The Narrows(71)

“Don’t wanna be out there on them streets tonight,” Pete said. His long hands shook fiercely in his lap. “Things are fallin’ apart out there, Ben, and I’m gettin’ a little scared.”

Ben leaned closer to the bars of the cell. “What’s falling apart, Pete? Tell me what’s going on out there.”

“It’s not something I can see,” Pete said, also leaning toward Ben. “I can feel it, though. I feel it the way some animals feel it when a storm’s coming. It’s in my bones.”

“What is?”

“Uneasiness.” Pete placed one hand against his abdomen. “Makes me sick to my stomach.”

I know the feeling, old friend, Ben thought.

“Can I tell you something…without you thinking I’m crazy?” Pete asked.

“Sure. Go ahead.”

Pete shuffled his feet beneath the bench. He was wearing scuffed boots with high laces, the cuffs of his pants tucked into them. “First off,” the man began, “I wasn’t always this guy sittin’ here. You know what I mean? I came from someplace else and had things in my life, Ben. You’ve known me as old Poorhouse Pete—”

“Now, Pete—” Ben began.

“—and that’s just fine, but that ain’t who I always been.” Pete cleared his throat and Ben could see his eyes welling up. When he opened his mouth again to speak, his lower lip quivered. “I once was married, did you know it? Way out in a different part of the country. I was much younger and damn if some ladies didn’t think I was a fine-looking fellow.”

Ben smiled sadly at the man.

“We had a daughter and she lived to be five years old,” Pete said. “She was a beautiful child and the light of my life.”

Ben felt his body go numb. “Oh, Pete. I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

“Was struck and killed by a drunk driver right out in the street where she was playing,” Pete said. “Right in front of our house.” Pete looked at him, his colorless eyes like chunks of granite, his complexion as ruined and asymmetrical as a topographical map of the Sahara Desert. “Well, as you can see, a tragedy like that breaks a man down. People say men are stronger than women, and maybe in some regards that’s even true, but not when it comes to the people we love being taken away. My Holly. My little girl, Holly.” He made a quavering, paper-thin sound. “Maybe I’m weak because I wound up here, all the way at the opposite end of the country, covered in filthy clothing and drinking too much whenever I have enough money to do so. Maybe that makes me weak, Ben. I don’t know.” He held up one crooked finger. The fingernail was black. “But what I do know…”

“What?” It came out in a reverent whisper.

“What I know is my Holly came back last night. She was down by the Narrows, standing right there on the water, Ben, looking up at me. It was going on dusk so it was hard to tell for certain, but I didn’t need to be able to see with perfect clarity to know it was her and that, after all these years of being dead, my little girl Holly had come back.”

Ben felt instantly cold. He opened his mouth to speak but could find no words. He’s drunk, that’s all, he thought, though wondering if he actually believed it. Old Poorhouse Pete’s off the wagon again. Nothing unusual about that.

“But I ain’t crazy,” Pete continued, “and I know nothing good is gonna come from seeing my poor sweet girl down by the Narrows. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I don’t wanna go back out there, Ben.”

Ben stood up. He dragged the chair back behind the desk. “You can’t stay in here forever, Pete. It’s not a motel.”

“I know it ain’t. Just for tonight though, Ben, okay? Please?”

Rubbing the back of his head, Ben said, “Yeah, okay. Sure. Have you eaten?”

“Shirley brought me a sandwich earlier.”

Slowly, as if in a dream, Ben nodded. He went to the door and paused in the doorway. “You want me to turn out the lights so you can get some sleep?”

“No.” Across the room, Pete’s eyes were like twin headlights. “Leave the lights on, for God’s sake, Ben.”

“All right.”

Ben walked back down the hall, suddenly feeling the weariness of the past two weeks pressing firmly down on his shoulders. The goddamn storm, the unidentified boy washed up at the mouth of the river, the slaughtered cattle, and now the missing Crawly boy…

In truth, it was almost comical. But Ben didn’t feel like laughing.

He returned to the Batter’s Box to find Eddie La Pointe settling in his cubicle with some cartons of Chinese takeout. “Hey, Ben. Hungry?”

“Not really.”

Eddie switched on the small black-and-white TV that sat at the corner of his desk and turned it to one of his beloved horror-movie channels. He cracked open the lid of one of the cartons of Chinese food and the smell was instantly overwhelming.

Ben sat at his own cubicle and looked forlornly at the massive amount of paperwork stacked on his desk. His head hurt and his eyes burned from lack of sleep. Absently, he rummaged around the top of his desk for the bottle of Advil he knew was there, somewhere, among the madness.

“Second storm front moving in later this week,” Eddie said around a mouthful of noodles. “Cumberland Public Works already put out their flood warning.”