We obviously couldn’t meet at my place, but Owen, with a quick caution that his mom might be around (translation: drunk and bothersome) said we were welcome to come to his house.
I got there half an hour early so I could get a sense of the situation, and therefore the likelihood of a problem. Luckily, his mom was on the couch, leaning on Phil and watching something on TV. She looked drowsy and happy, both hopeful signs that she wouldn’t suddenly burst in on us guys with a long and sloppy speech.
Owen told me he’d mentioned to Phil that a couple of other guys were coming over, which was also reassuring. Phil does what he can to keep things smooth if there’s a chance Owen will be embarrassed, which was my main worry too.
I know it’s tough for Owen, and the reason I’m one of the few friends who’s at his place on a regular basis.
But this night turned out all right as far as Mrs. Cass was concerned. Aki and Jean-Guy arrived and after introductions we went out into Owen’s sunroom.
Jean-Guy stopped just inside the door and took a good look around.
“Wow!” he said. “Who did all this?”
“You mean the plants?” Owen said, although there wasn’t anything else Jean-Guy could have meant. “I kind of mess around with them.”
“This is fantastic,” Jean-Guy said. “Isn’t it, babe?”
“Uh, sure,” Aki agreed. He made an effort to look interested.
The next ten minutes or so was spent with Owen and Jean-Guy discussing the different plants. Aki and I found other things to talk about while that went on, and then I got my chance to explain why I’d wanted to meet.
I wanted to be sure everyone had all the details, so I took the time to go over it quickly. The medical scam. The “bribe” of a car. The recent conversation I’d had with Ms. Abboud. The fact that Nora’s mom appeared to have some involvement. My certainty that my mother was one hundred percent in the dark.
And then the part that was new, and hard to admit. Thoughts of striking out, either physically or with words. The rage that seemed to be simmering just below the surface. My fear that it would overpower me, and I’d say or do something catastrophic.
“If you can,” I said when I’d finished saying everything I wanted to, “try to pretend you don’t know anybody involved. Like it’s a hypothetical situation about someone else.”
“Okay,” Owen said. “So, how can we help?”
“Talk it through. Tell me what you think,” I said.
“As in, should you take action or not?” Owen asked.
“Basically,” I said. “It’s haunting me nonstop. What should I do? Should I even do anything at all?”
“Do you want to start with your own thoughts on any of that?” Aki asked me.
“No. I just want to hear what you guys have to say.”
The first and biggest thing that came out was whether or not I should contact the police. Jean-Guy suggested making lists of Report and Don’t Report reasons for going to the authorities. We all agreed that was a good idea.
Oddly, it was almost relaxing, sitting back and letting the three of them talk. I liked the way they discussed it, going back and forth on different points.
The list on the Report side of the debate was all about victims and the different ways it would be helping them. Except, everyone agreed there wasn’t much that could be done for anyone who’d already been conned, so that would mostly help future victims.
Owen said if the fake medical clinic got shut down, people would go ahead and get traditional treatments.
“And they wouldn’t be passing over who-knows-how-much money for the privilege of being conned,” he added.
“Maybe that’s true,” Aki said. “But I’m not so sure. After all, these people must be looking for options, or at least open to the idea of alternative treatments.”
“They might just find another scam,” Jean-Guy added. “Maybe even one that’s worse. And they could still get ripped off.”
I couldn’t help thinking that was like a drug dealer saying if they weren’t selling dope, users would just get it from someone else. As if it was okay to commit a crime because other lowlifes were doing it too. But I kept my resolve and said nothing.
After that they moved on to reasons against reporting it and the focus swung around to how that would affect me, my family, and my world.
“Well, here are the results,” Jean-Guy said when they’d finished. He passed me the lists and I was shocked at how long the Don’t Report list was. There were at least three times more items on it, as compared to the Report list.
Jean-Guy had kept track of it all in point form and even though I’d been there while they talked it over, my stomach clenched reading through the two columns. Not everything on either side was definitely going to happen, but I didn’t see anything that wasn’t at least possible. The list of reasons not to report my dad were pretty much all about me and my family. It started off with this:
Those were the main things and it really brought it home to me how massive the consequences of turning my dad in would be. It was world upside down stuff.
I thanked the guys for helping me sort it all out the way they had.
“So,” Aki said, “is your choice clearer to you now?”
“I’m not sure,” I said carefully. “But the list of reasons not to report my father is so much longer than the reasons to do it.”
That was true. If they were on a balance scale, the Don’t Report side would have far outweighed the Report side. But there was something else that factored into the equation in a much bigger way and that was how it all felt.
One thing I appreciated them mentioning was that my feelings of rage, the urges to strike out, were a separate matter. They all agreed I should see a psychologist or counsellor — someone who could help me sort that out and deal with it properly.
Lying in my bed a few hours later, I went over it all again.
The list of reasons not to go to the authorities was loaded with things that mattered to me personally. That sounds selfish, I realize, but it’s also true. Just thinking about possible outcomes made me nauseous.
My mother was a huge concern, but the truth was that this thing could break both of us.
And this comes across as horribly callous, but I’m trying to be honest here. Fact is, the side in favor of reporting the crime affected people I didn’t know. Of course, I hated the idea that they were being ripped off, but with no personal connection it was difficult to relate very deeply to the wrongs being done to them.
Sure, I’d sat with Aki, watching people go in and out of the fake clinic, but they were nameless faces, there for a moment and gone. I knew nothing about them or what they were going through. And it occurred to me that a good percentage of the “patients” Aki and I had seen were older, with most of their lives behind them. Mine was still ahead.
I went over it all for hours; I even tried to envision having a conversation with my father where I persuaded him to stop what he was doing.
In the end I felt as stuck as I’d been all along. Unsure about what to do. Unprepared to take a step either way.
The new school year was just over a week away. If I could somehow put it all out of my mind, if I could get through twelfth grade, I just might be able to move on into my future and leave the whole thing behind me.
I told myself I was just putting my life in a holding pattern. That once I’d graduated, I could make a decision more easily.
I knew that was a lie. And a cop-out.
And then, just a couple of days later, I had another urge. A much different kind than those I’d been feeling toward my father. It was strange, and to this day I can’t explain it, but it was an overwhelming feeling telling me to go somewhere.
I called Aki to see if he was free. He was. Another “chance” happening that could have changed everything if it had been different.
If he’d been busy, if he’d told me we’d have to go another day — well, who knows what the outcome would have been.
But he wasn’t busy, and we did go. He picked me up.
“Where are we going?”
“Remember the old couple, the ones we followed that first time?”
“Yeah.”
“I want to go there.”
“Like, go and talk to them?”
“Maybe. Honestly, I have no plan. Just a feeling.”
It didn’t take long to get there. Aki parked on the street near the couple’s house. A sign on the lawn caught my eye at once.
“Their house is for sale!”
“Well don’t jump to any conclusions,” Aki said quickly. “Lots of older people sell their homes when it gets to be too much to take care of a place.”
That was true, but how could I find out for sure if it was why this couple was selling? I was wondering if I could hire Ms. Abboud to schedule a viewing and see what she could find out when Aki spoke again.
“Look, a car’s pulling into the driveway. Let’s get out and take a stroll past the place, maybe we’ll pick up on something.”
We did, moving slowly along the sidewalk. As we neared the edge of the yard, a man got out of the driver’s side and walked around to open the passenger door. He reached down, giving his hand to assist someone out, and when that person emerged, we saw that it was the woman, the one from the old couple we’d followed there.
She looked frailer than I remembered, and a surge of anger clutched me. Was this evidence of failing health because of my father?
It was, but not in the way I thought. As we sauntered slowly past, I heard a moan from the old woman, and the young man with her spoke.
“I know, Mom. I know it’s hard. But it’s the best thing for you.”
“I just never thought I’d be the one left behind,” came a thin, plaintive voice from the woman. “Or end up as a burden to my children.”
“You’re not a burden, Mom. Joanne and I are glad to have you come and stay with us.”
“But Dawson and I had a plan,” she said, and then she broke down crying. “What fools we were, taking that mortgage to pay for a treatment that didn’t help one bit.”
“You weren’t fools,” her son said gently, “you were swindled. But there should be a little something left for you when the house sells, and no matter what you’ll always have a home with us.”
The old woman continued to cry, and he encircled her frail shoulders with his arm and held her against his chest, murmuring that it would be all right.
I’d heard all I could stand by then. Nudging Aki with my arm I swung around and walked back to the car as quickly as I could. My jaw trembled with fury as Aki slid into the driver’s seat.
He waited, silent, looking straight ahead while I steadied my breathing and fought to control the churning in my gut.
“What a monster,” I said at last. “How could anyone do that to an old couple? So, the old guy died — maybe because he didn’t get the right treatment — and his wife is left in a bind because they were scammed.”
“I’m so sorry, Ethan,” Aki said.
“What if she didn’t have a son ready to take her in?” I said. “What about all the other victims who have no one to help them?”
Aki didn’t try to answer, but then I wasn’t really asking him.
“You know what?” I said, “I want copies of everything you gathered. All the stuff I didn’t want to risk taking to my place. The full list of license plate numbers, the brochure, and all the other notes you made.”
Aki started the car. He didn’t ask me what I wanted it for. He just drove to his place and for the next forty minutes we worked with barely a word between us, copying page after page of information and notes. Then he put all the photos he’d taken whenever he had a clear enough shot to get pictures of people coming out of the “clinic” on a thumb drive.
“These too?” he asked, flicking through the pictures of Nora’s mom’s car, including the one where her face was easily recognizable. I realized as I scanned them that her license plate was clearly visible in two of the photos.
I hesitated. Then I said, “Yes.”
He added them, put the drive and all of the other evidence into a bag, and passed it to me.
“You want a lift?” he asked.
“Please.”
When he pulled up to the police station Aki offered to go in with me.
“No. Thanks, but I need to do this by myself. Is it okay if I give them your name and contact information though?”
“Definitely.”
And then I was there, on the sidewalk, alone. I watched as he gave a short wave and drove off. I stood for a few minutes after he’d disappeared from sight.
I felt sick. And scared. It took a crazy amount of effort to make myself walk up to the door.
And that’s where I stood. Once again frozen in place, feeling the strength of my resolve beginning to waver.
My hand was on the door handle. I remember looking at it like it belonged to someone else. My heart was hammering like mad. My knees threatened to fail me.
I’d made up my mind. I was there to do the right thing. And yet …
I still had a choice.
I glanced up, saw my reflection in the glass. And I knew — the guy staring at me was going to remember what he did at this moment for the rest of his life.