D Carpenter - Infertile Grounds

Arthur hung up the phone, finished his notes and headed for the gym downstairs. He needed to blow off some steam and think. Half an hour on the heavy bag should do the trick.

“Don’t do it!” Pell cried as he pulled Chris off the stunned man. Chris pushed him away and raised his fist to strike him again. But then he stopped, briefly regaining some control, he knew that this could easily escalate into something much worse than a cheating spouse. How could she do this to him?

“I can’t believe this, Karen,” he said as he jumped up, stumbled past Pell and out into the hall. He had to get out of here, out of this house.

He turned and screamed from the top of the stairs, “You better get your stuff out of the house before I get back. If you’re here tomorrow, I don’t know what I’ll do.”

“Wait. Please,” she cried after him.

“Come on, Pell,” Chris said as he leapt down the stairs and ran out to the car.

As soon as Pell was in the car, Chris peeled out of the driveway and down the street. For whatever reason, he drove to his office. Once he had parked in front of the building, he slammed his fist into the steering wheel and slumped over it, burying his head in his arms. “Why?” He moaned. “Why has she done this? Who is that guy? How could she?” He broke down and cried, jerking with each sob. One fateful moment had changed his life forever. His seven-year marriage was over. He could never reconcile what he had walked in on. He knew himself too well to entertain that thought.

Most of his employees were virtual and the office was dark. Pell hadn’t spoken since they left Chris’ house. He passively watched Chris let it all out, he knew better than to comment at this point. After a few minutes Chris began to calm down and regain some control.

“This is my office,” he explained, furiously wiping the tears from his face. He was still in shock. “We can spend the night here.”

Chris pointed out the kitchen area and the bathrooms as they walked through the building and then guided him to an office with a comfy couch. “You can bed down here. I need to be on my own for a bit. I need to think.” As Chris left Pell and headed up the hallway he looked back. “Thanks, Pell,” he said quietly.

If not for Pell, he could easily have been a double-murderer right now. It was a long night. He went to his office and finally dozed off sometime after 4 am.

When he woke up, he was sitting in his chair with his head tilted to one side. After a few painful minutes of swiveling his head around, he was able to get rid of the stiffness that had set in as he had slept.

Looking at his computer screen, he remembered why he was sleeping in his office. It had the feeling of a bad dream, but it had happened – his wife had been in bed with someone else.

He shook his head in disbelief as he hauled his stiff, cramped body out into the kitchen area. It was a little before six in the morning. He poured himself a cup of cold, twelve-hour-old coffee and dropped down into a chair.

What the hell would he do now? They had been happy. How could she do something like this? It wasn’t as though he hadn’t had opportunities to cheat during their marriage. Temptation had knocked many times but his love for Karen had kept him in line. Was it that simple – that romantic? Was it his love for Karen? Or was it something else? A deep-seeded need for consistent connection fostered by the unbearable loss of everyone he truly cared about as a child in that gas explosion– a psychological weakness that had blinded him to the realities of the world, of human relationships in particular? No, it wasn’t his fault! He wouldn’t let himself fall into that self-blaming induced malaise. He had been there once before and it had taken him a long time to get out.

She had defiled the sanctity of their marriage. In his bed, under his roof. What a slap in the face.

“Good morning,” Pell crackled walking into the kitchen

Chris nodded. He most certainly couldn’t say that it was.

They were quiet while Pell stretched. “How you feeling today, man?” He asked sympathetically.

“I don’t know,” Chris shook his head. “I still can’t quite believe it. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m going to have to really think this through.”

“Of course,” Pell said. “Meanwhile I’m going to call Carl and then I’m thinking to go over to Harvard and see what we can find out about Sarah Burns. Maybe we can talk to some of her professors or advisors. You never know, maybe there’s something there. You want to come with me?”

“I’m gonna pass,” Chris said. He was surprised to hear how sad his own voice sounded. “I’ve got to get this other stuff ironed out. Good luck though, Pell. I hope you do track her down.”

“I’m the FBI guy, right?”

“It’s so ironic. Almost unbelievable,” Chris said.

“What’s that?”

“If I hadn’t seen that plane go down I never would have met you, Pell. And most likely I would not have seen my wife in bed with another man. I would have come home to her relaxed, naive and horny. Never knowing or suspecting anything. Would I have been better off not knowing?”

“Maybe it was your destiny for you to see the plane go down? To hear David’s story”

“Destiny sucks.”

“I’m going to go now,” Pell said after an awkward moment. “I’m really sorry about what happened last night.”

“Don’t be. It’s not your fault. I’m sure that someday I’ll be glad it happened.”

“Maybe so. Is there someplace I can grab some breakfast around here? I’m starving. We haven’t eaten since we left Bangor yesterday afternoon. You should eat too – keep your energy up Chris,” Pell pointed out.

Chris shook his head. He was in no mood for eating. He gave Pell directions to a local diner, and handed him the keys to the rental car.

“Good luck, Pell.”

“Thanks for everything. I’ll be in touch,” he said as they shook hands.

Chris went back into his office and sat down. What was he going to do now? His staff would be showing up for work in a couple of hours, and he had little or no desire to see any of them.

He decided to get on with his life, starting immediately. He had to persevere.

Pell dropped the phone on the seat next to him. The answer had been exactly as he predicted.

“We’ll do some more poking around but from what I’ve seen so far, there’s nothing here. I don’t know exactly what you stumbled on but it’s not worth a lot of man-time right now. We’ve got other big cases going on that are for real. Go back up to Bangor,” Carl had said. Then the bastard had hung up without giving him a chance to argue.

Carl Moscovitz was either a complete fool to drop this case, or he had realized Pell was onto something big and would be going after every lead possible, just without Pell. If it were the latter and it proved out, Pell would be willing to bet that if his name were even mentioned, it would only be in passing. Carl was very good at self-promotion but, with all that was at stake, could he be stupid enough to simply drop it?

Pell climbed back into his car and looked at the clock in the dash. It was a little before 8. He had a hunch his next appointment might throw some light onto the situation. If Carl found out that he was actively working the case, he would have him fired but that was better than languishing in an unsatisfying job, always saying ‘what if’ or ‘if I had only’ for the rest of his life. Sometimes moving on was hard to do; change was scary, but stagnation, or in his case slow decay, had proven much worse.