Paul Doiron - Bad Little Falls

After a few minutes, Jamie returned, scowling. “That woman is such a bitch. I’m in there all the time, and she still cards me.” She tore open the cellophane and used a nail to pierce the cardboard. She removed two pieces of nicotine gum and popped them into her mouth.

A hidden cell phone chirped from somewhere on her person. She dug into her pocket and looked at the luminous screen. “I need to take this,” she said.

“That’s fine.”

She swung the door open and stepped out again. I watched her stand, shivering, under the klieg light. She spoke with animation into the phone and then began to pace back and forth, ranging farther and farther away from the door. She leaned against a white box advertising crushed ice and stared at nothing in particular. Finally she flipped the lid of the phone down and climbed back into the warm truck.

“That was my ex,” she explained.

“Your ex?” I thought she meant Randall.

“My ex-husband. Lucas’s dad. Suddenly he’s available to drive me to Machias to pick up the van. That’s Mitch in a nutshell, Mr. Dependable.”

I didn’t know how to respond. I’d understood that Lucas’s father wasn’t Randall Cates, but it hadn’t occurred to me that another man might still be important in her life. Not that it should concern me.

“You must think I’m a piece of work,” she said.

“Kind of. Yes.”

“I suppose I am, but I’m trying to be a better person. I’m really, really, really trying. I’ve made so many mistakes in my life. This whole thing seems like my fault, like it’s a punishment for everything bad I ever did.” Immediately she started to shake and sob. “Poor Prester. I am so scared to see his face again.”

She put her head down and cried into her hands.

I sat quietly, afraid to touch her.

We arrived at the hospital ten minutes before the end of visiting hours, which meant that Jamie felt obliged to venture into the medical-surgery unit to look upon her brother’s ghoulish face, and because she was in such a state of wild grief, I felt obliged to join her. I thought that she might refuse my offer of help. Instead, she looked up at me and said, “Please,” and I realized I was deeper into dangerous territory than I’d previously understood.

We found a sheriff’s deputy sitting inside the door to Prester’s room, reading a dog-eared copy of American Snowmobiler he must have pilfered from the waiting room. He was a fresh-faced guy with the neat mustache some rookie cops grow after joining the fraternity, finely boned hands that would be useless breaking up a bar brawl, and an officious tone that started down around his larynx.

“No visitors,” he said, barring our way.

“This woman is his sister,” I explained.

“The sheriff doesn’t want him talking to anyone until we get a statement from him.”

“Has he been charged with anything?”

“No.”

“Then you can’t stop her from visiting his bedside.”

“Look, man, I’m just following orders.”

“Is he even conscious yet?” I asked.

“Every once and a while, he starts yammering, but then he passes out again.”

“I need to see him,” Jamie said. “Please.”

“What is it with this guy?” he said. “How many times do I have to tell people he can’t be disturbed?”

The deputy’s nameplate said DUNBAR.

“Jamie, can you just wait outside for a second?” I said.

She removed her ski jacket and folded it over her arm. Dunbar watched her hips jiggle as she paced across the room, past the nurse’s desk at the center, hugging herself tightly.

“Why don’t you let her look in on her brother for a few minutes?” I said to Dunbar. “If the guy’s asleep, there’s no harm in her holding his hand.”

He gnawed on the edge of his mustache. “Is she your girlfriend or something?”

“I just gave her a ride to the hospital.”

His eyes followed her ass closely. “She’s the one banging Randall Cates?”

In the interest of helping Jamie see her brother, I resisted the urge to smack him across the chops. “Not anymore.”

He rolled the magazine into a tight tube and thwacked it like a nightstick against his open palm a few times. “I need to be in the room.”

I motioned to Jamie.

Prester Sewall lay prone on the wheeled bed. Some time over the past hours, the doctor had wrapped white bandages around his face, so that only his closed eyes showed now. He looked small with the sheet pulled up to his narrow chest and his skinny arms extended at his sides. We could hear his labored breathing through the strips of gauze.

“Prester?” Jamie whispered, taking his hand.

His eyes snapped open, bloodred and filled with terror. “Jamie?”

“Oh shit, he’s awake,” said Dunbar.

“I’m so happy to see you,” she said, but her voice cracked.

“What have they done to me, Jamie?”

His sister started to sob and shudder. Reflexively I set my hand on her shoulder.

“You’re OK,” she said. “Prester, you’re OK.”

“I’m not OK! They’re going to cut off my fingers!”

“Prester…” Her folded coat slid off her arm onto the floor.

“They’re going to cut off my nose!”

“Prester…”

He tried to sit up but didn’t have the strength and dropped his head against the pillow. “They won’t show me my face. I keep asking for a mirror, but they won’t bring me one.” He waved his bandaged arms. “What do I look like, Jamie? I look like a freak, don’t I?”

She put a hand to her mouth to hide her sobs. “Maybe they can do plastic surgery. Doctors in France gave a woman a new face.”

“I don’t want a new face! I want my normal face. I’m never going to have sex again in my life!”

“The doctors can repair your face.” She looked at me with pleading eyes. “Can’t they, Mike?”

“Doctors can do some amazing things,” I replied, fully aware of the lameness of this as a response.

“Who’s he? What’s he doing here?” His crimson gaze turned on the deputy standing behind me. “Why are the cops here, Jamie?”

“This is my friend Mike. He’s the warden who found you. He said you and Randall got lost in the snow.”

Again the injured man tried sitting up, and again he flopped back against the pillow as if attached to it by a string. “Where’s Randall? Is he here in the hospital? Is his chest OK?”

“We’d better cut this off,” the deputy whispered in my ear.

Jamie dropped down to one knee and clutched at her brother’s freckled arm. “Randall’s dead, Prester.”

“Jamie,” I cautioned.

“He’s dead?”

“The cops won’t tell me what happened,” she said.

“OK, that’s enough.” Dunbar tapped his rolled magazine against his open hand. The gesture was meant to be intimidating but came across as comic-as if he was really going to club anyone into submission with an old issue of American Snowmobiler.

Prester’s voice rose to the level of a wail. “Randall’s dead?”

If Sewall really did kill his friend, I thought, he’s a terrific actor.

“Give me a fucking break,” Dunbar muttered.

Prester was breathing heavily through his bandages. His bloody eyes were locked on mine. “What happened to him? Did he freeze to death?”

The deputy had forgotten his own orders to prevent the injured man from having any conversations. “You know exactly what happened.”

“Leave him alone,” said Jamie. “My brother’s an injured person.”

“Your brother’s a murder suspect.”

“Dunbar,” I said, my voice heavy with warning.

Prester Sewall had begun to flail his arms and kick his legs. “The cops think I killed Randall?”