“You missed him by an hour, Mr. Man,” the charge nurse said.
A broad woman packed into navy-blue polyester pants and a billowing white nurse coat, she conveyed warmth and authority in equal measure. A sunshine logo on her coat accompanied equally cheery canary-yellow lettering, which read MCCLAIR CHILDREN’S MENTAL HEALTH CENTER.
Evan put away his forged Child Protective Services credential, flapping closed the worn brown billfold. The wallet, in addition to his frayed Dockers and Timex watch, were props that screamed Ordinary Guy on State-Employee Salary.
Tapping his clipboard against his thigh, he hurried to accompany the nurse as she ambled down the hall.
“Missed him?” Evan said. “What do you mean missed him? His caseworker visitation is overdue.”
“Baby doll, the only things here that ain’t overdue are the late notices on the bills. We are bailing out a rowboat with a Dixie Cup.”
In one of the rooms, a kid was thrashing against the wall and bellowing. Two orderlies restrained him, one for each arm.
The nurse stopped in the doorway. “C’mon now, Daryl,” she said. “Act like you got some sense in you.”
The boy calmed, and she kept on.
A few perfunctory posters were gummed to the bare walls, tattered and ripped. Lichtenstein apple. Picasso face. A faded Starry Night. Stacked on a service cart were dining trays filled with half-eaten meals. Watery green beans. Cube of corn bread. Hard-crusted grilled-cheese sandwiches. The place smelled of industrial detergent, bleach, and kids of a certain age kept in close proximity.
Evan knew this place, knew it in his bones.
He cleared his throat as if nervously, adjusted his fake glasses. “You said I missed Jesse Watson?”
Joey’s additional online machinations had confirmed that this was the name David Smith had been living under at the Richmond facility. Joey was outside now in the rented minivan, a block away in an overwatch position near the intersection.
The nurse paused and heaved a sigh that smelled of peppermint. “He ran away.”
“Ran away? When?”
“Like I said, he was gone before seven-o’clock bed check. So call it a hour, maybe a hour and a half. Musta slipped out the back door during the commotion.” Her mouth tweaked left, a show of sympathy. “Girl in six had a grand mal at mealtime.”
Evan shoved his glasses up his nose, a cover for the actual dread he felt rising from his stomach into his throat.
She registered his concern. “We already filed the police report. I’m sorry, but it’s in their hands now.”
“Okay. I’ll just do a living-conditions check and be on my way.”
“We do the best we can do here with the state funds shrinking all the time.”
“I understand.”
“Do you?”
“I do.”
She stopped and took his measure, the raised freckles bunching high on her copper-colored cheeks. Then she blew out a breath, deflating. “Look at us, acting like we on different sides. I’m sorry, Mr.…?”
“Wayne.”
“Mr. Wayne. I know you’re just trying to do the best you can, too. I guess it’s…” Her not-insignificant bosom heaved. “I guess I’m embarrassed we can’t do better by them. I use my own salary for Christmas and birthday gifts. The director, too. He’s a good man. But good isn’t enough sometimes.”
“No,” Evan said. “Sometimes it’s not. Which room was he in?”
“Fourteen,” she said. “We group the kids with less severe conditions in the C Hall. We’re talking ADHD, dyslexia, visual-motor stuff.”
“And Jesse’s condition was…?” Evan flipped through the pages.
“Conduct disorder.”
“Of course.”
She waved a hand adorned with hammered metal rings. “C’mon, I’ll walk you.”
The walk took longer than Evan would have liked, but he held her pace. They passed a girl sitting on the floor picking at the hem of her shirt. Her fingernails were bitten to the quick, leaving spots of blood on the fabric.
“Hi, baby doll, be back for you in a second, okay?” the nurse said.
The girl turned vacant eyes up toward them as they passed. She had beautiful thick hair like Joey’s, a similarity Evan chose not to linger on.
The nurse finally arrived at Room 14, knocked on the door once briskly, and opened it. The three boys inside, all around the age of thirteen like David Smith, lounged on bunk beds, tapping on cheap phones.
In another time, in another place, Evan had lived in this room.
“This is Mr. Wayne,” the nurse said.
The oldest-looking kid shot a quick glance at Evan and said, “Lucky-ass us. Another social worker.”
“Respect, Jorell, or I’ll notch you down to red on the board again.”
Evan asked, “Did any of you see Jesse Watson run away?”
They all shook their heads.
“He didn’t talk about it before? No planning? Nothing?”
“Nah,” Jorell said. “That fool was bent. For a skinny white boy? He was nails. Could fight like a mofo. He had things his own way.”
“Jorell,” the nurse said wearily.
It wasn’t the first time she’d said his name like that. Or the hundredth.
“Where were you guys before bed check?” Evan said.
“Still in the caf,” another kid said. “Mindin’ our bidness. Jesse come back to the room early, do push-ups and shit. He say he gonna be a marine.”
Evan stepped inside, pointed. “This his bunk?”
“The very one,” Jorell said.
Jorell was a smart kid. Smart kids in places like this tended to have worse outcomes. A nice dumb boy could toe the line, graduate with C’s, get a steady job at a fast-food joint, live to see thirty.
On the radiator by the empty lower left bunk rested a Lego version of a Star Wars rebel commanding a Snowspeeder. Evan recognized it from one of Peter’s comic books. He picked it up. “This was Jesse’s?”
“Yeah. Ain’t that some white-boy shit?”
All three kids laughed, even the Caucasian one.
The charge nurse said, “You just dying for me to level you down tonight, ain’t that so, Jorell?”
He silenced.
Holding the Snowspeeder, Evan stepped back to her, said quietly, “I’m guessing this was one of the gifts that came out of your salary.”
She nodded.
Evan said, “It’s probably the only thing in the world he has that’s actually his.”
Her mocha eyes held the weight of all forty lives she’d been charged with. “That’s probably right.”
“I doubt he’d run away and leave it behind.”
“What are you saying, Mr. Wayne? The boy broke out. Happens all the time.”
Evan set the Lego rebel back on the radiator and stepped toward the sash window. It rattled up arthritically. He leaned out, noted the fresh gouge marks in the paint on the sill.
“They usually break out from the outside?” he said.
The charge nurse came over and looked at the window, and her hand pressed against her neck. Seeing her expression, he regretted his phrasing.
“I’ll call the police again,” she said quietly.
The boys had silenced; even Jorell had sobered up.
Evan started for the door. “Like you said, it’s in their hands now.”
As he hustled out, he passed that girl in the hall, forgotten, picking at the hem of her shirt with bloody fingernails. In his mind’s eye, he pictured Joey sitting in her place.
He blinked away the image, banishing it from his thoughts, and kept on.