even after he broke her own brother's nose. So he hasn't bothered with her since. I don't blame him. I haven't either."

I sensed our conversation was coming to an end. "What about the cops? Has anyone gone to the police about this guy?"

"What are the police gonna do, Shawn? They know all about Cory and his dealing and they haven't done a goddamn thing yet." Beth let out a quick breath. "I have my own troubles, you know. I'm getting married soon. " Beth Bentley had told me everything she had wanted to say. She gave me Rachel's work number at a place called A Cut Above.

"By the way," I said, before she could hang up. "What does your father think of all this?"

"My father? How should I know? We haven't heard from him in over a year, ever since he ran off with some underage girl to Tijuana."

"Jesus Beth. Your poor mother. How's she doing with all this?"

There was a brief silence, and then a deep breath.

"Oh, you don't know. My mother passed away last year."

"No. I'm sorry." I stared at the broken salt shaker, stunned. "I didn't know."

"My mother was the only one who really cared what happened to Rachel, except for me, of course. But what can I do? Rachel has her own life to lead. Besides, if she didn't want Jeff's help, then she surely doesn't want mine. But anyhow, it was nice talking to you again. If you see Rachel why don't you try talking some sense into her. Maybe she'll listen to you. You two had a good thing once. I've really got to go. Bye."

I hung up the phone. I turned my attention to the spilled salt that was a tiny white hill on the table. Rachel was cursed with a family like my own, too caught up in themselves to help her when she truly needed it. It was time to set all things right, with Rachel, and with myself. But how many people had I failed in the past? How many had fallen prey to my keen ability to lay waste to their trust in me? Rachel, Glenn. I thought of Jane then, and scattered the pile of salt with a sweep of my hand.

  I got up and quickly went to the cupboard. Heidi raised her head from where she was lying under the table to see what I was doing. I returned with a bottle of tequila and a glass. Escape was my only hope. I would escape it all if only for a while, even if I needed a little help in doing so. I ran my finger through the salt on the table and used it to chase the bitter taste of the tequila from my mouth. I got out the phone book and checked the listings for A Cut Above in Worcester. I began to feel the slow tug of the tequila behind my eyes. I took another drink as I found the ad, and another as I read the words "Walk-ins welcome".