The furniture was a little low for him, almost as if she wanted to make her guests struggle. She watched him ease his way into an armchair. “Felix refused to have furniture like this because he said it was uncomfortable. It’s not, but it’s hell getting in and out of it at our ages.”
“I’ve lost fifteen pounds,” he said. What was it about her that made you want to blurt things out? He wondered if she had unnerved Felix, too.
“How great, to go into the New Year with a jump on self-improvement. I’m afraid I might find those fifteen pounds before the year is up. Latkes for Hanukkah, then my daughter Michelle’s husband insists on a traditional Christmas.” She made a face. “My family wasn’t religious, not at all-my daughter Linda is the only real Jew in the family-but I still don’t like to see a tree. Plus, it’s confusing for the grandchildren. What are they, those Iranian-Jewish-Scots with a Chinese first cousin?”
“Regular United Nations,” he said, knowing it was weak. He never had the patter. And this woman, she liked talkers, he bet. Felix Brewer had been a big talker.
“Yes,” she said. “And it’s better, having a mix of things. I assume you come from mixed stock, too?”
Why would she assume that? Oh, she was a typical norteamericano, had no idea how many blond Cubans there were.
“No, straight-up Cuban. It’s not uncommon-the blond hair, the light eyes.”
“Is that why they call you Sandy?”
“No. I didn’t get that nickname until I was a young detective.” He couldn’t stop, he was that unnerved by her. “It was a practical joke. You see-I bought myself a briefcase. I don’t know why. I was just so excited, when I made detective. And I would carry this briefcase to and from work every day. I saw right away that it was stupid, but I was proud, I didn’t want to back down. I used it to carry my lunch, a thermos of coffee. But it had all these pockets, pockets I never opened. And yet, every day, it got heavier and heavier. Just a little bit. Turns out some guy was putting sand in the pockets I didn’t use. Figured it out when I turned it upside down one day. So-Sandy. With everyone but my wife, who called me Roberto.”
“I don’t like practical jokes.”
“Me, either.”
An awkward silence, an unfortunate segue, but there was nothing to be done.
“So when we searched your house, back in March. The shoebox.”
“Yes, that was returned to me a while back. This time, I shredded the contents and put the box in a recycling bin.” A little sigh. “I miss Bendel’s. My son-in-law takes good care of me, but I can’t go that deep into his pockets. You know, even if there was any money left over, from what Bert took, I wouldn’t be allowed to have it. The federal government wants it for back taxes. But there’s not enough money left to make a difference. Or so Bert says.”
“Something was missing. From your box.”
“Oh, I know. Do you think I would have shredded the contents without going through it? I’m well aware what was missing, Detective.”
He handed the envelope to her.
“How did he get it to you?” he asked.
“No idea.”
“I’m not going to be a cop anymore. I’m not a cop. I’ve just come from a job interview, in fact. I think I’m going to be a private investigator.”
“Sandy Sanchez, PI. You’ll need a fedora.”
She wasn’t going to tell him how she had gotten the letter. Why should she? It was idle curiosity on his part. Besides, Sandy Sanchez’s questions hadn’t been particularly good for Bambi Brewer’s family. Or maybe they had. He couldn’t tell, and she wasn’t sharing. She probably assumed he had read it. He had. Read it and put it aside, in the file, but without tagging it as evidence. It wasn’t evidence. But it was a peephole onto one of the city’s most famous mysteries, and he couldn’t help reading. He was only human.
“Well, then,” he said, standing to go. “Happy Hanukkah. Do you say ‘Happy Hanukkah’?”
“Sure,” Bambi said. “Why not?”
Bambi watched the sun set from her living room, another reason she preferred this side to the harbor view. Not that she had a choice when Hamish gave it to her. Beggars can’t be choosers. And Bambi knew from beggars. She had been one most of her adult life.
It was getting close to the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. She never got over how quickly the sun went down, as if late for an appointment on the other side of the world. There was a red disc, then ribbons of orange and, bam, darkness. Still, there was enough light from the city around her to read the letter she knew almost by heart. It had been written on tissuey Airmail stationery. She never knew how he had gotten it to Tubby, and she had certainly never asked.
April 5, 1986
Dear Bambi,
This letter will get to you long after this date, but I am writing it on Michelle’s 13th birthday. I know you will see that she has a blowout of a bat mitzvah, with all the trimmings. I wish I could be there. I wish I could tell you where I am, but all I can say is that it’s warm and the ocean is nearby, yet I never swim.
I miss you every day. Every hour. Every minute. But at least I have a sense of you. The girls-who are they? How did they turn out? Beautiful, of course, because you are beautiful. But are they nice young women, Rachel and Linda? Do they have steady men? Are they good people, good earners? What is Michelle like as a teenager?
I ran away because I thought I couldn’t live in prison. But these rooms, while unlocked, are prisons, too. I have tried to figure out a way to come back, but it can never be.
I’m sorry for the pain I caused. It was wrong. I don’t know how to explain it. Perhaps there are no explanations for doing the wrong thing. At any rate, I’m not going to try. I hurt you. But you hurt me, too, by making it seem as if you didn’t really need me. There I go again, trying to find an explanation.
You and our daughters were my greatest happiness. And the single best day, best moment of my life was in February 1959 when Bert and Tubby said we should crash that stupid high school dance.
I hope you have been judicious with what I gave you. It should last a long time, but if you ever run into any difficulties, trust Bert.
With love, forever and ever,
Felix
The letter may have been written in April, but it had not arrived until August of that year. There had been a strange comfort, knowing he was alone, but she still had to live with the torment of believing he had sent for Julie, because why else would she have given Rachel all that money and disappeared? Poor Rachel, incapable of asking for a single dime for herself, yet humbling herself before her mother-in-law to bail out her own mother. Bambi had never doubted that leaving Marc was the right thing for Rachel; Joshua was the far better man. That had been evident long before Bambi had learned of Marc’s affair with Michelle.
She had told Michelle in no uncertain terms to keep the secret. She did not doubt that Rachel would forgive her sister, but it was too much to ask. And Bambi was an expert at knowing what was too much to ask.
She had kept this letter, surrounded by what she thought were boring receipts, of interest to no one, allowing herself to read it no more than once or twice a year, puzzling over its one clue, the nearby ocean in which he never swam. Mexico, apparently, according to Rachel. But then, that had been what Bert told Julie Saxony. Who knew what was true anymore. Interestingly, of all her daughters, it was Michelle, who knew the least, who had tried hardest to find her father. That was why she had gravitated to the tech industry in the first place, she had confided. But there was no search engine that could find Felix.