Blood Test Read online

  “I’ll make it a point to do that.”

  She looked away from me, talked to her diplomas.

  “Do you have a lady friend, Alex?”

  “Yes. She’s in Japan now.”

  “Miss her?”

  “Very much.”

  “Figures,” she said good-naturedly. “The good ones get snapped up.” She rose to indicate the audience was concluded. “Good to meet you, Alex.”

  “My pleasure, Diane. Good luck with the vines. What I tasted was great.”

  “It’s gonna get better and better. I can feel it.”

  Her handshake was firm and dry.

  My Seville had cooked in the open parking lot and I pulled my hand away from the heat of the door handle. Midway through the motion I sensed his presence and turned to face him.

  “S’cuse me, Doc.” He was looking into the sun and squinting. His forehead was sweat-glossed and the canary-colored shirt had darkened to mustard under the arms.

  “I can’t talk now, Mr. Moody.”

  “Just a sec, Doc. Just lemme connect with ya. Lemme zero in on some main points. Communicate, you know.” His words came out in a rush. As he spoke, the half-closed eyes darted back and forth, and he rocked on his boot heels. In rapid succession he smiled, grimaced, bobbed his head, scratched his Adam’s apple, and tweaked his nose. A discordant symphony of tics and twitches. I’d never seen him this way but I’d read Larry Daschoff’s report and had a good idea what was happening.

  “I’m sorry. Not now.” I looked around the lot but we were alone. The rear of the court building faced a quiet side street in a run-down neighborhood. The sole sign of life was a scrawny mutt nuzzling a patch of overgrown grass on the other side of the road.

  “Aw, c’mon, Doc. Just lemme make a few main points, lemme break on through, lemme zero in on the main facts, like the shysters say.” His speech picked up velocity.

  I turned away from him and his hard brown hand closed on my wrist.

  “Please let go, Mr. Moody,” I said with forced patience. He smiled.

  “Hey, Doc, I jus wanna talk. State my case.”

  “There’s no case. I can’t do anything for you. Let go of my arm.”

  He tightened his grip but no tension registered on his face. It was a long face, sun-cured and leathery, with a broken pug nose at center, a thin-lipped mouth, and an oversized jaw—the kind of mandibular development you get from chewing tobacco or gritting your teeth.

  I put my car keys in my pocket and reached around to pry his fingers loose but his strength was phenomenal. That, too, made sense, if what I suspected was true. It felt like his hand had become heat-welded to my arm and it was starting to hurt.

  I found myself assessing my chances in a fight: we were the same height and probably just about the same weight. Years of hauling lumber had given him an edge in the physical strength department, but I’d been sufficiently diligent about karate practice to have a few good moves. I could stomp down hard on his instep, hit him when he was off-balance, and drive away as he writhed on the cement... I interrupted that train of thought, ashamed, telling myself that fighting him would be absurd. The guy was disturbed and if anyone should be able to defuse him, I should.

  I dropped my free arm and let it fall idly to my side.

  “Okay. I’ll listen to you. But first let go so I can concentrate on what you have to say.”

  He thought about it for a second, then grinned broadly. His teeth were bad and I wondered why I hadn’t noticed it during the evaluation, but he’d been different then—morose and defeated, barely able to open his mouth to speak.

  He released my wrist. The piece of sleeve where he’d held me was grimy and warm.

  “I’m listening.”

  “Okay, okay, okay.” His head continued to bob. “Just gotta connect with you, Doc, show you I got plans, tell you how she twisted you roun’ her little finger jus’ like she did me. There’s bad stuff in that house, my boys tell me how he’s makin’ the kids do things his way, and she lets it happen, she says okay, okay. Fine and dandy with her, they be cleanin’ up after a scumbag like that, who knows what kind of dirt he’s leavin’ around, the guy’s not normal, you know? Him wantin’ to be man of the house and all that, all I gotta say is har, har, you know.

  “Know why I’m laughin’, doc, huh? To keep from cryin’, that’s why, keep from cryin’. For my babies. The boy and the girl. My boy tol’ me the two of them be sleeping together, him wantin’ to be the daddy, to be the big shot in the house that I built with these two hands here.”

  He held out ten large-knuckled, bruised fingers. There was an oversized turquoise and Indian silver ring on each ring finger, one in the shape of a scorpion, the other a coiled snake.

  “You unnerstan’, Doc, you grab what I’m tossin’ at you? Those kids are my life, I carry the burden, not nobody else, that’s what I tol’ the lady judge, the bitch in black. I carry it. From me, from here.” He grabbed his crotch. “My body into hers when she was still decent—she could be decent again, you unnerstan’, I get hold of her, speak some sense, straighten her out, right? But not with that Conley there, no way, no fuckin’ way. My kids, my life.”

  He paused for breath and I took advantage of it.

  “You’ll always be their father,” I said, trying to be reassuring without patronizing him. “No one can take that away from you.”

  “Right. Hunnerd procent right. Now you go in there and tell that to the bitch in black, straighten her out. Tell her I got to have those kids.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  He pouted like a child denied dessert.

  “You do it. Right now.”

  “I can’t. You’re under a lot of stress. You’re not ready to take care of them.” You’re going through a full-fledged manic episode, Mr. Moody. You’re a manic-depressive and you need help badly...

  “I can handle it, I got plans. Get a trailer, get a boat, take ’em outta the dirty city, outta the smogclouds, take ’em to the country, fish for trout, hunt for meat, teach ’em the way to survive. Like Hank Junior says, country boy will survive. Teach ’em to shovel shit and eat good breakfasts, get away from scumbags like him and her until she gets straightened out, who knows when it’ll come she keep up with him, humpin’ him in front of them, a disgrace.”

  “Try to calm down.”

  “Here, watch me calm down.” He inhaled deeply and let the air out in a noisy whoosh. I smelled the stench of his breath. He cracked his knuckles and the silver rings sparkled in the sun. “I’m relaxed, I’m clean, I’m ready for action, I’m the father, go in and tell her.”

  “It doesn’t work that way.”

  “Why not?” he growled and grabbed the front of my jacket.

  “Let go. We can’t talk if you keep doing that, Mr. Moody.”

  Slowly his fingers parted. I tried to edge away from him but my back touched the car. We were close enough to slow-dance.

  “Tell her! You fucked me up, you fix it, Headshrinker!”

  His voice had taken a decidedly menacing tone. Manics could do damage when they got worked up. As bad as paranoid schizes. It was obvious that the power of persuasion wasn’t going to do the trick.

  “Mr. Moody—Richard—you need help. I won’t do anything for you until you get it.”

  He sputtered, sprayed me with saliva, and jacked upward viciously with his knee, a classic street brawler’s move. It was one of the gambits I’d figured him for and I swiveled so that all he made contact with was gabardine.

  The miss threw him off-balance and he stumbled. Consciously sad, I caught his elbow and threw him off my hip. He landed on his back, stayed down for a quarter second, and was at me again, arms chopping like a thresher gone mad. I waited until he was almost on me, ducked low, and hit him in the belly just hard enough to knock some wind out. Moving out of the way I let him double over in privacy.

  “Please, Richard, calm down and pull it all together.”

  His response was a growl and a snivel and a
grab for my legs. He managed to get hold of one cuff and I felt myself going down. It would have been a good time to jump in the car and tool out of there, but he was between me and the driver’s door.

  I contemplated a move for the passenger door, but that would mean turning my back to him and he was strong and crazy-fast.

  As I contemplated, he bounded up and charged toward me shouting gibberish. My pity for him had made me too careless and he was able to connect with a punch to the shoulder that made my body rattle. Still stunned, I cleared my eyes soon enough to see the follow-through: a left hook aimed squarely at my man-made jaw. Self-preservation won out over pity and I slid away, took hold of his arm, and threw him full-force against the car. Before he could have second thoughts I jerked him up, yanked the arm behind him, and pulled up to the point where it was just short of snapping. It had to be agonizing but he evinced no sign of suffering. Manics could get like that, on a perpetual speed trip, impervious to minor details like pain.

  I kicked him in the butt as hard as I could and he went flying. Grabbing for my keys, I jumped in the Seville and spun out.

  I caught a glimpse of him in the rear-view mirror just before turning onto the street. He was sitting on the asphalt, head in hands, rocking back and forth and, I was pretty sure, weeping.

  2

  THE BIG black and gold koi was the first to surface, but the other fish soon followed his lead and within seconds all fourteen of them were sticking whiskered snouts out of the water and gobbling down food pellets as fast as I tossed them in. I knelt by a large smooth rock fringed with creeping juniper and lavender azaleas and held three pellets in my fingers just beneath the surface of the water. The big one caught the scent and hesitated, but gluttony got the better of him and his glistening muscular body snaked its way over. He stopped inches from my hand and looked up at me. I tried to appear trustworthy.

  The sun was on its way down but enough light lingered over the foothills to catch the metallic glint of the gold scales, dramatizing the contrast with the velvety black patches on his back. A truly magnificent kin-ki-utsuri.

  Suddenly the big carp darted and the pellets were gone from my hand. I replaced them. A red and white kohaku joined in, then a platinum ohgon in a moonlight-colored blur. Soon all the fish were nibbling at my fingers, their mouths soft as baby kisses.

  The pond and surrounding garden refuge had been a gift from Robin during the painful months of recuperation from the shattered jaw and all the unwanted publicity. She’d suggested it, sensing the value of something to calm me down during the period of enforced inactivity, and knowing of my fondness for things oriental.

  At first I’d thought it unfeasible. My home is one of those creations peculiar to southern California, tucked into a hillside at an improbable angle. It’s an architectural gem with spectacular views from three sides but there’s very little usable flat land and I couldn’t envision room for a pond.

  But Robin had done some research, sounding out the idea with several of her craftsmen friends, and had been put in touch with an inarticulate lad from Oxnard—a young man so outwardly stuporous his nickname was Hazy Clifton. He had arrived with cement mixers, wooden forms, and a ton or two of crushed rock, and had created an elegant, meandering, naturalistic pond, complete with waterfall and rock border, that weaved its way in and around the sloping terrain.

  An elderly Asian gnome materialized after Hazy Clifton’s departure and proceeded to embroider the young man’s artistry with bonsai, zen grass, juniper, Japanese maple, long-necked lilies, azalea, and bamboo. Strategically placed boulders established meditative spots and patches of snowy gravel suggested serenity. Within a week the garden looked centuries old.

  I could stand on the deck that bisected the two levels of the house and look down on the pond, letting my eyes trace patterns etched in the gravel by the wind, watching the koi, jewellike and languid in their movement. Or I could descend to the floor of the garden and sit by the water’s edge feeding the fish, the surface breaking gently in concentric waves.

  It became a ritual: each day before sunset I tossed pellets to the koi and reflected on how good life could be. I learned how to banish unwanted images—of death and falsehood and betrayal—from my mind with Pavlovian efficiency.

  Now I listened to the gurgling of the waterfall and put aside the memory of Richard Moody’s debasement.

  The sky darkened and the peacock-colored fish grayed and finally melted into the blackness of the water. I sat in the dark, content, tension a vanquished enemy.

  The first time the phone rang I was in the middle of dinner and I ignored it. Twenty minutes later it rang again and I picked it up.

  “Dr. Delaware? This is Kathy from your service. I had an emergency call for you a few minutes ago but nobody answered.”

  “What’s the message, Kathy?”

  “It’s from a Mr. Moody. He said it was urgent.”

  “Shit.”

  “Dr. D?”

  “Nothing, Kathy. Please give me the number.”

  She did and I asked her if Moody had sounded strange.

  “He was kind of upset. Talking real fast—I had to ask him to slow down to get the message.”

  “Okay. Thanks for calling.”

  “I’ve got another one, came in this afternoon. Do you want to take it?”

  “Just one? Sure.”

  “This one’s from a doctor—let me get the pronunciation right—Melendrez—no Melendez-Lynch. With a hyphen.”

  Now that was a blast from the past...

  “He gave me this number.” She recited an exchange I recognized as Melendez-Lynch’s office at Western Peds. “Said he’d be there until eleven tonight.”

  That figured. Raoul was a notable workaholic in a profession famous for them. I recalled seeing his Volvo in the doctors’ lot no matter how early I arrived at the hospital or how late I left.

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it, Dr. D. Have a nice one and thanks for the cookies. Me and the other girls finished ’em off in one hour.”

  “Glad you enjoyed them.” That was a five-pound box she was talking about. “Munchies?”

  “What can I say?” she giggled.

  A switchboard staffed by potheads and they never fouled up a message. Someone should be researching it.

  I drank a Coors before addressing the question of whether or not to return Moody’s call. The last thing I wanted was to be on the receiving end of a manic tirade. On the other hand, he might be calmer and more receptive to suggestions for treatment. Unlikely, but there’s enough of the therapist left in me to be optimistic past the point of realism. Recalling that afternoon’s scuffle on the parking lot made me feel like a jerk, though I was damned if I knew how it could have been avoided.

  I thought it over and then called, because I owed it to the Moody kids to give it my best shot.

  The number he’d left had a Sun Valley exchange—a rough neighborhood—and the voice on the other end belonged to the night clerk at the Bedabye Motel. Moody’d found the perfect living quarters if he wanted to feed his depression.

  “Mr. Moody, please.”

  “Second.”

  A series of buzzes and clicks and Moody said, “Yeah.”

  “Mr. Moody, it’s Dr. Delaware.”

  “’lo, Doc. Don’t know what got into me, jus’ wanted to say sorry, hope I dint shake you up too badly.”

  “I’m fine. How are you?”

  “Oh fine, jus’ fine. Got plans, gotta get myself together. I can see that. What everyone’s saying, gotta have some sense to it.”

  “Good. I’m glad you understand.”

  “Oh, yeah, oh yeah. I’m catchin’ on, jus’ takes me a while. Like the firs’ time I used a circular saw, supervisor tol’ me Richard—this was back when I was a kid, jus learning the trade—gotta take your time, take it slow, concentrate, ‘thwise this thing chew you up. And he’d hold up his left hand with a stump where the thumb shoulda been, said, Richard, don’ learn the hard way.�
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  He laughed hoarsely and cleared his throat.

  “Guess sometimes I learn the hard way, huh? Like with Darlene. Mighta listened to her before she got involved with that scumbag.”

  The pitch of his voice rose when he talked about Conley so I tried to ease him away from the subject.

  “The important thing is that you’re learning now. You’re a young man, Richard. You’ve got a lot ahead of you.”

  “Yeah. Well... old as you feel, y’know, and I’m feeling ninety.”