Mourn The Living. Henry Perez
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to step in for him as soon as you can.
Chapa listened to the message twice. Matt Sullivan wasn’t prone to wild exaggeration or quick to panic. Chakowski had been the paper’s chief political reporter since before Chapa started there fifteen years earlier. The veteran newsman had taken Chapa under his wing and guided him through some difficult times.
What could’ve happened? Chapa wondered. Something terrible? If it had been a heart attack or car accident Sullivan would’ve said so. Concerned for his friend, he tried to think of a way to find out without calling the paper. When he came up dry, Chapa let out a long breath, and phoned his editor.
“It’s awful, Alex. They’re blaming it on a gas leak, maybe some bad electrical wiring, or a combination of the two.”
“How did it happen?”
“Damned if I know. But it was an old house, and it had old wiring and probably even older pipes.” It sounded like Sullivan was making no effort to hide the tension in his voice. “You’re heading back, right? On your way home?”
“That’s right. What was Jim working on?”
Chapa felt himself slipping back into investigative reporter mode. His instincts muscling out everything else.
“The usual, local business news, some politics. I’m sure there was a pet story or two that he was tracking. But Chakowski is like you.”
Chapa noticed Sullivan’s use of present tense—Chakowski is like you. It would take a while for a lot of folks to get used to the idea that someone as vital as Jim Chakowski was gone, just like that.
“I take that as a compliment, Matt. But like me, how?”
“You both have a habit of telling me what you’re up to on a need-to-know basis. As a result, your editor sometimes doesn’t know much.”
Chapa liked Sullivan. The guy didn’t always hold his own against the brass, but he was one of the good guys and very good at his job.
“Look, Matt, I’d love to help out, I think you know how I feel about Jim, but I don’t know squat about his beat,” Sullivan was trying to sneak in a word or two, but Chapa didn’t let him. “And even if I did, I’ve got other plans for the next several days.”
“I know you do, and I respect that, but it wouldn’t take much time, not really. Jim already had a couple of stories in the pipeline, and I could scale back the number of column inches you’d have to fill.”
Chapa wanted to think about this situation, and told Sullivan that, then signed off before his editor could pitch it to him again. Part of him felt he owed it to Chakowski. Who else could take over? No one. Then there was the issue of job security, or rather the lack of it. Sullivan had been decent enough to avoid bringing that up. But Chapa, like most other newspaper reporters in the twenty-first century, had no guarantee of still having a job next month, or even next week.
Those were the simple realities of working in an outdated industry, and several years of falling revenues and budget cuts had left him vulnerable to the next wave of layoffs. He was well paid and a columnist, both of which made him expendable. Taking over an existing beat could buy Chapa an extra week on the job, and maybe that could lead to an extra month, perhaps longer.
He took his eyes off the road long enough to sneak a glance in the direction of the backseat, and reasoned that doing what his editor was asking would only take him away for three or four hours a day, tops. When Sullivan called back a short while later, Chapa didn’t hesitate.
“I’ll do it, Matt, but I get overtime for the next two weeks.”
“I can do that.”
“And none of this counts as vacation time.”
“A little tougher to pull off, but consider it done.”
“Give me the address.”
“806 Dwight Street, it’s over by—”
“I know where it is, I’ve lived in Oakton for a long time. I’ll be there in less than two hours.”
As Chapa put the phone back into a cup holder that was still sticky from a minor coffee spill a week earlier, he heard his traveling companion stirring in the backseat. He took a look in his rearview and saw her eyes open.
“Hi Daddy,” Nikki said in a voice that was still more asleep than awake. “Did I hear my favorite song playing on your cell phone?”
Chapter 4
Three days earlier
Chapa stood in the middle of what he now understood to be the living room, though it was at least four times the size of an apartment he’d once rented. Unlike the other three large rooms he’d been led through on his way there, this one was two stories in height.
Carla was looking down at him from a balcony on the second floor. She smiled, nodded, turned then vanished, only to reappear across the room from him a minute later.
“You look good, Alex.”
Carla looked better. She always had. Chapa wondered if his ex-wife had some work done, but he knew she didn’t need any. Carla’s high cheekbones, like her light blue eyes and thick blond hair, all came naturally.
She walked toward Chapa, then stopped just a couple of feet from him, like she wasn’t sure whether to hug him, offer a handshake, or do nothing at all. Chapa didn’t move, and he wasn’t interested in any niceties, let alone physical contact. The smell of her fragrance, deceptively gentle, encircled him like a coy predator.
“You could’ve called, let us know you were coming, Alex.”
Chapa shrugged. “I was in the neighborhood. The court order says our time together begins today. Would you like to read it again?” he started to reach inside his jacket.
Carla shook her head and turned away.
This was Chapa’s first trip to Boston. The first time he’d been to the house his daughter had moved to with her mother and stepfather. Several years of court battles had seen his ability to have some say over his child’s life dwindle down to an afterthought.
Chapa hadn’t spoken with Nikki for more than two weeks, and had not seen the ten-year-old in nearly six months. When Carla began making some noise about her husband Stephen adopting Nikki, Chapa fired his attorney and replaced him with a far more aggressive one. Though he was still trying to figure out how he would manage to afford the guy, his new lawyer wasted no time in shutting down any talk of an adoption and doing what he could to make certain Chapa’s rights as a father were protected.
“Where’s Nikki?”
“She’ll be home in a short while. We’re part of a carpool, and today it’s one of the other moms’ turn to bring her home.”
“If I’d known that I would’ve picked her up from school.”
“No need. She’ll be home soon.”
Chapa nodded, then continued to take in his surroundings. Lush carpeting gave way to tiles that disappeared down each of the four hallways leading to the rest of the house. Various tchotchkes, which Chapa assumed had come from other countries the couple had visited, rested on tables and otherwise useless pedestals. A mirror that had been placed far too high on a wall for anyone to look into, reflected the elaborate light fixture hanging from the middle of the ceiling.
“Alex, are you sure you can take care of her?”
“She’s my daughter. I took care of her for six years. I’m not new at this.”
Chapa saw the concern on his ex’s face. No matter his problems with Carla, and they were great in both number and scope, he knew she had worked to be a good mother from the moment Nikki was born. Though Chapa also understood it wasn’t something that came naturally to her.
Some of the choices she’d made for their daughter troubled him.