“And sleeping very little. And obviously speedy…” Ellen shook her head. “A lot of these hard-charging executives are on drugs.”
“I don’t know,” I said.
She just looked at me.
I went back into my office to call Ricky, and from the office window I saw Julia backing her car down the driveway. I went to wave to her, but she was looking over her shoulder as she backed away. In the evening light I saw golden reflections on the windshield, streaking from the trees above. She had almost reached the street when I thought I saw someone sitting in the passenger seat beside her. It looked like a man.
I couldn’t see his features clearly through the windshield, with the car moving down the drive. When Julia backed onto the street, her body blocked my view of the passenger. But it seemed as if Julia was talking to him, animatedly. Then she put the car in gear and leaned back in her seat, and for a moment I had a brief, clear look. The man was backlit, his face in shadow, and he must have been looking directly at her because I still couldn’t make out any features, but from the way he was slouching I had the impression of someone young, maybe in his twenties, though I honestly couldn’t be sure. It was just a glimpse. Then the BMW accelerated, and she drove off down the street.
I thought: the hell with this. I ran outside, and down the driveway. I reached the street just as Julia came to the stop sign to the end of the block, her brake lights flaring. She was probably fifty yards away, the street illuminated in low, slanting yellow light. It looked as if she was alone in the car, but I really couldn’t see well. I felt a moment of relief, and of foolishness. There I was, standing in the street, for no good reason. My mind was playing tricks on me. There was nobody in the car.
Then, as Julia made the right turn, the guy popped up again, like he had been bent over, getting something from the glove compartment. And then the car was gone. And in an instant all my distress came flooding back, like a hot pain that spread across my chest and body. I felt short of breath, and a little dizzy.
There was somebody in the car.
I trudged back up the driveway, feeling churning emotions, not sure what to do next. “You’re not sure what to do next?” Ellen said. We were doing the pots and pans at the sink, the things that didn’t go in the dishwasher. Ellen was drying, while I scrubbed. “You pick up the phone and call her.”
“She’s in the car.”
“She has a car phone. Call her.”
“Uh-huh,” I said. “So how do I put it? Hey Julia, who’s the guy in the car with you?” I shook my head. “That’s going to be a tough conversation.”
“Maybe so.”
“That’ll be a divorce, for sure.”
She just stared at me. “You don’t want a divorce, do you.”
“Hell, no. I want to keep my family together.”
“That may not be possible, Jack. It may not be your decision to make.”
“None of this makes any sense,” I said. “I mean the guy in the car, he was like a kid, somebody young.”
“So?”
“That’s not Julia’s style.”
“Oh?” Ellen’s eyebrows went up. “He was probably in his twenties or early thirties. And anyway, are you so sure about Julia’s style?”
“Well, I’ve lived with her for thirteen years.”
She set down one of the pots with a bang. “Jack. I understand that all this must be hard to accept.”
“It is, it is.” In my mind, I kept replaying the car backing down the driveway, over and over. I was thinking that there was something strange about the other person in the car, something odd in his appearance. In my mind, I kept trying to see his face but I never could. The features were blurred by the windshield, by the light shifting as she backed down the drive… I couldn’t see the eyes, or the cheekbones, or the mouth. In my memory, the whole face was dark and indistinct. I tried to explain that to her.
“It’s not surprising.”
“No?”
“No. It’s called denial. Look Jack, the fact is, you have the evidence right in front of your eyes. You’ve seen it, Jack. Don’t you think it’s time you believed it?”
I knew she was right. “Yes,” I said. “It’s time.”
The phone was ringing. My hands were up to the elbows in soap suds. I asked Ellen to get it, but one of the kids had already picked it up. I finished scrubbing the barbecue grill, handed it to Ellen to dry.
“Jack,” Ellen said, “you have to start seeing things as they really are, and not as you want them to be.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I’ll call her.”
At that moment Nicole came into the kitchen, looking pale.
“Dad? It’s the police. They want to talk to you.”
DAY 5
9:10 P.M.
Julia’s convertible had gone off the road about five miles from the house. It had plunged fifty feet down a steep ravine, cutting a track through the sage and juniper bushes. Then it must have rolled, because now it lay at an angle, wheels facing upward. I could see only the underside of the car. The sun was almost down, and the ravine was dark. The three rescue ambulances on the road had their red lights flashing, and the rescue crews were already rappelling down on ropes. As I watched, portable floodlights were set up, bathing the wreck in a harsh blue glow. I heard the crackle of radios all around.
I stood up on the road with a motorcycle police officer. I had already asked to go down there, and was told I couldn’t; I had to stay on the road. When I heard the radios, I said, “Is she hurt? Is my wife hurt?”
“We’ll know in a minute.” He was calm.
“What about the other guy?”
“Just a minute,” he said. He had a headset in his helmet, because he just started talking in a low voice. It sounded like a lot of code words. I heard “… update a four-oh-two for seven-three-nine here…”
I stood at the edge, and looked down, trying to see. By now there were workers all around the car, and several hidden behind the upturned frame. A long time seemed to pass.
The cop said, “Your wife is unconscious but she’s… She was wearing her seat belt, and stayed in the car. They think she’s all right. Vital signs are stable. They say no spinal injuries but… she… sounds like she broke her arm.”
“But she’s all right?”
“They think so.” Another pause while he listened. I heard him say, “I have the husband here, so let’s eight-seven.” When he turned back to me, he said, “Yes. She’s coming around. She’ll have to be checked for internal bleeding at the hospital. And she’s got a broken arm. But they say she’s all right. They’re getting her on a stretcher now.”
“Thank God,” I said.
The policeman nodded. “This is a bad piece of road.”
“This has happened before?”
He nodded. “Every few months. Not usually so lucky.”
I flipped open my cell phone and called Ellen, told her to explain to the kids there was nothing to worry about, that Mom was going to be okay. “Especially Nicole,” I said. “I’ll take care of it,” Ellen promised me.
I flipped the phone shut and turned back to the cop. “What about the other guy?” I said.
“She’s alone in the car.”
“No,” I said. “There was another guy with her.”
He spoke on his headset, then turned back to me. “They say no. There’s no sign of anyone else.”
“Maybe he was thrown,” I said.
“They’re asking your wife now…” He listened a moment. “She says she was alone.”
“You’re kidding,” I said.
He looked at me, shrugged. “That’s what she says.” In the flashing red lights of the ambulances, I couldn’t read his expression. But his tone implied: another guy who doesn’t know his own wife. I turned away, looked over the edge of the road.
One of the rescue vehicles had extended a steel arm with a winch that hung over the ravine. A cable was being lowered. I saw the workers, struggling for footing against the steep slope, as they attached a stretcher to the winch. I couldn’t see Julia clearly on the stretcher, she was strapped down, covered in a silver space blanket. She started to rise, passing through the cone of blue light, then into darkness.
The cop said, “They’re asking about drugs and medicines. Is your wife taking any drugs or medicines?”
“Not that I know of.”
“How about alcohol? Was she drinking?”
“Wine at dinner. One or two glasses.”
The cop turned away and spoke again, quietly in the darkness. After a pause, I heard him say, “That’s affirmative.”
The stretcher twisted slowly as it rose into the air. One of the workers, halfway up the slope, reached out to steady it. The stretcher continued upward.
I still couldn’t see Julia clearly, until it reached the level of the road and the rescue workers swung it around, and unclipped it from the line. She was swollen; her left cheekbone was purple and the forehead above her left eye was purple as well. She must have hit her head pretty hard. She was breathing shallowly. I moved alongside the stretcher. She saw me and said, “Jack…” and tried to smile.
“Just take it easy,” I said.
She gave a little cough. “Jack. It was an accident.”
The medics were maneuvering around the motorcycle. I had to watch where I was going. “Of course it was.”
“It’s not what you think, Jack.”
I said, “What is, Julia?” She seemed to be delirious. Her voice seemed to drift in and out. “I know what you’re thinking.” Her hand gripped my arm. “Promise me you won’t get involved in this, Jack.”
I didn’t say anything, I just walked with her.
She squeezed me harder. “Promise me you’ll stay out of it.”
“I promise,” I said.
She relaxed then, dropping my arm. “This doesn’t involve our family. The kids will be fine. You’ll be fine. Just stay out, okay?”
“Okay,” I said, just wanting to mollify her.
“Jack?”
“Yes, honey, I’m here.”
By now we were approaching the nearest ambulance. The doors swung open. One of the rescue team said, “You related to her?”
“I’m her husband.”
“You want to come?”
“Yes.”
“Hop in.”
I got into the ambulance first, then they slid the stretcher in, one of the rescue team got in and slammed the doors shut. We started down the road, siren moaning. I was immediately moved aside by the two paramedics, working on her. One was recording notes on a handheld device and the other was starting a second IV in her other arm. They were worried about her blood pressure, which was dropping. That was a great cause for concern. During all this I couldn’t really see Julia, but I heard her murmuring. I tried to move forward, but the medics pushed me back. “Let us work, sir. Your wife’s got injuries. We have to work.”
For the rest of the way, I sat on a little jump seat and gripped a wall handle as the ambulance careened around curves. By now Julia was clearly delirious, babbling nonsense. I heard something about “the black clouds,” that were “not black anymore.” Then she shifted into a kind of lecture, talking about “adolescent rebellion.” She mentioned Amanda by name, and Eric, asking if they were all right. She seemed agitated. The medics kept trying to reassure her. And finally she lapsed into repeating “I didn’t do anything wrong, I didn’t mean to do anything wrong” as the ambulance sped through the night.
Listening to her, I couldn’t help but worry.
The examination suggested Julia’s injuries might be more extensive than they first thought. There was a lot to rule out: possible pelvic fracture, possible hematoma, possible fracture of a cervical vertebra, left arm broken in two places and might need to be pinned. The doctors seemed most worried about her pelvis. They were handling her much more gingerly when they put her into intensive care.
But Julia was conscious, catching my eye and smiling at me from time to time, until she fell asleep. The doctors said there was nothing for me to do; they would wake her up every half hour during the night. They said that she would be in the hospital at least three days, probably a week.
They told me to get some rest. I left the hospital a little before midnight. I took a taxi back to the crash site, to pick up my car. It was a cold night. The police cars and rescue ambulances were gone. In their place was a big flatbed tow truck, which was winching Julia’s car up the hill. A skinny guy smoking a cigarette was running the winch. “Nothing to see,” he said to me. “Everybody’s gone to the hospital.”
I said it was my wife’s car.
“Can’t drive it,” he said. He asked me for my insurance card. I got it out of my wallet and handed it to him. He said, “I heard your wife’s okay.”
“So far.”
“You’re a lucky guy.” He jerked his thumb, pointing across the road. “Are they with you?” Across the street a small white van was parked. The sides were bare, with no markings or company logo. But low on the front door I saw a serial number, in black. And underneath it said SSVT unit.
I said, “No, they’re not with me.”
“Been here an hour,” he said. “Just sitting there.”