Paranoid.
They weren’t convinced of my innocence yet.
I looked at Phelps when I answered. I couldn’t keep the sense of pleading out of my voice. The cheap interrogation trick was working. “I was here. All night.”
“Is there a Mrs. Enright who can vouch for that?” It was Lewis again.
I met his gaze as he blocked my view of the shrine on top of the piano. My throat tightened as the tears began to well in my eyes. “You’re standing in front of what is left of Mrs. Enright.”
Lewis glanced back at the pictures.
“She and my daughter were killed in the bridge collapse. There’s no one left to vouch for me.” I couldn’t say anything more. My throat clenched as the tears advanced.
Phelps cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, Mr. Enright.” He took a deep breath.
I held my hands to my face, fighting back the tears, battling for composure.
For the ten thousandth time.
Phelps must have signaled Lewis, because they moved to the door at the same time. After a moment I followed them. They stepped outside and Phelps turned to me. “Thank you, Mr. Enright. We appreciate your help with this case. And we’re sorry for your loss. If we have any more questions, can we call you?”
“Yes, of course.” I wiped the tears from my cheeks. “Sorry.”
“No need to be. Thank you again, sir.” Phelps fingered a contact card out of an inside pocket of his suit coat and handed it to me. “If something like this happens again, call me. Day or night. Okay?”
“I don’t want it to happen again.”
“No, but if it does...”
I closed my eyes and nodded.
Phelps and Lewis returned to their car. Lewis never said a word, but as he climbed into the black Ford Taurus, his eyes kept coming back to me. Even as they drove away.
It’s more than a shrine.
More than a memorial to them or to their memories.
It IS them.
All that I have left.
Phelps and Lewis were both back by one that first day.
“I hope we’re not bothering you, Mr. Enright,” Phelps said breezily, ever the good detective. His broad upper lip spread into a smile but still hid his teeth.
Lewis stood behind him on the stoop, his cold blue eyes telling me that his role hadn’t changed either. “Had any more visions?”
I met his cynical gaze. “No. What do you want?”
Lewis stepped forward and stuffed a piece of paper into my hand. “We’ve got a warrant to search the premises,” he said as he shouldered past me.
“Strictly routine,” said Phelps, still smiling.
“What are you looking for?”
Lewis answered from behind me. “Evidence.” A dozen cops who had hidden themselves from view converged on my door and flooded the house. Phelps took me by the elbow and led me to the couch.
I fought the urge to panic. Whether I had something to hide or not, the police invading my home rattled me. Heavy footsteps thumped the floor above me. Drawers slid open and slammed shut. Orders were shouted up and down the stairs. The whole place seemed to groan under the onslaught. I’d seen movies where evidence had been planted, and that paranoia began to infect me.
“I have nothing to hide,” I said to Phelps as he sat again on the front edge of the green wing chair. “They’re not going to find anything.”
Phelps held up his hands to calm me. “It’s okay. I believe you. But we have to do this. Obviously, most people aren’t psychic, so we have to verify that you weren’t involved in any way. The information you gave us was so specific that we have to check you out. Between you and me, I hope we leave empty-handed.”
I was distracted by a cop who was reaching for the pictures on top of the piano. Attempting to remove the shrine.
My vision frayed.
Pixilated.
I jumped to my feet.
Fear and rage.
Rage at the cops.
At the bridge.
At life.
At death.
At Icarus.
Phelps anticipated my next move and grabbed my arms.
“Calm down, Professor.” He looked at the cop. “It’s okay, Rob. Just leave it.”
Rob shrugged and moved to a bookshelf.
Phelps settled me back onto the sofa.
He kept his hand on my back as the sobs echoed through me.
“I don’t want anyone to touch them anymore,” I said, forcing out words swollen by the tears. “Not EMTs. Not medical examiners. Not cops. I want them to rest in peace.”
The search was over an hour later. As Phelps had hoped, and as I’d known they would, they left empty-handed.
Much to Lewis’s dismay.
Once again, he didn’t say anything to me as he left.
The third one:
The bridge deck has maroon railings. Maroon streetlamps with drooping heads — drooping as if bowed in prayer — spilling lonely pools of light onto the pavement. Two bike lanes in the middle, two pedestrian lanes on the sides. Twenty feet wide at the most.
Beneath the bridge, the man’s clothes are ragged, soiled, from living on the streets, in dumpsters and under bridges. Living in the dark, dirty places of society. One of the feral humans who live below the radar. Below the surface.
He’s on his back, lying perpendicular to the railroad tracks that run beneath him, one rail under his shoulders, the other under his knees. His face is dark, covered by a matted beard and skin that has been leathered by sun and wind. A black stocking cap remains on his head, having somehow managed to survive the fall in place, nearly blending into a shiny halo of blood. His arms are out to the sides, as if he had tried to fly. Black lines look like tethers on his wrists.
3:28 a.m.
Legs splayed.
Back aching.
Head to the side, arms surrounding it in a broken halo.
I lift myself up to my elbows. The room is dark except for the red numbers on the clock and a gray glow bleeding around the edges of the curtains. I wipe sweat from my forehead. My T-shirt collar is wet, my pillow damp. I can smell lilacs.
Phelps answers on the fourth ring, his voice a nearly unrecognizable croak. “Phelps.”
“I’ve seen another one.”
He clears his throat. His bed creaks from movement. Him or someone else?
“Professor.”
“Yes. This one is on the railroad tracks under the Dinkytown Bikeway Connection.”
“The what?”
“The old Northern Pacific Bridge that runs between the east and the west banks at the U. It’s a bike path now.”
“Which bank is the body on?”
“The east bank. On the railroad tracks below it.”
“Do you recognize him?”
“He looks homeless.”
“Are you sure he’s dead? Those guys can sleep anywhere.”
“His wrists were bloody. Just like the others.”
Phelps hesitates. He wants to stay in bed. “Are you sure about this one?”
“So sure I can smell the lilacs.”
The piano, a Baldwin Acrosonic spinet, was my mother’s. She was a music teacher. I was her student. McKenna was learning to play, too. She was my student.
By eight years old she was better than I had been at that age.
I loved sitting in the other room listening to her practice. The mistakes. The breakthroughs. The moments of near perfection. The innate challenge of it. The will to succeed. To prevail.
The lessons of life found in something as simple as “Chopsticks.”
An hour after I called him about the third one, Phelps was at my door. This time without Lewis. I offered him some coffee. He held the mug with both hands, as if he needed its heat. He was out of uniform, wearing running shoes, navy blue athletic wind pants with three white stripes down the legs, and a navy blue baseball jacket with white leather sleeves. His skin looked pale under the fluorescent kitchen light. A light that buzzed like a fly caught in a mason jar.