Man in the Water, page 21
“Yes, but how did you know? And Maryanne, did you know that she was—is she bi, too?”
“No, she’s a straight-up lesbian.”
“I’ve known her for three years,” I said. “She never told me.”
“Why would she?”
“She told you.”
“No, she didn’t, but I knew and she knew I knew. There was no reason to talk about it.”
“How did you know?”
“McKenzie, if you and I weren’t together she would have been all over me like a cheap suit.”
“That’s my line.”
“That’s why I used it.”
“No, I don’t believe it.”
“Don’t believe what?” Nina asked. “You don’t think I’m desirable to other women? Huh.”
“No, what I meant—I’m just surprised that I could have been friends with these women for so long and not know something as personal as this about them.”
“Does it matter?”
“To me? No. No, not really. The way I look at it, it’s just another two women in the universe that want nothing to do with me.”
“Let’s keep it that way. You know, I’ve always been impressed by how liberal you are when it comes to sexuality and race and religion and things like that.”
“Hey, do I call you names?”
“What?”
“I’m not liberal. I’m selfish. The way I look at it, if it doesn’t affect my life personally, I don’t care what other people do. Seriously, why would I? Why should I give a damn what God they worship or books they read or people they sleep with or restrooms they use or music they listen to or what they study in school or geez, how they live their lives; the color of their skin or shape of their eyes or whether or not they wear a COVID mask in a grocery store? There are people out there who do nothing all day but search for something to be pissed off about when there is so much joy to be found. I refuse to be that guy.”
I used my fork again, pointing at the sweet corn and roasted red pepper succotash Monica Meyer had prepared.
“For example, I never had this before,” I said. “This is really good.”
“Tell Monica.”
While promising Nina that I would, my cell phone began vibrating on top of the small table where we were sitting. I turned it over and read the caller ID—Nevaeh Woods.
“Well, that didn’t take long,” I said.
“For what?” Nina asked.
“For pressure to build.”
I rose from the table and stepped away until I was standing behind her desk, not because I didn’t want Nina to hear the conversation but because I didn’t want to distract her from her meal.
“Hi, Nevaeh,” I said. “This is McKenzie.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“I told you I didn’t want you investigating my father’s death anymore.”
“Who told you I was?”
“You were at Mike Boland’s funeral.”
“I was invited to attend by friends of Mike’s from the Potzmann-Schultz VFW post,” I said. “I noticed that you weren’t there. Neither was your stepmother.”
“We sent flowers.”
“Yes, I saw them. Very nice.”
“Attending the services wasn’t all that you did, though, was it?”
“Who told you that?”
“Enough, McKenzie. Enough is enough is enough. No more. I said to stop investigating Dad’s death and I meant it. What more do I have to do?”
“Tell me why?”
“I told you why.”
“Because you now believe that it was an accident that your father fell into the river.”
“That’s right. You said yourself that there wasn’t any evidence to prove otherwise.”
“And because the investigation is upsetting Bizzy and even though you’re not related, you’re family.”
“It’s true.”
“I don’t believe you.”
I didn’t know if Nevaeh had paused because she was surprised by my response or because she needed a moment to take a deep breath before screaming “Fuck you, McKenzie” into the phone and ending the call.
I turned to face Nina, who hadn’t eaten a bite while I was talking to E. J. Woods’s daughter.
“Pressure,” I said.
FOURTEEN
It was during a bright, cloudless Tuesday afternoon that members of the Memorial Rifle Squad met the hearse carrying Mike Boland’s casket as it slowly approached the pavilion that served the Fort Snelling National Cemetery. They snapped to attention as the black casket was removed from the hearse and carried by six strong men to a stand beneath the pavilion. The squad displayed the colors denoting all of the armed services of the United States, yet only the flag bearing the seal of the U.S. Army was dipped to salute Boland.
The cemetery was adjacent to the historic fort and the Minneapolis–St. Paul International Airport. It was the only national cemetery in Minnesota and provided the final resting place for more than 250,000 service members and some of their spouses; precise row after precise row of identical white headstones fanned out over 436 acres. It was very beautiful and very majestic and very sad all at the same time.
I can tell you the history of Fort Snelling. I learned it when they buried my father there a little more than a decade ago. Its original purpose was to keep the peace on the western frontier, except by 1855 the frontier had moved so far west that the garrison had been removed. It became an assembly ground and training center for Minnesota volunteers during the Civil War and continued to serve that purpose until 1946 when Fort Snelling was deactivated as a post, although it remained the headquarters for the 88th Army Reserve Command.
The national cemetery was established in 1939 and now boasted a population greater than every city in Minnesota save Minneapolis and St. Paul. Because it was so sprawling, it was difficult to locate a specific grave site even if you had been there before unless you used the cemetery’s grave finder. I had to use it to find my dad even though I’d been there every Memorial Day since he passed.
My old man had been a child serving underage with the First Marines at the Chosin Reservoir in Korea; “The Forgotten War” it was called. “At least I want to forget it,” the old man told me. He was forty-two when he married my mother. She was twenty. I’ve always wondered how that happened only I never got the chance to ask. That’s because my mother died fifteen years later of cancer—“Such an emotional word,” Nevaeh called it. “Filled with fear and anger and grief and resignation.”
I was twelve at the time. My father was fifty-seven. He was a good man and kind. Also taciturn. He would go to all of my baseball games, my hockey games. He would sit in the stands and watch, yet rarely cheered and seldom had a comment beyond “Good game” when we won and “That’s too bad” when we lost. Most people who saw us together assumed he was my grandfather.
I loved him more than I have words to say.
It was because of the old man that I took the price on Thomas Teachwell, the enterprising embezzler I had tracked nearly to the Canadian border on my own time. I wanted to give him a more comfortable retirement, only Dad had passed six months later.
I tried not to think about any of that, though, during the service honoring Mike Boland. I was there, after all, to observe the crowd. It wasn’t particularly large. There were a few people that I recognized from the services I had attended the previous Friday in Red Wing and others from Potzmann-Schultz. Mostly I was wondering if the blonde Boland had met at the St. James Hotel in Red Wing would appear. I suspected that she had—Bizzy Woods was standing behind and off to the side from where Mrs. Boland sat on a bench facing her son’s casket.
Nevaeh stood next to her. She gave her stepmother a nudge when she saw me among the other mourners. Bizzy waved her off with just a slight gesture of her hand as if my presence held no possible interest for her.
I continued to watch the Memorial Rifle Squad. It consisted of volunteers gathered from the various military branches that had been honorably discharged and were now members of veterans service organizations such as the American Legion, VFW, and DAV. They wore white shirts with the badge of the MRS stitched above their left pockets and garrison caps.
The squad accompanied Boland’s casket to the pavilion, as it had done for every single veteran, over eighty thousand of them, since 1979 when the squad was formed. Words were spoken and seven members of the squad fired three rifle volleys; not an actual twenty-one-gun salute, oh no, that was only for dignitaries. “Taps” was played. The American flag was carefully folded and presented to Mrs. Boland just as it had been presented to me. I nearly lost it and might have if not for my inner voice telling me, The old man would not approve.
It all reminded me of a passage printed on the Fort Snelling Memorial Rifle Squad website entitled The Last Duty Call.
I am a veteran and have served my country.
I am here to receive military honors.
I am here for my last earthly call to service.
As I arrive at the cemetery pavilion, the color guard is called to attention. My branch of service flag dips and I am saluted.
Announcements state this ceremony consists of three distinct elements …
Three loud rifle volleys announce I have sacrificed for my country and can be laid honorably to rest.
A distant bugler plays the memorable twenty-four notes of Taps signifying my interment, and that God is nigh and all is well.
With precision and care, the flag of my country is folded. The folds slowly encase life’s brilliant red and white stripes, which disappear into the dark blue with stars, a symbol of nightfall, a time for my rest and eternal peace.
The presenter gives my flag to a loved one as a lasting symbol of honorable service. Three shell casings from the rifle volleys are included to reflect …
DUTY, HONOR, and SACRIFICE.
The ceremony ends with one final salute honoring our country and my service.
This is a place of peace and lasting remembrance.
I am like all soldiers at this sacred place. Our tombstones remain as a symbol of the cost of freedom.
This is my new and our last duty call.
I had no idea who wrote it, yet it read to me like something out of Ralph Waldo Emerson.
After the service was concluded, the Memorial Rifle Squad marched off, followed in turn by the other mourners. Sheila and the other vets, Josh and Grant, gave me a nod as they passed yet said nothing, not to me or to each other. I heard Mrs. Boland say, “That was nice.” Her friend Mary replied, “Yes, it was.” I approached Mary. It was my intention to point Bizzy out to her and ask if she was, in fact, the woman Mary had seen with Boland at the St. James. I wasn’t able to reach her side, however, because I was intercepted by Bizzy.
“Mr. McKenzie,” she said. “It’s a pleasure to see you again. I only wish it were under better circumstances.”
I glanced over her shoulder. Nevaeh was moving slowly toward a car parked in the cemetery’s lot. Her expression suggested that she was not happy and I could imagine her stepmother shooing her away with the words “I’ve got this.”
“Mrs. Woods,” I said.
“Please, call me Bizzy.”
“May I ask where that name came from?”
“It was the best and last in a long succession of nicknames. I was born Elizabeth and that became Liz which became Lizzy which became Lizzy Bea—my last name was Beamon. Lizzy Bea became Bizzy Bea which became Bizzy. I must admit, I like it.”
“So do I.”
“Mr. McKenzie—”
“Just McKenzie is fine.”
“I was told your first name is Rushmore.”
I recited the joke that I kept in my pocket for just such occasions.
“My parents took a vacation to the Badlands of South Dakota,” I said. “They told me that I was conceived in a motor lodge in the shadow of Mount Rushmore, so they named me after the monument. It could have been worse, though. It could have been Deadwood.”
Bizzy thought that was funny. Most people did. She hooked her arm around mine.
“Come,” she said.
We began strolling up the narrow road to another narrow road that led us deep into the cemetery. Bizzy was wearing a black summer sundress adorned with pink flowers; both her skirt and her hair rippled in the wind. I was in my funeral outfit—black shoes, black slacks, sports jacket, and white shirt. Together, with her arm linked in mine, I’m sure at a distance we appeared to be a romantic couple. Only her grip on my arm was stronger than it should have been and I was feeling the tension of a sprinter waiting for the gun to go off.
We were surrounded by white monuments and far removed from the other mourners when Bizzy said, “It’s so quiet here,” even as a passenger plane taking off from the airport passed overhead. “If it weren’t for the planes … Do you think I should take a pic or a video?”
“I’m sure you’d get a lot of likes on your social media platforms.”
“Do you follow me?”
“I’ve peeked at your posts from time to time. I especially liked the red dress you wore for International Women’s Day.”
“You don’t think uploading a post from the cemetery would be in bad taste?”
“You’re honoring a friend and employee; why would that be in bad taste?”
“Maybe later.”
We walked some more.
“McKenzie, I will always be grateful you tried to help me that day at the marina when E. J. died,” Bizzy said. “I’m also grateful that you made such an effort to help Nevaeh, too. You’re a good man. A kind man. Believe me when I tell you that I know how rare that is. You must know, though, that none of this is any of your business. It was none of your business when Nevaeh asked you to become involved and it is certainly none of your business now that she’s told you to please stop. It’s between me and the insurance companies. It’s between me and Heggstad Marina and don’t tell me that the owner is a friend of yours because you already testified that he’s not. So why, why, why are you doing this?”
“Mankind was my business,” I quoted. “The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”
Bizzy stopped walking. She turned to face me.
“What the fuck?” she asked.
“Charles Dickens,” I said. “A Christmas Carol.”
She stared at me like I was nuts. Honestly, I couldn’t blame her.
“Here’s the thing,” I said. “You find a man in the water and you ask yourself, how did he get there, and no one will tell you. A curious mind might wonder why not.”
“E. J. fell. It was an accident.”
“If that’s true, why are you here encouraging me to go away?”
“To keep you from turning it into something else.”
“Ask your attorney; he’ll tell you that if I can prove that your husband was murdered or at least provide a convincing argument to that effect, the result would be the same. The insurance companies would be compelled to honor their contracts. You’ll still get your four million dollars.”
“Not if they think I murdered my husband.”
“Did you?”
“Fuck no.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck…”
Bizzy walked five long steps away from me, paused, and slowly walked back.
“Please excuse my language,” she said. “For years now I’ve been trying to be a better person than I was, only sometimes the past reaches out to me. McKenzie, I don’t know what to tell you. Twenty years ago, I would have known exactly what to say and do, only now…”
She linked her arm with mine again and we kept strolling along the narrow road until Bizzy veered off it onto the plush green lawn and we found ourselves walking among the headstones.
“I didn’t kill my husband,” she said. “I loved E. J. He saved my life.”
“Nevaeh told me that you saved each other.”
“I suppose that’s true.”
“Bizzy, why were you at the marina that Saturday?”
“I already told you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I hardly believe it myself. McKenzie, we were just driving around looking for a place to have breakfast. We did that a lot. If you knew E. J. and me, you’d know that we were both lousy cooks. We decided to go to Stillwater. There’s a place called the Oasis Cafe that we’d been to before. They make breakfast sandwiches with buttermilk pancakes and it wasn’t that far a drive from our house. While we were driving E. J. asked, ‘Do you think the river is still frozen,’ and I said, ‘Does it matter?’ He said, ‘Let’s take a look,’ and I said, ‘Are you crazy?’ We kept driving and it became clear that E. J. was no longer looking for the cafe. Instead, he saw the marina and he said, ‘Let’s pull in here.’ I didn’t argue with him because you don’t argue with E. J. when he gets something in his head. We parked and he said, ‘Do you want to come with?’ and I said, ‘Heck, no. It’s cold.’ He went out onto the dock and I stayed in the car. I was swiping through my social media sites on my phone and after a while I looked up and asked myself, ‘Where is he?’ That’s what happened and yes, I know it sounds stupid, but it happened just like that. I got out of the car and started looking for him and then you and your wife arrived.”
The story sounds awfully plausible the way she told it, my inner voice informed me. Well thought out; well-rehearsed. It might even be true.
“Here we are,” Bizzy said.
That’s when I realized that we weren’t just strolling; Bizzy was leading me to the grave of her husband. We stopped in front of his pearl-white granite headstone.
EARL JOHN
WOODS
MSG US ARMY
PERSIAN GULF
DESERT SHIELD/STORM
JUNE 10 1960
MARCH 25 2023
LOVING HUSBAND
AND FATHER
Woods had been buried seventy-six days ago according to my fuzzy math, yet the well-cared-for lawn above his grave gave the impression he had been there for a thousand years.
Bizzy stepped close to the headstone and ran her hand gently over the curved top.
“No, she’s a straight-up lesbian.”
“I’ve known her for three years,” I said. “She never told me.”
“Why would she?”
“She told you.”
“No, she didn’t, but I knew and she knew I knew. There was no reason to talk about it.”
“How did you know?”
“McKenzie, if you and I weren’t together she would have been all over me like a cheap suit.”
“That’s my line.”
“That’s why I used it.”
“No, I don’t believe it.”
“Don’t believe what?” Nina asked. “You don’t think I’m desirable to other women? Huh.”
“No, what I meant—I’m just surprised that I could have been friends with these women for so long and not know something as personal as this about them.”
“Does it matter?”
“To me? No. No, not really. The way I look at it, it’s just another two women in the universe that want nothing to do with me.”
“Let’s keep it that way. You know, I’ve always been impressed by how liberal you are when it comes to sexuality and race and religion and things like that.”
“Hey, do I call you names?”
“What?”
“I’m not liberal. I’m selfish. The way I look at it, if it doesn’t affect my life personally, I don’t care what other people do. Seriously, why would I? Why should I give a damn what God they worship or books they read or people they sleep with or restrooms they use or music they listen to or what they study in school or geez, how they live their lives; the color of their skin or shape of their eyes or whether or not they wear a COVID mask in a grocery store? There are people out there who do nothing all day but search for something to be pissed off about when there is so much joy to be found. I refuse to be that guy.”
I used my fork again, pointing at the sweet corn and roasted red pepper succotash Monica Meyer had prepared.
“For example, I never had this before,” I said. “This is really good.”
“Tell Monica.”
While promising Nina that I would, my cell phone began vibrating on top of the small table where we were sitting. I turned it over and read the caller ID—Nevaeh Woods.
“Well, that didn’t take long,” I said.
“For what?” Nina asked.
“For pressure to build.”
I rose from the table and stepped away until I was standing behind her desk, not because I didn’t want Nina to hear the conversation but because I didn’t want to distract her from her meal.
“Hi, Nevaeh,” I said. “This is McKenzie.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“I told you I didn’t want you investigating my father’s death anymore.”
“Who told you I was?”
“You were at Mike Boland’s funeral.”
“I was invited to attend by friends of Mike’s from the Potzmann-Schultz VFW post,” I said. “I noticed that you weren’t there. Neither was your stepmother.”
“We sent flowers.”
“Yes, I saw them. Very nice.”
“Attending the services wasn’t all that you did, though, was it?”
“Who told you that?”
“Enough, McKenzie. Enough is enough is enough. No more. I said to stop investigating Dad’s death and I meant it. What more do I have to do?”
“Tell me why?”
“I told you why.”
“Because you now believe that it was an accident that your father fell into the river.”
“That’s right. You said yourself that there wasn’t any evidence to prove otherwise.”
“And because the investigation is upsetting Bizzy and even though you’re not related, you’re family.”
“It’s true.”
“I don’t believe you.”
I didn’t know if Nevaeh had paused because she was surprised by my response or because she needed a moment to take a deep breath before screaming “Fuck you, McKenzie” into the phone and ending the call.
I turned to face Nina, who hadn’t eaten a bite while I was talking to E. J. Woods’s daughter.
“Pressure,” I said.
FOURTEEN
It was during a bright, cloudless Tuesday afternoon that members of the Memorial Rifle Squad met the hearse carrying Mike Boland’s casket as it slowly approached the pavilion that served the Fort Snelling National Cemetery. They snapped to attention as the black casket was removed from the hearse and carried by six strong men to a stand beneath the pavilion. The squad displayed the colors denoting all of the armed services of the United States, yet only the flag bearing the seal of the U.S. Army was dipped to salute Boland.
The cemetery was adjacent to the historic fort and the Minneapolis–St. Paul International Airport. It was the only national cemetery in Minnesota and provided the final resting place for more than 250,000 service members and some of their spouses; precise row after precise row of identical white headstones fanned out over 436 acres. It was very beautiful and very majestic and very sad all at the same time.
I can tell you the history of Fort Snelling. I learned it when they buried my father there a little more than a decade ago. Its original purpose was to keep the peace on the western frontier, except by 1855 the frontier had moved so far west that the garrison had been removed. It became an assembly ground and training center for Minnesota volunteers during the Civil War and continued to serve that purpose until 1946 when Fort Snelling was deactivated as a post, although it remained the headquarters for the 88th Army Reserve Command.
The national cemetery was established in 1939 and now boasted a population greater than every city in Minnesota save Minneapolis and St. Paul. Because it was so sprawling, it was difficult to locate a specific grave site even if you had been there before unless you used the cemetery’s grave finder. I had to use it to find my dad even though I’d been there every Memorial Day since he passed.
My old man had been a child serving underage with the First Marines at the Chosin Reservoir in Korea; “The Forgotten War” it was called. “At least I want to forget it,” the old man told me. He was forty-two when he married my mother. She was twenty. I’ve always wondered how that happened only I never got the chance to ask. That’s because my mother died fifteen years later of cancer—“Such an emotional word,” Nevaeh called it. “Filled with fear and anger and grief and resignation.”
I was twelve at the time. My father was fifty-seven. He was a good man and kind. Also taciturn. He would go to all of my baseball games, my hockey games. He would sit in the stands and watch, yet rarely cheered and seldom had a comment beyond “Good game” when we won and “That’s too bad” when we lost. Most people who saw us together assumed he was my grandfather.
I loved him more than I have words to say.
It was because of the old man that I took the price on Thomas Teachwell, the enterprising embezzler I had tracked nearly to the Canadian border on my own time. I wanted to give him a more comfortable retirement, only Dad had passed six months later.
I tried not to think about any of that, though, during the service honoring Mike Boland. I was there, after all, to observe the crowd. It wasn’t particularly large. There were a few people that I recognized from the services I had attended the previous Friday in Red Wing and others from Potzmann-Schultz. Mostly I was wondering if the blonde Boland had met at the St. James Hotel in Red Wing would appear. I suspected that she had—Bizzy Woods was standing behind and off to the side from where Mrs. Boland sat on a bench facing her son’s casket.
Nevaeh stood next to her. She gave her stepmother a nudge when she saw me among the other mourners. Bizzy waved her off with just a slight gesture of her hand as if my presence held no possible interest for her.
I continued to watch the Memorial Rifle Squad. It consisted of volunteers gathered from the various military branches that had been honorably discharged and were now members of veterans service organizations such as the American Legion, VFW, and DAV. They wore white shirts with the badge of the MRS stitched above their left pockets and garrison caps.
The squad accompanied Boland’s casket to the pavilion, as it had done for every single veteran, over eighty thousand of them, since 1979 when the squad was formed. Words were spoken and seven members of the squad fired three rifle volleys; not an actual twenty-one-gun salute, oh no, that was only for dignitaries. “Taps” was played. The American flag was carefully folded and presented to Mrs. Boland just as it had been presented to me. I nearly lost it and might have if not for my inner voice telling me, The old man would not approve.
It all reminded me of a passage printed on the Fort Snelling Memorial Rifle Squad website entitled The Last Duty Call.
I am a veteran and have served my country.
I am here to receive military honors.
I am here for my last earthly call to service.
As I arrive at the cemetery pavilion, the color guard is called to attention. My branch of service flag dips and I am saluted.
Announcements state this ceremony consists of three distinct elements …
Three loud rifle volleys announce I have sacrificed for my country and can be laid honorably to rest.
A distant bugler plays the memorable twenty-four notes of Taps signifying my interment, and that God is nigh and all is well.
With precision and care, the flag of my country is folded. The folds slowly encase life’s brilliant red and white stripes, which disappear into the dark blue with stars, a symbol of nightfall, a time for my rest and eternal peace.
The presenter gives my flag to a loved one as a lasting symbol of honorable service. Three shell casings from the rifle volleys are included to reflect …
DUTY, HONOR, and SACRIFICE.
The ceremony ends with one final salute honoring our country and my service.
This is a place of peace and lasting remembrance.
I am like all soldiers at this sacred place. Our tombstones remain as a symbol of the cost of freedom.
This is my new and our last duty call.
I had no idea who wrote it, yet it read to me like something out of Ralph Waldo Emerson.
After the service was concluded, the Memorial Rifle Squad marched off, followed in turn by the other mourners. Sheila and the other vets, Josh and Grant, gave me a nod as they passed yet said nothing, not to me or to each other. I heard Mrs. Boland say, “That was nice.” Her friend Mary replied, “Yes, it was.” I approached Mary. It was my intention to point Bizzy out to her and ask if she was, in fact, the woman Mary had seen with Boland at the St. James. I wasn’t able to reach her side, however, because I was intercepted by Bizzy.
“Mr. McKenzie,” she said. “It’s a pleasure to see you again. I only wish it were under better circumstances.”
I glanced over her shoulder. Nevaeh was moving slowly toward a car parked in the cemetery’s lot. Her expression suggested that she was not happy and I could imagine her stepmother shooing her away with the words “I’ve got this.”
“Mrs. Woods,” I said.
“Please, call me Bizzy.”
“May I ask where that name came from?”
“It was the best and last in a long succession of nicknames. I was born Elizabeth and that became Liz which became Lizzy which became Lizzy Bea—my last name was Beamon. Lizzy Bea became Bizzy Bea which became Bizzy. I must admit, I like it.”
“So do I.”
“Mr. McKenzie—”
“Just McKenzie is fine.”
“I was told your first name is Rushmore.”
I recited the joke that I kept in my pocket for just such occasions.
“My parents took a vacation to the Badlands of South Dakota,” I said. “They told me that I was conceived in a motor lodge in the shadow of Mount Rushmore, so they named me after the monument. It could have been worse, though. It could have been Deadwood.”
Bizzy thought that was funny. Most people did. She hooked her arm around mine.
“Come,” she said.
We began strolling up the narrow road to another narrow road that led us deep into the cemetery. Bizzy was wearing a black summer sundress adorned with pink flowers; both her skirt and her hair rippled in the wind. I was in my funeral outfit—black shoes, black slacks, sports jacket, and white shirt. Together, with her arm linked in mine, I’m sure at a distance we appeared to be a romantic couple. Only her grip on my arm was stronger than it should have been and I was feeling the tension of a sprinter waiting for the gun to go off.
We were surrounded by white monuments and far removed from the other mourners when Bizzy said, “It’s so quiet here,” even as a passenger plane taking off from the airport passed overhead. “If it weren’t for the planes … Do you think I should take a pic or a video?”
“I’m sure you’d get a lot of likes on your social media platforms.”
“Do you follow me?”
“I’ve peeked at your posts from time to time. I especially liked the red dress you wore for International Women’s Day.”
“You don’t think uploading a post from the cemetery would be in bad taste?”
“You’re honoring a friend and employee; why would that be in bad taste?”
“Maybe later.”
We walked some more.
“McKenzie, I will always be grateful you tried to help me that day at the marina when E. J. died,” Bizzy said. “I’m also grateful that you made such an effort to help Nevaeh, too. You’re a good man. A kind man. Believe me when I tell you that I know how rare that is. You must know, though, that none of this is any of your business. It was none of your business when Nevaeh asked you to become involved and it is certainly none of your business now that she’s told you to please stop. It’s between me and the insurance companies. It’s between me and Heggstad Marina and don’t tell me that the owner is a friend of yours because you already testified that he’s not. So why, why, why are you doing this?”
“Mankind was my business,” I quoted. “The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”
Bizzy stopped walking. She turned to face me.
“What the fuck?” she asked.
“Charles Dickens,” I said. “A Christmas Carol.”
She stared at me like I was nuts. Honestly, I couldn’t blame her.
“Here’s the thing,” I said. “You find a man in the water and you ask yourself, how did he get there, and no one will tell you. A curious mind might wonder why not.”
“E. J. fell. It was an accident.”
“If that’s true, why are you here encouraging me to go away?”
“To keep you from turning it into something else.”
“Ask your attorney; he’ll tell you that if I can prove that your husband was murdered or at least provide a convincing argument to that effect, the result would be the same. The insurance companies would be compelled to honor their contracts. You’ll still get your four million dollars.”
“Not if they think I murdered my husband.”
“Did you?”
“Fuck no.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck…”
Bizzy walked five long steps away from me, paused, and slowly walked back.
“Please excuse my language,” she said. “For years now I’ve been trying to be a better person than I was, only sometimes the past reaches out to me. McKenzie, I don’t know what to tell you. Twenty years ago, I would have known exactly what to say and do, only now…”
She linked her arm with mine again and we kept strolling along the narrow road until Bizzy veered off it onto the plush green lawn and we found ourselves walking among the headstones.
“I didn’t kill my husband,” she said. “I loved E. J. He saved my life.”
“Nevaeh told me that you saved each other.”
“I suppose that’s true.”
“Bizzy, why were you at the marina that Saturday?”
“I already told you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I hardly believe it myself. McKenzie, we were just driving around looking for a place to have breakfast. We did that a lot. If you knew E. J. and me, you’d know that we were both lousy cooks. We decided to go to Stillwater. There’s a place called the Oasis Cafe that we’d been to before. They make breakfast sandwiches with buttermilk pancakes and it wasn’t that far a drive from our house. While we were driving E. J. asked, ‘Do you think the river is still frozen,’ and I said, ‘Does it matter?’ He said, ‘Let’s take a look,’ and I said, ‘Are you crazy?’ We kept driving and it became clear that E. J. was no longer looking for the cafe. Instead, he saw the marina and he said, ‘Let’s pull in here.’ I didn’t argue with him because you don’t argue with E. J. when he gets something in his head. We parked and he said, ‘Do you want to come with?’ and I said, ‘Heck, no. It’s cold.’ He went out onto the dock and I stayed in the car. I was swiping through my social media sites on my phone and after a while I looked up and asked myself, ‘Where is he?’ That’s what happened and yes, I know it sounds stupid, but it happened just like that. I got out of the car and started looking for him and then you and your wife arrived.”
The story sounds awfully plausible the way she told it, my inner voice informed me. Well thought out; well-rehearsed. It might even be true.
“Here we are,” Bizzy said.
That’s when I realized that we weren’t just strolling; Bizzy was leading me to the grave of her husband. We stopped in front of his pearl-white granite headstone.
EARL JOHN
WOODS
MSG US ARMY
PERSIAN GULF
DESERT SHIELD/STORM
JUNE 10 1960
MARCH 25 2023
LOVING HUSBAND
AND FATHER
Woods had been buried seventy-six days ago according to my fuzzy math, yet the well-cared-for lawn above his grave gave the impression he had been there for a thousand years.
Bizzy stepped close to the headstone and ran her hand gently over the curved top.
