The bliss lasted thirty seconds.
Then came the patter of flip-flopped feet and small voices.
Three black-haired children surrounded the spa, gazing ravenously at the roiling blue water.
"I want in cuzzi," said the little girl, who couldn’t have been older than three.
One of the twin boys hoisted her up.
"No, Jason," boomed a voice from the second level of the motel. "You kids stay out of the water till we come down."
"Dad, I just wanna—"
"All of you. Go wait over there. Now."
The children obeyed. I watched them waddle away and sit poolside on the cooling concrete. One of the boys advised his little sister to be careful because she couldn’t swim, which in turn ignited a heated debate concerning who was and was not the boss of whom.
The parents came down shortly thereafter.
Roughhousing ensued.
The father tossed his sons screaming into the brisk water and dove in after them as the mother lifted her little girl and waded into the shallow end.
I closed my eyes and tried to block out everything but the hot, soothing fracas that massaged me. In prison, during the bad times, when Orson tormented me, there was a place I would run to—a field of soft grass that waved endlessly into the horizon like a green sea.
I was just managing to slip away when the sound of footsteps obliterated my mental oasis. My eyes opened. One of the boys was swinging his leg over the side of the spa.
"Jason!" his father yelled, treading water in the deep end of the pool, "Told you not to bother that gentleman."
Jason dipped his toes into the water and hollered.
"Boy!"
His father climbed out of the pool and marched over.
The boy bolted past him and cannonballed into the shallow end, drenching his mother and sister. The little girl screamed that she’d been blinded and began to cry. As Jason’s mother commenced to thoroughly dress him down, the boy’s father approached the Jacuzzi.
He had pure white hair, and the closer he came, the younger he looked, his face pale and without wrinkle, a hard and slender build.
He said, "Sir, I apologize for the disrupt—" The family man smiled, muttered, "Oh, my," and climbed in.
I didn’t understand until I looked him in the eyes. It was their black intensities that convinced me I was sharing this Jacuzzi with Luther Kite, his hair as white and cropped as it once was long and black, glistening with chlorinated water.
"Boy, it feels good in here," he said.
The woman in the shallow end called out, "Where’d Daddy go?"
Luther cocked his head back and said, "I’m in the Jacuzzi, Christie! Entertain the children please!"
Luther looked back at me, said, "So, old man, do you feel redeemed?"
I started to rise, felt Luther’s smooth legs wrap around my ankles.
"Sorry, I didn’t introduce myself," he said, extending his hand. "Bob Crider."
I just stared at him, and he withdrew his hand, unshaken.
"Please. I’m curious," he said. "You turned yourself in. Spilled your guts. Spent sixteen years in prison. Paying for your sins. I kept up. Read the articles. Your slobbering confession. Justice is served. Penance performed. Do you feel redeemed?"
"I don’t know. Look, I’m really tired. I should—"
"Whatever happened to that sweet little detective and her son?"
My throat tightened, as it always does when I think of Violet.
"She killed herself."
"How?"
"Shotgun under the chin."
"Hmm. Always thought that’s how you’d end up."
"Yeah, well, there’s still time."
"What? Being out, free again not what you thought it’d be?"
"When you’re on the inside, there’s always the outside to look forward to. But when you’re on the outside, and freedom and blue sky don’t do it for you, all you have to dream about is death."
"Why do you suppose that detective killed herself?"
"Guilt."
"Try loneliness."
"No, Violet had a husband. Lived near her family. She—"
"Not that kind. She was lonely like you’re lonely. Like I’m lonely. Like the few who understand that all this is an illusion, savagery’s mask. I mean, different as we are, Andrew, I feel a kinship sitting in this hot tub with you that I haven’t felt in years. The same truths have been revealed to us, no?"
"I guess."
"It’s devastating when you feel you’re the only one who knows this terrible secret. That’s the brand of loneliness that killed Violet."
I looked beyond Luther, at his family playing in the swimming pool.
"See you went and got yourself a family."
Luther grinned, glanced back at the pool.
"Beautiful, aren’t they?"
"They know what a psychopathic fuck Daddy is?"
"I’m not that way anymore."
"Really."
My boxer shorts ballooned. I lifted the waistband. Bubbles rushed to the surface.
"I’m a pastor now, Andrew."
I smiled, said, "Guess you’ve been redeemed."
"By the blood of Christ I have."
"You believe that."
"We all sin and fall short. Some more than others."
"Sure. Some cheat on their taxes. Some break children’s necks and hang women off of lighthouses."
"Sin is sin. I’ve repented."
"Paid for them how?"
"Christ paid for them."
"That’s convenient."
"That’s grace."
"What would your father think?"
"He’d be amused. Then he’d kill me."
We laughed. Luther’s dentures shone. Perfectly straight and creamy. His real teeth had gone the way of Rufus’s.
"You’re not a believer are you, Andrew?"
I slid under and came up again, brushed my gray hair out of my face.
"No."
"I could help you. I’d like to help you."
"I’ll pass."
One of the twins ran up and leaned over the edge beside his father.
"When are you coming, Dad? You promised."
Luther kissed Jason’s cheek.
"Give me a minute, son."
Jason sprinted back and yelled as he canonballed again into the pool.
I rose up out of the water, my skin steaming.
"What if it runs in the family, Luther?"
"Runs in everybody’s family."
I climbed out of the Jacuzzi and wrapped myself in a towel.
"Grace, Andrew. It’s free, and it’s the only shot at a happy ending you’ve got."
"Goodbye, Reverend Kite."
I unlatched the gate and started toward the stairwell. By the time I’d reached my door on the second level, Luther was back in the pool, chasing his boys and terrorizing them with the soundtrack to Jaws.
I leaned against the railing, shivering now, observing the family at play. After awhile, my eyes moved beyond them to the black sweep of grassland all around. Felt that tightness in my throat again, but it wasn’t Vi this time. Amid all that darkness and the stars falling through it on their absurd and fleeting vectors, the lighted pool area below and the ruckus of Luther’s family seemed all that was left of the world.
# # #
I took a shower to wash the chlorine out of my hair. As the water beat down on my face, I sensed a sleepy headache coming from the wine. Didn’t matter. My suitcase was packed. I would push on to Denver tonight.
I turned off the water and threw back the curtain.
Luther stood dripping in his swimming trunks, skin glistening with beads of water.
"It was Orson’s," he said, turning the ivory-hilted knife in his right hand, the blade shimmering as if newly-forged.
"Haven’t lost the taste, I see."
A tremor in my voice. Sound of fear. I tasted it, too—rust in the back of my throat.
"Never, Andrew. But afterwards, I’ll ask forgiveness, and I’ll mean it, and come tomorrow I’ll bathe in the light of grace."