The Town (38 page)

But he was asking her, begging her, pleading with her, and she owed him at least that much. It had been his dream to come here, it meant a lot to him, and it was only for a month. Besides . . . maybe she was overreacting, letting her emotions dictate her thoughts.

“I swear. One thing more and we’re out of here. Packed and gone. McGuane in our rearview mirror.”

There was something about his voice that rang false to her, and she had the sudden desire, the sudden
need,
to look at his face and see if the deception she thought she heard was really there, but he was still hugging her, holding her tight, his head on her shoulder, her head on his, and she decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.

“All right,” she said. “Okay. One month.”

The café was closed, as it had been for the past three days, but Paul’s car was parked in the alley, and Gregory used his own key to unlock the front door. He walked inside. “Paul?”

There was no response. He shut the door behind him, looked around. Nothing had been touched since that night. Yellow police ribbon still circled the mangled mess of lights and rigging that littered the better part of the room. Even from here, Gregory could see dried bloodstains on the floor and on the smashed tables and chairs.

He had not spoken to Paul since the funeral, and then it had been merely a generic “I’m sorry,” that echoed the words of the people in line in front of him. He felt bad that he had not called, had not made more of an effort to be there for his friend. He’d sent a condolence card, but that was even more impersonal, and he knew he should have talked to Paul, but the truth was that he did not feel close enough to him to do that. Sure, they’d been hanging together for the past few months, but before that it had been nearly twenty years since he’d seen him, and Paul had to have friends who were closer to him than Gregory, had to have formed relationships with other people in the intervening years.

Gregory felt strange being here alone like this. He should’ve called Odd first, brought him along. He had no idea what to say or do, but he’d already committed to this course of action, and again he called out, “Paul?”

There was noise in the back.

“It’s Gregory!”

Paul emerged from the office area, looking bad. He obviously hadn’t shaved since the funeral, and although he had changed out of his suit, his clothes were wrinkled, dirty, and disheveled. “What are you doing here?”

Gregory shuffled his feet awkwardly. “I just . . . I came to find out how you were doing, see if you need any help with anything.”

“How I’m doing? How I’m doing?” Paul strode across the floor toward him, fists clenched. “How the fuck do you think I’m doing? My wife is dead.”

Gregory licked his lips. “I thought you might need some help with the cleanup—”

“Cleanup? What am I supposed to clean up? This place is history. After the victims finish suing my ass, I’ll be lucky to own the fucking clothes on my back.” He shoved a finger in Gregory’s chest. “I never would’ve done any of this if you hadn’t bullied me into it!”

“Bullied you?”

“You think I wanted to have concerts in my café? I never even thought of that before!”

Gregory felt himself being drawn into the argument. “You were complaining that you were barely making enough money to survive. I was just trying to help you out.”

“You were on an ego trip. You were bored and rich and looking for something to do, and you thought you’d come and lord it over the people you used to know. And now Deanna is dead because of it.”

“Wait a minute—”

“You never liked her anyway, did you? Are you happy now? Got what you wanted?”

Gregory held up his hands. “Sorry,” he said. “I just came by to see how you were. If you don’t want me here . . .”

“A little late for that, isn’t it? I never wanted you here at all. And if I’d listened to what that little voice was telling me, my wife would be alive.”

Gregory felt his anger building. “It’s not my fault. The rigging collapsed. It was an accident.”

“Accidents don’t just happen.”

“Of course they happen.”

“There’s always a cause.”

“And that’s me?”

“If the shoe fits . . .”

“Look, I don’t want to fight. I know what you’re going through—”

“You have no idea what I’m going through!”

Gregory backed up. “Fine,” he said. “Fine. I’m here if you need me. Give me a call if you want. But I think it’s better if I leave you alone right now.”

“You’re here if I need you? Where were you when I needed you to make sure your lights and sound system were safe enough not to kill people, huh? If you hadn’t been too fucking cheap to get a professional to put it in, this never would’ve happened!”

“You’re the one who wanted Odd to handle it!”

“And he failed! You and Odd are the ones who fucked up here. You killed my wife and Irma Slater and Houston Smith and Linette Daniels and I’m going to sue your ass for everything you’ve got, you cocksucking little milk-drinking faggot!”

Gregory pushed him.

They hadn’t had a physical altercation since they were little, since junior high, when Paul had gotten blamed after Gregory keyed the gym teacher’s car, but they got into it now, escalating instantly from shoving to punching. They were both horrendously out of shape, but anger and adrenaline made up for lack of fitness and expertise, and the fight was vicious. There was no one else around; neither of them was concerned with maintaining a manly facade, and they kicked and punched and pulled and grabbed in animalistic fury.

Paul yanked Gregory’s hair, pulled him forward, then punched him in the stomach, knocking him down, and though he could barely breathe, Gregory rolled out of the way before he ended up with a hard kick in the midsection. He staggered to his feet, faced Paul, and though he didn’t want to think it, the thought arrived unbidden:
I wish I had my gun.

Paul came at him again, and Gregory kicked out, the toe of his shoe connecting with his friend’s gonads, and Paul fell to the floor, clutching his crotch, curling in on himself, whining in a high, doglike squeal.

A rectangle of light appeared, approached, and then overtook the two of them, and Gregory turned to see Wynona opening the door. “What is going on here?” she said, looking around.

Paul moaned, and Gregory stared at her dumbly.

The teenager walked in, walked past him, and crouched down next to Paul. She looked up at Gregory disgustedly. “Haven’t you done enough?”

He backed toward the open door, letting his fists fall open.

“You killed his wife, now you want to kill him too?”

“I didn’t kill anybody,” Gregory said. His voice sounded slurred, dumb, confused.

“Just get out of here,” Wynona told him, helping Paul to his feet.

He looked at the two of them, then turned and hurried out of the café.

He
had
wanted to kill him, Gregory thought. If he had had his gun, he would have.

And as he got into the van and drove away, he realized that he didn’t feel ashamed about that at all.

“L
ook!”

Tompall looked.

It was Jesus.

The picture was grainy and smudged, like a textbook photo of the shroud of Turin, the features of the face hinted at more by what was not clear than by what was. He picked up the sheet of paper, looked at the one beneath it.

Same thing.

Ditto for the one beneath that.

And the one beneath that and the one beneath that . . .

All of the copies made on the machine were imprinted with the countenance of Christ.

“This is a joke, right?” Tompall turned toward his assistant.

Johnny shook his head, his eyes wide.

“Well, what did you do?”

“Nothing!” Johnny’s voice was high and nervous. “I just copied these articles for Mrs. Kness. She wanted twenty copies of each, one for each student in her class, and I put them through, had them collated . . . and this is what came out.” He handed Tompall the originals, and Tompall sorted through the articles.

Nothing out of the ordinary here.

He opened the copier, checked the camera, checked the glass, even checked the ink and toner, though that could not possibly have a bearing on what had happened.

Finally, he made a copy himself.

Instead of a reproduced article on sea turtles, the photocopy showed the picture of Jesus.

He replaced the paper in both trays, made several copies, varied the reproduction size, but the result was always the same.

“Jesus,” he breathed, and the exhalation was not one of identification or recognition.

“What should we do?” Johnny asked.

“Try doing these on the other machine. And get me something else to copy. We’ll see if it’s the articles or the machine.”

It was both.

No matter who copied what, or which machine they used, the result was always the same.

Tompall was sweating, not only afraid but frustrated. He didn’t know if this was a miracle or a haunting. He didn’t really care. He just wished it had happened to someone else. He had orders to complete here. The town hall’s new budget book by Friday. Ab Reese’s pharmacy calendars by Monday. Not to mention all the piddly-ass little photocopies that they were given each day—wills and tax forms, letters and checks.

“You think Christ’s trying to tell us something?” Johnny asked.

Tompall looked at him. “Just shut the fuck up.” He unplungged both machines, plugged them in again, used Windex to wipe the glass, then, as an experiment, took one of the first Jesus pictures and tried to make a copy of it.

This time, the result was a little bit different.

He and Johnny stared at the legal-sized paper. In this one, Jesus was smiling, and there was a little cartoon speech bubble, like the ones in comic books, coming out from his mouth.

“The Molokans killed me!” Jesus was saying.

Johnny read the words. “You think that’s true?” he asked, his voice hushed.

Tompall shook his head slowly, wiped the sweat from his forehead with a paper towel. “Who knows anymore?” he said, staring at the image. “Who the hell knows?”

“You think we should tell someone?”

“Not yet,” he said, and he took the picture with the cartoon bubble, placed it on the glass, and hit the Copy button on the machine.

“Adam?”

Babunya’s voice sounded tired, and he looked up from his comic book to see her standing in his doorway.

“Yeah?”

“What are you doing?”

“Reading.”

“You are very quiet.” She walked into his room, looking around at the mess. It was the first time she’d come in here since they’d moved into the house, and he wondered what the reason was for her visit now.

“How are you?”

He looked at his grandmother and realized that he’d been avoiding her. He’d always been close to her, and they’d talked a lot when they’d first moved here, but in the weeks and months since, he’d made an effort to stay away from her, although it was not something he had even recognized until now.

The
banya.

It was the
banya
that had come between them. He hadn’t liked lying about going there, and it had been easier just staying away from her. Even after he had stopped sneaking over to the bathhouse, he’d found himself avoiding his grandmother.

Why? he wondered.

He could not really say.

She had obviously noticed, and he assumed that she was now attempting to cross that breach, to break down that wall. He wanted to be able to meet her halfway, to be as close to her as he had been before, but he felt himself stiffen as she approached. Part of him wanted her out of his room, wanted to guard the secrecy he’d been cultivating.

Why? he wondered again.

Once more he did not know.

“I’m fine,” he said rather formally, in answer to her question.

She walked over, smiling, intending to sit down next to him, but she stopped just before reaching the bed, focusing on something to the left of him, on the floor. Frowning, she reached down, picked up Sasha’s panties from the space beneath the box springs where he’d shoved them.

She looked at him evenly, and he wanted to protest that he didn’t know what they were, didn’t know how they’d gotten here, but he found himself turning away under her strong gaze, and though he opened his mouth to speak, no words came out.

She slipped the panties in the pocket of her housecoat and sat down next to him.

“Is not your fault,” Babunya said softly, putting an arm around his shoulder. “You good boy. I know that. You always good boy. You were born with happy face. The first time I saw you, in the hospital, I saw you had happy face. Sasha and Teo, they don’t have happy face like you. I know this not your fault.”

He was crying, though he didn’t want to and could not remember the last time he had done so, and he hugged Babunya, filled with guilt and a deep, humiliating shame. At the same time, he felt liberated, as if he’d been keeping a secret for a long, long time that he had finally been allowed to tell. He thought of the
banya,
thought of the spot above the highway where they’d been arrested. He wiped his eyes. “What’s happening?” he asked.

“Evil,” she said, and the word, spoken so plainly and straightforwardly, made the hair on his arms bristle.

He licked his lips. “The
banya
?” he whispered.

She sighed. “Evil always come back. The Devil work in many ways. Even good people influenced by evil. That what happen to you. That is why you throw rocks at cars and . . .” She glanced down at her housecoat pocket, looked quickly away.

“I didn’t mean to,” he said. “I don’t even know why I did it.”