Awakening

by Soidenet Gue

The first two phone calls went unanswered. Still sad­dened and distracted by the news of Jack Lemmon’s death, Dominic Milton turned off the radio. He cut the last orange and pressed the halves onto the fruit squeezer to complete the breakfast he had been trying to make that morning. After the phone rang for the fourth time, he waited a while before answering in his usual husky voice, unaware that the caller was his cousin Dwayne and not the man his cousin used to work for. After confirming to Dwayne that there had been no changes in their upcoming late-evening rendezvous whatso­ever, Dominic hung up the phone right before his daughters came to the dining table. At once, he wiped away the forlorn look he wore on his face that could have brought back painful memories to the girls. They were still quite young, but they could recall that familiar look they’d seen on their father’s face for weeks after their mother lost her battle against colon can­cer.

In the past five years, Dominic had committed eleven grand thefts. Such larcenies took place while he was still employed with City Furniture, making deliveries throughout Palm Beach and Broward counties. His first felony involved stealing a used bicycle. It happened while the raspy voice of his ailing wife burned in his mind as her hands gripped his fore­arms. “You’re a lot stronger than you think, Dom. You’re the strong one, not me. That’s why you’re so special. That’s why I was lucky to have you.” At the time, if he could kill, then he’d have killed just to feel better or different. But how could he attribute this ongoing practice to the calamity that had befallen his beloved wife and her passing? Dominic would ask himself.

Now, over a quarter of the house’s furniture and appli­ances had been stolen in one form or the other. The house, which he had repainted about two years ago, brought a sense of comfort to his daughters. They were as involved in choosing the appropriate colors and moving things around to make room for new interior design ideas as he was. He had paid for the white and brown paint that now colored the house’s inte­rior and exterior with his sweat. But not the tools—no, they came from a different store after a slick, successful slip-and-fall operation. He had snatched the white pearl necklace around the neck of his younger daughter, Mandy, from the purse of a young beachgoer at the sandy beaches of Boca Raton. A five-hundred-dollar Gucci bag—another one of his previous suc­cesses—lay bare on the dining table before his oldest daughter, Vicky. He had given it to her for her fourteenth birthday last October. This gift to his daughter became the last effort that cemented the strong bond he had struggled to create with the two of them for quite some time.

“Who called? Was it Grandma?” Vicky asked, picking at her scrambled eggs.

“You don’t sound too excited. It’s not too late. You do know that, yes?” Dominic said.

“For what?”

“You girls can stay if you want.”

“It’s fine, Dad,” Mandy said before Vicky could retort. “We just didn’t have to go this early.”

The plan was for them to spend three weeks at their grandparents, but they had fought their father over it and, in the end, settled for one week instead. Despite the big pool at their grandmother’s house and the Wellington Shopping Mall nearby, the girls thought they’d have a lot more fun staying at home, even if it meant playing on their computer all day with no Internet access.

“Tell you what. I’ll think of something before you go back to school. Not Disney World, but I promise it’ll be fun. How’s that?”

They smiled at once as they watched their tall father with his week-old beard rise from his seat and pinch their cheeks. He took a small slice of bacon from Mandy’s plate and walked away to put their belongings in the car. On mornings like these, he seldom had any complaints. His daughters cleaned around the house and washed the dishes. They pretty much abided by his cardinal rules more than they broke them. Vicky had long heeded his advice to wear leggings or pants after entering the age of puberty. There was nothing to add to Mandy’s makeup and her long, honey-blonde hairdo before school or a special event. He admired how Mandy followed in her sister’s footsteps without any grievances.

But now, with each passing day, Dominic found himself at a crossroads. His daughters were the reason he had to end his double lifestyle. How long could he keep this secret from them? he would ask himself. Sooner or later, he realized, they’d have these unpalatable questions, and he’d have to be forthcoming with them whether he liked it or not. In fact, as they hugged him and left the house that morning, a part of him felt like he should just quit by the time the girls returned home. Still, another reason prevailed—an attractive woman named Tavana he had met ten months ago and was hoping to introduce to the girls in the not-too-distant future, perhaps in the fall.

Around nine o’clock, Renoir picked up Dominic in his 1996 dark-blue Cadillac DeVille from Delray Beach. They had been acquainted for five years. The vehicle smelled of fresh marijuana. Renoir had never held a job for more than three years in his life. He didn’t want to admit it, but he loved the joy he felt while stealing—no matter whether a big steal or small—although he had yet to become the professional he had envisioned himself to be ever since the age of twelve, when he started taking cash from his mother’s purse.

“Got my money?” Renoir asked Dominic, screaming his lungs out like a man under the influence of ecstasy. Then, he changed his voice to normal and said, “Just messing with you, dude.” Well, for now, he thought to himself. Who do you think you are? All I had to do was mention your name downtown, and you were done for, but I shut my hole. “Now, here’s what you need to know. If we make it out short, then you still owe me ten large. I don’t care if we make it out clean. You still owe me. Got that?”

Dominic did not utter a word. He thought Renoir was trying to imitate some old actor’s Southern accent that he had heard in a movie. He couldn’t recall the name of the movie, except he knew that it came out in the mid-seventies. Either way, Dominic thought Renoir did a remarkable job acting for a man who was still in his late thirties, a few years younger than Dominic himself.

At the first traffic light, they waited and looked on with indifference at the wearisome-looking woman in her McDon­ald’s uniform crossing the street as though the lights would never turn green again. She glanced up in Dominic’s direction and then winced in either fatigue or the intense light from the Cadillac’s left beam, which had just been replaced the day before. When the car made a hard left to head west on Boyn­ton Beach Boulevard, Renoir quietened as his heart and mind fixated on getting the first job done before ten o’clock. For Dominic, though, it was the second job that worried him the most, and for that, he needed to have an unencumbered mind. He gently patted his hand against the back of his headrest. In his head, he tried to go over everything he had planned for the night with great concentration.

The place was an enclosed residential community that housed the basement poker card game Dominic had picked out, but it boasted neither a guarded entrance nor surveillance cameras. Renoir enjoyed these types of jobs because planning for them wasn’t time-consuming, and he wouldn’t have to use any real bullets either. The biggest challenge for them was acquiring the Pizza Hut uniform they needed to make it inside the house. Yet, it took Dominic less than two days to find someone they could trust, a slacker on parole who was willing to lend out his t-shirts for twenty dollars each.

They pulled up outside the community and turned gleeful as they slipped on their t-shirts and hats. Dominic couldn’t help but wonder if Renoir was aware that Dwayne had been released from the county jail the day before. “Can’t say I missed Dwayne,” he said.

“How much you wanna bet he’d have been bitching non­stop about tonight?” Renoir asked. “You know, making a bunch of fuss about how he wouldn’t wear none of those t-shirts unless they were clean. Goddamn pain in the ass.”

“Yeah. No mincing words there. That’s our Dwayne, all right.”

Renoir amused himself with a slice of cold pizza from one of the four boxes in the rear passenger seats and signaled Dom­inic to get back in the car. The other three boxes contained anything but pizzas. Renoir had suggested they stuff them with a pile of old newspapers instead. “All right, let’s go. Let’s hit ’em. It’s about time we collect that dough,” Renoir said, lap­ping his tongue around his greasy lips.

* * *

The second the clock on the wall hit a quarter after ten, and a barefoot Mrs. Tolbert stepped away from the living room window overlooking the street outside. As she walked toward the master bedroom on the opposite side across the hall, her lithe strides made her wide-open, slate-gray nightwear billow out behind her, displaying her naked torso and thighs like a model on a catwalk. The only thing she disliked about her body was the skin tags on one side of her upper back, and she had two of them. She looked more charming and beautiful now than she did a decade earlier when she was in her early twen­ties. But she remained convinced that her husband was in denial because he must have noticed. Even the sixty-year-old man living across the street had noticed—she had rebuffed his advances not once but four times in the past two months lead­ing up to the summer alone.

The TV inside the master bedroom was already on, show­ing a sex scene from a movie that had been put on repeat. When Mrs. Tolbert heard the front door open and close, she turned up the volume and slunk into the closet with a hand­gun. She waited with anxiousness while peering through the blinds. Soon, a man who she had never seen before charged into the room with a digital camera held in a ready position, like a novice paparazzo. After the first camera flash went off, a thin smile broke on Mrs. Tolbert’s face. She felt less nervous now as the man lowered his hands and stood there in absolute befuddlement, glancing at the TV screen, the bed, and then the door. The man stood there, frozen, until the opening of the closet on his left made him turn his head in awkwardness. “What the hell? Who the hell are—?”

“I’m Tavana. Who the hell are you?”

This became the moment when the man, with a big smile on his face, would have said, “Name’s Renoir. Nice to meet ya,” but he could no longer speak. His eyes bulged out of their sockets, his tongue seized not by the sight of the firearm point­ing at him but rather Tavana’s side breasts and the irresistible-looking maze on her stomach.

Tavana gestured to him to inch closer to the bed. “Easy now, big fella. Pay attention,” she said. “See those handcuffs on the bed? Pick them up first. Then drop the cam on the bed, on the same spot.”

Renoir showed some reluctance at first. He had no other choice but to comply when Tavana cocked the firearm. Even then he wasn’t too concerned, almost as if something nice could have come out of all this. Perhaps this was because his eyes never left Tavana’s body, and her face was not yet twisted in any form of serious indignation. For a moment, it seemed as though his will to provoke, threaten, or plead no longer existed.

“Careful with that,” Renoir said after Tavana struck a sole wedding picture onto the dresser with the barrel of the fire­arm. The broken frame hurled against his knee. “So, what now? Hell, do you want?”

“No. I do the talking here, big fella. You’re in my house, in case you forgot.” Tavana turned off the TV. “Now, cuff your hands to the bedpost.”

She sucked in her breath, feeling more in control. He had obliged again with next to no resistance despite the gun he had tucked around his waist, which he had not attempted to draw. She pulled the gun from his waist and threw it on the floor out of his reach. With a satisfying grin, she fixed her nightwear, grabbed the digital camera, and went straight into the living room.

There, Tavana flipped the light switch three times and waited by the front door. A few seconds later, the doorbell rang. She opened the door to reveal Dominic, still in his Pizza Hut uniform, pretending to be delivering a pizza. She handed him over Renoir’s camera and took the empty box of pizza from him. “I’m fine. You can breathe now. I’m okay,” she said in response to the worried look on his face. “How will you get home? You can’t leave in his car.”

“I know. Dwayne’s outside.”

“Who?”

“You don’t know him.”

“What about that . . . little affair? How did it go?”

“Not bad. Just a little over nineteen grand, but nobody got hurt. So, that’s good news. Okay, then. I’ll—” Dominic said, turning his head. The owner of the elegant home next door acknowledged him with her index finger in the air before her hand lowered to command her dog into the house. Dominic suppressed his contagious laughter. “She thinks she knows me,” he told Tavana in a controlled, quieter voice. “Well, how do I look?” he asked, holding out his hands to show off his T-shirt better.

“Childish. No, um, stupid.”

“Ouch.”

“You better get out of here. Good night, Dom. Bisous.”

“Yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow. Be careful.”

Walking away from the front porch, Dominic looked back with a familiar smile when he heard Tavana break one of the living room windows.

* * *

Tired of waiting for her choleric husband to inform her about how he and his precious little friends had gotten robbed last night at a stupid poker card game, Tavana exited the house at ten o’clock sharp, feeling insulted and bruised. Without hesitation, she slashed not one but two tires of her husband’s brand-new white Jaguar using the black metal hair stick that had kept her hair in place in a sleek low bun. If he had not already called his assistant to tell her that he’d be late, he might as well have made that call now to inform her that he’d take the day off.

After their magical cruise-ship honeymoon in the Carib­bean four years ago, all Tavana wanted was a child and a hus­band to love her, make love to her at least once a week, and be available when she needed him. Their five-bedroom house and cars held little importance to her. Everything was going according to plan until he opened that second clothing line store in Coconut Creek, thirty miles apart, without consulting her first.

Dominic had just finished watering his front lawn when Tavana pulled up into his curved parking lot. He stopped his whistling for a moment but picked it up again, even louder when he approached her car close enough to notice the flare of excitement that sparkled in her eyes as he looked at her through the windshield. Forthwith, he threw the Sun-Sentinel newspaper he was about to read onto the front porch. He didn’t even bother to ask her if she had seen the headline: “Renoir Jackson Arrested on Multiple Charges Including Possession of Illegal Firearm.”

She nudged open the door wide with her knee as if she couldn’t wait or knew no other way to expose her cherry blos­som pink underwear this very instant. “Well, I don’t suppose it’s too early for the beach,” she said in a purr, followed by high-pitched giggling.

“No, it’s not. We’re going in your car, but I’m driving.”

“Need to talk to you about something. Something serious.”

“Can it wait?”

Knowing how soon his daughters would come crawling back into his arms, she said, “Um, yeah, but it has to be today.” She suspected that he’d need at least some time, some peace of mind, to think about it before giving her a proper answer.

The red Lexus SC, which had seen better days, swerved quickly from one lane to the other on Congress Avenue, irking and scaring off other drivers. “What’s got into you?” Tavana asked after they got a middle finger from an infuriated driver. “I’d like to get there in one piece, please. If that’s possible.”

Dominic took off his powder-blue t-shirt and threw it onto the back seat, unaware of Tavana’s titillating eyes ogling at his muscles. He was just the way she liked him and envied him—just as fit and perfect as her much younger husband used to be until he stopped clearing his schedule for the gym.

After a while, Dominic gave her a broad smile and watched her lower her window all the way, letting the soft breeze caress her hair while she reclined in the seat, head tilted back. Her casual Navajo white short dress reminded him of some of the younger local girls he’d seen parading on the beach since the beginning of spring. He had gone to the beach dozens of times with his daughters since his wife’s death but never touched the water. He’d help Mandy build those big sandcastles that she loved, and she would try to drag him closer to the water for him to wash his hands, but he had preferred to watch them play and swim instead. His lips widened once again as he spotted a four-year-old picture in the corner between the dash­board and windshield. The small snapshot showed Tavana and her husband in the middle of four guys holding what appeared to be a live eighteen-foot Burmese python. Tavana leaned for­ward and peered at it for a moment with delight in her eyes. Yet it was in a way that suggested those days were behind her.

“We can stop somewhere to grab a bite if you want,” he said.

“Around here? I don’t think so. I don’t think they have what I’ve been dying to eat all week long.”

“What’s that?”

“A Cuban sandwich.”

“What? You gotta be kidding me?”

“Kid you not. The best sandwich ever. Seafood restaurant in Boca Raton.”

“Is that where you first met him? Or is that where you had that first date?”

She laughed.

“Tell you what, babe. I’ll make you something special when we get back. The best sandwich ever, at my house. Just wait till we get back.”

“What if we don’t make it back?” she asked.

With eyes closed, Tavana suppressed her smile. They were about to drive past Doc’s All-American restaurant on Swinton Avenue in Delray Beach, less than two miles from the beach. She cared not one bit about Cuban food. Sometimes, she didn’t even taste it. Buying Cuban food at least once a week was the best and simplest way for her to keep her hopes alive that one day her husband would return to his senses.

The first thing Tavana did after they arrived at the beach came as a much bigger surprise to Tavana herself than Domi­nic: three front handsprings that ended with her feet in the water, followed by her hands as she dipped for a short swim. The water turned out to be cooler than she had hoped, but it still felt good. When she ran back to shore, Dominic gazed up and down at her for an eternity with her dress in his hands and a dropped jaw until she stuck her tongue in his mouth and kissed him for more than twenty seconds. It was then she real­ized that the great leaps of her gymnastic display, which she hadn’t performed since her teenage years, had drawn a small crowd of four out-of-town seniors in search of gossip to recount to their friends when they got back home.

Tavana passed her sunscreen to Dominic. He started with her arms first, then her back. “Do you remember where we first met?” she asked while she enjoyed the stroke of his warm hands on her soft skin.

“Of course.”

“Show me. Where?”

“Not too far from here,” he said. Then, they lay down on the blankets she had brought with them.

“Yeah, but where? Farther south or north?” she asked and let out a cute laugh when he had to think about this while look­ing both ways. During this, she caught a glimpse of the bracelet on her wrist.

He pointed north straightaway as she craned her neck to make sure she had not left her purse too far away from her. “Officially, yes,” he said. “But we’ve met before. I mean, we sort of ran into each other before. I’m talking about April, um, last year.”

She seemed puzzled.

“Up in Okeechobee. You were planning a wedding, and I was delivering some stuff for the groom and bride.”

“Okeechobee, eh? That’s a bit out of your turf, no?”

He didn’t feel obliged to reply. At least not at the moment because he knew she’d want to know whether he had quit or gotten fired from working for City Furniture. Instead, he forced a smile that ended with a scoff.

“Well, it’s a relief to know that you didn’t get away with the wedding ring.”

There, he let out an exasperated sigh. Then, he pushed himself up to sit as if to avoid making any eye contact with her while wondering whether he should go for a swim now. He never saw the thrill in discussing that lifestyle with any­one—least of all her. Guys like Renoir and Dwayne would have indulged themselves this very moment, but not him. “So,” he said, “what did you want to talk to me about?”

* * *

Tavana lay in Dominic’s bed, post-sex. She lighted a ciga­rette, drew from it, and then offered it to Dominic when he came out of the bathroom. He shook his head. Her eyes moved to one of the two framed photographs of his wife on the dresser and said, “I can see where Mandy got her looks. She was beautiful.”

“Yes, she was, even in her final moments.” He joined her in bed with a sigh of both contentment and sadness, wondering if he should ask her again about what she needed to tell him since that morning. He had a pleasant feeling that whatever had been occupying her mind had something to do with her hus­band—perhaps she was ready to ask him for a divorce.

They talked about their pet peeves growing up in the sev­enties and eighties. Then, he listened to her as she told him about all the capitals and historical cities she wanted to visit if she ever started a new life or before she died, the places she’d never go if she were pregnant, and the small countries or dis­tant islands she’d travel to if she ever were in mourning of a loved one. Of all places, Dominic thought, she despised Leba­non since her father had been robbed at gunpoint in Beirut when she was a child. “My, oh my, I love Venice,” she said. “Three visits back to back in less than two years.”

“When was that?”

“Before I got married,” Tavana said the word married through gritted teeth as though it was the dullest word she’d ever known in her whole life. “Oh, Dom, it’s magical. I’ve been thinking about going back. Before the year’s over, hope­fully. Who knows? Maybe I’ll manage to drag you along.” After three minutes or so, she stubbed out the cigarette in a small ashtray on the bedside table. “What are you going to do with that money?” she asked.

“It’s all yours if you want it.”

“Your share is almost ten grand, no? Now, just imagine that multiplied by, say, six or seven. Can you?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Come on, Dominic, don’t be naive. I’m dead serious here. You get half now, then the other half . . . after.”

“After what? I told you, I’m not sure where you’re getting at.”

“After we get rid of him.”

Dominic remained there, placid, with his glazed eyes looking up at the ceiling. It was as though her words had gotten lost in translation. Suddenly, he bolted from the bed at light­ning speed with the growling sound of a mad, vicious creature and threw her clothes at her. “Get the fuck out of my house! Get out!”

Tavana did so without any sign of protest. She kissed him on the cheek, gave him a one-armed hug, thanked him for the fantastic day he had shown her at the beach, and urged him to mull over her offer before leaving. When he sensed that she had exited the house, adequately clothed or not, he sank on the bed, nettled by her stone-cold voice that echoed in his head over and over again—After we get rid of him. Had she thought of this beforehand, or could this have been the result of last night because of her husband’s indifference and insensitivity toward the intruder in his house who could have hurt his wife? Dominic had not the slightest clue. He buried his head in his hands, try­ing to ponder over this, but he could not. He felt as though he was paralyzed until he heard the front door open, followed by Dwayne’s cheerful voice, forcing him to his feet.

Dwayne Gunner was about Tavana’s age and had to cele­brate his recent birthday in the Palm Beach County jail because of Renoir’s plain stupidity. A man of perfect posture, Dwayne was clad in a tight t-shirt that showed his biceps and the distinc­tive tattoos on his arms. The effect of the smile Tavana had put on his face right outside in the parking lot was still on display. He adored the sound of her voice and wished he had met her before. “Wow! I love your hat, Dwayne,” she’d said to him. She thought his Panama hat’s color and style went well with his sunglasses and everything else he had on.

Except for women and thieving, Dwayne shared little in common with Dominic, who thought that Dwayne was too much of a daydreamer for the most delicate things in life, which he couldn’t afford. Even when he was on a job, he couldn’t stop gossiping about how well and nice he’d live if he ever won a lottery.

“What’s with you? Didn’t you just get laid?”

“Trust me, Dwayne, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.” Dwayne put down the Sun-Sentinel newspaper he had picked up from the front porch on the coffee table next to his hat. He then served himself a beer from the fridge and hastened back into the living room to listen with attentiveness as Dominic fidgeted while recounting Tavana’s madness. Dwayne burst into laughter. “And that’s the thing you’re so worked up about? Come on, Dom. It’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard in years. What’s the matter with you, pal?”

“Yeah, thanks for cheering me up. You see, I’ve had this one thing in mind ever since she showed up this morning saying she had something serious to tell me.”

“What? You thought she was finally gonna ask for that divorce, huh?”

“Yeah, why not? Isn’t that what unhappy couples do?” Dominic said. A stern look swept over his face as he pounded his fist against the wall, making the four antique porcelain plates hanging on it shake a little. Then, his voice deepened with both anger and regret. “Doesn’t matter. She’s not who I thought she was. It’s all over.”

“If you say so,” Dwayne said. “Don’t know if she’s crazy and dangerous, but I know she’s right about one thing. It’s a shitload of money. That’s for sure. I know exactly what I’d do if I had to do it. I mean, I got some pretty good ideas.”

Dominic pretended he hadn’t heard Dwayne this time. He was in the kitchen, retrieving a paper bag that contained half of the stolen money from the poker game. He came over and handed it to Dwayne.

Dwayne opened the bag and glanced inside. He said, “Well, at least she tried to get the asshole’s attention first.” He took the last swig of his beer and then grabbed the newspaper. Renoir’s mugshot gave him a sense of gratification, but he could feel something was still amiss. He still didn’t know how much joy he’d have felt if he had the opportunity to kick Renoir in the face until he bled before the police made the arrest. With a loud sigh, he got up, all ready to leave, promis­ing Dominic that he’d soon visit his ailing sister in Sarasota.

* * *

Dominic walked into his dining room in a gray suit with a face that reflected a rare sense of bliss. It had been about three months since he had tossed Tavana out of his house and his life altogether. Since then, he hadn’t heard from Dwayne.

Vicky stopped rocking her shoulders and paused the new Destiny’s Child album she was listening to across the table. She squinted at her father even after she twirled her hair out of her eyes, trying to guess what her father was up to. Mandy simply looked up at him for a moment to make certain he wore the appropriate tie, just like her mother used to. That jocund face of her father had nothing to do with his clean shave. Neither did it relate to the compromise he had reached with Vicky the day before over his list of forbidden ideas regarding that hand­some boy in her new science class who she couldn’t stop talk­ing about since her school opened that fall.

“You look weird,” Vicky said. She found a lot more joy in saying this than the opposite. She kept her eyes on her father as he dashed over to take his first bite of the breakfast she had already prepared, though it had gotten cold.

“You don’t have to be so mean. Dad looks awesome,” Mandy said.

“Since when was it customary to go on a date in the morn­ing?” Vicky asked.

“I’m not going on a date, Vicky. Job interview at Costco,” Dominic said.

His daughters knew he had had at least three dates in the past two months, except none of the women had made it to his front porch. The first woman kept changing the subject every time his daughters came up in their conversation. This first happened in the car and then when they arrived at the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens located in western Delray Beach. At first, the second lady surprised him, as she turned out to be the Miss Louisiana USA runner-up a decade earlier. Although he had noted her sultriness, it soon became evident that she was living in the past. The woman remained confident that her days of glory were ahead of her. The third, a disgraced medical examiner, reminded him too much of Dwayne Gunner’s fatal flaw after they had gotten the check at her favorite restaurant on the second date.

“I’m dropping you girls at the mall to finish shopping for school, and then I’ll pick you up when I’m done. Just a job interview. Won’t be too long. Wish me luck.”

Mandy drank up her orange juice and said, “Dad, can we get a cat?”

“A cat? That’s funny,” Dominic said and looked at his wife’s picture on the wall. “She always thought you were a dog per­son.”

“Hey, Vicky, what’s a dog person?” Mandy asked.

“Don’t know. Little girls who like to move around a lot, unable to keep their mouth shut for a minute.”

Mandy crinkled her nose.

Dominic choked on a mouthful of honey-coated toast, looking at Mandy’s face.

They left the house in a black Jeep Cherokee at ten o’clock. Mandy, who seldom sat in the back seat since turning thirteen a month ago, searched on the car radio for something pleasing to listen to. She gave up in vain after Dominic urged her to choose a station and sit back. Meanwhile, Vicky remained in the back seat, preoccupied with reading a fashion magazine that she found very amusing. Mandy would always remember the three-way intersection where the vehicle had stopped when her father first heard the news on the radio: “Today we’re looking at a beautiful day, plenty of sunshine. Even clearer sky along the Treasure Coast. And unlike yester­day, we’re not expecting any rainfall. In the latest news, fashion boutique owner, Frank Tolbert, was found dead at work in his office yesterday at noon. There’s little that we know at this point except that his wife, Tavana Tolbert, had been brought in for questioning this Saturday morning and that the police said they are not ruling out foul play.”

In an instant, Mandy watched her father turn off the radio and tighten his grasp on the steering wheel, his face solidified into that of a complete stranger. In response to his utter silence, after she asked him if he knew the people mentioned on the radio, she reached over to touch his face, then his hand with affection.

* * *

Later that Saturday, around sunset, an unmarked police car cruised up behind Dominic’s Jeep Cherokee in the parking lot. Behind the wheel of his Jeep, Dominic sat with a small photograph of his wife in his hands. He heaved one plaintive sigh after the other; his mind was consumed not by the success of his recent job interview but rather by the solemn morning walks he and his daughters would take at the end of the month to the cemetery where his wife had been buried. He kissed the picture twice, put it in his wallet, and his eyes narrowed on the police car in the side-view mirror for an instant.

He opened the door and turned off the engine when the man in the police car—black, mid-forties—approached the Jeep, wearing a braided leather bracelet with the Haitian national flag.

“Dominic Milton?”

“Yes.”

“Detective Michel Salomon with the Boynton Beach Police Department. Are you in a hurry? I was wondering if I could have a word with you.”

Dominic told Detective Salomon he was about to pick up his kids. “Birthday party four blocks from here. But yeah, sure, why not? May I ask what this is about?” He climbed out of the vehicle and stood there in the dry evening air, holding the door open with his right hand. For a brief moment, his mind won­dered if he should change that vague expression on his face.

“Have you ever met a Frank Tolbert?”

“Don’t believe I have, but the name sounds familiar. Hmm. Why is that?”

“That’s a good question.”

Dominic glimpsed at the Jeep’s center console in an attempt to remember. He steadied his eyes on Detective Salo­mon and with a loud snap of his fingers, said, “Bingo. That guy who died while at work yesterday? I heard that on the news. Is that why you’re here? What’s this got to do with me?”

“Nothing, I hope. Can you tell me why you and Mrs. Tol­bert stopped seeing each other?”

Dominic’s face dropped. He felt the two drops of cold sweat that escaped from under his right armpit. He imagined Detective Salomon would ask that question—but not this fast and not so straightforwardly.

“I mean, you do know Tavana Tolbert, correct?”

“Yes. We had a thing.”

This made Detective Salomon chortle. “I know,” he replied. “She said so.” He reached for a notepad from inside his jacket pocket, opened it, and read, “The best thing that ever happened to me in years.” Then, he took one step toward Dominic, whose lips parted to ask the detective if he had a cig­arette, but the words never came out. “That’s how she put it when the two of you were lovers. Now, can you tell me when and why the two of you stopped seeing each other?”

“It was sometime in the summer. I just had to call it quits because things weren’t working out.”

“Things not working out, how?”

“Let’s just say that I found out she wasn’t my type. Found that out way too late. That’s just about the only regret I have ’cause I did like her.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to explain that, sir.”

Dominic took a deep breath. His hands became moist. He shut the door of the Jeep. “Gee, I wish I had a better way to put it, but . . . okay, she struck me as the kind of woman who’s willing to do anything to get what she wants. And I mean any­thing. Doesn’t matter if anyone gets hurt or who gets hurt.”

Detective Salomon flicked his pen, ready to take notes. “Now,” he said, “what would you say if you had to describe her relationship with Mr. Tolbert?” He flinched as he saw Dominic bump his fists together.

Pondering what to say next, Dominic puckered his lips just enough not to draw too much attention to himself. “From what I could tell, it was hard not to think that the guy was the biggest mistake, disappointment in her life, you know. She resented him, couldn’t stand him. No question about that. I wish I could help you, but I don’t know what else to say.”

“She said the last place you guys saw each other was here. Is that so?”

“That’s right.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then what? The two of you just stopped talking?”

“You could say that. At this point, I mean, after she left, there were almost no more phone calls. I’m not saying she didn’t try calling a few times. She did. But I ignored her.”

“I see. Just one more thing. Where were you yesterday between the hours of, say, ten in the morning and one in the afternoon? His shop was closed for renovation when he was killed, but—”

“Killed?”

“Well, he got hit by some heavy equipment. We believe he died in his office trying to reach the phone. There was no sign of forcible entry or anything. But someone else might have been there. And whoever they were, they not only knew Mr. Tolbert, but they possibly watched him die. The evidence that we have so far points in this direction. That’s why we’re look­ing into everything to find out what happened.”

“I understand.” Dominic exhaled. “I was in Wellington at the Millers. They’re my in-laws. I was assembling a computer desk for them. You know, the kind of stuff that comes in the box all nice and neat and everything, but you still gotta put the pieces together yourself,” he said, exhaling again. “Yeah. Some­thing like that.”

“Very well, Mr. Milton. We will be in touch if we need you,” Detective Salomon said. He left his card, thanked Domi­nic for his cooperation, waved goodbye, and then took off.

* * *

One early evening, Dominic put his Costco uniform in the washer and stopped from entering the bedroom when he spot­ted a half-smiling Mandy by the front door with the mail in her hands. The bottle of Heineken in his hand didn’t feel as cold as he had thought.

“Got a Thanksgiving postcard here, Dad,” Mandy said and turned on the bell-shaped table lamp.

“Where does it come from?”

“Venice, uh, Italy. It says, ‘Dwayne Gunner and a Friend.’ Here, Dad.”

Dominic smiled at the news, but after taking the postcard from his daughter, his face flushed, just like he had reacted to the dreadful news of Frank Tolbert’s death on the radio that summer. Wait a minute. That’s Tavana’s handwriting, he thought, glaring at the postcard. “Well, well, well. What do you know?”

“Are you okay, Dad?” Mandy asked.

He bit his upper lip. For a few seconds, he wondered if Dwayne had something to do with Mr. Tolbert’s death.

“What is it?” she asked again.

“Ah, it’s nothing,” Dominic said. “Don’t worry about it.” He drew a long, deep breath and went on, “Hey, are you still interested in getting that cat?”

Mandy nodded.

“Great! Let’s make it happen.”

“Now?”

“Yeah, sweetheart. Why not? Go get your sister.”

“Yes! Thanks, Dad!” she said, spun on one foot, and wrapped her arms around her father. “You’re the best!”

Smiling again and watching his daughter run down the hallway—screaming, “Vicky! Vicky!”—Dominic placed his beer on the coffee table and ripped the postcard to pieces.