Once I start regretting how I screwed things up with Kate, it’s only a matter of a couple more sips before I revisit
That’s how it works with me and Dr. Jameson. First I think about losing Kate Costello. Then I think about losing basketball.
See, first I had nothing. That was okay because in the beginning everyone has nothing. Then I found basketball, and through basketball I found Kate. Now, Kate would deny that. Women always do. But you and I, Doc, we’re not children. We both know I never would have gotten within ten feet of Kate Costello without basketball. I mean, look at her!
Then I lost Kate. And then I lost basketball. Bada-bing. Bada-boom.
So here’s the question I’ve been asking myself for ten years: how the hell am I going to get her back without it?
Chapter 16. Kate
UNTIL THIS GOD-AWFUL, godforsaken morning in early September, the only funeral for a young person I’d ever attended was, I think, Wendell Taylor’s. Wendell was a big, lovable bear who played bass for Save the Whales, a local band that made it pretty good and had begun to tour around New England.
Two Thanksgivings ago, Wendell was driving back from a benefit show in Providence. When he fell asleep at the wheel, he was six miles from his bed, and the telephone pole he hit was the only unmovable object for two hundred yards in either direction. It took the EMS ninety minutes to cut him out of his van.
That Wendell was such a decent guy and was so thrilled to actually be making a living from his music made the whole thing incredibly sad. Yet somehow his funeral, full of funny and teary testimonials from friends from as far back as kindergarten, made people feel better.
The funeral for Rochie, Feifer, and Walco, which takes place in a squat stone church just east of town, doesn’t do anyone a lick of good.
Instead of cathartic tears, there’s clenched rage, a lot of it directed at the conspicuously absent owner of the house where the murders took place. To the thousand or so stuffed into that church Sunday morning, Walco and Feif and Rochie died for some movie star’s vanity.
I know it’s not quite that simple. From what I hear, Feif, Walco, and Rochie hung out at the court all summer and enjoyed the scene as much as anyone. Still, it would have been nice of Smitty Wilson to show up and pay his respects, don’t ya think?
There is one cathartic moment this morning, but it’s an ugly one. Before the service begins, Walco’s younger brother spots a photographer across the street. Turns out that the
Walco’s brother and his pals trash his camera pretty bad, and it would have been a lot worse if the police weren’t there.
That scene, I come to think later on, that violent altercation, was what some people might call an omen.
Chapter 17. Kate
IT JUST KEPT getting worse and worse the day of the funerals.
The line of neighbors waiting to offer their condolences to Mary and Richard Walco starts in the dining room in front of the breakfront, snakes along three living room walls, then runs past the front door and most of the way down the bedroom hallway. Clutching Mary Catherine’s tiny hand for dear life, I thread my way through the heavy- hearted gathering as if the carpet were strewn with mines and make my way to the end of the line.
All morning I’ve clung to my niece like a life preserver.
But MC, who thank goodness knows nothing of human misery, has no intention of staying put and breaks out of my grip and zigzags blithely around the room. She finally gloms on to her mom.
When MC scampers off, all the gloom of this dreadful day floods into the space she’s left behind.
I steady myself against one yellow-wallpapered wall and wait my turn, trying to will myself into invisibility. It’s not a skill I’ve mastered over the years. Then there’s an alarming tap on my shoulder.
I turn. It’s Tom.
And as soon as I see him, I realize he is the land mine I was hoping Mary Catherine would protect me from.
Before I can say a word, he moves in for a tentative hug that I don’t reciprocate. “It’s awful, Kate,” he mumbles. He looks awful too, as if he hasn’t slept in about ten days.
“Terrible” is what I manage to say. No more than that. Tom doesn’t deserve more. Ten years ago he broke my heart, blew it apart, and didn’t even seem to care that much. I’d heard the rumor that he was running around on me and partying hard. I hadn’t believed the rumor. But in the end I sure did.
“It’s still good to see you, Kate.”
“Spare me, Tom.”
I see the hurt in his face and now I feel bad. Mary, mother of God! What is it with me? After five years together, he breaks up with me ON THE PHONE, and now I feel bad.
The whole thing has me so contorted, I want to run out into the street and scream like a crazy person.
But of course I don’t. Not good girl Kate Costello. I stand there with a dim-witted little smile plastered on my face, as if we have been enjoying innocuous pleasantries, and finally, he turns away.
Then I take a deep breath, give myself a stern talking-to about the need to get over myself, and wait my turn to offer some consoling words to the thousand-times-more-wretched Mary Walco.
One strange and disturbing thing: I hear virtually the same line half a dozen times while I’m standing there waiting to see Mary-
Chapter 18. Kate
I OFFER WALCO’S mom the little that I can, and then I cast about the room for a red-haired toddler in a black velvet dress.
I see MC in the corner, still with her mom, and then spot my precious pal Macklin Mullen and his handsome grandson Jack over by the makeshift bar. Jack, a lawyer like myself, wanders off as I approach. Okay, fine. I was going to congratulate him on getting married, but whatever.
Mack is sipping a whiskey and leaning heavily on a gnarled black-thorn shillelagh, but when we throw ourselves into each other’s arms, his embrace is as warm and vigorous as ever.
“I was fervently hoping that would never end, Katie,” he says when we finally release each other.
“For God’s sake, Macklin, cheer me up.”
“I was about to ask you to do the same thing, darling girl. Three boys dead-tragic, pointless, and mystifying. Where you been keeping yourself all this time? I know about your many accomplishments, of course, but I’ve been waiting to toast you in person. Actually, I’ve been waiting to get you drunk! Why in Christ have you been such a
