In Laymon's Terms

“Hell, yes. I had to drive into Portland last weekend to pick up some materials, some supplies, you know? Twice I walked into oncoming traffic! Then driving back here I had the Buick up to seventy and...well, do you know the area up north of there?”

“Yes, sir, I do, sir. Lived in this area all my life.”

“Well, then you know all these blind hills, all these hairpin turns along route 80. A dog, a cat, another car—any one of them could have sent me off the road. I’m not even that good a driver. Look, please don’t call me ‘sir,’ okay?”

“All right.”

“No offense.”

“None taken.”

“It reminds me of my father.”

“Your father?”

“He always wanted us to call him ‘sir.’ Know what I mean? So I’m supposed to be a painter, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, what I’m just trying to say here, it seems as though since Barbara left, everything’s completely drained of color. Everything’s gray. No color at all. It’s like the best of me, of my life, she took away with her. Like she took something I honestly can’t get back again. That I’ll never get back again. Like there’s no point. Like the best of me’s past and gone now. You see what I’m saying?”

“You can’t stop the pain. And you can’t see a future without it.”

“That’s right.”

He leaned forward, elbows on the desk. The chair creaked again. The rain pounded. They’d told him during the training sessions that just the act of talking to someone could temporarily change perspective, offer a reprieve, that simple human contact actually had the power to alter brain chemistry. He didn’t know if he believed that but it was time to get cracking.

“Can I ask you, have you given any thought to how you might do this?”

“Do what? Take my life?”

“Yes. You don’t have any guns in the house, do you?”

“No.”

“That’s good. How then?”

“I...I don’t know.”

“I bet you can’t guess what I used to do for a living.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m retired. You know what I used to do for a living?”

“What.”

“I was a cop.”

“A cop?”

“That’s right. Twenty-four years on the highway patrol.”

“Really?”

“That’s right.”

“I don’t get it. Why are you telling me this?”

“Because over twenty-four years you see things. A lot of things you don’t necessarily want to see. You know in some states attempted suicide’s still against the law? It is. And there’s a reason for that. Do you know what you goddamn people put us through? You jump off a bridge, we find you gray and blue and bloated in the water. We pick you up, good chance you’re gonna explode in our faces or fall the hell apart in our hands. Blow your head off and we pick pieces of you out of the carpet or the grass or scrape what passes for your brains off the goddamn walls. Take a dive off a building you maybe kill a pedestrian, whoops, sorry! We got to figure out who the fuck’s who. We pack you in bags, wipe away your vomit and shit and your piss. You miserable sonovabitch. You make somebody else pick up your cold dead guts and you think you’re worth the trouble. You want to die? You piece of shit I ought to kill you! I’d at least be cleaning up my own mess! My mess! Oh, you’re such a nice guy, you’re hurting, my fucking heart goes out to you!”

He could almost hear the pulse racing on the other end of the line and then it went dead. Same as the last four—though the teenage kid had hung up on him halfway through when he told him to stop sucking at his mother’s tit. The little prick.

He replaced the receiver.

He knew this couldn’t last. How could it? Somewhere along the line somebody, one of these goddamn whiners, was going to decide complaining about him was worth living for and that would be the end of it.

Meantime he figured he was doing a lot of good here.

He suspected he was probably batting four out of five.

He doubted the kid would off himself but then he doubted he’d be the one to do any complaining either.

It was time for that smoke. Hell, he was a volunteer. Screw the rules. He got out of the chair and left the office and walked down the empty hall to the men’s room, sat in a stall that still reeked of the janitor’s morning Lysol and lit up. He listened to the rain and wind outside. He got into a coughing fit, which served to remind him he had only one lung left which was why he’d left the HP in the first place. He wondered what he’d do with himself once they kicked him off this job.

Find another crisis center? They sure weren’t in short supply.

He flushed the butt and when he got back to the office the phone was ringing.

“Crisis Center Hotline. How can I help you?”

“I’m about to eat my weapon.”

“Excuse me? Say that again?”

“I said I’m about to eat my weapon. What are you, deaf? I just wanted somebody to know. Not that that makes any goddamn difference either.”

“Ralph?”

“Huh?”

“Ralph? Is that you?”

“What? Who the fuck is this?”

“Jesus Christ, Ralphy. It’s Joe. What the fuck are you talking about?” He’d know his ex-partner’s voice over a screaming crowd at Fenway Park.