Damnable
CHAPTER 3
HATCHER DIDN’T NEED TO CHECK THE ADDRESS. IT WAS the right street, and the pink flamingos told the rest. He’d almost forgotten about her thing for those creatures, the mild obsession she’d ceaselessly indulged, taking it with her from place to place, year to year. It was bad enough growing up with the stupid birds always nearby, on the refrigerator, hanging from the rearview mirror, perched on shelves, pinned to her clothes. But having them flocking on the front lawn—gaggles of them stuck in the ground, proudly displayed for everyone in the neighborhood to see—that had been awful. He remembered being enchanted by them as a small child, puzzled by them in elementary school. By fifteen, the whole thing was positively mortifying. New neighborhoods, new neighbors, but always those same damn cheap, gaudy, embarrassing plastic birds.
The half dozen flamingos leaned at odd angles in front of a small split-level, eyeing him warily from atop their thin metal rods as he made his way up the walk. The house was set back a few yards from the sidewalk in the middle of the block on a sloping street in Queens. Dark siding over painted cinder block, covered with some kind of textured mortar. An older neighborhood, probably built in the ’50s, with large maples and oaks buckling the concrete paths and curbs in various places, the broken canopy above depositing nuts and branches and leaves on to the small lawns and the narrow roadway. Nicer than anything he could remember having lived in as a kid, but that wasn’t saying much.
He climbed the two cement steps onto the stoop and rang the doorbell. Some faint footfalls, then he heard a latch and the door opened behind the screen.
Hatcher’s mother stood in the doorway, beaming.
“Jacob! I can’t believe it’s really you.”
He had to step back as she flung the screen door open, narrowly avoiding a smack in the head. She bounced onto the stoop and threw her arms around him. He wasn’t sure what to do with his hands as she squeezed his midsection and rocked from side to side. Leaving them hanging at his sides seemed too consciously aloof. Hugging her in return would have been disingenuous. He settled on patting the backs of her shoulders. But not for long, and without much enthusiasm.
She pulled away, sniffling, smiling at him with teary eyes. “You’re so big and strong now.”
“I eat a lot.”
The years didn’t melt or peel away as he’d half expected; he didn’t feel dragged into the past. It was more like something he had left behind and hadn’t paid much thought had just leaped a chasm, caught up to him in the here and now. Heavier, older, but still the person he remembered, time now dragging at her skin, pulling at her curves. She must have given up that fight for eternal youth.
She looked surprisingly domesticated, wearing dark polyester slacks and a light blue knit blouse, a small white apron around her waist. Her hands felt cool and damp as she ran them down his cheeks, like she had hastily wiped them dry. He forced a mild smile, gently took her arms by the wrists, and lowered them. The silence quickly became awkward.
“Did you have any trouble finding the place?” she said, finally.
“No. I took the bus to Queens; it dropped me off a few blocks away.”
“Where’s my mind gone? Please, come inside.”
She stepped back, gesturing Hatcher into her home.
The air was thick with the trapped odor of food. The precise smell was hard to pin down, generations of aromas worked into the walls over years, probably the furniture, too, competing with something more immediate coming from the kitchen. It was a little too much, but not altogether unpleasant.
“I just put some coffee on. It should be ready in a minute.”
Hatcher nodded, treading behind her into a small living room.
Karen Woodard kept a tidy house these days, or at least had tidied up in anticipation of Hatcher’s visit, he couldn’t be sure which. The décor was simple. A bit cluttered, but livable. The stuff of discount stores and consignment sales, early American furniture with wood frames and quilted blankets, wooden tables with gilded lamps and fringed bell shades. A scarred, darkened hardwood floor with small oval rugs stitched in concentric rings. And, of course, flamingos. Pink ones, white ones, tall ones, squat ones, porcelain ones, sewn ones. On the walls, the tables. Flamingos were everywhere, even more so than when he was a kid. She led him to a sofa with a pink flamingo throw pillow and sat. He took a few extra steps and lowered himself into a neighboring chair.
“There’s so much I want to know about you,” she said, sliding over to be closer to him. “About where you’ve been and what you’ve done.”
“You mean, why I was in prison.”
She shook her head, a pained expression washing over her face. “No, no. Just about you in general. Unless, that’s something you want to tell me.”
“All I really want is to know what’s going on.”
She stood, brushing her hands down her apron. “Coffee should be ready. Would you like some?”
Hatcher rubbed his eyes and blinked a few times. He could already sense this was going to be more difficult than he had thought. It had been nine hours since he’d spoken with his mother on the phone from the confinement facility. She had avoided the subject then, she was avoiding it now.
“Sure. Coffee sounds good.”
He watched her head into the kitchen, past a small dining area with a table set for three, then leaned forward, forearms on his knees, and swept the room. On the far wall, above a table of framed photos, was a picture of him from high school in his football pads, holding his helmet. Next to it was a photo of a man he didn’t recognize, dark hair and light brown eyes, square-jawed, a controlled smile spreading his lips thin. The teenaged Hatcher wasn’t smiling at all in his.
His mother returned carrying a tray with cups and a small matching pitcher and sugar bowl. The warm scent of food cooking, meaty and moist, stronger than the odor of the house, followed her. It tickled his nostrils, made a tangy taste juice the sides of his tongue.
“Cream and sugar?”
“Fine.”
He gestured toward the wall of photos. “You still married to Carl?”
“Yes. He’ll be home soon.”
Hatcher nodded. He would have bet a significant amount of money that they were long divorced. He remembered his mother going from a woman in her twenties fishing for love and romance to one in her thirties looking for a meal ticket. He supposed that should have made him feel some sympathy for Carl Woodard, but it didn’t. Then or now.
She dropped a sugar cube into one of the cups using a tiny pair of tongs, carefully adding some cream. Holding it by the saucer, she offered it to him. It rattled slightly in her hands as he reached for it.
“Mom,” he said, coughing slightly. The word felt foreign in his mouth, like a hair that had been stuck in the back of his throat, pushed out with his tongue. “It’s time you tell me what’s going on.”
Karen ran a thumb along the inside of a gold chain around her neck, gently pulling it out. Her throat moved behind it as she swallowed. “It’s been so long, Jacob. I’ve missed you so. You were just a boy, last time.”
Hatcher said nothing. There was nothing to say.
“You don’t know how long I’ve been looking forward to this day. I just wish—”
“Look, it’s nice you’re glad to see me. Really, it is. But right now I just need you to explain things. Starting with what I’m doing here.”
Karen looked down at the coffee tray, still fondling her necklace. “Garrett was killed.”
“Yeah, I got that much. Who the hell is Garrett?”
“Your brother.”
“And I’ll ask again, just like I did this morning. Are you saying I had a brother I didn’t know about?”
“Yes.” She raised her eyes, then lowered them. Her body seemed to sag under the crush of what she was thinking. “You did.”
“I’m waiting.”
She paused, twisting her head to look out the front window. Her eyes were fixed on some faraway spot. “I had a child before . . .” She paused, took a breath. “Before your father and I got married,” she said.
Hatcher leaned back into the chair, ran a hand over his hair. He wasn’t shocked by what she said, had even considered the possibility. But he was genuinely confused. Given how she had lived after his father left, he had no reason to think she hadn’t slept with other men before the two of them had met. But it still didn’t make any sense.
“You said something about my father not taking this well.”
“Yes.” She took her eyes from the window and peered into her coffee. “I’m worried about how this will affect him.”
“Okay, this is where you’re losing me. If you had a child before you met my father, how would he even know him?”
“I didn’t say it was before I met your father. I said it was before I married him. He had left for Vietnam not long after we started dating. I was only in high school and I found out I was pregnant.”
“And he didn’t want you to have it?”
She glanced at him with a pained expression. “No, it wasn’t like that. He didn’t know. He’d already shipped out. It was my parents. I put the baby up for adoption.”
“But you ended up getting married.”
“He came back a year later. We dated a few times and I felt like I had to tell him. How could I not. I was shocked that he asked me to marry him, right then, right after I explained what had happened, while I was still crying and asking him to forgive me. We talked about trying to get the baby back, and I know he tried very hard to find a way, but it just wasn’t something you did back then.”
“So, this wasn’t a half sibling we’re talking about?”
“No,” she said. A little too quickly, Hatcher noted. Insulted, perhaps. “I can show you the birth certificate, if you don’t believe me. I kept a copy. It shows he was your full-blooded brother.”
He adjusted himself in his seat, leaning forward. “And now he’s dead.”
“Yes,” she said softly. She let the word to hang out there like it was the first time she had actually considered the possibility.
“How come I didn’t know about him?”
“It was complicated. I was going to tell you when you were old enough to understand, but then your father and I split and I was scared. I know I should have. I’m sorry. I just didn’t know how, or if it was even the right thing to do. You were always such an angry child. Always acting out, getting into fights. I didn’t want to confuse you. I guess I didn’t want to give you another reason to hate me.”
Now it was Hatcher’s turn to stare at his coffee. Angry child. He stifled the urge to say something about that, something he knew she wouldn’t like. A different school almost every year, a different house every few months, a mother who was living with a different guy every time he turned around, meaning he was living with a different guy every time he turned around. And through all of this, a father who was nowhere to be found. What the hell did she expect?
“You know, when I first saw him, I thought he was you. He’s not quite as big as you, but he has your features.” Her gaze slipped down to her hands, interlaced in her lap. “Had your features.”
“When was this? That you first saw him?”
“Garrett showed up at my door about ten months ago. He was some kind of security consultant, was good at finding information. Said he found out he’d been adopted and decided to research his birth parents, dug through hospital records. He seemed pleased to learn he had a brother.”
Hatcher scratched the side of his nose. “Are you sure he was who he said he was?”
“I think I’d know my own son.”
Hatcher thought of something he could say to that, but didn’t. “How could you know someone you hadn’t seen in over thirty years? Since he was a newborn baby?”
“I’d know! I mean, I knew. It was Garrett. I’m not completely dumb. Of course I had a hard time believing him at first. But his eyes. They were so familiar. Your eyes, Jacob.”
She glanced away, wiped the back of her hand against the corner of her lid, blinking, then started fondling her necklace again. “You always had the greatest eyes.”
“Did he want anything?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, when he showed up. Did he ask for anything? Money? A place to live?”
“Of course not! He wasn’t some bum. He never asked me for a thing. He just wanted to get to know his parents. Is that so hard for you to understand?”
Hatcher ignored the question, thinking, Yes, very hard. “I saw the name ‘Garrett Hatcher’ on the message.”
“He started using the name Hatcher after he found your father and me. He said he was going to legally change it back.”
“Why?”
“Why not? Your father was very happy about it.”
“Speaking of that, what’s the deal with you and my father? You sound as if you’ve been talking to him.”
“Yes. It’s not like it used to be, Jacob. Your father and I have been cordial since Garrett came back. We’ve talked on the phone.”
“Cordial.”
“People change, Jacob.”
He took a sip of his coffee. “They sure do.”
“I know you’re mad at me. You’ve always been mad at me for something. I wish you could please stop, just for a little while.”
“Do I look mad?”
“I always did the best I could, Jacob.”
Hatcher finished off his cup, set it on the tray. “What does Carl think of all this?”
“Carl? You know how he is. But he understands. He never spoke much to Garrett, but he was sorry to hear what happened.”
Yeah, sure he was, Hatcher thought. What a humanitarian.
Some things change, and some things don’t. She was acting like she didn’t know why he’d simply up and left after high school, but there was no way, he thought. Just no way. He didn’t really remember saying good-bye as much as merely leaving, taking a bus and a suitcase to a tiny college in another state, an undersized and relatively slow linebacker on a Division II scholarship. Her marrying Carl Woodard had been the final straw. Having that clown come in and “lay down the law” had disgusted him to the point of wanting to puke. Or make Carl puke. Blood. All those staredowns and arbitrary rules, those conversations Hatcher could hear where that fucking loser would talk about the “kid” needing to be put in his place. Carl had a stepson from a previous marriage, older than Hatcher, who’d been in and out of rehab and constantly doing time. Carl had cut ties with him after his divorce, but he was always telling Hatcher’s mother how Hatcher would turn out the same way if someone didn’t get tough with him, teach him to respect authority. Hatcher wondered if the asshole ever knew how close he’d come to getting the shit stomped out of him back then.
“What do you want from me, Mom?”
“What do you mean?”
“What am I doing here?”
“I thought you would want to come, because of your brother.”
Hatcher glanced over to the photos on the wall, nodded toward them. “A brother I didn’t know I had, that I never met. I haven’t spoken to you in a dozen years, and suddenly I’m summoned for a funeral. I’m sorry, it doesn’t add up.”
“I know. It’s all just so horrible.”
“That’s not what I mean. What I’m talking about is, what made you track me down? Go to the Red Cross? Why was it so important to have me here?”
“I . . . thought I might need some help with all the arrangements. Help dealing with things. The funeral’s the day after tomorrow. It’s all so overwhelming.”
Hatcher tilted a finger in her direction. “You’re lying.”
“What kind of thing is that to say?”
“If the funeral is the day after tomorrow, you’ve already taken care of the arrangements. Now just tell me the truth.”
“I’m not lying.”
“You’re trying not to, but you’re not being candid. Picking and choosing your words. You’re hiding something. Believe me, I can tell.”
She poured some more coffee into her cup, steadying the back of her pouring hand with the fingers of her other. “Please, Jacob. This is difficult enough.”
“Okay, let me spell it out for you, and make it simple. I can tell by your nonverbals that you’re not telling me everything. I can tell by the way you move your eyes, the way you look up and away before you say certain things. I can tell by the way you’re holding that cup in front of you right now, like a shield. By the way you use your necklace as an excuse to hold your hand near your mouth. Don’t bother trying to convince me I’m wrong, because I’m not. Just tell me.”
“I don’t want you to think I don’t want you here, Jacob. I do. I’ve always thought of you. You’ve always been in my thoughts.”
Hatcher shot a glance at the ceiling as he took a breath. “What is it?”
“I wasn’t sure I’d ever see you again. I’m so glad you’re here. I can’t tell you how much my heart jumped when I heard the door. When I talked to you on the phone.”
“Tell me.”
“It was something your brother said.”
He nodded impatiently, rolling his hand for her to keep going. “What?”
“A few days before he died, on the phone. He told me, almost like he was joking . . . He said if anything should happen to him, I should find you.”
“Me?”
“Yes.”
Hatcher’s eyes drifted over to the framed photo of the man on the wall, that measured smile. “He probably just meant that you should find me because I’m your son, thinking it would be a good thing. Or maybe you misunderstood him.”
“No. We were talking on the phone, and I asked him how things were going, and he said fine, and then he grew quiet, and then he said if anything out of the ordinary should happen to him, that I should find you. I told him he was making me nervous, and he changed the subject, told me to forget about it, laughed a bit, like he wished he hadn’t said it.”
“Why would he say something like that?”
“I’m not sure. Not long after he contacted me, just after he started talking to me and your father, he became interested in you. Said he never had a real brother, just like you’ve been saying. A few weeks ago, he said he had located you, that you were on an assignment for the military, and wouldn’t be back until the summer. He told me you were in the army and had your unit information. He said in a few months, he’d get in touch with you, had me hoping maybe you’d want to come back and see me.”
Hatcher’s eyes roamed the room, skipping from flamingo to flamingo as he digested the information.
“That doesn’t make any sense. Why would he tell you to find me if something happened to him? He didn’t know anything about me.”
“Jacob, I think he knew he was in danger, or might be. The police are saying it was some crazy person Garrett got tangled up with in the street, trying to help some woman who was being mugged, but I don’t think I believe them. When I remembered what he said . . . it was frightening. I think he knew someone might try to hurt him.”
“Even if that’s true, I don’t see where I fit in to any of this.”
“Garrett knew about you, Jacob. He was in the military, too, for a while. The air force. He said you were some kind of elite soldier. He spoke admiringly of you, said men like you made things better for everyone else. With your bravery.”
“What could he possibly know about me?”
“I don’t know. Maybe enough to trust that his brother would figure out what happened.”
Before he could respond, Hatcher heard the sound of a car door shutting from somewhere in front of the house.
“That’s Carl now. Please listen to me, Jacob,” Karen said, scooting forward to the edge of the cushion. “Your father isn’t well. Garrett told me he’s been suffering from diabetes for years. He could hardly walk. Garrett forced him into a hospital, insisted he go. In fact, I think Garrett may have been going to visit him when he was . . . when he died. He had just found a special diabetes center for him at a hospital in the city. It’s very bad. They may have to amputate.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Hatcher said, though he actually found it hard to feel anything specific.
“It would be nice if you could go see him. I think he and Garrett had grown close. I spoke to him on the phone right after I found out, then again yesterday. He’s not taking it well.”
“I haven’t seen him since I was eleven years old.”
“But it would mean so much to him.”
“Him? Or you?”
The door opened and Carl entered, pausing to wipe his shoes on the welcome mat. He was still short, with slicked down strands of thinning hair and a gut that hung out over his belt like he was trying to sneak a bowling ball in somewhere. He wore a tan shirt and tan slacks. A state highway department patch was sewn onto one of the sleeves. Some kind of civil service uniform.
“Dear, Jacob’s here! Isn’t it so nice to see him again?”
Carl grunted a greeting, shooting Hatcher an expression that was part smile, part snarl. Hatcher stood, realized he’d actually been looking forward to this. A little bit, at least. It also gave him an excuse to cut things short and get out of there.
“Don’t you look all growed up,” Carl said, running his gaze from toe to crown. “Must be nice, sitting around all day, lifting weights, doing nothing.”
“Kind of like working for the state,” Hatcher said. “Except for the lifting weights part.”
“Still got a mouth on you, huh?”
“Oh, Carl,” Karen said, slapping his shoulder, an unconvincing look of scorn pinching her face. “Quit being such a grouch.”
“I’m just saying, is all.”
“That’s okay,” Hatcher said. “I was just about to leave anyway.”
“No!” Karen said, putting a hand on Hatcher’s arm. “I’ve been making dinner all afternoon. A pot roast. Please say you’ll stay.”
“The boy wants to go, Karen. Let ’im go.”
Hatcher held his stare, peering down into those eyes, remembering just how much he couldn’t stand living under the same roof with the man, how he marked the time until he would be able to leave and never come back. “On second thought, I think I will stay.”
“Oh, good,” Karen said. “And I hope not just for dinner. We have a second bedroom with a foldout bed.”
Hatcher smiled at Carl. “What do you think?”
“I think you’re going to do what you want, no matter what I think.”
“Oh, don’t mind him. We’re happy to have you.” Karen hugged him one more time, giving an extra squeeze at the end, then gave Carl a peck before heading to the kitchen. “You just relax. I’m going to check on dinner.”
Carl watched her leave the room. “I never thought I’d see you again,” he said.
“I guess thinking isn’t your strong suit.”
“Don’t you go making things tougher on her than they already are, convict.”
“I don’t plan on making anything tough for anyone. Except for you, if you talk to me like that one more time.”
“This is my house. I can say anything I want.”
“You absolutely can. I’m just letting you know there’ll be consequences this time around.”
Carl glared fiercely into Hatcher’s eyes for a few seconds, then backed off a step. He reached into his pocket and removed a small flamingo figurine, a white one and a pink one sharing the same space, necks intertwined, and placed it on a table next to a few others, glancing over toward the kitchen as he did.
“Unlike you, I wouldn’t want to do anything to upset your mother,” he said.
Hatcher rolled his eyes. Puh-leeze. “In case you hadn’t noticed, being here wasn’t exactly my idea.”
“Well, it wasn’t my idea, either. All the fault of that Garrett, went and got himself killed.”
Hatcher shot a look over his shoulder, lowered his voice a notch. “Since you brought it up, maybe you could quit being a jerk for a few seconds and tell me what you knew about him.”
“Why?”
“I’m curious.”
“Not much. Only that I didn’t like him. Didn’t trust him.”
“Why was that?”
Carl ran his eyes down Hatcher’s shirt and then back up, a disgusted grimace contorting his mouth and brow. “Because he reminded me too much of you.”
Hatcher’s mother came out of the kitchen and announced that dinner was ready. She was only a few steps past the dining area when she paused and tilted her head, lips quavering, hands on her hips, eyes on her new figurine.
“It’s beautiful!” she said, rushing to give Carl a hug. “Where would I be without you?”
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