David Jackson - The Helper

He tosses the phone onto the bed as though he’s just noticed that it’s crawling with insects. He continues to stare at it.

Someone is going to get hurt tonight, maybe even killed. And I can make it go one way or the other. I don’t know who the intended victim is. I don’t know their name, where they live, what they look like, where they work, nothing.

And yet I have the power to save them.

So what do I do now?

What the fuck am I supposed to do now?

I should call it in, he thinks.

I should call the station house, let them know I just had this phone conversation. Let them decide what to do about it. Then I’m in the clear. I don’t have to worry about it. I can go back to thinking about what to do for poor old Mrs Sachs. They can go look for the stupid diary and solve the case and get all the glory.

But on the other hand. .

What can I tell them? I know nothing about the person who is supposed to get whacked tonight, so telling them that isn’t going to make any difference. I suppose I can mention the diary. If there is a diary. And if it contains any clues. Which it probably won’t, because this guy is probably just a complete flake who gets off by getting cops to dance for him. And anyway I can check out for myself whether this diary exists.

Shit! Why does my life have to be one huge fucking dilemma?

Doyle opens the bedroom door and re-enters the living room. Rachel is watching the television with the volume turned up — something she often does when she’s annoyed and she wants to shut out everything and everyone else.

First things first, he thinks. So he goes over to her and sits next to her on the sofa and asks her what she’s watching and waits for her gruff reply and then tells her he’s sorry.

‘I was just trying to let you know. .’ she begins.

‘I know, I know. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. It was just one of those calls.’

‘I don’t know what “one of those calls” is. We don’t have calls like that. We don’t have secrets that have to be whispered to other people in other rooms. Do we?’

‘Uhm, not usually, no. This one was different. Sensitive. You know? Sometimes there are things happening that I can’t even tell you about. Sometimes it’s better for you and Amy if you don’t know what’s going on.’

She searches his face with worried eyes. ‘Are you in danger?’

‘No. But sometimes there are things connected with the job that I can’t discuss in front of you. I know it hasn’t happened very often in the past, but occasionally something crops up.’

‘What, does Mrs Sachs actually work for the CIA or something?’

‘Something like that.’ He gives her a chance to mull it over. ‘We still friends?’

She answers him with a kiss. ‘Now go eat your freezing cold lasagna. You’ll have to pick out the broken glass yourself.’

He returns the kiss, then moves to the table.

Why didn’t I tell her? he wonders. What was it about that particular call which made me unable even to tell my own wife about it? Okay, the guy knows a lot of things, but surely even he can’t find out if I talked to Rachel.

Deep down, he knows the answer, and it tears him apart. He’s kept things from her before. About the things he’s had to do. About the actions he’s had to take in order to keep his life together. It wasn’t difficult for another little lie like this to trip off the tongue.

And he hates himself for it.

He pushes his food around the plate and stares at the back of Rachel’s head, and he tells himself that if she turns around now he will burst into tears and he will open up his soul to her and she will be able to decide for herself whether he is a monster or just a frail human being, just like everybody else on this planet.

But she doesn’t turn and he doesn’t speak. He just pushes the food around and tries to convince himself that he is doing the right thing. That maybe, just maybe, his silence will save lives.

All is confusion.

She thinks at first that she is in her own bedroom. Which would mean that there wasn’t this stupid oversized nightstand on which she’s just smacked her skull. And it would mean she wouldn’t have wasted time fumbling around for the damned light switch so that she could see where she was going instead of slamming into other items of cumbersome furniture. Why does a single guy need so much storage space, anyhow? Especially a guy who seems to have only about three changes of clothing?

She gets to her cellphone just before it cuts to voicemail. Stabs at the receive button as she tries to blink away the blurriness from her vision.

She attempts a hello, but it gets choked away. She clears her throat, tries again. A voice she doesn’t recognize says her name.

‘Yes, that’s me. Who is this?’

‘This is Detective Doyle, Eighth Precinct. I’m sorry to call you so late like this. .’

‘What? What is it?’ She’s wide awake now. A call from the police at — what time is it? Four o’clock on a Sunday morning — has that effect.

The figure in the bed stirs. A groggy face squints at her. ‘Whassamatter? Whoozaonphone?’

She raises a finger to silence Alex while she listens to the caller.

‘It’s nothing to get alarmed about, Miss. It’s about your husband.’

‘Gary? What about him?’

‘Like I say, it’s nothing to get too worried about. Your husband was brought into the precinct station house a couple of hours ago. He was drunk and he’d been in a fight.’

‘A fight? Oh, Jesus!’

‘He’s not badly hurt. A few cuts and bruises is all, although he seems to have lost his keys and his phone. We normally let people like this sleep it off in the cells, but it being a Saturday night they’re all full. At the moment he’s asleep in one of our interview rooms, but he can’t stay there. So we were wondering if you could come over and take him off our hands. We couldn’t get much sense out of your husband, but he did manage to tell us where you work, so I know you’re only a few minutes away. We found your phone numbers in his address book. I tried your work number but they said you’d gone out on a break, so I hope you don’t mind me calling you on this number.’

‘No, that’s fine. I’ll come right over.’

‘You know where we are?’

‘I think so. By Tompkins, right?’

‘That’s it. Just ask for Detective Doyle at the desk.’

She ends the call. ‘Shit!’

In the bed, Alex is sitting up. ‘Who was that?’

She starts searching for her clothes. They got thrown in all different directions not long after she got here.

‘Some detective called Doyle at the Eighth Precinct. Gary’s there. Drunk and beat-up. They want me to go get him.’

Alex lets out a snort of laughter. She picks up one of his socks and throws it at him.

‘It’s not funny. You know, one of these days we’re going to get caught doing this. The cops even tried calling me at work tonight. I think Bella must have covered for me. But what if Gary calls one night when I’m supposed to be working? What if it’s not Bella who answers, but someone who doesn’t know I’m supposed to be at work when really I’m over here getting my brains banged out?’

‘Yeah, well if Gary did a little more brain-banging himself, maybe you wouldn’t have to put yourself through all this.’

‘Shut up, Alex. You’re really not helping.’

She’s cheating on Gary. She accepts this. Mostly she tries not to think about it. When she can’t avoid it, she tries to justify it to herself. Unreasonable behavior on his part. Lack of attentiveness to her womanly needs. Her conjugal rights. Whatever. But when others attack him, as Alex just did and frequently does, she feels compelled to leap to his defense. Gary has issues. After what they went through they both had issues, but she got over it and he didn’t. It’s sad, but there it is. He’s not a bad man, she thinks, and he doesn’t really deserve what I’m doing to him.