Chương 18
The surgery went well, then recovery became complicated by rejection concerns and an infection. Anna spent twelve days sleeping in a hospital chair. She did not call Victor until Thomas was stable.
The prison phone system announced the connection in a mechanical voice.
Victor answered. “Anna?”
“He got the kidney.”
Victor sat down on the edge of his bunk. Around him, men talked, laughed, and waited for other phones.
“When?”
“Twelve days ago.”
“You waited twelve days?”
“He was sick.”
“Is he all right?”
“He’s complaining about the food.”
Victor closed his eyes. “Good.”
Anna’s breath shook.
“He has to take medication for the rest of his life,” she said. “There are risks. It isn’t finished.”
“I know.”
“I keep expecting someone to take it back.”
“They won’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No.”
She laughed softly through tears she refused to acknowledge. “Still honest at inconvenient times.”
“How is the scar?”
“Ugly.”
“Thomas will enjoy showing people.”
“He already asked whether it makes him look dangerous.”
“It does.”
“You haven’t seen it.”
“He was dangerous before.”
Victor heard Thomas say something in the background.
Anna moved the phone. “He wants to talk.”
Thomas’s voice came through weaker than usual but unmistakably amused. “I have a functioning kidney and still no truffle fries.”
“Life is unfair,” Victor said.
“Anna says you look terrible in your prison picture.”
“I look better than the pictures outside federal court.”
“That’s a low bar.”
They spoke for five minutes about medication, school, and a basketball game Victor had not seen. No one mentioned the fifty-two thousand dollars.
When the call ended, Victor remained seated with the receiver in his hand until another man asked whether he planned to marry the phone.
Victor hung up.
He returned to his bunk and removed Anna’s latest letter from beneath the mattress. He had read it enough times to soften the folds.
Four years after the night in the bedroom, Victor was transferred to a lower-security facility. Anna visited for the first time.
She had completed nursing school and worked on a hospital medical-surgical floor. Her hair was shorter, falling just past her shoulders. She wore a blue sweater and carried no bag because the facility prohibited them.
Victor entered the visiting room in khaki clothing and paused when he saw her.
She stood.
For several seconds neither spoke.
Then Anna said, “You look like the pictures now.”
Victor sat across from her. “Unkind.”
“You’re thinner.”
“The food.”
“Nina warned you.”
“She enjoyed it.”
A vending machine hummed beside the wall. Families spoke at nearby tables under the eyes of correctional officers. A child pushed toy cars along the floor.
Victor folded his hands. “How is Thomas?”
“Annoying.”
“Healthy?”
“Mostly. His labs are good. He’s taking classes in social work.”
“He’ll regret that.”
“He says criminals need better listeners.”
Victor glanced toward the officer near the door. “He may be right.”
Anna studied his face. The sharp features remained, as did the dark eyes, but the constant readiness for violence had eased. It had not disappeared. She doubted it ever would.
“You never asked why I was really in your room,” she said.
Victor looked at her.
“You said I collapsed.”
“You did.”
“Before that.”
He waited.
Anna rubbed her thumb against the edge of the table. “I was changing the sheets. Mrs. Bell told me to finish the upstairs rooms before dinner. I felt dizzy and sat down.”
“In my bed.”
“On the edge.”
“You were under the duvet.”
“I got cold.”
“You took off your shoes.”
“They were hurting.”
Victor’s mouth shifted.
Anna continued, “Then I saw the lamp.”
“What about it?”
“It looked like one my mother had.”
The cream ceramic base and linen shade had belonged to Lucia. Victor had kept it beside every bed he owned since her death.
Anna said, “My mother used to leave hers on when Thomas was sick. I thought I would lie down for one minute. I knew I shouldn’t. I just wanted to be somewhere that felt like she might walk in.”
Victor looked down at the table.
“That’s why I asked for one minute,” she said. “It wasn’t only the fever.”
“Why tell me now?”
“Because you kept the lamp.”
“I keep many things.”
“You sold the building with the elevators.”
“They were unreliable.”
“They had character.”
Victor looked at her.
Anna smiled.
The visit ended after an hour. They did not hug because a table divided them and physical contact was restricted to the beginning and end. At the exit, Anna stepped close enough to put her arms around him briefly.
Victor held her with careful pressure.
When she left, he watched through reinforced glass as she collected her coat and walked into the afternoon light.
He did not feel redeemed.
The word seemed too clean for anything that had happened.
He felt the cost of what could not be repaired and the weight of what still could.
Two years later, Victor was released under supervision.
Nina met him outside the facility in a practical gray sedan. She handed him a phone, a wallet, and an inexpensive watch.
Victor examined it. “Plastic.”
“It tells time.”
“Poorly?”
“Accurately. You may find that upsetting.”
The city had changed in small ways during his absence. Restaurants had new names. A glass building occupied the corner where an old tire shop had stood. People paid for coffee without touching money. Victor felt both conspicuous and invisible.
He did not return to the Gold Coast house. It had been sold as part of the restitution settlement.
The new owner renovated the bedrooms and replaced the cream duvet.
Mrs. Bell had saved the bedside lamp before the sale. She gave it to Anna, who kept it in a closet for almost a year.
On the evening of Victor’s release, Anna invited him to the apartment she shared with Thomas. It was on the third floor of a brick building owned by the employee trust. The elevator worked but made a scraping sound between floors.
Victor arrived carrying no gift.
Thomas opened the door.
He was twenty-five now, broader in the shoulders, with color in his face. A pale transplant scar showed above the waistband of his jeans when he reached up to hug Victor.
“You’re squeezing,” Victor said.
“I have years to make up for.”
“You could’ve started with a handshake.”
“Prison made you delicate.”
Anna appeared from the kitchen wearing dark blue scrubs. She looked tired, healthy, and entirely herself.
“You’re late,” she said.
“Traffic.”
“You had no car.”
“Nina drives aggressively in slow traffic.”
From the kitchen, Nina called, “I can hear you.”
Victor entered.
Evelyn sat at the dining table arguing with Mrs. Bell about whether the chicken was overcooked. Leo stood near the window holding a bowl of salad. He had left Victor’s organization during the investigation and now ran a licensed security company. Raymond had moved to Florida and sent a card containing only the words DON’T GET SENT BACK.
The apartment was crowded and loud. Nothing matched. A stack of textbooks occupied one chair. Thomas’s medication organizer sat beside a bowl of lemons. The walls displayed photographs, including one of Anna in a nursing-school gown and another of Thomas holding a sign that read NEW KIDNEY, SAME BAD ATTITUDE.
Victor remained near the door.
Anna noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re doing the thing.”
“What thing?”
“Looking for the exits.”
“There are two.”
“There’s one door and a fire escape.”
“Two.”
She took his coat and hung it beside hers.
Dinner was imperfect. The chicken was dry. Evelyn said so repeatedly. Mrs. Bell became defensive, then admitted she had forgotten to set a timer. Thomas ate more salt than Anna approved. Nina received a work call halfway through dessert and disappeared into the hallway.
Victor listened more than he spoke.
After the others left, Thomas went downstairs to walk Evelyn to her car. Anna carried plates into the kitchen. Victor followed with the glasses.
“You don’t have to help,” she said.
“I know.”
He placed a glass beside the sink.
On the counter near the window stood Lucia’s lamp.
Victor stopped.
Anna dried her hands on a towel. “Mrs. Bell gave it to me.”
“You kept it in a closet.”
“How do you know?”
“She writes letters.”
“She writes you?”
“Once a month. Mostly complaints.”
“That sounds like her.”
Victor touched the ceramic base with two fingers. A faint chip marked one side, the same chip Lucia had made when she knocked it from a crate during their first move after the factory closed.
Anna turned on the lamp.
Warm light spread across the kitchen.
“I thought you should have it,” she said.
Victor shook his head. “No.”
“It was hers.”
“It’s yours now.”
“Why?”
“You were the one who needed it.”
Anna looked at him.
Outside, a train passed several blocks away. The glasses in the cabinet trembled faintly.
Victor walked toward the living room. An unfolded blanket lay across the sofa.
“Where am I staying?” he asked.
“Nina booked a hotel.”
“Which one?”
“The one with the thirty-dollar hamburger.”
Victor looked back.
Anna leaned against the kitchen counter. “Thomas insisted.”
“Truffle fries?”
“He says prison has lowered your standards.”
Victor picked up his coat.
At the door, Anna said, “You can stay here tonight.”
He turned.
“The sofa,” she added. “Do not make that face.”
“What face?”
“The one from the federal-court pictures.”
Victor glanced at the blanket.
“You have work tomorrow,” he said.
“I know.”
“Thomas needs rest.”
“He’s downstairs explaining his transplant scar to a parking attendant.”
Victor removed his coat again.
Anna took it and returned it to the hook.
“You get one night,” she said.
“One minute was enough for you.”
“I had pneumonia.”
“I’ve been incarcerated.”
“Not contagious.”
Victor sat on the sofa. The cushion sank beneath him. Anna turned off the overhead light, leaving Lucia’s lamp glowing in the kitchen.
She paused before going to her room.
“Victor.”
“Yes?”
“Thank you for not arriving too late.”
He looked toward the lamp, then at her.
This time he did not answer with money, guilt, or promises.
May you like
He simply unfolded the blanket, lay down in a room where no one feared his sleep, and closed his eyes while ordinary sounds continued around him—the elevator scraping between floors, Thomas laughing in the hallway, Anna setting a glass of water beside the lamp.
The light remained on.
