Winter Moon

shuddering as if with fever chills, though that stage of his illness

had passed almost two days ago. Heather squeezed her eyes shut, bit

down on her tongue almost hard enough to draw blood, being strong,

being strong even if, damn it, no one should ever have to be so

strong.

"Gotta go," she said softly.

Toby pulled back from her.

She smiled at him, smoothed his tousled hair.

He settled into the armchair and propped his legs on the stool again.

She tucked the blankets around him, then turned the sound up on the

television once more.

Elmer Fudd trying to terminate Bugs Bunny. Cwazy wabbit. Boom-boom,

bang-bang, whapitta-whapittawhap, thud, clunk, hoo-ha, around and

around in perpetual pursuit.

In the kitchen, Heather hugged Mae Hong and whispered, "Don't let him

watch any regular channels, where he might see a news brief."

Mae nodded. "If he gets tired of cartoons, we'll play games."

"Those bastards on the TV news, they always have to show you the blood,

get the ratings. I don't want him seeing his father's blood on the

ground."

The storm washed all the color out of the day. The sky was as charry

as burned-out ruins, and from a distance of even half a block, the palm

trees looked black. Wind-driven rain, gray as iron nails, hammered

every surface, and gutters overflowed with filthy water.

Louie Silverman was in uniform, driving a squad car, so he used the

emergency beacons and siren to clear the surface streets ahead of them,

staying off the freeways.

Sitting in the shotgun seat beside Louie, hands clasped between her

thighs, shoulders hunched, shivering, Heather said, "Okay, it's just us

now, Toby can't overhear, so tell me straight."

"It's bad. Left leg, lower right abdomen, upper right side of the

chest. The perp was armed with a Micro Uzi, nine-millimeter

ammunition, so they weren't light rounds. Jack was unconscious when we

hit the scene, paramedics couldn't bring him around."

"And Luther's dead."

"Yeah."

"Luther always seemed ..."

"Like a rock."

"Yeah. Always going to be there. Like a mountain."

They rode in silence for a block.

Then she asked, "How many others?"

"Three. One of the station owners, mechanic, pump jockey. But because

of Jack, the other owner, Mrs. Arkadian, she's alive."

They were still a mile or so from the hospital when a Pontiac ahead of

them refused to pull over to let the black-and-white pass. It had

oversize tires, a jacked-up front end, and air scoops front and back.

Louie waited for a break in oncoming traffic, then crossed the solid

yellow line to get around the car. Passing the Pontiac, Heather saw

four angry-looking young men in it, hair slicked back and tied behind,

affecting a modern version of the gangster look, faces hard with

hostility and defiance.

"Jack's going to make it, Heather."

The wet black streets glimmered with serpentine patterns of frost-cold

light, reflections of the headlights of oncoming traffic.

"He's tough," Louie said. "We all are," she said.

Jack was still in surgery at Westside General Hospital when Heather

arrived at a quarter past ten. The woman at the information desk

supplied the surgeon's name--Dr. Emil Procnow--and suggested waiting

in the visitors' lounge outside the intensive care unit rather than in

the main lobby.

Theories of the psychological effects of color were at work in the

lounge. The walls were lemon yellow, and the padded vinyl seats and

backrests of the gray tubular steel chairs were bright orange--as if

any intensity of worry, fear, or grief could be dramatically relieved

by a sufficiently cheerful decor.

Heather wasn't alone in that circus-hued room. Besides Louie, three

cops were present--two in uniform, one in street clothes--all of whom

she knew. They hugged her, said Jack was going to make it, offered to

get her coffee, and in general tried to keep her spirits up. They were

the first of a stream of friends and fellow officers from the

Department who would participate in the vigil because Jack was well

liked but also because, in an increasingly violent society where

respect for the law wasn't cool in some circles, cops found it more

necessary than ever to take care of their own.

In spite of the well-meaning and welcome company, the wait was

excruciating.

Heather seemed no less alone than if she had been by herself.

Bathed in an abundance of harsh fluorescent light, the yellow walls and

the shiny orange chairs seemed to grow brighter minute by minute.

Rather than diluting her anxiety, the decor made her twitchy, and

periodically she had to close her eyes.

By 11:15, she had been in the hospital for an hour, and Jack had been

in surgery an hour and a half. Those in the support group--which now

numbered six--were unanimous in their judgment that so much time under

the knife was a good sign. If Jack had been mortally wounded, they

said, he would have been in the operating room only a short while, and

bad news would have come quickly.

Heather wasn't so sure about that. She wouldn't allow her hopes to

rise because that would just leave her farther to fall if the news was

bad after all.