While Ryan and Hippo plowed through Bastarache’s files, I went to the Impala, got my laptop, and booted. The dial-up connection was excruciatingly slow. Launching my browser, I crawled through “porn producers,” “porn makers,” “porn companies,” “sex film industry,” etc., etc.
I discovered the Religious Alliance Against Pornography. Read articles about city attorneys and federal prosecutors pursuing court cases. Saw virtual lap dances, overdone orgasms, and boatloads of silicone. Learned the names of producers, performers, Web sites, and production companies.
I found no one calling himself Pierre.
By four-thirty I felt like I needed a shower. And antibiotics.
Closing the PC, I moved to the lounger, thinking I’d rest my eyes for five minutes. Across the room, I could hear Ryan and Hippo banging drawers, shuffling receipts and invoices.
Then I was arguing with Harry. She was insisting I put on moccasins. I was objecting.
“We’ll be Pocahantas,” she said.
“Dressing up is for kids,” I said.
“We have to do it before we get sick.”
“No one’s getting sick.”
“I’ll have to leave.”
“You can stay as long as you want.”
“That’s what you always say. But I’ve got the book.”
I noticed Harry was clutching her scrapbook.
“You didn’t see the part about Evangeline.”
“I did,” I said.
As I reached for the book, Harry swiveled. Over her shoulder I could see a child with long blond hair. Harry spoke to the child, but I couldn’t make out her words.
Still holding the book, Harry walked toward the child. I tried to follow, but the moccasins kept sliding from my feet, tripping me.
Then I was peering into sunlight through an iron-barred window. All around me was darkness. Harry and the child were staring in at me. Only it wasn’t a child. It was an old woman. Her cheeks were sunken, and her hair was a silver-white nimbus surrounding her head.
As I watched, rents appeared in the wrinkled skin around the woman’s lips and under her eyes. Her nose opened into a ragged black hole.
A face began to materialize beneath the woman’s face. Slowly, it took form. It was my mother’s face. Her lips were trembling and tears glistened on her cheeks.
I reached out through the bars. My mother held up a hand. In it was a bunched wad of tissue.
“Come out of the hospital,” my mother said.
“I don’t know how,” I said.
“You have to go to school.”
“Bastarache didn’t go to school,” I said.
My mother tossed the tissue. It hit my shoulder. She threw another. And another.
I opened my eyes. Ryan was tapping my sleeve.
I went vertical so fast the recliner shot into full upright and locked.
“Bastarache will be out in an hour,” Ryan said. “I’m going to tail him, see where he goes.”
I looked at my watch. It was almost seven.
“You could stay here with Hippo. Or I could drop you at a motel, pick you—”
“Not a chance.” I got to my feet. “Let’s go.”
As we drove, I dissected what I could recall of the dream. The content was standard fare, my brain doing a Fellini with recent events. I often wondered what critics might write of my nocturnal meanderings.
Tonight’s offering was a typical retrospective from my subconscious. Harry and her scrapbook. Kelly Sicard’s reference to moccasins. Her wadded tissue. Bastarache. The window bar imagery was undoubtedly thrown in by my id to portray frustration.
But my mother’s appearance puzzled me. And why the reference to a hospital? And sickness? And who was the old woman?
I watched other cars pass, wondering how so many could be on the road so early. Were the drivers going to jobs? Delivering kids to early morning swim practice? Returning home after a long night serving burgers and fries?
Ryan pulled into a lot outside the prison’s main entrance, parked, and leaned sideways against the door. He clearly wanted quiet, so I dropped back into my thoughts.
Minutes dragged by. Ten. Fifteen.
We’d been there a half hour when a dream-inspired synapse fired.
