Some people say waiting is the hardest part and I’m one of them. At least I was until that snowy Tuesday when I sat in a frigid, windswept parking lot at Missouri Eastern Correctional Center. I hated waiting, and I’d been doing it for forty-five minutes. Dad said to get there at eight sharp and I did. Well. Okay. Ten after eight. But I was only late because I didn’t want to do it. Nobody would. Freezing your butt off with the grand view of razor wire, a guard tower, and the brown buildings of a correctional center wasn’t high on anybody’s list. Why do they call it a correctional center anyway? Does it actually correct anything or anyone? I had serious doubts on that because I’d been roped into picking up Stevie Warnock and he was beyond correcting.
Stevie was the dimwitted son of one of the smartest men I knew, Big Steve Warnock, a brilliant lawyer and long-time friend of my family. It doesn’t sound like a big deal to pick up one felon from a minimum to medium security prison, but it was. Stevie had been a problem all his life and specifically for me. The moron liked me and that’s why I got the pleasure of dealing with him. My dad and Big Steve said I had a good track record with the nitwit, but that was just luck. Something was going to go wrong with this assignment and I resented it. I was supposed to be in Germany on a case. A real case. A paying case.
About two weeks ago, I’d been kidnapped by Anton Thooft and had then been hired by his sister Kimberly to find out why a fifty-something teacher working in Stuttgart, Germany at a Department of Defense school had suddenly flown back to his home state of Missouri, knocked me out with a chemical agent, and thrown me in a trunk. Nobody thought hiring me, the victim, was a good idea, except Kimberly, but I did it. I found out that Anton had been blackmailed over a family secret, which, as he might’ve predicted, tore his family apart. But Kimberly wasn’t done. She wanted to know who did the blackmailing and why. I was all set to hit the road until my mother got wind of the plan and, as all loving mothers do, she ruined it. “It’s Christmas. You have to rest.”
It wasn’t Christmas, yet, and I didn’t want to rest. I wanted to know why Anton had targeted me, not to mention I had a bet with my boyfriend Chuck over the culprits and I intended to win. Bathroom cleaning was on the line and I take that very seriously. But when Mom couldn’t prevail upon me to stay home, she called in reinforcements and the rest of my family piled on. My grandparents, aunt, cousins even. They all had something to say about my trip. They all said that Kimberly didn’t care if I went before or after Christmas as long as it happened. That was true, but I cared. It didn’t feel right to let it lie. I was still going until my father, the great and bossy Tommy Watts, got into the act. Dad thought I should stay home and take it easy. “Rest, bake, relax,” he said.
I should’ve known he was up to something. My dad doesn’t relax. He doesn’t understand the urge. The man couldn’t watch a movie with my mom without a case file on his lap or a phone in hand to answer emails. It’s just not who he is. I will admit he’d been trying and he’d even been described as calm recently. Once. And that’s why I fell for it. Dad was going to be a regular dad. He was going to do Christmas like people do. Yeah, right.
Seventeen hours after he said, “Relax, baby girl”—That’s right, I counted—I got the swell job of picking up Stevie Warnock from prison. I protested. I really did. “It’s for the family,” Dad said. Not our family obviously, but Dad didn’t make distinctions like that. Big Steve and his long-suffering wife Olivia were like family and that was the end of that discussion.
I knew all about the legal maneuvering Big Steve had done to score a sweet deal for his son. Four years for whatever he did. I’m sure Dad told me what the charges were, but I wasn’t paying attention. It was probably a laundry list. I wouldn’t put anything past Stevie, except violence. He was never violent, more like accident-prone, and if there was an accident, Stevie was going to have it. The guy just rolled with whatever was happening. He never thought about it. If someone happened to cross his path and said, “Hey, drive this coke to New Jersey and bring back a crate of Uzis. You got nothing else going on.” Stevie would say, “You’re right. I don’t.” And there he’d be driving drugs and guns across state lines.
How the dufus was so consistently in the wrong place at the right time to do something bad was a mystery. It just happened. I’d asked Stevie and he had no idea. To be fair, no idea was the story of his life, but now I was involved in it again. The last time I’d seen him was in New Orleans, a lifetime and a half ago when he was on the run from the Costillas after stealing sixty-two stereos from them and leading a blood-thirsty Richard Costilla to my grandparents’ house where I ended up shooting him in the face. Not a good time and I still wasn’t over it. Mom said I should forgive Stevie, but how do you forgive someone who never apologized and probably had forgotten all about it. You can’t. You just can’t.
I wasn’t going to forgive him for freezing my butt off either. I felt bad about running the engine and wasting gas, so I kept turning the car off, but then my hands and feet would go numb and I’d have to turn it on again. What was taking so long? It’s not like Missouri wanted to keep him.
Get your little bag of crap and get out.
I kept an eye on the visitor’s entrance with its snowy walkway, but there was nothing to see. The prison seemed like a ghost town in the middle of nowhere, even though it was very close to the Hwy 44 corridor. If I got out of the car, I could probably have heard the traffic and it was in-between Pacific and Eureka, two bustling small towns. All sorts of things were happening just a mile or two away, but right there it felt like Siberia with mounds of snow so high I could barely see the top of the sign for the prison when I drove in. Honestly, if you didn’t know it was there, you might miss the whole shooting match as my grandad would say. Just a little blue sign with gold lettering, oddly friendly for a prison. I didn’t miss it. I wish I had because the waiting turned out to be the best part of my day.
Just when I picked up my phone to call Dad and report that Stevie had apparently not scored early parole for reasons unknown, the door opened and the dufus ambled out. His brown hair was shaved and he wore a white tee shirt and a pair of sweatpants that were brand new but way too short. He’d gained a little weight and wasn’t quite as spindly as before, but it was the same old Stevie, goofy as hell and totally confused, which was probably why a guard came out with him. I’d seen a few other prisoners leave when I arrived. But they were alone for their reunions. Stevie was the only one who rated an escort. She probably wanted to make sure he left. With Stevie, there was a possibility that he’d wander around the parking lot until he got frostbite or maybe she thought nobody wanted him back and he’d need a ride to his parole officer to check-in.
Whatever the reason, a large black lady with rosy cheeks and an air of exhausted resignation pointed the way down the walk to Stevie and then accompanied him to the edge of the parking lot where she stopped to watch him wander around. I took a breath and got out to wave. Stevie spotted me and did a fist pump.
“Hey, Mercy. What you doin’ here?” Stevie gave me an unwelcome hug and I gave him one of Chuck’s jackets. It engulfed him like he was wearing his dad’s clothes.
“I’m picking you up,” I said.
“I know. I requested that you get me.”
Then why did you ask?
“Swell,” I said.
“Yeah, it is.” Stevie grinned at me and I felt a twinge of affection for the idiot. He wasn’t mean-spirited. I had to give him that.
“Why did you ask for me?” I asked.
“You and me. We got a thing going on.”
I stared for a second, trying to get his meaning. He couldn’t mean a thing like a thing thing, even Stevie wasn’t that stupid.
“We don’t have a thing,” I said.
“Oh, yeah. I told all the guys about you and me.” Stevie waved an arm at the prison and a pit formed in my stomach.
“You told a bunch of prisoners about me?”
“About you and me. They already knew about you. You got a lot of fans on the inside.”
Awesome. Just what I don’t need.
“I hope you told them that I have a six-foot-two cop boyfriend who likes to shoot people for sport,” I said.
“Hell, no. Nobody wants to hear that,” said Stevie. “I told them about how much fun we had in New Orleans and how hot and cool you are.”
“Thanks. That’s just great.”
I started to open the passenger door for him and he said, “See, we got a thing.”
“If by thing you mean you do something stupid and I have to help out with it, then yeah, we have a thing.”
“Exactly,” he said.
I opened the door. “Whatever. Get in and let’s get this over with.”
“Where are we going?” He held up a small paper bag. “My bags are packed.”
“I see that. Get in.”
“Don’t you get it? That’s a movie quote. I’m the crazy prisoner.”
I covered my eyes for a second. “Yes, you’re the crazy prisoner. Please, get in. We’ve got a lot to do. I have to take you shopping, get you cleaned up and presentable for your mother and your parole officer. This could take a while.”
“The Green Mile. I’m Wild Bill. That’s what the guys called me.”
“That’s not a good thing, Stevie,” I said.
“It’s my first nickname. I always wanted a nickname.”
“You have a nickname. Stevie’s your nickname. Your name is Steven.”
“That’s no good. Stevie.” He blew a raspberry. “I wanted something cool. Call me Wild Bill.”
“That’s a hard pass,” I said, pointing to the passenger seat.
“Why not? Come on. Call me Wild Bill.”
“That guy was a deranged child rapist and killer.”
“Other than that, he was pretty funny and we look alike,” said Stevie. Always the one to miss the big picture was our Stevie.
“Get in,” I said. “I’m supposed to take you to Macy’s.”
“Ooh, I like Macy’s. Let’s go. My bags are packed.” He grinned at me again and I rolled my eyes.
And that’s when it happened. It was all fine. I mean as fine as it gets with Stevie and then it went to crap. Just like that. Stevie started to duck into the passenger side and I saw the back of his head for the first time.
“Oh, my god!” I lunged for him, dragging Stevie out of the seat and throwing him against the car. Not bad, considering I still had one arm in a cast. “What the hell is on your head?”
“What? What?” Stevie slapped his hands over the back of this head and started spinning. Think dog chasing his tail as if he could see the back of his head if he just went fast enough.
I watched for a second in amazement and then grabbed him, shoving him back against the car. “Stop that!”
“What is it? What is it?” he asked in a panic. “Do I have fleas?”
“Probably, but no.” I turned him around to get a better look, hoping I’d seen it wrong. A mistake. A trick of the light. “Crap on a cracker. Are you insane? Have you lost what little mind you had?”
“What is it?” Stevie started feeling the back of his head again.
My heart was pounding and my vision got a little misty. I had to fix it. How was I going to fix it? “A tattoo.”
Stevie slumped against the car and patted his chest. “Oh, Jesus. You scared me. I thought something was really wrong with me.”
“Something is,” I said.
“Huh?”
I’m not gonna lie. If I’d had a weapon, it wouldn’t have looked good for Stevie. But since I didn’t, I buried my face in my hands.
“Dude, it’s fine,” he said. “Just a tattoo. Everybody has tats.”
I didn’t look up. I couldn’t. I wasn’t ready. “Everybody doesn’t have that tattoo.”
“Jeez, I didn’t know you were a drama queen. You gotta do what ya gotta do.”
“You didn’t have to do that.”
“I did. You see, I joined this club and you got to get tatted up. Don’t worry. Chaz did it for free. Didn’t cost me nothing.”
I looked up and stared into his blank face as he glanced around looking just as happy as all get out. “What are you planning on telling your parents?”
Stevie shrugged. “Nothing. Who cares? My hair’ll grow. I got hair, Mercy.”
“Not right now you don’t,” I said.
“A couple of weeks and presto, it’s gone.”
“But it will still be there.”
“Nobody will know,” he said, and I could see his interest in the situation fading. Not that he was much interested in the first place.
“You’ll know. I’ll know, and it’s right there on your head. Didn’t Big Steve and Olivia visit?”
“Sure. Dad came a few times, but he’s mad about something. Mom came every week. She loves me.”
Not for long.
“How’d you hide it?”
“Huh?”
“That…that thing on your head, Stevie. How’d you hide it?” I asked.
“I didn’t. They probably didn’t care.”
My fists clenched, even the one in the cast. “They would care. I care. Everybody in the whole damn world would care.”
“Don’t get excited about nothing, Mercy,” said Stevie.
That’s when I got excited. I got super excited. I snatched his little brown paper bag right out of his hands and started smacking him with it. A debit card, razor, and toothbrush all went flying.
“Hey!” Stevie ran and I chased him, right around the car in a circle.
“Come back, you moron. I’ll smack that thing right off your head.”
“You’re crazy! What’s wrong with you?” Stevie yelled and put on a little speed to dash out of my reach.
“Come back here so I can kill you!” I yelled over the roof of the car.
Stevie looked at me totally bewildered. “I didn’t do nothing.”
“I will get a gun and shoot you if you say that again!”
There was a loud slap on the hood of the car and we looked over to see the guard standing there with her hands on her hips. Even in my fury, I could see she’d expected this and was ready. “I can’t have that kinda talk now.”
“Have you seen that?” I was still yelling. I couldn’t stop.
She nodded. “I’ve seen it.”
“What?” Stevie asked, still bewildered.
“You have a swastika on your head!” I yelled.
“Huh?”
The guard shook her head slightly and sighed. “It takes all kinds.”
“Of idiots,” I yelled.
“Hey!” yelled Stevie. “Who you calling an idiot?”
“You’ve got a swastika tattooed on your head!”
Stevie’s forehead puckered into a frown. “A what?”
“A swastika. A Nazi Swastika. On your head.”
“Nah.” Then he chuckled. “I just got the club tat.”
“The club tat is a swastika.”
He looked up to the sky and thought about it. “Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah, Stevie,” I yelled. “You let someone put that obscenity on your head. Permanently.”
“I didn’t know.”
“It’s your job to know what some white supremacist douchebag is tattooing on your head!”
“Calm down. I’ll just grow out my hair.”
I gripped the top of the car for support. “When? Today? Before your Jewish parents see it?”
The guard whistled. “Stevie Stevie Stevie.”
“I didn’t mean nothing by it,” said Stevie.
“That’s the problem!” I yelled. “You never mean anything by anything, but you still do it. Your mother. What am I going to say to Olivia?”
“Mom won’t care.”
“Yes, she will and your father. This’ll kill your father. Are you trying to kill Big Steve?” I asked. “Maybe you want him to kill you. Is that it? Is that the plan?”
“It’s not that bad.” Stevie looked like it might just be dawning on him that he could be in trouble. He looked at the guard with raised eyebrows.
“You’ve got a huge problem,” she said. “Whatever this woman tells you to do you better do it.”
“Yeah?”
“Oh, yeah.”
I looked at that swastika and whipped the poofball hat right off my head. “Put this on.”
“It’s a girlie hat,” protested Stevie.
I marched around the car, grabbed him by the shoulders, and faced him toward the guard. She slapped the hood again and said, “What did I just say?”
Stevie pulled on my hat and I shoved him in the car with a boot to the butt for good measure. I slammed the door and stomped over to the driver’s side. Murder was on my mind and it must’ve shown.
“Miss Watts, you aren’t going to take him out and shoot him, are you?” she asked.
“Call me Mercy and probably not. I’m sorry. I didn’t ask your name.”
She smiled and pulled open her parka so I could see her name tag. “Officer James, but Stevie knows me as Noreen.”
“Thanks,” I said. “You may have saved his life.”
“I thought we’d be having a problem, but I admit I was glad to see you instead of his father or yours,” said Noreen.
“That would’ve been bad,” I said, taking a breath. “You’re very calm about this.”
“Same shit different day. It’s not unusual.”
“Stevie has got to be unusual.”
“Yeah, well, they usually know what’s on their own heads, but Stevie, he’s not typical in a lot of ways.” Noreen gestured to the prison. “There’s a lot of innocent men in there but not him. He owned it from day one.”
“Only ’cause he’s too stupid to deny it,” I said.
“That and he is who he is and he’s not ashamed.”
“He should be. I’m ashamed of him.”
“For what it’s worth, I don’t think he had any clue about that ink or the so-called gang that gave it to him.”
“That’s the problem,” I said. “He’s always been like that.”
A look of consternation passed over Noreen’s face.
“What?” I asked.
“Well, I’m not supposed to say this or even know it, but…”
“But…?” I asked.
“It’s confidential, you understand, and you didn’t hear anything from me.”
Ah, crap.
“What is it?”
“I think he’s got a diagnosis.”
“Diagnosis? For what? He’s sick?”
“From the therapist. We offer therapy and counseling to our inmates. We are trying to rehabilitate them and it helps.”
People always surprised me. Nasty seemed to come out of nowhere, but so did kindness.
“Do you think Stevie will tell me about it?” I asked.
“He seemed to like therapy and if he remembers, you’d be the one he’d tell,” said Noreen.
“Me?”
“He’s got great affection for you.”
I leaned over and looked through the windshield. Stevie grinned and waved at me. “I don’t understand that.”
“It is what it is,” said Noreen. “I’ve dealt with enough nasty bastards to appreciate the good-hearted idiots.”
“You’re not upset about the tattoo?”
“Mercy, I’ve seen it all in there five times over. Stevie Warnock’s idiot ink comes as no great surprise. He’s lucky they didn’t put it on his forehead.”
“You don’t get paid enough,” I said.
“Amen.” Noreen gave me a wave and strolled back to the prison. I was sorry to see her go.
I turned down a back alley in the Central West End of St. Louis and Stevie leaned forward squinting. “Where’s Macy’s?”
“We’re not going to Macy’s yet,” I said, squeezing my mother’s car between a dumpster and recycling cans. “This is first.”
“How come we’re parking back here?”
“We’re near Hawthorne Avenue and I’m not taking any chances.”
Stevie frowned and asked, “Chances of what?”
“Somebody seeing my mother’s car at a tattoo shop. Nobody is going to know about this. Nobody.”
“Who’s getting a tattoo?”
“You.”
He did a fist pump. “Yes. I’ve been thinking about getting a sleeve. What do you think about my mom’s favorite flower?”
I put my forehead on the steering wheel. “A tattoo to cover up that abomination on the back of your head.”
“Oh. That’s not as much fun,” said Stevie. “And the first one hurt bad.”
“Good,” I said.
“You’re mean to me.”
“I’m saving you from certain death or would you like me to drive to my parent’s house and let them get a load of your latest bad decision?” I asked.
“Mercy?” Stevie’s voice was soft and a little pleading.
“Yeah?”
“I don’t have any money.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I got out and Stevie obediently followed me to the front of Black Heart Ink. I’d texted the owner, Charming Velázquez, before we left the prison parking lot. If anyone could be understanding of Stevie, it was her.
I’d known Charming forever. We went to school together. She was the only daughter of a pair of nice but uptight radiologists. She was supposed to go to medical school and make up the fourth generation of Velázquez doctors along with her brothers. Charming went a different way and I heard her mom was still taking anti-depressants over it. Being the family outlier gave Charming a soft spot for those of us that didn’t quite fit and Stevie certainly qualified. Plus, she wasn’t easily spooked. She did penis piercing, for crying out loud. I did catheters in my normal life as a nurse, but piercing was beyond the pale for me.
The door dinged when I opened it and Charming’s small but snazzy studio appeared empty, but I could hear chatting from behind the black and chrome partition.
“Be right out!” called Charming from somewhere in the depths of her studio. It was a great location and Charming was doing well for herself, but that wasn’t helping her with her mother.
I went over to look at the books. Something to cover up a swastika wasn’t going to be easy. Flowers? Something geometric? I found a cool tribal pattern that might work and said, “What do you think of this?”
No answer.
I turned around to see Stevie hovering by the door, still wearing my poofball hat and wringing his hands.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Nothin’.”
“Come over here and look at this.”
“Do you know them?” he asked.
“Who?”
“The shop people.”
“I do. I texted her about your situation. I told you that.”
He looked confused. “Did you?”
“I did.”
“What’d she say?”
I shrugged. “Come over.”
“Was she mad, too?” he asked, and my frozen solid heart melted just a tad.
“She’s not mad at you, Stevie. She doesn’t know you,” I said.
He was unconvinced and stayed by the door. Charming popped out from the back about three minutes later with a customer who was gingerly putting on a jacket. She greeted me, rang up the customer’s enormous bill, and chatted happily about his next section, which I gathered was quite ornate. When he turned to go, he got a load of Stevie in his prison togs, Chuck’s huge jacket, and my pink poofball and to his credit, he hesitated but then just nodded at me and then Stevie before leaving.
Charming came out from behind the counter and hugged me. We’d never been friends in high school but since then we’d formed a casual friendship. We had disappointing parents in common.
“How’s the arm?” she asked.
“Better, thanks.”
She took a look at my face. “Rash is better, too. That was wicked. Are you sure you don’t want me to do some eyeliner? I could totally give you the Marilyn cat eye.”
“’Cause that’s what I need,” I said with a laugh.
“It would look great.”
“I know, but I’m trying to blend not stand out more.”
“Girl, you’re the spitting image of Marilyn Monroe. When are you going to embrace it?” Charming asked.
“Never.”
“I give up.”
“Finally.”
We laughed and then turned to Stevie who was now pressed against the plate glass window.
“So, who do we have here?” Charming asked and she was as her name implied, charming, but Stevie looked absolutely terrified.
I waited to see what he’d do until it became clear that nothing was the answer.
“This is Stevie Warnock. He just got released this morning.”
“Don’t tell her that,” he said and then clamped his hand over his mouth.
“What is up with you?” I asked.
“Nothin’,” he said behind his hand.
Charming waved him over. “Come on. I don’t bite and I don’t give a damn about your previous incarcerations, either.”
Stevie didn’t budge and Charming shrugged. “We’ve got to get a move on. I’ve got a sleeve coming in and he’s a wrastler.”
“A what?”
“Never mind. I’ve got the time right now,” said Charming. “Just barely.”
“Give us a minute,” I said. “I’ll get him squared away.”
Charming smiled. “A minute. I’m counting.”
She went into the back and started chatting with someone. I pointed at Stevie. “What is your deal? We’ve got to fix that thing.”
“I don’t want her to see it,” said Stevie.
“She has to see it.”
“You think it’s bad and—”
“It is bad and it’s awful. How can you even question that?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“What about your family?” I marched over, grabbed Stevie and dragged him in front of a mirror. Then I whipped him around and held up a hand mirror so he could see the back of his head. There it was in black and blue. Weird, I know, but some of it was blue. Maybe the scumbag ran out of black. It wasn’t a great tattoo and only about three-fourths finished, but it was definitely a swastika. No doubt about it.
Stevie frowned. “He didn’t finish. He told me he got it done.”
“That’s what you’re worried about?” I whacked him with the mirror. “What about your family? How could you do this to them after everything they went through. I just…I can’t even.” I was yelling again and Charming ran out, took one look at Stevie’s head, and her pretty face turned to thunder.
Stevie slapped a hand over the back of his head. “Don’t look.”
“Too late,” she said.
“That’s right. It’s too late!” I yelled. “I’m done. I tried. When Big Steve kills you, don’t come crying to me.”
“He’ll forgive me. He always does,” said Stevie backing away slowly.
“Not this time. She was his mother, Stevie. Do you think he’s just going to get over that? He’s not over it. He’ll never be over it. You’ve been nothing but trouble and now this. This! Of all things. It’s an insult to your grandparents, not to mention millions of other people.”
“My grandparents?”
“Yes.” I grabbed him by the tee shirt and twisted it. “The people who fought to survive and gave you your life.”
Stevie’s eyes were wide and for once not empty. “What are you talking about?”
I shoved him away from me and Charming ran over, wrapping her arms around me.
“You know!” I yelled. “You just don’t care enough to remember.”
“I don’t know. What about them?”
Charming held me back and it’s a good thing, too. I had a foot back. I was going to start kicking. No thought went into that. I was going to start kicking the stupid out of Stevie Warnock. As far as I knew, kicking hadn’t been tried yet, and I was willing to give it a go.
“He doesn’t know, Mercy,” said Charming.
“He does!”
“I don’t!” Stevie yelled. “I don’t know anything. Nobody tells me anything about anything!”
“Tell him,” said Charming.
“Your grandmother was in the resistance during the war. She was a child, but she ended up in a concentration camp where she nearly died. But she married your grandfather who was also in a camp and they had your dad. The strain of having a child was too much for her and she died. Constanza gave her life only to have her only grandchild get a swastika on his head!”
Stevie dropped his hands. “How do you know all that?”
I took a breath and then said, “I’ve been investigating your family, trying to find out what happened to Constanza.”
“Does my dad know?”
“Of course, he knows.”
“All of it?”
“He’s known about his parents for forever. I found out about the resistance part and I told him.”
“I didn’t…” Stevie wandered over to the books and began flipping through the sketches and pictures. Charming let go of me and sat down next to him. “If you have any ideas that aren’t in the books, let me know. We can work it out.”
A huge guy with every inch of him tattooed came out of the back. “Charming? You alright out here?”
“Sure, Darius. Can you call my eleven o’clock and cancel?”
“The wrastler?”
“Yeah.”
“No problem. That guy’s a nightmare,” said Darius. “What should I tell him?”
“Family emergency.”
Darius looked the three of us over, nodded, and went into the back.
“Sorry if you’re losing a customer,” I said.
“He’s not going anywhere. He loves my work and nobody else will put up with him. He passes out and then tries to punch me. We’ve taken to strapping him to the chair, so in a way you’ve made my day easier.”
Stevie didn’t look up. He kept flipping through pages, but I had the feeling he wasn’t seeing any of the art. “Where were they?”
“Auschwitz. Your grandfather was in the main camp and your grandmother was in a satellite camp,” I said.
“Why? What did they do?”
“They were Jews, Stevie.”
“I know, I mean in the resistance, what did they do?” he asked quietly.
“He wasn’t in it that I know of and we’re still working on how Constanza was involved.”
“Dad never told me.” Stevie looked up and his eyes were sad and had a loneliness to them that I’d never seen before. “Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Maybe it was too hard to talk about,” said Charming.
“He told Mercy.”
I sat down on the other side of him. “Actually, he didn’t. I found out through some other stuff I was working on and he confirmed it.”
“He probably thought I was too stupid to understand,” he said. “I am too stupid.”
I took his hand and said, “You don’t have a good track record, but maybe you can tell me what the therapist said.”
“Huh?”
“In prison. You saw a therapist, didn’t you?”
“How’d you know?” he asked.
“Everybody does, don’t they?” I asked.
“Not everybody. Some guys think it’s bullshit, but I liked it. Misty was nice. We talked and I felt better. I got techniques.”
“For what?”
“Concentrating and thinking about stuff. I’m supposed to keep a notebook so I can remember stuff by writing it down.” Stevie closed the book and asked, “Do you do lilies and sunflowers?”
“Sure.” Charming got up and went behind the counter. “I’ve got a special book back here.”
She brought the book out with a sketch pad and two of them went through the book and designed the most beautiful tattoo I’d ever seen. Intertwined lilies and sunflowers with a dragon peeking through the leaves and stems.
While they worked, I asked questions. Stevie, as usual, didn’t remember exactly what Misty the therapist had said. He didn’t even remember what her last name was. He did know that she thought he needed pills and he was supposed to see a doctor who could give him the pills, but he got paroled before that happened.
“What were the pills going to do?” I asked.
“Help me to think,” he said. “I think I think just fine, but she said I don’t.”
“Sounds like ADD,” said Charming. “My stepson Liam has that. He takes Concerta. It helps a lot.”
“What does he do?” Stevie asked.
“He can’t concentrate. He’s impulsive and does crazy stuff like he forgets to use a potholder and burns his hand. He does his homework but can’t remember to turn it in. Last week, his mom forgot his med on accident and some kid dared him to eat a rock and he did it. Liam just doesn’t think without his meds. His doctor says he suggestible.”
Stevie looked up from the sketch and said, “I ate stuff.”
“I know,” I said, suddenly feeling flipping terrible. ADD. Was that the problem?
“What did you eat?” Charming asked.
Stevie frowned and looked at me like I’d been there. I wasn’t, for the record. Stevie was five years older than me.
“Worms and rocks,” I said.
He made a face. “Oh, yeah. Why in the hell would I want to do that?”
“We never knew why.”
“Maybe pills will change that,” said Charming. “You should call the therapist, Mercy.”
“She won’t tell me anything. He’s not my kid.”
“Stevie can give her permission.”
I got out my phone and went through a huge rigamarole to find out who Misty was and how to contact her. You’d think Misty was a state secret. In the end I had to call on my new prison connection, Noreen. She gave me Misty’s name and number, but I didn’t hear it from her.
By that time, Charming was almost done with the drawing, but Stevie wasn’t quite satisfied. “I need my grandpa in there.”
“Did you know him well?” I asked.
“He talked to me and he was really nice.”
“He talked to you?”
Charming looked up from the shading she was doing. “Is that weird?”
“Kinda,” I said. “Big Steve said he never talked, that he couldn’t really communicate at all.”
“That’s so sad.”
“He talked to me,” said Stevie.
“About what?” I asked.
He frowned. “I don’t know. He was really quiet and nice though.”
“Gentle,” said Charming. “Something gentle.”
I pointed at the dragon. “Who’s this?”
Stevie laughed. “I just like dragons. I think Grandpa liked them, too.” Then he frowned. “He did. He gave me dragon books. I think they’re still at home.”
“And the sunflower is who?”
“Mom. It’s her favorite.”
“What about the lily? I asked.
“I just…I can’t remember. I think I just like lilies.”
Charming grabbed a second sheet of sketch paper and quickly drew a sweet little mouse. “Gentle, sweet, a survivor.”
“And it works with the rest of it,” I said.
“Do you think he’d want to be a mouse though?” Stevie asked. “He was a big guy like Dad.”
“I have no idea,” said Charming. “The biggest guys can have the sweetest souls though.”
“He’d be happy that you remembered him. He could be the dragon, if you want,” I said.
“No,” said Stevie. “He wasn’t the dragon. I think the mouse is good. He was super quiet. You hardly knew he was there. Let’s do the mouse.”
Charming worked the mouse into the final image and it really worked.
“It’s going to go away completely, right?” Stevie asked. “The swastika will be gone. Mom and Dad’ll never know?”
“With the shading and lines, it will disappear,” said Charming.
“But it will still be there, like Mercy said,” he said sadly. “I’m an idiot.”
“Don’t think of it like that,” I said. “It’s still there, like what happened to them is still there, but they’re the bigger part of the picture. Surviving and going on is the most important part.”
“Yeah, that’s good.” He grinned. “Let’s do it.”
Charming and Stevie went down to a room so she could get to work and I got on calling Misty the therapist. After some wheedling and getting Stevie on the line, she agreed to talk to me. This was the one time when my so-called celebrity status worked in my favor. She knew who I was and for some reason decided I was more trustworthy because of it.
“You understand that I didn’t do formal testing on Stevie?” Misty asked.
“Got it, but what is your opinion?” I asked.
“He’s got ADD off the charts. I’m surprised he can drive.”
“He’s wrecked four cars and lost his license.”
“Well, there you go,” said Misty.
I went into another room, closed the door, and curled up in the chair, surrounded by beautiful artwork and needles. Needles I was used to. Artwork not so much. “So, I have to ask. How did you know he had ADD? Nobody ever mentioned it before that I know of.”
“His handwriting. It’s terrible.”
“That’s half the people I know.”
“His is different. If you watch him writing, he’s just having a terrible time. Not that he can’t write. He can, but it’s an effort to stay focused and do it well. He has to slow down and he struggles with that. Then I started watching his eyes. He fades out and looks away, like he’s gone for a few seconds and then comes back. He misses out on what happened in that time period.”
“And you think meds will fix that?” I asked.
“Fix isn’t the right word. It will help. If he slows down his brain, he’ll be able to drive down the street, see a stop sign, and then continue driving and remember it’s there.”
“He can’t remember stop signs?”
“Well, it’s not that he doesn’t remember them exactly. His brain will have bounced off to something else.”
“What a nightmare.”
“I’d say so. Don’t get your hopes up too high though. Stevie’s no genius. He’s not going to get on meds and suddenly be analyzing Shakespeare and get totally into physics.”
“Nobody will think that’s a possibility,” I said.
“You’d be surprised with parents. They will get ideas about their kid and it’s hard to let go of them.”
I wondered what Big Steve would think. Olivia would definitely get her hopes up. “Why didn’t anyone catch this before?”
“I couldn’t really say, but it wasn’t hugely popular to medicate kids when Stevie was young, and even when they did it was mostly for hyperactivity. Stevie’s not hyper. They probably just thought he was dumb.”
“He kinda is,” I said.
“I assessed his IQ as average. He’s not an idiot. He’s average.”
“Seriously?”
“I swear to God. Stevie Warnock is average,” said Misty.
“Holy crap,” I said. “Do you get this a lot at the prison?”
“I do and let me say Stevie’s lucky. He came from a good home with kind parents with no abuse of any kind. If you combine Stevie’s ADD with violence and/or neglect, you’ve got a real problem.”
“You think he’ll be alright then?” I asked.
“He’s got a better chance than most.”
I thanked her and went back to Stevie who was lying down prone with his eyes closed while Charming inked his head.
“Well?” she asked me.
“He’s got ADD, a whole lot of ADD,” I said. “But he’s not crazy or anything. Meds will help.”
Charming continued to work and then asked, “I know I said I didn’t care, but what did he do to get into prison?”
I named a few things that Stevie had done and Charming got thoughtful. “Nothing violent?”
I laughed. “Nope. Can you imagine Stevie violent? No way.”
“Liam’s doc is great and he treats adults. I’ve got a card in my wallet. Why don’t you get it out and call him?”
I got out the card. Downtown office. Convenient enough to get there easily. “Is he taking patients?” I asked.
“Tell him I sent you and I think he’ll squeeze Stevie in,” said Charming. “He’s a good guy. I just didn’t want to send him a psycho.”
“Not a psycho,” I said with a laugh.
“You know I was thinking…”
I leaned over to look at the swastika that was rapidly disappearing into something gorgeous. “That you wish you could post this transformation?”
“No, but that would be nice,” she said.
“What then?”
“He’ll need a job,” said Charming.
Stevie’s eyes popped open. “Did someone say job?”
She gave him a little smack on the shoulder. “Don’t move.”
“I’m not. You hiring?”
Charming gave him an evaluating look. “Maybe if you get medicated and stay medicated.”
“You’d do that for me?” he asked.
“You remind me of Liam. I’d want someone to give him a chance.”
“Who’s Liam?”
“My stepson.”
“You’ve got a stepson?”
Charming rolled her eyes. “You really need those meds.”
Stevie gave her a thumbs-up. “I’m on it.”
I poked him. “You mean, I’m on it.”
“Same thing. We got a thing, you and me. We help each other.”
I couldn’t remember Stevie ever helping me, but I was willing to go with it under the circumstances. “Sure, why not?”
“I’m gonna get a job and remember stuff,” said Stevie. “Dad’ll be so happy.”
He will. He really will.