said.
They all nodded again.
“I regret that you’re not doing
time,” Jesse said. “And if you
fuck up here, maybe I can still get you some. You understand?”
Bo Marino said, “Yes, sir.”
The other two nodded.
“I have no respect for you,” Jesse said.
The three boys didn’t say anything. They didn’t look at Jesse or
each other.
“I think you three are punks.”
None of the three had any answer.
“I am going to make your time here as unpleasant as possible,”
Jesse said.
The three boys looked at the floor. Jesse looked at them for a while without speaking.
“Okay,” he said finally, “go see
Officer Crane at the front
desk. She’ll tell you what to do.”
57
Jesse sat drinking coffee with Captain Healy in the front seat of his Ford Explorer, while the fine snow came down steadily in the parking lot behind the courthouse in downtown Salem.
“You have everything you need but
evidence,” Healy
said.
“That’s all that’s
missing,” Jesse said.
“Except motive.”
“Well, yeah, that too.”
“Gee,” Healy said. “Hot on the
trail.”
“They did it,” Jesse said.
“I believe you,” Healy said.
“But I’m not the one that needs to
believe you.”
“I know,” Jesse said.
He drank some coffee.
“I can’t even get a search
warrant.”
“Judges hate to issue them on cop
intuition,” Healy said. “Want
some surveillance help?”
“No,” Jesse said.
“Might prevent them from killing the next one,” Healy
said.
“I think I’m the next one,”
Jesse said.
Healy looked at him and raised his eyebrows and didn’t say
anything.
“They’ve been taking pictures,”
Jesse said.
“Of what?”
“My home, the station.”
Healy frowned, watching the steam rise from the triangular tear
in the plastic top of his coffee cup.
“They’re interested in you,”
Healy said.
“I’d say so.”
“And they’re serial killers,”
Healy said.
“I’m convinced of it.”
“And they kill people at random, for no obvious reason,” Healy
said.
“They seem to.”
The snowflakes were very small, and with no wind they fell straight down, like white rain.
“You figure you’re being penciled in as their next victim,”
Healy said.
“Yes.”
“And you figure the picture-taking is foreplay?”
“Something like that.”
Healy said, “I can give you a couple of troopers to watch your
back.”
Jesse shook his head.
“This might be an opportunity,” Jesse said.
“They try to kill you and you catch them in the act?”
“Yeah.”
“Serial killers like ritual,” Healy said.
“So they’ll come at
you from the front, and shoot you one time each.”
“Probably at the same time.”
“Simultaneous climax,” Healy said.
“You think you can keep them
from killing you?”
“Yes.”
“You trust them to come at you the same way,” Healy
said.
“People like these people, they’ll do it the
same.”
“Let’s hope so,” Healy said.
“And, if I fuck up,” Jesse said,
“you can avenge
me.”
58
It was twenty minutes to midnight when Jenn called and woke Jesse up.
“I just did the eleven-o’clock
news,” Jenn said. “Did I wake
you.”
“No,” Jesse said. “I was
awake.”
“Your voice sounds like you were
sleeping,” Jenn
said.
“I’m awake,” Jesse said.
“I wanted to apologize,” Jenn said.
“Okay.”
“You were sleeping.”
“And you called to apologize for waking me?”
“No, silly, for the other day, when I wanted you to give me
special access.”
“Which is more than I get,” Jesse said.
“I know,” Jenn said. “But what
was so bad about it was, here you
are with this huge serial killer problem to deal with, and I’m
thinking only about what would be best for me.”
“What’s new,” Jesse said.
Jenn was silent for a moment.
“Well,” she said. “You are
grouchy.”
“I am,” Jesse said.
“It’s okay,” Jenn said.
“You deserve to be.”
“Thanks.”
“What I want you to know is that I realize I was thinking only
about myself and my career when I asked you to let me in with a camera.”
Jesse was silent.
“And I realize that I have often been that way with you.”
“I know,” Jesse said.
“You’re not going to help me with
this,” Jenn said. “Are
you?”
“You’re doing fine by yourself,”
Jesse said.
“I’m going to try to be better,”
Jenn said.
Jesse waited.
“It’s a hard balancing,” Jenn
said. “If I go too far the other
way, I give myself away. I become entirely dependent on someone else to direct my likes and dislikes, what I want to do, what I should do. You know?”
“Yes,” Jesse said.
“And after a while I resent it, and the resentment builds, and
after a while I explode and go the whole other way. Instead of being all about you, it becomes all about me.”
“Be nice if you could find a middle
ground,” Jesse
said.
“Yes,” Jenn said.
Jesse was lying on his back in the dark, with the phone hunched
in his left shoulder. His handgun was on the night table beside the bed. There was no sound in the apartment.
“Maybe I can,” Jenn said.
“We both have changes to make,” Jesse said.
“I wonder who we’ll be when
we’ve made them,” Jenn
said.
“Whoever we are,” Jesse said,
“we won’t be
worse.”
“I can’t seem to get you out of my
life,” Jenn
said.
“I know,” Jesse said.
“Can you wait?” Jenn said.
“Until I get better?”
“I have so far,” Jesse said.
“But will you still?”
“I don’t know, Jenn. I try not to plan too far
ahead.”
“I don’t want a life without you in
it.”
“That’s not entirely up to you,
Jenn.”
Jenn was quiet for a time. The bedroom was in the back of the apartment, away from the harbor. There was a dim hint of light from the street made a little brighter by the snow cover.
“Is there anyone else?” Jenn said.
“Not yet,” Jesse said.
“But there might be?”
“Jenn,” Jesse said. “My life
would be far less complicated if I
could be happy without you.”
“I know,” she said.
“But so far,” Jesse said, “I
can’t.”
They were both quiet, still connected by the phone line, with nothing much else to say. The silence extended.
“The pressure about those serial murders must be awful.”
“Everyone feels it would be good to catch them,” Jesse
said.
“Including you,” Jenn said.
“That’s where the most pressure
is.”
Jesse didn’t comment.
“And you have to carry it alone.”
“Not entirely,” Jesse said.
“I wish I could help you,” Jenn said.
“Be good if you could,” Jesse said.
Again they allowed the silence to settle.
“I’m sorry,” Jenn said.
“I know.”
“I’m working on it,” she said.
“I am too.”
“I know.”
There was more connective silence.
“We’ll get there,” Jenn said
finally.