Thirty-Nine

I still had the problem of keeping Lieutenant Lee from ripping my mother’s house apart. I needed to get those notebooks. They had to be in the house somewhere, but I didn’t know where to look. I had one shot left. I called Uncle Walt and he agreed to meet me at a coffee shop in Sudbury.

Jael said, “I will drive you.”

“You think Uncle Walt is dangerous?”

“Anyone can be dangerous.”

Sudbury Coffee Works sported a large brass teapot hanging from its brick facade. I love places like this—independent coffee shops whose local owners roast their own beans and have committed their livelihood to the creation of a good cup of coffee. The coffee shop had a long, low serving counter, with the roaster sitting out where you could watch it work.

The décor represented the taste of the owner rather than the committee-conceived, focus group–judged, and executive-­approved decor of Starbucks. Lively blue and green tables sported artwork secured under clear polyurethane surfaces. Jael sat across from me drinking a cup of tea, while I had opted for a mug of coffee—the 1776 blend, a nod to Sudbury’s revolutionary history and its victory in grabbing the 01776 zip code.

Uncle Walt walked into the coffee shop, waved hello, bought a cup of coffee in a disposable cup, and settled down at our table. He pointed at my stitches. “Jesus Christ, Tucker. What happened to you?”

“A bald guy with a teardrop tattoo beat me up in Quincy Market.”

Walt’s eyes flashed recognition.

Jael asked, “Do you know the man who beat Tucker?”

Walt held out his hand. “Hi. I’m Walt.”

Jael shook Walt’s hand and said, “I am Jael Navas. I am Tucker’s friend.”

“Well, good for Tucker! The boy has good taste.”

Walt hadn’t answered Jael’s question, but I didn’t want to press. That answer didn’t interest me. I assumed that Walt would know Teardrop if he owed Graxton money, and I didn’t want to alienate him.

I said, “Uncle Walt, I need your help. It’s my mother.”

“What about her?”

“The Boston Police are going to search her house. They’re going to dig through her crap to find out how my father paid for that house in Pittsfield. They’re looking for my dad’s notebooks.”

Walt drank his coffee. “His notebooks? They’ve got to be in her house somewhere. I haven’t seen that woman in almost ten years, and she had piles of shit even then.”

“The piles are bigger now, believe me. Do you have any of his notebooks?”

“Hell no. He never shared those with me. I’m surprised he never put the little locks on them with the little girlie keys to keep everyone out. He was a secretive bastard.”

“Tell me about it.”

Walt raised his hand. “Don’t judge him, son. It’s what he did for a living. People forget, we lived through some bad times. We were sure the whole world was going to get blown up, and he was doing his part to keep that from happening. Keeping secrets was part of his job.”

“Even from you?”

“Even from me? Tucker, I’m a glorified janitor. Your dad dealt with things on a need-to-know basis, and I didn’t need to know shit to sweep the floors. So, yeah, he even kept secrets from me.”

“Keeping secrets was one thing; raising me in a lie was another. He stole my brother from me.”

Walt grimaced. “Come on, Tucker. He couldn’t tell anyone about Pittsfield. Your mother would have divorced him, Sal’s family would probably have killed him, and you would have grown up in a broken home. You sure as shit wouldn’t have been able to afford MIT.”

“MIT wasn’t worth being raised by a liar.”

“Don’t be a baby. You think things are bad between you and your mother? Imagine how it was for him, married to a friggin’ devout Catholic who didn’t want any kids after she had you. Said that you were too much work and she didn’t want another one.”

“Yeah, but—”

“You know how a devout Catholic practices birth control?”

“I thought they didn’t practice birth control.”

“Oh, they practice it—with abstinence. Your mother cut your father off the day you were born. He was going to divorce her sorry ass as soon as you were out of college, but he didn’t want your college fund getting caught up in some bullshit Massachusetts divorce court.”

“Abstinence?”

“Yeah. So maybe he was screwing the babysitter and maybe he knocked her up. But he did okay by her, bought her a house, was a father to her child. God knows what that cost him.”

I crossed my arms and looked out the window. “Whatever.”

Walt stood. “Suck it up, son. So you didn’t meet your brother. Boo hoo. Go make some friends.” He stalked out of the coffee shop.

“Sorry you had to see that,” I said to Jael.

Jael said, “Family issues are always difficult.”

“You know what I have to do now,” I said. I pulled out my Droid and dialed.

“Hi, Ma. I’m in Sudbury. How about if I come over for dinner?”