Falls (Pt. 5): And Tom

8.

Hard splashes of red swept across the street and houses, broken into shards by trees and mailboxes and fences and over my legs and chest. Then blue. Red. An ambulance and two Sheriff cars were parked in front of the house. I stopped and stared and Marie ran on. Bev was in the street crying and yelling and Marie ran to her and wrapped her arms around her and Bev collapsed onto the ground and Marie went with her. I walked slow up the road trying to process everything through a days worth of wine and sun. On porches I saw people standing in house coats and with beer bottles and whispering to each other and I saw an Officer in the road talking to Marie as Bev wept in her arms. I could almost hear the CB in one of the Sheriff cars squawk and hiss and I tossed my water bottle into the bushes.

I walked slow up to the house and another officer was coming out. He signaled over the one that was talking to Bev and the two of them spoke quietly on the porch as I knelt in front of Marie and Bev.

Bev's make up had streamed down her face and she was weeping, not crying. |Deep heavy gasps and loud cries and the whole neighborhood was entertained. I could see Marie now was crying, though silently, and I knew she was being strong for Bev. I held them both tight and kissed the tops of their heads.

"I'll be right back," I said.

I stood and walked to the front porch. The Sheriff or maybe Sheriff's deputy stopped me. "Can't go in there."

"I live here."

The officers now seemed interested. "Oh?" He took out a notepad and small pencil. "What's your name, then?"

"What happened," I asked. "Where's Tom?"

"I asked you a question, sir. What's your name?"

"James. James Martin," I said. "What happened to Tom?"

"You live here a while, James?"

"Please, my friend, what..."

"Listen James, as soon as I'm done, only a couple questions, I'll have the EMT speak to you. But for now, answer my questions."

"I've lived here most of the summer. Since June."

"And it's been you, the two girls and your friend here? The whole time?"

"Yes." I was biting my tongue and attempting to look sober and calm.

"You ever do cocaine, James?"

"No, sir."

He was writing all of this down. I assumed he was writing this. He could have been practicing his political cartooning hobby. I didn't know. His partner, or the other officer at least, was staring at me unblinking. I assumed he was looking for some sense of a lie, some twitch or reaction that I was too drunk or uninformed to hide.

"You sure about that?" he asked.

"Yes, I'm sure."

"What about the other two? The girls."

"I don't know, officer. Not that I know of."

"You don't know? Never after a particularly wild night at the bar? Fourth of July, maybe?"

"I have never seen either of them do cocaine, or anything else officer. We drink is all."

"Yeah." He scribbled something else down. "Go stand with the girls over there and I'll talk to you after."

Bev had stopped sobbing, but both her and Marie were still streaming tears and make-up and breathing deep. Bev's head was still on Marie's shoulder and Marie was holding Bev's hand. Their faces were red and puffed. Marie looked up at me, but Bev was somewhere else.

None of us knew what to say. I stared at the house. My heart was heavy. My chest ached. It was full night now. My chest ached and it was full night.

"Mr. Martin."

I turned and I could feel Marie's head turn with me. The officer was standing next to me. He seemed indifferent to the situation. He had seen it a thousand times. A thousand bodies. A thousand broken hearts. What did it matter to him? I wanted to hit him. The son of a bitch.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Let's step off to the side here and we'll talk."

I followed him a few steps into the darkness. He began to speak hushed. Not wanting the girls to hear, I assumed. "Well, looks like your friend overdosed."

"Jesus Christ."

"So, about the cocaine use."

"I had no idea. Is he alive?"

"Well, yes. His heart had stopped for a while, the EMT's didn't know how long, but he's comatose at the moment."

"The girl, Beverly, says she was here with him. That they had done it together."

I looked over at Bev and acted surprised but didn't have to act hurt.

"You still say you had no idea?"

"Yes, of course. But, fuck..." I dropped my shoulders. Exhaled. "What do we do?"

"Well, we're trying to contact his family. For now, I'm going to need to take Beverly in and have a conversation with her."

"Is she in trouble?"

"Can't really say."

"What about Marie and I?"

"You two are fine for now, but until we know a little more, just hang around for a while. Behave."

"We can do that."

The ambulance began to pull away, dragging the screaming reds and blues with it, and I looked and Bev stared at it as it drove and the weeping started again. The second officer walked over. "See you back at the station?"

"Yeah. I'm going to bring the girl in. I'll see you there."

"All right." The second officer nodded to me and walked to his car, got in and drove off as the first officer walked toward the girls.

I stood in the dark and watched as the girls stood and the officer led Bev into the back seat as she tried to stand straight and then they two drove away and I walked over to Marie.

"I don't... I..." she said.

I hugged her.

9.

It wasn't our house when we walked inside. Empty and drained. The lights were all on. The coffee table was shoved aside. The air was thick and the house seemed to stretch outward forever. A house in a dream. The ladder for the crawlspace was pulled down and I lifted it up and it slammed against the ceiling, closing. I walked into the kitchen and took two beers out, opened them, and brought them to the living room where Marie had collapsed on the couch. On one wall of the room there was a small portable radio that we sometimes brought to the beach. I turned it on soft and for whatever reason it was on an A.M. talk channel. It was only background noise. I sat down next to Marie and handed her a beer. She took it and sipped from it.

"I can't believe this," she said. Now she laid her head on my shoulder.

"I know."

"Do you think he'll be okay?"

"I don't know. He's alive."

"Yeah. He's alive, but I feel awful because then I think, for how long? I just, I don't know." She spoke with a soft tone that reminded me of losing a job I despised but depended on. 'Oh, I'm fired.'

I put my foot on the edge of the coffee table and sipped from my beer. "What did Bev say happened?"

"She didn't, really. Just that she was only gone for a minute and that things were fine. She was crying a lot."

"Yeah. Christ I'm glad he isn't dead."

"Me too. Poor Tom. He never even liked coke. It's so weird. He used to get all bummed about Bev doing it, and now..."

"He's done it before, though. More than a couple of times. It's not like he never touched it or anything."

"That's true."

"I think he just hated seeing Bev deteriorate, you know? Just, she isn't the girl he came out here with."

"She's not that bad."

"You saw her when we came home the last night. She was weird all night. Staring down some girl..."

"Amanda, she told me."

"Who?"

"Just, some girl. Bev really dislikes her."

"Oh, well, then she's tearing her clothes off and running around. I mean, That's definitely not the girl we knew before."

"I know. You're right, and honestly, he probably felt a little trapped here. Shit, before this, we barely knew either of them and if he broke up with her, he'd really have nothing."

"Yeah," I said. "That's pretty much what he was saying last night. He didn't want to turn into Bev and he didn't want to see her die and he didn't want to get trapped here. He said he needed to get out of here. I thought he was going to split this morning while we all slept."

"I think it's hard for me to understand them, you know?"

"Why?"

"I don't know, like, they aren't us."

"People keep saying that."

"Do they?"

"Yeah. I get it. We're a real couple. Fucking whatever."

"Don't sound so excited. What I mean is, if you developed something like that, a coke habit or whatever, I wouldn't abandon you, you know? It wouldn't even be an option. I'd get you help and I'd be your rock and you would never feel alone. But, that's just what he did, and he condemned her, and now... all because he went and did what he hated about her."

"We're going in circles, honey. He hated the way it affected her. And they were only together a few months. In the first few months I may have split also."

"You would have?"

"Maybe. I don't know."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. I probably would have to."

We drank our beers and the fog of the day was clearing. The excitement wore off and we fell asleep on the couch to the rhythmic static of voices on the radio.

10.

The next day I was in the crawlspace. Only a small beam of light came in through a vent at the end of the room. I could see the silhouettes of Tom's lamp and his guitar and his tape decks and boxes that weren't ours tucked into the corners. I sat on the floor in the middle of the circle of tape decks and looked from one to another to another. I wondered if he had finished whatever he had been working on. I wondered if he'd be back soon to finish it. Or back.

I stood up, careful not to move anything, and went back downstairs.

11.

Bev and Marie were on the porch swing. Marie had her legs out and Bev was sitting with her legs up and facing Marie. I could hear them mumbling from inside the house and when I went outside they stopped for a moment.

"Hey you," Marie said.

"Hey beautiful." I kissed her and sat in one of the plastic chairs. The air was cool under the roof and in the sun filled street it would be just above comfortable. A hinted breeze moved easily past us in gentle and light waves. Bev looked like shit.

"You okay?" I asked Bev.

She was staring toward her feet. Her hair was tangled and greasy. She wore a ripped red sweatshirt and I assumed underwear. "I don't know. I guess."

I looked at Marie. She spoke to me with a curving mouth and pulled eyebrows and wide eyes and it said 'What do we do now?' I had no idea. I shrugged and she looked at Bev.

"What time did you get back?" I asked Bev.

"This morning. I don't know. Sun was up."

"You slept yet?"

"Tried. Can't."

A tear rolled down her cheek. "It was my fault," she said.

"No," Marie said. "Tom makes his own decisions."

"No.  If it wasn't for me, none of this. None of this."

"I guess I could say the same thing," I said.

The girls looked at me. They both knew what I meant but neither agreed.

"No, I did this," Bev said. "I'm the asshole he hated. I'm the asshole with the fucking coke. I gave him the fucking coke."

"It's not like he's never done it before," Marie said.

"Yeah, I know, but, this time, you know. This was the time I made him do it."

"Bev, honey," Marie said. "You have to stop thinking like that. It was his decision. And honestly, it could have gone a lot worse."

"He's in a fucking coma, Marie."

Marie tightened her mouth. She had more to say but she wasn't going to.

"He could have died," I said.

Bev looked at me. Her eyes were swollen and yesterdays makeup was everywhere. She got off the bench and pulled her sweatshirt down to cover herself. "Yeah, that's a big fucking difference."

She went inside and slammed the screen door behind her. We could hear her stomp her way down the hall and then I heard the door to the crawlspace being pulled down, then heard it spring back up and Marie looked at me.

"Think she'll be all right?"

"Was she before?"