“Right now,” Bernie was saying, “let’s get back to why you killed April.”
“I already told you-I don’t know,” Thad said. “I don’t remember a thing about that night.”
“What night?”
“That goddamn night. I’d never done drugs before, not even pot. I’d hardly ever been drunk.”
“You did drugs that night?”
“April was kind of wild, like I said.”
“What drugs?” Bernie said.
“Oh, man,” said Thad, “I’m one of those people that drugs just live for, you know?”
Bernie didn’t say whether he did or didn’t, whatever Thad’s question might have been. That was one of his interviewing techniques and this was an interview, no doubt about it, and not close to being the first one we’d done with someone or more than one someone in bed. In fact, that kind of interview often went well for us.
“Stick with that night,” Bernie said.
“I told you I don’t-”
Bernie cut Thad off, his voice rising. “Where were you?”
Thad kind of cringed, just at the sound of Bernie’s voice. “If you’re going to hit me again, don’t stop. You’ll be doing me a favor.”
“There’s no time for your dramatics,” Bernie said. “Where were you?”
Thad laughed, a harsh little laugh, quickly done with.
“Something’s funny?” Bernie said.
“The opposite,” said Thad. “I’ve trained myself to shut out the critics. Now you come along.” Bernie stared down at him. Thad looked away, turning again to the curtains; he seemed to be seeing something far away. “We were at Jiggs’s place,” he said in a voice that got quieter and also stranger as he went along, almost like he wasn’t really with us, hard to explain. “Jiggs was living at his dad’s and his dad was usually gone-he worked in the oil patch out in Texas. This particular night was my last one. I had to go home the next morning for summer school on account of my lousy grades. I wanted April to come with me. She wanted me to stay. We had a little fight about that.”
Silence. We waited. That was another part of our interviewing technique. Bernie had explained why more than once, but it was one of those reasons that just didn’t stick. I tried not to worry about that; actually, I didn’t even have to try. I’m lucky that way.
One thing about this particular technique: there was no point in waiting forever. Just before we were about to hit forever, Bernie said, “What kind of fight?”
Thad glanced at Bernie, squinting as though Bernie was too bright. “Nothing physical, if that’s what you’re thinking,” he said. “We argued a bit, that’s all. Maybe she cried. But then she came up with this idea to take LSD. Go on a trip together after all, kind of thing. I wasn’t that enthusiastic-we’d smoked some pot and we were drinking vodka, too. But I went along. All I remember-I still see them-were these terrible visions, in a tunnel, April and me, although we were actually in bed, and claws.”
“Claws?”
“Horrible long hooked claws, clawing and clawing at us.”
Big claws? I’d been up close to an angry mama bear, knew more than I wanted to about big claws. I started feeling kind of sorry for Thad, but not much, since I was getting the feeling he’d done something real bad long ago.
“And?” Bernie said.
“And nothing,” Thad said. “We just clung to each other, shaking and crying. At least I was. She might not have even been there.”
“April might not have been there?”
“I don’t know.” Thad’s eyes turned deep and murky. He closed them. “I feel like-I felt like-I was all alone, clinging to myself.” His chest rose, fell, rose again. “April, April,” he went on, very softly. “But she won’t answer. Still mad? I have to go to school, babe. It’s my whole-” His eyes opened. He blinked a few times and his eyes returned to normal, if eyes like Thad’s could ever be called normal. Was he back in the here and now? I myself preferred the here and now at all times, maybe something we can go into later.
Thad tried to meet Bernie’s gaze and actually did. “But she must have been there,” he said.
“Why?” Bernie said.
“Because when I woke up she was right next to me.” Thad shuddered. “Blood all over her, all over me, and the knife was still in my hand.”
“What knife?” Bernie said.
“This ordinary kitchen knife.”
“From Jiggs’s kitchen?”
“I guess so.”
“How did it come to be in the bed?”
“I must have gotten up and brought it there.”
“Do you remember doing that?”
“I told you-I don’t remember anything.”
“Where was Jiggs this whole time?”
“Hanging with friends. He didn’t come back until morning. By that time, I was freaking out. He kind of took over.”
“In what way?”
“Handling the situation.”
“How did he do that?”
“Calmed me down, to begin with,” Thad said. “Getting me to understand that I hadn’t been in my right mind, like temporary insanity.”
“Making you not responsible?”
“Legally, right?” He gave Bernie a challenging sort of look.
“Your nightmares tell a different story,” Bernie said.
Thad hung his head. At that moment, I felt something soft move against me. I looked down, and there was Brando lying at my side, curling around my back legs. The feeling wasn’t the worst in the world.
“Whose idea was it to dump April behind the Flower Mart?” Bernie said.
Thad winced. “Jiggs’s,” he said. “It was meant to be… misleading, I guess you’d say.”
“I guess.”
“After that, we… we cleaned up the place, and Jiggs drove me to LA. He decided to stay when we got there. His old man didn’t care.”
“What happened to the knife?”
Thad shivered like it was cold, even though the AC wasn’t nearly as cranked up as it often is in Valley houses. “Jiggs cleaned it and put it back in the kitchen drawer.”
Bernie nodded like that made sense. “You got away with murder,” he said.
“I sure don’t feel like it,” Thad said.
“You’re too sensitive,” said Bernie.
Thad turned red.
“When did the blackmailing start?”
“How do you know about that?”
“Everything comes out eventually,” Bernie said. “In the real world,” he added.
“Christ, stop,” said Thad. “Just stop tormenting me. I already confessed. And I’ll tell you something-the only reason I took this pissy role was because of the location. My subconscious wanted to come back here, to-I don’t know-make things right.”
“By killing the blackmailer?” Bernie said.
“Huh?”
“Come on,” Bernie said. “You don’t know who was blackmailing you?”
“Of course I do,” said Thad. “It was this old boyfriend of April’s, Manny something, and a gangster pal of his. I kind of remember April mentioning she dumped him, but it turned out he was stalking her. He saw us that morning through the window.”
