Jonathan Santlofer - Anatomy of Fear

Crossing the 59th Street Bridge brought me back to when Julio and I were kids and we’d boost a car and drive over to Long Island City, park in some abandoned lot, get stoned, and gaze back at the city floating over the East River like Xanadu, bridges strung like Christmas lights, majestic skyscrapers lit up winking against a night sky. It was thrilling. Now it was the same bridge, but the thrill was infused with fear. I could have used a little of the dope Julio and I used to smoke.

“So what’s with this?” Terri held the jar of blue water up to the light. “You into watercolors?”

I thought about saying yes, but didn’t want to lie to her. “It’s something…from my grandmother. Well, from her friend, actually. It’s hard to explain.”

“Try me.”

I did. I told her about the bótanica and the limpia, and the way Maria Guerrero had released something that allowed me to finish the drawing.

When I stopped talking Terri was staring at me, mouth open, so I decided not to tell her the part about the egg and the gladiolas. Sometimes less is more.

“And this blue water, I’m figuring it’s not Tidy Bowl?”

“It’s supposed to keep me safe and pure.”

“Probably a little late for purity, but I’ll settle for the safe part.” She looked down and I followed her glance. The Smith & Wesson was sticking out of my pocket.

“You were planning to do this alone, weren’t you?”

“Me? No. Never.”

“Bullshit,” she said, a wry smile twisting back into worry as the city slid behind us like a memory and Queens came into view.

It makes perfect sense to him now, what he’s been doing and what he’s been working toward for so long. The plan is set. God has told him what to do and he will not fail.

He takes a moment to admire his craft, but no longer needs any props, everything set sharply in his mind. He crumples the drawing in his hand and drops it into the wastebasket.

He stares up at the ceiling as if he can see into his perfect living room-the matching sofa and armchairs, wide-screen TV, everything he had at one time worked for and thought important. He knows better now. None of it matters, not the sofa, nor the armchairs, not the TV, not even the home itself; not the wife who has left him, nor the child whom she has taken with her.

How long ago was that? A few days, months, a year?

For a moment he wonders if they ever existed. Perhaps he has invented them. Perhaps they were a fiction. He tries to reconstruct their faces, but there is no room in his brain for anything other than the picture of what he is about to do, so big, so extravagant it blots out everything else.

He checks over his supplies. Everything is ready. This is what he has prepared for. This is his moment.

Jesus, is it Twenty-third Street or Twenty-third Avenue?”

“I don’t know. I just wrote what the receptionist told me, 202 Twenty-third. How was I to know the numbered streets crossed the same numbered avenues? Whoever devised this system was a fucking sadist!”

“Well, we’ve been up and down Twenty-third Street and there’s no number 202,” said Terri. “So it must be Avenue.”

I found my way onto Twenty-third Avenue and Terri called out the numbers until we reached number 202, a small one-family brick house on a tiny plot of land. It didn’t look like much. But what was I expecting, flames whipping through the roof like the drawing I’d made of my abuela ’s vision?

“Keep going,” she said.

I cruised past, then doubled back and cruised by it again, trying to determine if anyone was home. There was no car in the driveway, but that didn’t really tell us anything. I parked across the street and rolled down my window.

“Can you see in?” she asked.

“What, you mean through the walls, like Superman?”

“I meant into any of the windows, but if you can see through the walls, go for it.”

The windows were obscured by blinds or drapes.

“This is so fucked,” said Terri. “You realize that, don’t you?”

“Yeah. I do. But if Wright is the Sketch Artist, he’s gone to a lot of trouble to set me up.” The irony did not escape me: Would the real Sketch Artist please stand up? “He could disappear now and leave me to pay the price. I just need to get some proof…to clear my good name.” I added that last part to get a smile out of Terri, her face a map of worry. “I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”

“Forget it,” she said. “I was the one who dragged you into the case.”

A good point and I appreciated her saying so.

I glanced down at my drawing, noticed what I’d scribbled in a corner, and pointed it out. “I totally forgot-Wright’s telephone number, the receptionist gave it to me.”

Terri punched it into her cell.

“Anything?”

“It hasn’t even rung yet. Relax.” She chewed her lip, cell pressed to her ear. “It’s ringing. One…two…three times.”

“What are you going to say?”

Terri clamped her hand over the mouthpiece. “I don’t know. Five…six…seven. No one is picking up. Eight…nine…ten rings. No machine picking up either.” She shut the cell.

“If he’s in there, would he answer?”

“Not if he’s spotted us sitting here staking out his house.”

We sat for another fifteen minutes, waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, Terri said, “Come on.”

She reached for the door handle, but I stopped her.

“What? You drag me out here and now you’re going to wuss out on me?”

“No. Give me your hand.”

“We don’t have time for a Hallmark moment, Rodriguez.”

“Just give me your hand.”

I opened the jar of colored water and let some trickle onto her hands, then mine. It didn’t feel foolish. It felt right, like part of a ritual, as if I were preparing us for battle.

“Oh, Jesus. Is this like The Exorcist or what?”

“It can’t hurt,” I said.

She gave me a look as she dried her hands on my sleeve, then checked the service revolver she had holstered beneath her jacket. “You ready?”

“Yes,” I said. I’d been getting ready since I started the Sketch Artist’s portrait, from the minute I drew the first pencil stroke on paper, but hadn’t known it until that moment.

I got out of the car, heart beating fast, hand gripping the revolver in my pocket. I stared at the house as we got closer, trying to feel if there was a presence inside, but obviously my gift for feeling things did not include houses.

Terri pressed the bell and we heard it chime somewhere inside. “What are you going to say?”

Terri thought a moment. “That I’m from NYPD Personnel and need to discuss a few things about his dismissal, how’s that?”

“If Wright is the unsub he probably knows who you are.”

“Right. Okay. I’ll give him a version of the truth. That I’m investigating a case, that’s all. Maybe he’ll play along, try and act normal.”

“Or try to make a break for it, or-”

“Well, it’s too late to turn around and change our minds. You wanted to do this, Rodriguez, remember?” She tried the bell again. There was no answer.

“I’ll check the back,” I said.

“Okay,” she said. “But wait for me.”

Terri watched Rodriguez round the corner of the house and disappear. She had to stop herself from calling out “Be careful.” Then she sidled over to a window and peered through a gap in the drapes. She could make out a couch and a big flat-screen TV. There were no lights on. Maybe he wasn’t home.