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Prologue
October 1998
Is a life defined by circumstances, or do circumstances define a life?
I’ve been asking myself that same question this whole drive.Like most men nearing thirty, I like to think I’m the master of my own destiny. More and more lately, I’m finding that belief to be nothing more than a narcissistic pipe dream designed to make slightly self-conscious guys like me feel better about themselves. Especially because all the research I’ve done lately points in every opposing direction.
How can you be the master of anything when life chops you at the knees every time you try to stand up?
We all hear about the positive scenarios. The one where a third-generational inner-city kid breaks out of the violent gang his father and grandfather, and great-grandfather all belonged to, graduates from college, and then becomes the poster child for the phrase, “if you just put your mind to it, anything is possible.”
Or the prom queen who sleeps with her boyfriend once, gets pregnant at sixteen, raises that baby as a single mom and puts her life on hold for two decades, then becomes a nurse and every third person calls her reinvention story “inspiring.” You know, the same people who shunned her when she was an unwed teenage mother and had nothing to offer but a bullseye labeled Gossip About Me on her chest.
Or the drug addict who overdoses on heroin, finds God in rehab, and starts over as an evangelical pastor who preaches against the dangers of addiction and sex—both of which suddenly go hand in hand when one makes it his mission to save the world.
The point being, everyone knows a celebratory redemption story, one where the person in question overcomes adversity and becomes the main character in an undeniably remarkable turnaround story.
But there’s nothing but ridicule for the ones who never turn things around.
Like the socialite whose ex-husband was arrested on a money laundering charge and is now an outcast among her former upscale circle. Or the father who abandoned everything for his mistress and now lives an isolated existence in a run-down apartment with no mistress, ex-wife, or kids. Or the bank executive who embezzled money and lost it all only to wind up living under a forty-second street bridge with his close friend Jack Daniels. Or the beauty queen who fell victim to a botched facelift and now curses her existence behind two-inch thick, closed miniblinds.
No one celebrates the fallen and discarded because no one wants to admit it could happen to them. But we’re all just one misstep away from living an upside-down life while the rest of the world points out all the ways we deserve it.
And that brings me back to the question. Is life defined by circumstances, or do circumstances define a life? From what I gather, the short answer is this: When you spend your life around rotten people, you wind up in rotten situations. And if you’re not careful, the rotten rubs off, sometimes infecting a body that wasn’t even standing nearby. Everyone forgets that rotten carries a stench that travels far and worms its way inside the lungs to irritate the whole part.
From all the research I’ve done in the last two weeks, almost everyone in Sally’s world, most of whom disappeared a long time ago, was rotten. Her caregivers, her instructors, her friends. In short, Sally doesn’t belong to anyone, and no one belongs to her. She regularly broadcasts that fact by living alone in a rundown shack at the edge of town and daring anyone to cross her property line. The walls around that woman are high, both physically and metaphorically speaking.
It’s no wonder everyone thinks she’s crazy.
My only question is whether it’s all an act.
While rain falls harder, I push down the blinker and make a left turn onto a spottily paved two-lane road, with an abandoned gas station on one side and a partially collapsed barn on the other. I stare at the second-story barn loft, remnants of long-forgotten straw dangling from a decaying windowsill. Useless, abandoned, like so many other things in this backward town.“Finn, were you born in a barn?”I can hear the often-spoken words from my mother in my childhood when I left the back door open on my way outside to play a pickup game of basketball in the school yard across the street. What I never said was I wished I had been born in one. Barns hold generational secrets, and I’ve always been curious about the past. But that sort of response would have earned me a swat.
The barn disappears in the rearview mirror, a cloud of dust obstructing it in my wake. A tiny greeting card store blurs past on my left, followed by a couple farm houses and a large greenhouse with a dilapidated sign that reads “Ford’s Country Gardens” dangling from what appears to be a single rusty nail. The sign sways a bit in the breeze; I wouldn’t want to be standing nearby during a strong wind.
Right past the sign is her house.
I slow to a crawl as my pulse ratchets up, the woman’s reputation preceding my arrival. Billi is supposed to meet me here, but so far, I’m the only one who’s arrived. As the clear outsider in this scenario, I don’t like being here alone.
While I wait, I roll the passenger window down a few inches to take the structure in—a tiny house that might have been nice at one time but now is nothing more than a shack—wondering how any human could live in those conditions.
A small section of the roof is caved in at the back, a three-foot strip covered in a tattered gray tarp to keep the rain out. In my mind, I picture a row of metal buckets placed side by side on the kitchen floor, quickly filling up with raindrops, gathering the remnants from what a plastic tarp couldn’t possibly manage. The front entrance is nothing more than a two-by-six hole. Rough and weathered two-by-fours make up a door that hasn’t seen a coat of paint in decades. A cheap screen hung askew and slapped against it in irregular intervals.Slap bam! Bam! Slap…bam!I’m mesmerized by the sound, staring straight at it briefly in a trance-like state until movement catches my eye in my peripheral vision and snaps me out of it.
My gaze swings to the source of the movement, and I freeze.
A filthy, wrinkled woman stands in front of my car, naked from the waist up. An old prairie-style skirt hangs from her waist in an ironic juxtaposition; scandalous on top, modest on bottom, leaving only half her body to the most disturbing imagination. Her hair is wiry and gray, tangled in a heavy mass that likely hasn’t seen a brush in weeks. If she has teeth, she doesn’t show them, not even to snarl. Her chin juts from its lowest point, the only thing that lets me know she’s angry. I blink, stunned by what I’m seeing and unable to make sense of it, but also unable to turn away. I’ve seen this before. Déjà vu with no context.
I come to my senses and avert my eyes, using fumbling hands to roll down my window. To say something. Anything. Topless women aren’t supposed to be standing by an open roadway, even one so lightly trafficked. I start to ask her if she’s cold. To offer her the sports coat currently folded neatly across the passenger seat of my car. It’s Italian silk, but I have another one at home. A car whizzes by in a rush; not Billi like I hoped, but a carload of whistling, taunting high school boys. Ignoring them, I attempt to forge ahead like the good Samaritan my mom raised me to be.
“Can I…” the words trip from my open mouth, fighting to break free from the shock of the moment not yet worn off. Too late, I realize my mistake. Too late, I notice the gun in her hand.
My reflexes misfire all at once as I rush to shift into reverse, back up, and get the hell out of here. Every intention I have is a split second too slow. Before the gear makes it into position, the old woman lets out a scream, raises her gun…
And shoots me.
I
Part 1
