Legion

And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying,

My name is Legion: for we are many. (Mark 5: 9)

Paul Hannah was drunk and stoned, so he was driving very carefully. He had both hands on the wheel and his eyes on the road. He was concentrating as if his life depended on it...

...except when his eyes strayed to that damned speedometer. He couldn’t believe it was right. He knew he was blasting down the highway, but the needle said he was barely doing sixty. He kept staring at the thing, as if looking at it would reconcile sixty miles an hour with the sensation of freefall. Can you hallucinate a speedometer? Was it only a dream, one of those flying dreams like he had when he was a kid where he’d go sailing off into...

Lurching back to the task at hand he growled, Well it’d help if you’d dim your damned lights. He bent forward to keep the side mirrors from blinding him. The inside mirror was auto-dimming, but those side mirrors were like searchlights.

He could swear the guy was doing it on purpose, burning his high beams and riding his ass like he was trying to climb in the backseat. It was a big truck too—headlights up near his roofline. Why don’t you just pass? he wailed impotently, gripping the wheel tighter and squirming in his seat, which made the car jerk left and then right.

In the white glare, he squinted down at the speedometer. Down to fifty-five. Sheee-it, he hissed, gripping the wheel tighter and pressing the gas. The car surged forward, and he shivered inside his own sweat. He’d heard somewhere that the cops catch more drunks going too slow than going too fast, and it didn’t seem fair. If it was unwise and dangerous to exceed your own safe speed, how could they justify forcing drunk drivers to go faster? That was just wrong.

Sammie’s M3 was Paul’s favorite car in the world. He loved the little rocket and borrowed it often, sometimes like tonight, for no good reason. Gotta be careful with Sammie’s little baby, he mumbled as he checked the speedometer. Back up to sixty-two. Good.

But somehow the car had wondered off the road while he was checking his speed. He jerked it back. Shit, he hissed again, checking his mirrors and blinking in the glare. If that’s a cop, I’m toast.

What screwball name did Sammie have for that weed? Superhooch or Hammertoke? Whatever it was the stuff was so good it gave him the jitters. At one point, about three hours ago, he’d achieved the Perfect High, just the right blend of marijuana buzz and Johnny Walker glow, and he was floating in the breeze.

"Euphoria," he muttered wistfully, but it was his own fault. Instead of slowing down and carefully nursing his most excellent high, he’d kept right on pounding ‘em down, until he was just plain zonked. Now he was sweating in his clothes; the fun was past, and all he wanted was to get home.

"What we need is tunes, he said, reaching down and punching the radio knob. But the sound system exploded with a wall of noise that hit him like a slap. Shit!" he screamed as he lunged for the knob, poking at the dash and missing every time. In desperation, he leaned down on his elbow, and really focused on the little red lights.

FIND THE KNOB! FIND THE DAMN KNOB!

Again the car wandered onto the right shoulder, but this time, before he even noticed, the right wheels caught a long deep trough of rainwater, and in an explosion of spray, the car lurched to the right, off the shoulder and into the weeds along the embankment.

"Shit! he yelled inside the deafening finale of Lead Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven." At ninety-five decibels the car bucked and jarred, its right side tilting down the steep slope and its headlights flashing through tall weeds.

He was just fighting back onto the shoulder amidst the jarring and the noise and the glare with every muscle in his body approaching spastic rigidity when something slammed into him and sent him lurching off the shoulder, off the edge of the world, out into thin air.

There was a second of breathless, weightless nothing, and in that black void he contemplated the nature of his own stupidity and knew his fate was sealed. The moment hung there in time, and then he was hammered sideways, banging his head on the window just before the airbags blew.

His first mistake had been turning the key; his last was slamming on the brakes while his head was still reeling from the airbag explosion. The ditch was saturated mud and tangled weeds and offered about as much traction as greased glass. His sudden moves, the steep slope and the mud were too much even for BMW’s sophisticated electronic stabilization systems, and in an angry fit, the little red car whipped around and slammed sideways through a stand of sumac.

Seen from across the swamp, it was over in seconds. First there was a loud bang and then the little car was airborne. It started to spin in midair, but hadn’t turned halfway around before the passenger side sheared off a bunch of little trees and the car flipped into a roll. In less than a second it rolled three times and came to a very sudden stop in the deep, muddy swamp.

The night was strangely still after that. The little car’s lights and radio had blinked off when it hit the trees. Now all was quiet out there in the dark. The left wheels were buried in the mud, and the right wheels were facing straight up, turning lazily in the moonlight, mud and weeds bristling off the tread.

A few seconds later, up on the highway, the other car, a big black thing, roared backwards along the shoulder and skidded to a halt directly above the wreck. Silently, the passenger side window zipped down, replacing a shiny moonlit rectangle with a black hole. After a few seconds the moonlit rectangle was back; the truck’s lights switched on, dropped to low beams and roared off down the road.

A hundred yards to the east, old man Johansen lurched out of his chair and made for the phone. Sitting in the dark on his three-season porch—sleepless as usual and nursing a tall glass of milk—he’d seen the whole thing, and he couldn’t wait to call it in. The wreck would bring new people into his life, and it would be a great story to share on cribbage night at Burney’s.

Chapter 1

Friday, October 14, 9:11AM

How are you feeling, Mr. Hannah?

Paul Hannah, still drowsy, forced his eyes open against the glare. I don’t know, he muttered, wincing at the stab of light and raising a hand to his aching head, which he found wrapped in gauze.

Without paying him any more attention than she would an eggplant in the produce section, the chubby little nurse ripped the Velcro on a blood pressure cuff and grabbed his arm at the elbow. The Velcro made its usual loud complaint, but to Paul it was like an electric shock. Even worse, something about her cool touch was giving him tingles.

Squinting one eye, he took his first real look at her. She was fat, fifty and frumpish. Still, the tingles were giving him goose bumps. Very weird hangover, he thought, one in a million—at least. When she pumped up the cuff, the blood trapped and pulsed in his arm, and he felt his veins swell and harden. It didn’t hurt, really; it just felt... amplified. Electric.

Any nausea?

Nope.

Dizziness?

Not exactly.

He waited for her to ask if he was still stoned or if he was always this jumpy. She stopped talking to concentrate. After a throbbing hiss and the release of pressure, she said, Good, and went about her business.

He wondered if she was happy about his blood pressure or his freedom from dizziness and nausea. He concluded that she was simply in the habit of uttering a generic approbation after completing each tedious task in a long tedious day.

He wanted to keep her a moment longer. The tingles were making his heart race. He was sure it had goofed up his blood pressure test. He wasn’t thinking straight; he would be glad when she was gone.

She was taking his pulse now. He waited for her to ask about his tachycardia; maybe make a note in his chart. She didn’t. Maybe she was as excited as he was and trying to hide it. He snuck another peek. If this woman was excited, she would be great at poker. She gave him a practiced little pat on the arm that felt like a tazer jolt. Through the jangles, he heard her say something about the doctor, but he didn’t catch it. Then she hurried away, her rubber soles skweech-skweech-skweeching on the waxed floor, her gelatinous hips shimmering to the beat in her mint green surgical scrubs. It was like watching two thirty-pound bags of pistachio pudding making a break for the door, but she had five more visits to go before she could punch out and head home to her fat cat and her fading geraniums.

Cats and geraniums? Where had that come from? As he tried to sort it out, Paul had the clear impression of an orange and yellow tabby sleeping in the sun among leggy red geraniums.

Nurse? he said through the haze. She stopped with her hand on the door and looked at him over her shoulder, really looked at him for the first time.

What’s your cat’s name? Before the words were out of his mouth, the name Woody popped into his head.

Woody, she said and started to leave, then stopped, frowned and asked, How’d you know I had a cat?

Lucky guess, he said. What color is he?

Orange tabby, she said doubtfully.

He decided not to advise her to cut her geraniums back and water them less in the fall.

Mmm, she said, still frowning and shaking her head as she turned and was gone.

Whoa! he thought, What was that?

**********

He had just drifted off when he felt a hand resting on his shoulder as gently as a warm pool of light. Jenny, he thought at the familiar, welcome touch. Smiling, even before he opened his eyes, he said, Hi, and stretched comfortably. It was one of those long luxurious stretches, muscles aching pleasantly.

Hello, Paul.

The chilly formality of the reply ended his stretch mid-groan. This was a duty call... or worse… Business. Like a sewer backing up, reality came flooding back. They were enemies after four years of marriage. They were finishing up their own little cold war, and although the fighting was over, neither of them had won; they had simply stopped.

When did we give up? Paul wondered. No, he remembered, she gave up; I never tried.

Facing this fact for the first time, he felt his heart sink and close up like a fist. How could he love her so and still shrivel up like scorched bacon when she walked into the room? We both hate what has happened to us, but we don’t know how to fix it.

And the accident was only going to make it worse.

I’m sorry, he said.

About what? she said with a cavalier shrug that said there were far too many choices.

He felt the sting of indifference more than the accusation but resolved not to defend himself. Sticking to his penitence, he answered her question. About the accident, he said. I was careless.

You were drunk.

Drunk and stoned and careless... And stupid...

And monotonous.

The jibe was right on target, but he was too busy staring at her to notice. Is she really that gorgeous? Upon reflection he decided she was even more beautiful now than she had been the first time he ever saw her. He could still remember that first time. He would always remember it.

This came to him as only one in a flood of impressions; all of them trailing her into the room like a strange, intoxicating perfume. More like nerve gas, he thought sourly. It was all about the memories, the sweet ones, the tender ones, the good times, the romance. But there were the other kind too, memories that made him groan way down in his gut. Memories that brought him pain so deep, so fundamentally a part of him that it had begun to define him. He could not imagine anything worse than the pain of his countless regrets, and he hoped for mercy’s sake he never would.

As usual, he forced it out of his mind by thinking of something else.

She really was beautiful, but for some reason, the longer he had known her the less he actually saw her—until now. She had dark brown hair and big brown eyes, and her skin was pale and freckled like fresh cream sprinkled with cinnamon. He loved her freckles and never understood why she hated them. She had a straight nose and a wide, full mouth—some would say too wide and too full—but it was a generous mouth that lent character to all her other merely perfect features. And when she grinned...

He looked into her eyes but could not hold her gaze. Upon averting his eyes he felt hope evaporating like morning dew in the growing summer heat. When all hope was gone, he felt old, and somehow he new exactly how it would be to die alone, fully and finally forgotten. It was an empty feeling that crawled up out of his gut into the back of his throat. I won’t ask you to forgive me, he whispered from the bottom of the pit. I wouldn’t dare.

She gave him a cynical, eloquent look that asked: Was that your best shot? Your most touching plea for sympathy? And here I thought you were the master of manipulation. Your trademark is alternating betrayal and remorse. I know the rules. As long as I am willing to forgive, you will never change.

She is about to walk out of your life forever, a voice whispered inside his aching head.

He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t think. When he realized he was doomed, he let go of everything, and it felt like falling. Then he was falling, weightless and empty, and the panic was lost in the despair, and without the panic he remembered who she was. Jenny, he said and then, realizing he had spoken her name aloud, he stole a glance. Had she noticed? She was fiddling with her keys, memorizing the specks on the linoleum floor and wishing she was somewhere else. Were you home alone? he asked, trying to tack a question onto her name, which had slipped out and was lying there between them like a mistake.

After awhile she mumbled, Where else would I be? but her heart wasn’t in it; she didn’t even meet his gaze.

Nobody came by to sit with you?

For the first time, she gave him a glance, raising her eyes just for a split second and then blinking it away. At two in the morning? she said, letting one shoulder drop and tipping her head to that side the way she did. But she had fixed her gaze back upon the floor.

I thought maybe Julie or Sue? Maybe your mom?

They don’t know.

Ashamed of the rut we’re in, he said. You couldn’t bring yourself to add to my long and very public list of screw-ups. It wasn’t a question; he saw her predicament.

"I’m tired of the tea and sympathy. She said, lifting the other shoulder in a tiny shrug, glancing at him again. And of the advice," she added in a whisper. This time their eyes actually met for half a second before she withdrew again. In that glimpse, he saw equal parts of old and aging resentment mixed with something bleaker, close perhaps to the despair he was feeling. He had no doubt about what the advice had been. They were all telling her to end it, to put him behind her.

Hasn’t been any fun for you has it, he said very quietly.

She didn’t raise her eyes this time but froze... as if she had turned to stone.

I’ve been busy killing us both with my silly stupid self-centered...

He had hissed out the words, but he couldn’t finish; he’d run out of invectives.

Still she didn’t move a hair.

I’m so sorry, Jen. I can’t...

Suddenly her eyes darted up, and though wet and puffy, they were bright with rage. Paul Hannah would have jumped out of the way if he had not been flat on his back. The look on her face said, Don’t you dare say you’re sorry. Don’t you dare pretend it’s that simple!

Without thinking he blurted, No really, I’m done drinking, I...

She threw her keys across the room; they hit the bathroom door with a loud clack and then dropped to the floor. Somehow what he’d said was the last straw. Turning half away from him and ducking her head, she began flailing her arms at some menacing force that was closing in around her, threatening to suffocate her. Shut tight now, her eyes began squeezing out big fat tears that trailed down her face and dripped off her nose and upper lip. Seen in profile her face reminded Paul of a little girl with a scuffed knee and no one to turn to for comfort.

No, Paul pleaded. "This is different. I actually see how you feel and... Oh, Jenny... what have I done to you. I’ve hurt you so. I don’t have any excuse. I’ve been... How stupid could I… A half-wit could see…"

He had to stop. He couldn’t breathe.

Look, he said, fighting for control and pressing his palms hard against his throbbing head, "I can either stop drinking and face things the way they are or kill what’s left of us... It’s coming to that. I can feel it, and it’s not your fault. It’s mine. All of it..."

No more promises... she hissed through clenched teeth. No more... stinking... phony... apologies. Her words were projectiles, spaced apart as if she was hurling them at him one by one with all her strength.

Like a great hollow void growing in his gut, Paul felt the anguish, the desolation she felt. Standing there so straight, so close by his bedside, and yet so careful not to touch anything that had anything to do with him, she was holding her face in both hands now, covering her eyes with fingers clenched so tight the nails and knuckles were white. Was she trying to shield her face or trying to keep from exploding? He looked at her and saw for the first time in years what she really was, a beautiful, graceful, fragile, tenderhearted young woman in very deep trouble.

At twenty-four, she was already deeply cynical, with bitterness enough to age her well beyond her years. Just under five-eight, she seemed taller because of the way she carried herself, chin up, head and shoulders back. She was slim—some would say skinny—but shapely and lithe like a dancer. She had straight brown hair, her plainest feature, except that it was dark and thick and it glistened like expensive silk.

Even so, her eyes were the main event. They were brown and flecked with gold so warm, so alive, he could never quite put it into words. The light and life in her beautiful eyes had once been enough to rattle him. The merest glance would fill him up and make him a giggling fool. Now, as she stood so near, her face in her hands, he felt that he would give anything to see those eyes soft and smiling again... but where he was concerned they had turned to glass. Was it too late? Had one death led to another? Was the love that had bound them together already lost and gone forever? The thought struck him hard enough to take his breath away.

You’re right, he whispered when he could breathe again, No more promises, but one last appeal.

She made no sound except for her ragged breathing, but at the first hint that he might place yet another demand upon her, she pulled her arms in tighter and seemed to shrink, to retreat and to pull in all her defenses.

Please don’t do anything until I get home, he whispered. Then, give me one more month.

Blowing out through her nose as if he’d punched her in the gut, she lurched away. Turning her back but keeping her face covered, she crashed into the ventilator under the window and banged an elbow hard against the glass.

First time I screw up, you won’t even have to give me the boot, he pleaded, rushing on before she could say no. "I’ll leave on my own. Voluntarily. But let it rest for now, Jen. What do you have to loose? I’m not home now anyway. When I do get home, I’ll pack up all my stuff first thing, put it all in boxes and stack ‘em in the garage. If I mess up one more time—if I take even one drink—it’ll be my last at that address. My stuff’ll be right there ready to load up and haul away. No toil, no trouble. You won’t have to pack me up or throw me out. Just call a trucker—as easy as dialing the phone.

But give it just a little more time. Okay? ...Please, Jenny.

Her shoulders were shaking now. He could see he was tormenting her, but the damage had been done long ago, over too long a time. This was not his cruelest hour; it was his moment of truth.

"I do love you, Jen. I lost track of that, I’ll admit, but it’s still true. I got tangled up, feeling sorry for myself, looking for a way out—not out of our marriage—never that—out of the pain... out of... out of growing up, I guess. Out of facing up. I’ve been completely and totally selfish and incredibly... stupid, trying to weasel out of my share of the hurt and in the process... Ah, Jenny... in the process hurting you even more than you’ve already been hurt... and wrecking everything that really matters.

"Jenny, as ashamed as I am that I couldn’t or wouldn’t bear up, what I can’t stand is how much I’ve hurt you. I never tried to hurt you, but since it hap... since he... He was skating near the edge now, about to mention the unmentionable, but then she flinched. Her body jerked and her head actually bumped the wall as if in a spasm. In a split second, he saw it or felt it. She was bracing herself, trying to prepare to be hurt once more by what he was about to say. With an ache in his heart and a lump in his throat, he stopped himself and backed away, saying instead, ...but for some time now, I haven’t been paying attention, as if I was the only one hurting.

"I’ve become completely self absorbed in my own grief and heartache. I’ve been behaving as if I had a right to let everything go, to turn inward and to stop making any effort at... at anything.

Any fool knows it doesn’t work that way. Jenny, it’s all my fault. To do such a thing to you at such a time... it’s unforgivable, but I really... really don’t want to lose you. Whether you can believe that or not... I don’t know what I’d do... I don’t want us to be over.

For a long time she was silent. Paul tried to think of another argument, but came up blank. Finally she spoke. I came here to say goodbye, she whispered, to tell you I’m done.

I know, he said and held his breath.

For what seemed like forever the room was still. In the silence, the radiator ticked and snapped, and the wind rattled the window and moaned eerily through the cracks. Then a small chunk of ice clattered down the face of the building, rattling against the glass and vanishing into the night. Eventually, he began to hear the normal hospital sounds outside the room, but they were reaching him from some other world.

Still, the seconds ticked by.

Finally her shoulders dropped. One more month, she groaned. But I will hold you to this last promise with one modification, she added, spitting out the words like nails. "I will pack up your stuff and pile it by the door tomorrow morning, so it will be there when you get home. I’m not sure I care what you do after that. In the next thirty days, we’ll see if I can remember why I should care what you do."

Paul Hannah felt himself start to breathe again, and the first breath filled his lungs with a long shudder. Thank you, Jenny, he whispered.

She said, I’m going now, and was already moving toward the door. She sounded depressed and defeated.

Jen, he said. Maybe you should call Anna, drive up north for a visit. Maybe help out in the shop for a few days.

I have to work, she said dully and started her feet toward the door.

He searched for something he could do for her and came up blank.

Uhm... don’t forget your keys, he said.

Mechanically, she stopped, turned, walked over and scooped them up off the floor.

Looking down at his hands he said, I used to know how to make you happy. He said it reflectively, thinking out loud. As she reached the door, he added, With all my heart, I’m going to try to get that back.

When she met his gaze over her shoulder, he felt himself cringe and hoped she hadn’t noticed. Her soft brown eyes were still beautiful, but they were full of nothing at all. He hoped it was just that she was tired, but he knew better. Her eyes were dead; like doll’s eyes. They showed no pain, no frustration, not even fatigue or heartache. In that instant, he knew there was nothing he could do or say to make it right. Only time could do that, and thirty days was nowhere near enough to heal the damage he’d done.

Maybe she would never be able to forgive him. Maybe the soft, intelligent openness of her gaze was a kind of innocence lost. If his betrayal had taken that from her, he could think of nothing worse. He doubted he would ever live it down, and the thought came to rest inside him like a pool of hot lead in the pit of his stomach.

Chapter 2

Friday, October 14, 9:52AM

Like everyone else walking down the jet way at the Minneapolis-St Paul International Airport, A. J. Sanchez was thinking about next steps. The first order of business was to connect with local law enforcement; the trick was to choose the right contact. Once again he had no leads, no letter of introduction, and nothing much to offer anyone in exchange for their help. Even if the stories were true about Minnesota nice, nobody here would be rolling out the red carpet for him. Local police were often skeptical of federal law enforcement. That was one of the reasons the Justice Department made first contact through the NSA and not the FBI. Since he worked for the National Security Agency AJ was not a cop. As the theory went, that should put the local cops at ease, knowing he was not there to horn in on them.

But life seldom goes as planned. Policemen the world over are a cynical bunch, and to AJ this little game of federal bait and switch seemed to prove them right. Besides, people had funny notions about the NSA. In the movies it was often portrayed as shadowy and sinister, playing fast and loose with the Constitution. If AJ started waving his credentials around, the local cops might be more worried about him breaking the law than taking over their investigations.

As usual, before his flight he had spent some time on the Internet, researching the crime scene in Minneapolis, using Nexis and local news archives to identify the shakers and movers in the local constabulary. To his surprise the Hennepin County Sheriff was said to have a crack team of investigators, a modern crime lab, an excellent staff of forensic scientists and all the latest gear. After renting a set of wheels and dumping his stuff at the hotel, AJ would head over to the sheriff’s office and have a friendly chat with the desk sergeant. Sometimes a little face time near the bottom of the food chain helped him get the lay of the land.

AJ was pretty new at this, but at least he fit the mold. As expected at the Agency he was young and trim and extremely bright. He’d been a fed for five years—ever since law school—but only for the past eighteen months had he been attached to the Federal Taskforce on Internet Crime, which had kept him on the road almost constantly ever since. His boss said it was a great assignment for a young Turk, whatever that meant, but AJ’s parents were Mexican, not Turkish, and he was already getting a little tired of seeing the world. The taskforce included the whole national security apparatus, but the FBI and NSA formed its bipolar nucleus. The FBI was its law enforcement arm, but the investigations were about computers, the Internet, wire fraud, and a high tech protection racket, all of it NSA turf. Investigators like AJ worked way out in front of the guys with the guns, sometimes with computers but mostly interviewing people, following leads and coordinating with local law enforcement. He thought of himself as a bird dog, sniffing out federal crimes before calling in the Bureau to make the bust. He was not a cop, but he was an officer of the federal court and had NSA credentials to prove it. He carried them in a gold-embossed, black leather flip-open case just like the ones the FBI carried, and if he worked it right and showed some respect, local cops generally came around, deciding in the end that he was on their side.

Actually, although he wasn’t a cop, he was supposed to carry a sidearm. However, as usual his luggage was about two pounds light in that department. He might need a gun for self-defense but not for arrests, because he didn’t make arrests, so after a while he had simply stopped carrying. It was not that he didn’t know how to use one. In fact he had used one once, and once had been enough. Ever since that day, he had been getting along without one. Besides, it meant he didn’t have to check his luggage or fill out forms at the airport. The Transportation Security Administration had their initials embroidered on their shirts and jackets, but everyone knew TSA stood for Thousands Standing Around. Professional courtesy being what it was, AJ found that he moved much faster if he wasn’t packing heat.

The target of AJ’s current investigation—a very successful hacker named Samuel Duane Collins—lived in a western suburb of Minneapolis, a very expensive western suburb called Orono (Pronounced or΄-no). The Orono Police were about what you’d expect in an upscale bedroom community, so AJ thought his best law enforcement contact would be a sheriff’s deputy, not a traffic cop from Moneyville.

At times like this, making cold calls and looking for allies among strangers, AJ felt more like a traveling salesman than a federal investigator. Breezing into town, he must convince the local fuzz to realign their priorities. According to paid sources inside the hacker community, verified through NSA surveillance, Sammie Collins was an Internet racketeer at the top of the food chain, but the evidence they could use in criminal court was too thin. Collins was a careful, cleaver guy, and AJ was in town to poke around a little, maybe make a few friends in the right places, see if Sammie ever got careless. If the local cops could take Collins out of circulation for something unrelated to his Internet crimes, no one in Washington was going to complain about it.

Chapter 3

Friday, October 14, 10:30AM

Walking away from Paul’s room Jenny Hannah was dazed and distracted. She passed people in the hall without seeing them and moved through the hospital corridors like a zombie. Anywhere else, her shattered, aimless wandering might have drawn stares. In the hospital, she was just another of the walking wounded.

How could I have let him talk me into another month? she fumed. What in the hell is the matter with me? Am I really so stupid?

Last night she had been merely annoyed when Paul had dumped the last of his supper in the sink and rushed off to see Sam Collins. Sam was his main client, but he had no right to call at all hours and expect Paul to drop everything. Paul said he’d only be an hour or so, and she said, Hah! You’ll come home when he sends you home. Sometime around midnight, when he still wasn’t home, she realized she was trying to get mad enough to stop worrying. When the cops showed up at two it was the last straw. They said he’d been in an accident. They didn’t mention drunk driving, but they did say something about head injuries. She asked if there had been anyone else involved, and they’d said no. Well, thank God for that, she had thought. It was not the first time he’d landed her in a hospital waiting room in the middle of the night, but during the wee hours she had resolved that it would be the last.

That was less than six hours ago, and now she’d given him another month. What could have gotten into me? she fumed. I don’t owe him a damn thing. God knows I’ve carried my end of the marriage, and I’ve carried both ends for too damn long. No one, NO ONE would blame me for calling it quits.

But she’d made sacred vows. She even remembered some of them: For better or for worse. In sickness and in health.

She had promised, but what about his promises? When was enough enough? Did she ever promise to follow him down through the crack of doom? Did she ever promise to release her life into freefall on his whim? To help him flush it all down the toilet? All she could see into a bleak and dreary future was more drinking, more heartache, all the time watching the man she loved destroy everything they had.

The man she loved? Well yes, she loved him and hated him too. Nothing could kill her love for the man she married—not even the man she married. But this fool who smoked pot and drove drunk and didn’t give a shit about anything? This version of Paul Hannah was a total stranger.

The Paul Hannah she knew had an old-fashioned grace that they used to call breeding. She had loved his thoughtful kindness and the respect he showed to old women and little girls. She’d met him at Stanford, where pretty much everyone was bright and talented, but even there he’d stood out. She was a junior majoring in Political Science and preparing for law school. He was months away from graduating with honors in mechanical engineering. How romantic is that? With stars in his eyes, he once told her there was a place where physics and philosophy melded into one thought—whatever that meant.

He was at Stanford on a full-ride academic scholarship, but an English professor she was dating had confided over burgers and beer that the University had actually offered Paul Hannah his choice of scholarships, all of them full rides. Besides the one he’d accepted, Engineering had offered rides in several other disciplines, Humanities had offered another two or three, and Athletics had offered him three different scholarships for three separate team sports. When she’d asked Paul about it, he’d shrugged and said he’d chosen mechanical engineering because he was interested in physics and liked to design and build things. Besides, he said in a rare serious moment, even with a scholarship, he’d rather work part time to cover his living expenses than take the time away from his studies that the sports teams would have demanded. Even though he was usually fun loving and carefree, his earnest, practical answer had only added to her attraction.

She told her girlfriends she didn’t care that he was such a hunk, claiming with a straight face that she’d barely noticed his golden tan and straight white teeth. It was actually true that she liked that he made her laugh as much as the way he looked in his tennis whites. Even so, his broad shoulders and narrow hips, his sun-streaked, golden hair and his hard, flat stomach hadn’t driven her away. Then there was the way his incredibly blue eyes sparkled when he was up to something...

At a major intersection of hospital corridors, she stopped and shook her head to clear it. With the perspective of the past year, she now realized she had mostly loved the boy in the man. Her boss—a clever lawyer and a shrewd negotiator—had confided once that when struggling with a tough adversary, she tried to imagine him out on the playground in the fifth grade. Imagining Paul as a ten-year-old was ridiculously easy. Until the trouble started, she had always thought of his boyish charm as an endearing quality. Now she realized he was simply immature.

When the trouble started—that was how she thought of that terrible day when the world ended—when the trouble started, Paul just fell apart. While their whole world was still falling down around their ears, her sweet, boyish husband had folded like a kite. Jenny now supposed that Paul’s boyishness was due to the fact that things had always been too easy for him. He had worked at his studies. He had worked to make ends meet, but he was never really challenged.

He had never failed at anything in his life. In fact, he was typically the best at everything he did. He didn’t grow up rich and was never lazy, but he was so bright, so gifted in so many ways, he had always been everybody’s darling boy. And although he grew up in a modest, working class home, he had never had a serious illness, never lost a loved one, never faced a disaster. He was an only child, and his parents were still married and in good health. In fact they now seemed odd in their bland stability. They lived in a Norman Rockwell world in south Minneapolis. They were always there for Paul, had never presented him with a crisis. Their lives were quiet and safe, smooth and homogenized. Except for their brilliant son, they were totally unremarkable, and so in their limited view their darling boy could do no wrong. As a result, Paul was charmingly boyish simply because he was still just a boy. Now that he was in trouble, he was taciturn and brittle when he was sober—which was seldom—and silly, weak and often maudlin when he was drunk.

It wasn’t about brains or manners or style; it was about character.

How could she have missed all of this before? It was probably because she was in many ways Paul’s opposite. With Tyler gone, she had no one in the whole world. Also an only child, she’d lost her parents in a plane crash at fifteen and grown up over night. There was insurance and a trust fund, so she’d avoided the foster homes and the street, but she’d been raised pretty much by lawyers once her folks were gone. The boarding schools and early independence had given her a very clear idea of what she could and could not accomplish on her own. It had taught her to cope, that she could survive almost anything, given time.

So she could stand this. It didn’t help that she knew and understood that. It only added to her anguish and rage that, losing her son—losing little Tyler—she had lost her husband too. Once again she was alone, and it would have been far better if she had been the one who...

No. She would not go there again. She had considered suicide—studied it out as a practical alternative—and rejected it as too shameful, too cowardly. Tyler was gone, and to her lasting shame, all she wanted now was to forget him. That might be the best reason of all to get away from Paul. How could she forget little Tyler when she saw his face every time she looked at her husband?

No. There was no way she was going to continue this interminable string of ridiculous disasters, just because of one mistake, just because she had said, I do, when she should have run for her life.

She felt a stab of pain lance through her every time she acknowledged that Paul had been a terrible mistake. He had hurt her more than she would have believed possible. Between him and Tyler the two of them had fed her through a wood chipper.

Besides, he was never going to stop. He would drink himself to death, or worse, he would keep driving drunk, kill somebody and end up in prison, disbarred and brutally sober with no hope of ever living it down. No, she thought, what actually happens is always worse than anything I can imagine. The way he’s going he’ll end up living under a bridge in a cardboard box.

No! her mind seemed to shout. I will not watch that happen, and he has no right to ask it. No right at all, she said aloud and was disappointed at how normal she sounded. Maybe a noisy case of Tourette’s would be more fitting, she thought. I never promised to watch you self-destruct, she said in a louder voice.

Jenny?

She stopped. A man’s voice… Who..?

She turned and blinked several times. When she finally got her eyes to see what she was looking at, she recognized Brad Thomas walking toward her dressed in green hospitals scrubs. A neighbor from up the street, Brad was an orthopedic surgeon, single, thirty-something, slim, a marathon runner. He had red curly hair but was quiet and circumspect, definitely not the typical fiery redhead. Getting her sluggish brain in gear, she attempted a smile. He was not a close friend; they said hello on the street, shared a conversation a few times a year in the neighborhood. He worked funny hours and was often out running while the rest of the world worked or slept. At the moment, his green eyes looked more curious than troubled, as if catching her ranting at the moon in a room full of strangers was not what he had expected of her.

What are you doing here? he asked, studying her eyes and reaching out but not quite touching her shoulder.

She tottered backwards before she realized she was moving. Grimly, she froze and held his gaze. Paul was in an accident, she said mechanically, wondering how quickly she could get away, how much she would have to reveal to satisfy his curiosity and get him to leave her alone.

Was it serious?

No. I don’t think so; they just wanted to keep him overnight. Don’t they do that with head cases—injuries, I mean? Uhm, he looked okay to me... It dawned on her that she had barely noticed the gauze bandage wrapped around Paul’s head or the yellow-brown ooz on the white cloth above his left ear. Such physical damage was subtle compared to the dimensions of the actual disaster.

They do that to keep a concussion from leading to other problems, Doctor Brad was saying. I’m glad to hear his injuries are minor. I guess I was a little worried; you looked... I don’t know... preoccupied, I guess, he added, meeting her gaze with a professional smile that he used habitually, even in the neighborhood.

Preoccupied? she thought. How about mangled? Can you spell obliterated?

Is there anything I can do? he was asking.

She saw his lips move, heard the distant sound of his voice but took several seconds to piece together what he’d said. She glanced around for the first time and realized she had wandered off course and become lost. While she sorted things out, he folded his arms across his chest, something else he often did socially. Finally, she gave him a wan smile. I’m afraid I’m lost, she said. I wasn’t paying attention and now I have no idea... To complete the sentence she swung an arm in an arc wide enough to take in half the known universe.

Where were you headed?

Home.

Where did you park?

Uhm, I don’t... south... visitor’s... uhm, front.

Come on, he said with that professional smile. I’ll walk you out.

Oh no... you don’t... She held her ground. You’re busy.

Actually, I was just finishing up and going for breakfast. Have you eaten?

Uhm, no, I couldn’t... uhm... eat right now. I’d best get... and... and try and... I should go.

Of course, he said. Sure.

Another time...

I’d like that, he said. Very much. He was blushing.

Great. What’s he doing, hitting on me? Sure, she fumed. Let’s do lunch. I’ll have my people call your people. What the hell?

They stood looking at each other, Jenny feeling more and more irritated. Finally she pushed her chin forward and raised her eyebrows as if to say, Well?

Uhm, let’s see if we can find that front door, he said, still gazing at her. She thought she must look a fright, but in his gaze was a mixture of native trepidation and that old familiar look of appreciation that she had seen reflected in men’s eyes since she was in middle school. She used to like it—that simple look of delight that bordered on a kind of greed in some men. She had once found it reassuring. What a crock, she thought.

When he finally turned away and began to lead her through the maze, she sighed and said, Okay, and started following along beside him.

As they walked, Doctor Brad kept up a brave monologue about the hospital, their neighborhood, their neighbors, car accidents, and how dangerous the roads were getting. Mercifully he did not hold forth on drunk drivers, chemical abuse or other forms of lunacy that were clearly evident in her immediate family. Toward the end of their walk, he ventured a few stray remarks about the coming Thanksgiving Day Bears/Vikings game. By then he was really struggling to fill the social chasm that had opened up between them, and she supposed he was wishing she would chime in and help, but she didn’t. She simply could not find it within herself.

When they finally said good-bye at the front door, there was no mistaking Doctor Brad’s utter and total relief.

Driving home, her mind fell back into the same old rut, puzzling over Paul and the whole tangled mess. Something about him was different this morning. She wasn’t just looking for excuses for giving in; something really had changed. It was why she had lost her resolve. What had he said to change her mind when she was so sure she had heard it all? Was she simply codependent? An Alinon basket case as invested in his addictions as