Joel Goldman: Deadlocked

Mason looked at Nick, caught the caution in the boy's eyes, waiting for Mason to answer. Mason saw something else. A kid about to watch as the man who killed his parents is executed. The mother about to watch her son die had an edge on agony, but not much of one, Mason decided.

"Yeah. I'm coming," he said.

They passed through three security checkpoint X-ray scanners, emptying their pockets, standing with arms outstretched while a guard passed a metal detecting wand over their bodies.

"Now I know where the airlines learned how to do it," Mason said to Nick as they refilled their pockets.

The boy barely nodded at Mason's weak joke, shuffling his feet like a runner waiting to get down in the blocks, shaking his long arms, twisting his head from side to side, rolling his shoulders, and finally settling his limbs as the warden led them into the witness room. The mother was standing in front of the window looking into the execution chamber. She turned as they entered, a small gasp escaping her throat, her face pale, her eyes red, as her gaze settled on Nick. Just then, a priest wedged past them, crossing the room to the mother, embracing her. Mason overheard their brief exchange.

"Father Steve? Did he?" the mother asked the priest.

"Yes, Mary. Ryan made a confession," the priest said, the mother searching the priest's face with another unasked question. The priest answering. "To everything, Mary. To everything. I'm sorry. He did the right thing."

The woman buried her face against the priest's round chest for a moment, gathered herself, and returned to the window, her palms against the glass, her back to the rest of them. Mason glanced quickly at the witnesses, each of them nodding as they listened, satisfied that justice was about to be served.

The layout of the witness room and the execution chamber reminded Mason of a lineup, suspect and ringers arrayed on one side of a two-way mirror, cops and lawyers on the other. Mason wondered for an instant if Kowalczyk would be able to see them or whether the last image he would see would be his own. The warden answered his question.

"Mr. Kowalczyk can see us but not hear us. We will be able to hear him should he wish to make a last statement," the warden added, pointing to a speaker in the wall next to the window. "I am certain each of us recognizes the solemnity and difficulty of this occasion and will act accordingly."

The warden stationed himself next to the phone by the door, ready to answer if the governor called. No one spoke, a few of the witnesses taking seats in the back row, the others on their feet, holding their ground.

The silence was like an extra witness, crowding the small room, making everyone uncomfortable. The scrape of a chair by one, a cough by another, every sound grating on thin nerves. A round clock with a white face and black numbers mounted on one wall hummed with electrical current, seconds passing with a low buzz. Five minutes left.

Nick edged toward the left side of the window, leaving the right side for Mary and Father Steve, stealing glances at her, twirling a pen with one hand, the other drumming against his thigh. His breathing was shallow, turning rapid. Mason, worried that the boy might hyperventilate, stayed close to him.

Mary ran her beads through her fingers, praying in a soft, staccato whisper, the priest's hand on the small of her back. The door to the execution chamber opened, and Mary ended her prayers, forcing a smile as she let her beads slither to the floor.

Harry migrated to the window, filling the space between Nick and Mary, his jaw set, his eyes dark, his catcher-mitt hands gripping the ledge beneath the glass. His chest swelled as he took a deep breath, holding it as if it had to last forever. Four minutes left.

Ryan was on his back, head flat, no pillow, short brown hair matted, sweat reflecting the floodlights beaming from the ceiling. His wrists and ankles were strapped to the gurney, his thin white legs and bare feet sticking out from beneath his hospital gown. His palms were turned up, the blue veins in the center of his arms throbbed, impaled with IV needles, white tape holding the needles in place, a trickle of dried blood running toward one elbow, long clear plastic tubes dangling from each arm over the sides of the gurney. He raised his head, holding the angle as he found his mother, moistening his lips as he smiled. Mary smiled back. Ryan mouthed "nice dress," his mother nodding, her eyes glistening.

A guard pushed the gurney into position next to the far wall. Another guard threaded the IV tubes through the small openings until they were pulled taut from the other side by unseen hands. The two guards looked at the warden for a moment, then left, the door sealing behind them. The warden picked up the phone, flipped a switch on the wall, the speaker crackling. Two minutes left.

"Do you wish to make a last statement?" he asked, broadcasting the question into the execution chamber, a hiss of feedback spitting into the witness room.

Ryan craned his neck, whipsawing between the wall hiding his executioners and the window keeping his mother from him, watching for the first trace of death as it slid down the IV tubes toward him. His arms and legs trembled despite the straps, his chest heaved, his neck bulged with corded blood, his eyes widening as if someone had stretched his lids to their limit. He licked his lips again, swallowing to find his voice. One minute left.

Mary spread her hands wide on the glass, tilting her head a bit, her pained smile encouraging Ryan to be brave for both of them. Nick stopped twirling his pen, lacing it between his fingers and clamping down hard. Harry squinted, taking a short breath, his face turning red. The priest wiped his brow with a handkerchief, Mary touching her fingers to her lips, a last kiss.

Ryan let out a small cry, yanking his arms as he felt the burning sensation of the first drug. His head dropped to the gurney, lolling side-to-side, the drug working quickly. Mary turned to Father Steve, clinging to him, her eyes still locked on her son as Ryan lifted his head a final time, the words tumbling over his thickening tongue.

"I love you, Ma …So sorry… innocent."

And he was gone.

Mason stood at the foot of his parents' grave two days after Ryan Kowalczyk's execution. His parents were buried in Sheffield Cemetery, a pious slab of land running down a long slope in an industrial district on the northeast side of Kansas City. Owned by an Orthodox congregation, it held the remains of hundreds of Kansas City Jews dating back to the early 1900s, taking its name from the steel company that once dominated the surrounding landscape. Mason's parents were buried high enough that he could see I-435 to the east and the railroad tracks that ran north and south not far from the bottom of the long slope. A train whistle split the morning, shaking the living even if it didn't stir the dead.

His parents' names were carved in a single block of black granite, John and Linda Mason. Their Hebrew names were entered beneath the English. Mason struggled with the letters, familiar only in their form, their sound and meaning unknown to him. Claire had not pushed him to obtain a religious education, telling him that all the rules paled after the Golden Rule. Learn that one, she said, and you've learned enough.

Growing up, his Aunt Claire brought him to the cemetery on Memorial Day, though neither of his parents had served in the military. It was a good holiday for remembering people, Claire had explained. John was her older brother, Linda as close to her as any sister. Good people sorely missed was how she ended each of their visits.

Mason fell out of the routine of the annual visits when he left for college, returning to the cemetery only occasionally, the last time several years ago, the reason escaping him now. He didn't talk to his parents, as some people did when they visited the graves of loved ones. Mostly, he studied the headstone, hoping for an epiphany about what his life would have been like had they lived. He regretted nothing that had happened in his upbringing by Claire, though he missed every second of what his life might have been, the uncertainty never far from his mind.