like an hour. That’s relativity.” Einstein’s explanation of relativity makes sense to me. When you’re doing a stakeout, time slows. It’s watching and waiting, but mostly it’s just waiting.
Maybe Rose’s mother hadn’t had classes that day. Or it was possible she never looked at the student newspaper. There was no guarantee she was even a student at Cal State, Los Angeles, and even if she was, the idea of her showing up was probably just wishful thinking on my part. She had left Rose in a cardboard box at night to fend for herself. That didn’t make her mother-of-the-year material. Why would anything in the way of maternal responsibility kick in now? Her baby had been dead for almost two weeks, and any grieving she might have done was likely to have played out by now. And anyway, self-preservation would probably keep her away. The farther she kept from Rose, the less chance she’d have of ever being discovered.
There were those reasons and dozens more for Rose’s mother to not show up. There was only one thing that made me think she might appear at her baby’s grave: Rose’s pink bootees. I wanted to hate the woman, and I felt the need to arrest her, but she hadn’t abandoned her child in the way my mother had me. I was left to die, while Rose was left to live. My survival was a fluke; Rose’s death was a terrible accident. But it was still a crime. And it was my job to redress it.
I checked the time: half past nine. We’d been in the car for more than an hour. Even Einstein probably would have agreed it felt like at least eight hours. I kept rubbing my hands. I had forgotten how cold the desert can be on a cloudless January night. It felt more like Siberia than Southern California. The cold wasn’t playing well with my body, in particular those parts of my flesh that had burned. It felt like I was on fire again.
That wasn’t something I wanted to be thinking. I didn’t want to jinx myself. During my stay in the hospital I hadn’t awakened on fire, hadn’t been tortured by my old nightmare. It seemed almost too good to be true, but maybe I wasn’t the burning man anymore. Or it could have just been the heavy-duty pain meds I was taking.
Sleep-especially sleep without my pyre-was sounding better and better.
More time passed. In my two hours at the cemetery there had been no visitors to the grounds. That made sense, of course. The cemetery was closed. Besides, no one in their right mind would visit on such a chilly, dark evening.
My hand kept reaching for the ignition key, but each time I pulled it back. I tried to check the time no more than once every five minutes, but kept falling short of that mark. It was that damn relativity again.
I’ll leave at 9:45, I promised myself.
A few minutes later that time came and passed, but I still didn’t leave. It was easier for me to make a new promised departure time. I’ll take off at 10:00, I told myself. At 10:05 I pretended that I’d meant 10:15.
At 10:08 I noticed the headlights. The car was an old American sedan, a Buick, but the light wasn’t good enough to make out its driver. The car slowed at the driveway leading to the cemetery and then passed by it. I let out a lot of air at the false alarm.
Four minutes later the car was back. This time it pulled into the driveway. Instead of parking out back, the car came to a stop in the shadows about halfway down the drive.
Sylvia Espinosa’s article had been very specific about the location of the Garden of Angels. The car was parked near the pathway that led to it. The driver turned off the ignition.
I raised the binoculars. The driver was sitting in the dark, and the night prevented me from being able to see much. The shadow in the driver’s seat didn’t move for a long time. There wasn’t a second shadow, and there were no steamed-up windows, so the driver hadn’t pulled in for a make-out session.
In my gut I knew it was Rose’s mother sitting in the car. She was ready to be spooked. Most people are freaked out by visiting cemeteries at night. Don’t be afraid, I thought. All is well. I tried to breathe normally and keep my racing heart in check. I didn’t want to put the vibe out there, didn’t want to scare her away. I’m superstitious that way. I kept thinking soothing, calming thoughts.
The door finally opened, and as she stepped out I snapped off a few pictures. I was working without a flash and operating the camera in its night mode. After clicking, the shutter exposure was so slow it seemed to be on a time delay.
She began walking toward the Garden of Angels. Her face was obscured in shadows, but she looked young. She was wearing jeans and a black jacket. I wondered if she’d already burned her CSULA eagle sweatshirt.
Halfway down the walkway, she stopped and raised her hand to her heart. She looked like she was scared, or uncertain, or both.
If she got cold feet, I’d have to be prepared to intercept her. I eased out of the car, moving as quietly as I could. Sirius was awake now, but I whispered to him to be quiet and stay behind. I crept forward, keeping to the shadows, drawing closer to the woman. Along the way I stopped to take some shots of her car and its license plate.
I turned my attention back to the garden, but it took me a few moments to make out where she was standing. She had come to a stop among the crosses and was standing so still she could have passed for a statue.
And then the statue started crying.
Being a witness to anguish is a part of every cop’s job. During my career I’ve seen too much suffering, but this was emotion at its rawest. Some people need to emote to an audience; it’s almost like their pain can only register if seen by others. Rose’s mother wasn’t like that, and her misery seemed all the more profound because she thought she was alone.
Her body shook as she cried, and each wail was worse than the last, even though I didn’t know how that could be. As I heard her talk to her dead baby, as all her despair poured out, I silently backed away. Her confession was too painful to hear; her pain was too painful to bear.
I made it back to what I thought would be the safety buffer of my car, but even though I couldn’t hear I could still see, and that was bad enough. I was forced to watch as Rose’s mother beat on her own head without mercy, and just when I thought I’d have to intervene for her own safety, she fell exhausted to the cold ground, done in by her own hands. But even then she wasn’t through hurting herself. I saw her hand rise and fall, and I realized she was pulling out clumps of her own hair.
Finally, her hands full of hair, she crawled over to Rose’s grave, and there on bent knees she prayed. Her prayer took a long time. Most of the time she was shaking so hard it was a wonder that she managed to keep from falling over.
I was clothed in rectitude, and I tried to tell myself that her sorrow did not change the situation, but her misery hollowed out my beliefs and made them feel brittle.
At last she stood up. Through binoculars I watched as she touched her daughter’s memorial cross and then saw her fingers pause on my card. She brought her head closer to read the writing and see what was there. Then she freed my card from the gravestone.
As she made her way back to the car, she passed several spots that were well enough illuminated for me to get a good look at her. It was a face I wouldn’t ever forget, even if I wanted to. My face bears the scars from fire, and it has turned many an eye away. The hurt that showed on her face, the pain that registered there, was much harder to look at than my scars.
It was time to intercept her before she reached her car. It was time to make the arrest.
Maybe I’d be doing her a favor. It was clear that she needed to pay for her sins. That’s what I told myself the whole time she was walking to her car.
Wasn’t I the one who said the law was the law? It wasn’t my job to judge. I was supposed to uphold the law, and that meant processing this woman through the system.
She reached her car, and I didn’t stop her. I watched as she drove away.
CHAPTER 23:
By the time I got home my body was hurting, and that gave me an excuse to take my pain and sleeping meds. I didn’t want to think about what I had seen and what I had done, or not done, and what I would do.
The horns of a dilemma were deep into me, and no solution seemed right. I was afraid what I’d seen was
