“But she’s hot, if you could just see her,” he slurred.

“Don’t you even think about it,” he said threateningly, his voice low and mean. “I swear to God, if you do anything, I will…”

“You’ll what? Kill me?” More raucous laughter. “Sounds like you’d be cutting off your nose to spite your face, my friend. Well, where the hell am I supposed to go? Tell me that. I can’t go home, I can’t go to work.”

The door to the bedroom opened then and an equally exhausted Ruth appeared.

“I’ll call you back.” He hung up quickly.

“Who was on the phone at this hour?” she asked quietly. She was dressed in her robe, her arms hugging her body protectively. Her eyes were bleary and puffed, her hair pulled back in a ponytail; she looked so fragile, as if a raised voice might blow her over and break her. For the second time that night his heart melted, and he moved toward her, arms open.

“It was just a guy I know,” he whispered, stroking her hair. “He’s out drunk; I wish he’d stop calling. I wish he’d just go away,” he added quietly. He tossed his phone aside into a pile of teddy bears on the floor. “How are you?” He pulled away and examined her face closely. Her head was boiling hot, but she shivered in his arms.

“I’m fine.” She gave him a wobbly smile.

“No, you’re not fine, go back to bed, and I’ll get you a facecloth. I know where they are now,” he joked, and she smiled lightly. He kissed her affectionately on the forehead. Her eyes closed, and her body relaxed in his arms.

He almost broke their embrace to jump in the air and holler with celebration, because for the first time in a long time he felt her give up the fight with him. For the past six months, whenever he’d held her she had been rigid and taut, as though she was protesting him somehow, refusing to validate his behavior. He reveled in this moment, feeling her relax against him: a silent but huge victory for their marriage.

Among the pile of teddies his phone vibrated again, bouncing around in Paddington Bear’s arms. His screen flashed on again, and he had to look away, not able to stand the thought of himself. Now he could understand how Ruth felt.

“There’s your friend again,” Ruth said, pulling away slightly, allowing him to reach for his phone.

“No, leave him.” He ignored the call, bringing her closer to him again. “Ruth,” he said gently, lifting her chin so she could look at him. “I’m sorry.”

Ruth looked up at him in shock, then examined him carefully for the catch. There had to be a catch. Lou Suffern had said he was sorry. Sorry was not a word in his vocabulary.

From the corner of Lou’s eye, the phone kept vibrating, hopping around and falling out of Paddington Bear’s paws and onto Winnie the Pooh’s head, being passed around from teddy to teddy like a hot potato. Each time the phone stopped, it quickly started again, as if laughing at him, telling him he was weak for uttering those words to Ruth. He fought that side of himself, that drunken, foolish, childish, irrational side of him, and refused to answer the phone, refused to let go of his wife. He swallowed hard.

“I love you, you know.”

It was as though it was the first time she’d ever heard it. It was as though they were back at the very first Christmas they’d spent together, sitting in her parents’ living room in Galway—the cat curled in a ball on its favorite cushion by the fire; the crazy dog a few years too many in this world outside in the backyard, barking at everything that moved and everything that didn’t. Lou had told her then, by the fake white Christmas tree. The gaudy tree would slowly be lit up by tiny green, red, and blue bulbs, and then the lights would slowly fade out before gearing up again. Despite its ugliness, it was relaxing, like a chest heaving slowly up and down. It was the first moment they’d had together all day, the only moments they’d have before he’d have to sleep on the couch and Ruth would disappear to her room. He wasn’t planning on saying it; in fact, he was planning on never saying it, but it had popped out. Then the words were out, and his world had immediately changed. Twenty years later in their daughter’s bedroom, it felt like the same moment all over again, with that same look of pleasure and surprise on Ruth’s face.

“Oh, Lou,” she said softly, closing her eyes and savoring the moment. Then suddenly her eyes flicked open, a flash of alarm in them that scared Lou to death about what she was about to say. What did she know? His past behavior came gushing back at him as he panicked. He thought of the other part of him, out there and drunk, possibly destroying this new relationship with his wife, destroying the repairs they had just achieved. He had a vision of the two Lous: one building a brick wall, the other moving behind him with a sledgehammer and knocking down everything as soon as it was built. In reality, that’s what Lou had been doing all along. Building his family up with one hand, while the other shattered everything he’d strived so hard to create.

Ruth quickly let go of him and rushed away into Lucy’s bathroom, where he heard the toilet seat go up and the contents of her insides empty into the bowl. Hating anyone being with her during moments like this, Ruth, ever the multitasker, managed, in mid-vomit, to lift her foot to kick the bathroom door closed.

Lou sighed and collapsed to the floor on the pile of teddies. He picked up the phone that had begun to vibrate yet again.

“What now?” he said in a dull voice, expecting to hear his own drunken voice on the other end. But he didn’t.

The Turkey Boy 3

BULLSHIT,” THE TURKEY BOY SAID as Raphie paused for breath.

Raphie didn’t say anything; instead, he chose to wait for something more constructive to come out of the boy’s mouth.

“Total bullshit,” he said again.

“Okay, that’s enough,” Raphie said, standing up from the table and gathering the mug, Styrofoam cup, and candy wrappers from the chocolates he’d managed to munch through while he was telling his story. “I’ll leave you alone in peace now to wait for your mother.”

“No, wait!” Turkey Boy spoke up.

Raphie continued walking to the door.

“You can’t just end the story there,” the boy said incredulously. “You can’t leave me hanging.”

“Ah, well, that’s what you get for being unappreciative,” Raphie said with a shrug, “and for throwing turkeys through windows.” He left the interrogation room.

Jessica was in the station’s tiny kitchen, having another coffee. Her eyes were red, and the bags under them had darkened.

“Coffee break already?” He pretended not to notice her withering appearance.

“You’ve been in there for ages.” She blew on her coffee and sipped, not moving the mug from her lips as she spoke, eyes looking away in the distance.

“It’s a long story. Your face okay?”

She gave a single nod, the closest she’d ever get to commenting on the cuts and scrapes across her skin. She changed the subject. “So how far did you get in the story?”

“Lou Suffern’s first pill.”

“What did he say?”

“I do believe ‘Bullshit’ was the expression he used, which was then closely followed by ‘Total bullshit.’”

Jessica smiled lightly. “You got further than I thought. You should show him the tapes of that night. They just came in from the audiovisual conference call. They show a guy who looks exactly like Lou walking out of the boardroom, while at the same time another guy, who also looks exactly like Lou, is sitting at the conference table. Still no sight or word from Gabe though.”

“It could be Gabe in the conference call video.” Raphie thought hard. “He and Lou look very alike.”

“That would be much easier to believe but…”

“You don’t believe it?”

“You don’t believe the cloning version?”