From A Dead Sleep Page 5

  Commonly, those with autism avoid direct eye contact with others. Toby was no different, always keeping his gaze trained in a slightly different direction when socializing with people. However, there were two clear exceptions—people who he was comfortable enough with to draw into his sight: his mother . . . and Sean Coleman. Like most of the townsfolk, Toby’s mother couldn’t understand what her son saw in Sean. Sean was a bitter drunk and a bully; a bad seed no matter how one looked at it. He’d always been that way. But for whatever reason, Toby Parker saw something in the large bear of a man—something that the others didn’t see. Sean was an unwilling role model. He himself didn’t understand the boy’s interest. In fact, he often went out of his way to discourage it.

  Toby was heavyset, with a protruding belly and large eyes. His brown hair was formed in a crew cut, quite similar to Sean’s, although Toby clearly needed a trim. Sean suspected the boy’s choice of hairstyles wasn’t a matter of coincidence. Toby’s wardrobe seemed to consist primarily of multicolored, horizontally striped t-shirts. He had one on every time Sean saw him. Today’s combination was white, red, and brown.

  “Hey, Sean!”

  “What?”

  “I painted a new picture of that big oak tree in my backyard. You know . . . the one with the tire swing. Thanks again for those painting supplies. The brushes keep up well if you wash them right after using them.”

  Despite the drain on his body and in his head, Sean couldn’t help but crack a feeble grin. As much as he tried to hide his smile—and he tried very hard—it found its way out anyway. The corners of his mouth raised, and a discreet chuckle crept out.

  About six months earlier, Toby’s mother had invited Sean to her son’s birthday party. Actually, Toby had pleaded with his mother to invite his friend, and wouldn’t let up on his insistence. She obviously had concerns. It wasn’t exactly the brightest idea to invite the town’s black sheep, and a drunk to boot, to a child’s birthday party. Still, she knew it would mean the world to her son. It wasn’t an easy feat, however. Sean made it painfully clear that he had no desire to attend. To him, it sounded like a total drag. A kiddie party wasn’t exactly the place he wanted to spend any of the hours of his weekend. No beer. No eight-ball. No fun.

  The persistent mother tried several times to change his mind. All attempts were unsuccessful. Guilt tactics didn’t work, even when Diana was asked to help encourage her brother to come. The resolution finally arrived with a suggestion that Chief Lumbergh made. It was actually meant as a joke, and was met with rolled eyes by Diana . . . but it worked.

  Bribery.

  Toby’s mother ended up paying Sean twenty dollars with an additional ten dollars for Sean to spend on the gift of his choice for her son. The deal was sealed with the mention of the free food at the party.

  Sean’s choice of gifts wasn’t difficult to make. He had repeatedly heard the townsfolk mention that young Toby was artistic. In fact, he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why people made such a fuss over it. Sean had fancied himself a pretty good sketcher back in high school, but no one ever made a big deal out of his talents. It wasn’t until later at the party that it was explained to Sean that Toby was autistic, not artistic. He remembered how much like a fool he felt.

  “Bill Kenny wasn’t too happy with me today,” remarked Toby.

  The boy seemed to change topics with each breath.

  “Do you want to know what happened?”

  Sean glanced over the boy’s shoulder to look for his uncle. What was taking him so long?

  “Sure,” said Sean out of nothing more than morbid curiosity and a need to pass the time.

  “Mr. Kenny was coming out of French’s Pharmacy and walked right onto the sidewalk without looking both ways,” the boy relayed. “I couldn’t stop my bike in time and my forward progress was just too much to prevent a head-on collision. I’ve needed new brakes for some time now, you know. His mailbag of letters dropped all over the sidewalk. I tried to help him pick them up, but he wouldn’t let me. He had a few colorful words for me, though—none of which my mom would want me repeating. I told him he should have looked both ways, because he really should have. I also asked him if he had updated his glasses prescription within the last year. People should have their eyes checked on an annual basis, you know. Do you know what he told me?”

  “What?”

  “To mind my own business.”

  As awkward and as bothersome as Toby often was to Sean, the boy every once in a while found a way to unintentionally amuse him.

  “You’re a wild man, Toby,” Sean said with a slight smirk.

  Toby smiled, his eyes aligned directly with Sean’s.

  The tap of a car horn caused both of their heads to turn.

  “There’s my man!” greeted a friendly, elderly male voice over the roar of a loud truck engine. “How’s it going, Toby?”

  “Hi, Mr. Hansen!” replied the boy, retaining his smile and gazing out along the hood of the light-blue Ford pickup as it pulled up to the street corner perpendicular to the parking lot.

  An older but distinguished-looking gentleman proudly wearing a tall, straw cowboy hat flashed a charming smile at the boy through the open window. Well-kept, long silver sideburns trailed down both sides of his face. A matching goatee added a certain dignified element to his appearance—like a redneck Sean Connery. His license plate, surrounded by a shiny chrome frame below the grill, read MRGUARD—a cheap plug for Sean’s uncle’s security service.

  With a long toothpick angled out of the side of his mouth and a cunning shift of his eyes, he warned, “Don’t let that bum borrow your bike, Toby! He looks a bit cagey!”

  Toby’s high-pitched laughter resembled more of a cackle as the boy’s cheeks turned red and he glanced at Sean for a reaction. Sean displayed none.

  Sean lifted himself upright with a loud grunt and slapped dust from his pant legs. Without so much as a farewell to the young boy, he scurried out along the front of the truck, tracing his hand along the hood, and made his way around to the passenger door.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here,” he muttered to his uncle as the right side of the truck lowered from his weight as he got in.

  The car door slammed shut.

  Toby stood up on his tiptoes, straddling his bike and grasping the handlebars in front of him. “Goodbye, Sean!” he yelled.

  Sean’s only acknowledgment was the raise of a brow. It wasn’t visible through the glaze of the dusty windshield.

  Toby’s hand waved feverishly and enthusiastically. Zed rolled up his window and returned the gesture with a wink. He then turned to Sean with a disapproving scowl.

  “What?” Sean said in reply before turning his head away from the judging pair of eyes.

  As the large truck left the curb with a roar, Toby Parker’s bell rang out diligently through the air, as if it was signaling that dinner was ready. Zed watched him through his rearview mirror, observing the boy continuing to excitedly wave and ring. Toby kept up the salute all the way until the truck turned the corner and he had drifted from sight.

  “You know, it wouldn’t kill you to be a little friendlier to that boy,” Zed suggested, arching a brow. “He idolizes you.”

  “No one asked him to.”

  After a quick glance at his uncle, Sean leaned forward and twisted a brass knob on the dashboard’s A.M. radio. Sean was no fan of twangy country music, but he hoped doubling the volume would serve as a hint to his uncle to change the subject.

  “You know that his daddy . . .” Zed began, before taking a second to sigh and lean forward to drop the volume back down. “You know that his daddy left him and his mother when he was a youngun’. I’d think you could relate to that a bit.”

  A scoffing gasp slid from Sean’s mouth. “That kid should stay away from me.”

  “Come on,” the old man snarled with a rejecting wince and a shake of his head. “Why do you always have to shit all over yourself like that?”

  “Because it’s true!
” Sean snapped. “What does that kid want out of me?”

  “Probably just a friend.”

  “A friend? What? Like someone to throw a football around with or someone to take him to the movies?”

  “Maybe just someone to listen to him. To talk to.”

  “Well that ain’t me. I ain’t that guy. I’m the guy who gets smashed at bars and gets kicked out of his home because he pisses away his rent money on pool and poker.” Sean’s shoulders slumped, and he took a breath. A few moments later, he somberly continued. “I’m a joke in this town. No one takes me seriously. Not Gary, not even you.”

  With a discouraged grunt, Zed shook his head again and said, “Well, that’s one hell of a thing for you to say to me, boy.” His face turned to Sean, and his eyes burned right through his nephew. “I’m on your side, Sean. You’re not a joke to me. You’re my kin, and I’m proud of it. You wouldn’t be working for me otherwise.”

  Sean’s eyes lowered as his uncle’s words sank in. He raised his head and glanced out his window. Mom-and-pop shops at the edge of town floated by. None of them had changed in years. Same look. Same owners. Same names. He could feel his uncle’s glare from behind.

  Turning his eyes back on the road, Zed asked without expression, “You’re being evicted?”

  Sean closed his eyes and rested the side of his weary head against the warm window beside him. He knew his uncle would gladly bail him out. He had done it many times in the past. But Sean had always hated asking for anyone’s help, and with how he had lost the rent money this time, he wasn’t about to let his uncle get involved.

  “It’s fine. There’s no problem.” He cleared his throat and dropped his head to take inventory of his appearance, gazing down at his muddied and stained clothing. What a sight he was. Zed hadn’t remarked about the disarray of his uniform. Not one word. Sean found that odd considering the uniform actually belonged to his uncle’s company.

  Leaning back in the sheepskin-covered seat, Sean formulated how he would sneak down to the washing machine at the back of his apartment duplex without his landlord seeing him. Mr. Bailey lived on that very same side. A pawn shop that Sean frequented was closed on the weekends, but he knew that if he could hold off Bailey for another day, he could sell some items before work on Monday morning. Maybe . . . just maybe . . . he could make back enough to cover the rent.

  An odd sensation of nakedness suddenly overcame Sean. The staple weight that normally caused his front pocket to slightly sag . . . it was gone. His hand quickly rose to his chest where he fumbled unsuccessfully for the item that always resided there on his uniform.

  “Ah, shit!” he roared, before leaning forward and intensely scanning the floor and seat of the truck while distraughtly patting his hand across the other barren pocket.

  “What’s the problem?” asked Zed.

  Sean felt too humiliated to say, instead punishing himself over losing his badge. Despite his fuzzy head, he clearly remembered reattaching it to his shirt after waking up at the bottom of the trench by Meyers Bridge. After the morning he’d been through, it could have fallen off just about anywhere in between.

  He glanced up at his uncle’s eyes. Zed’s expression revealed that he had already gathered what was up.

  “Lose your badge?”

  Before Sean could say a word, his uncle attempted to put his mind to rest.

  “It’s no big deal, Sean. I have others.” Zed read defeat in his nephew’s eyes, and the look on his face showed that it pained his heart.

  “Hey!” he said with a wink and a smile, understanding all too well the pride that Sean took in his job. With a friendly backhand to his nephew’s shoulder, he added, “It’s not the badge . . . it’s the man behind it.”

  Sean had never questioned Zed’s loyalty or sincerity. His uncle cared about him. He had no doubts about that. But after the morning he was having, Zed’s words unintentionally prompted a sense of disesteem in Sean’s gut; a challenge to the faith his uncle had invested in him.

  “What did Jefferson tell you on the phone?” Sean muttered, watching for a reaction in his uncle’s eyes, but finding none. Zed’s silence indicated that he had indeed been briefed. “You believe me? That I saw a man kill himself?”

  Zed’s upper lip disappeared and his square chin extended. His lack of response generated an odd smugness from Sean, whose own need to self-deprecate had just been validated. Keeping his eyes trained forward on the road, Zed’s throat tightened and his toothpick swept to the opposite side of his mouth.

  After what seemed like an eternity, without removing his eyes from the road, Zed stated, “I don’t think you made it up, Sean.”

  With a disdainful sneer, Sean shook his head. “It was a yes or no question, Uncle Zed, but at least you’re being honest. It’s just that drunken Sean Coleman and his silly imagination. Right?”

  “Sean . . .”

  “Save it!” Sean snapped. “You and everyone else can go ahead and think I’m crazy. I know what I saw.”

  Zed didn’t respond at first, but he felt it time to get something off his chest. “Why do you think Lumbergh doesn’t believe you, Sean?”

  Sean sneered. “Don’t need another lecture.”

  “Sean . . . Gary’s a good man. He’s a good husband to your sister. Now, I know the two of you don’t see eye to eye, but—”

  Sean interrupted. “You know, I am so sick and tired of everyone telling me how good of a guy Gary is. I get it! Okay?” He shook his head. “The man spent twelve years down in Illinois, kissing more ass than he kicked. Did you know he’s never even fired a gun?”

  Zed sighed and said, “Never fired a gun in the line of duty, Sean. Of course he’s fired a gun before. He’s a trained police officer.”

  “Trained at kissing ass, maybe!” Sean barked. “Diana always talks about all the promotions he got. If he’s never even fired a gun before, how else do you think he got them? He comes into this town like a goddamned celebrity and they throw a police chief ’s badge right on him without even asking him a single question!”

  “Sean . . .”

  “Did you know that he voted for Al Gore?” He glared soberly at his uncle.

  Zed winced at Sean’s words, as if he had just stepped on jagged glass. He shook his head. “I did hear that. And I ain’t making any excuses for that. But, Sean, we both know that this isn’t about Gary’s past or his politics . . .”

  Breathing hard, Sean awaited his uncle’s explanation while already articulating a rebuttal in his mind.

  Taking his eyes off of the road to meet his nephew’s glower, Zed said, “Sean . . . I’ve known you all of your life. You’ve wanted to be the police chief of Winston since you were a little boy.”

  Sean wasn’t expecting those words to drop from his uncle’s mouth. He didn’t know what to say.

  “Now, maybe that was a pipe dream,” Zed continued. “Maybe it’s something you outgrew. I can’t say for sure. But something tells me that you feel he’s got what should be yours. I think that’s the reason you’re always conning the police into looking into possible crimes. You think you’re the one who should be calling the shots over there—not Gary.”

  Sean felt his temper simmer, but repressed the urge to unload on his uncle. Instead, he sunk his teeth down into his lower lip. He wasn’t going to lie; he did have aspirations of one day being the big man in Winston. But too much time had passed. He never had the drive. He had no credibility left in the eyes of the town folk. He had tested too many people and burned too many bridges.

  Zed was more perceptive than Sean had thought. Was he, Sean Coleman, really that open of a book? Did others see through him as well as his uncle did?

  An uncomfortable minute went by with no conversation between the two.

  “Your car’s at O’Rafferty’s, right?”

  “Yeah. How did you know?”

  “I read about it in the paper.”

  “Christ,” Sean said in annoyance. “That Hughes kid stays up all night to get his s
tupid tabloid column to print. He should work for the National Enquirer. He needs a life.” With his eyelids tightened, he leaned forward and began massaging his temples with his hands.

  “There’s some aspirin in the glove compartment, Sean.”

  Sean didn’t waste a second, leaning forward and letting the steel drawer drop open. A white plastic bottle of medicine rested clearly in view, but it might as well have been invisible. Sean’s gaze had been intercepted by the visual feast of a shiny and black holstered handgun that was now caressed in the glow of the small illuminating bulb beside it.

  “Holy shit!” Sean rumbled with his lips slowly forming into an uncharacteristic grin. With wide eyes, he quickly turned to his uncle who was now displaying a smug smirk of his own. Zed winked an eye at him and turned his attention back to the road. His smile widened.

  “Is this what I think it is?” an impassioned Sean asked.

  Zed was grinning from ear to ear now. “Give it a look!”

  For the better part of a year, Zed, who had a well-known passion for gun collecting, had been looking for a Heckler & Koch P9S Sport Mark III in a .45 caliber. It was an extremely difficult weapon to find, not to mention very expensive.

  Sean’s hand trembled as it carefully glided inside the glove box. Goosebumps rose along the back of his neck once his fingers brushed along the glossy wooden handgrip of the thirty-year-old German masterpiece of weaponry. He let out a long whistle of praise. His cautious handling and clear admiration of the gun prompted a giddy snicker from Zed.

  He knew Sean would be one of the few to appreciate it. “Don’t be shy! Take it out of its holster!”

  With his eyes outlining each groove and curve, Sean said, “Tell me you’re not keeping this baby in your glove box, Uncle Zed. This should be hanging from a rack above the fireplace.” He knew his uncle normally only carried a standard revolver on him and left his hobby at home.

  “Of course not. I just brought it along to show you.”

  “She’s a real beauty.”

  The tip of Sean’s tongue slid to the corner of his mouth as he popped out the gun’s clip and snapped it back in place. The crisp sound of metal on metal prompted an approving nod from him.