The Knowing Day

by Mike Dwyer

"Gerry, I'm glad you came. This will be a good visit."

Chet’s voice held too much calm. No smile, he knew not to try that, but his quasi-caring tone oozed steadiness, like a surgeon's to a patient about to go under. I pictured me lunging across the table, choking him out before a guard could grab me. Just a fantasy, I knew.

"It's not like you could come to me, Chet. You know, being incarcerated and all." I aimed for a biting edge, but it came out bratty. Haha, you're broken and I'm not. Chet and I were both broken, just in unlike ways for unlike reasons.

I hadn't seen him since his sentencing six years ago, and it was my first time at a prison. The visiting area's cushy upholstered chairs were a surprise, as were the shining wood-planked floors and framed Great Smokies prints gracing the warm blue walls. This awful visit was strictly need, zero want, and the out-of-place ambiance set me even more on edge.

Chet's looks hadn't changed much, save for some added muscle and the inked lightning bolt/swastika combos on his wrists, which were locked to the lacquered tabletop. He saw me linger on them and said, "Not reflective of my beliefs, Gerry. They're for protection, and a semblance of belonging to something. Gotta have both in here."

I shrugged and responded, "They fit a murdering coward." I got the bite right that time, but Chet stuck with his sensitive shtick, quietly replying, "If that belief helps you cope, Gerry, then hold onto it. I never hurt Angie, but I still don't blame you for thinking I did. In your shoes, not knowing the truth, I might think the same thing."

My hands balled into the tightest of fists, so I closed my eyes and did the inhale/exhale flow sequence I learned at my grief group. Whatever helps.

I then told him, "First, do not say my daughter's name. Second, I'm here because your lawyer said you will now tell me, finally, where her body is. He said you would only do that in person. Did you lie to get me here?"

"My lawyer, Mr. Jensen, believes in my innocence and is aware of the danger I'm in. He thought you could do something for me." He put his hands together, prayer style, or just pleading.

"I know that sounds ridiculous to you, Gerry, but Mr. Jensen is the eternal optimist. Never give up hope, right? You could help me, and An.., um, your daughter, she could still be found!"

I did a both-hands tabletop slap, but it was light, controlled. "Four or five lies just spewed from you, Chet. Gotta be closing in on the thousand mark."

Why had I come? I knew he wouldn't tell me where Angie was. That would increase his sentence, maybe to life. As it stood now, five 'good behavior' years would be cut from Chefs paltry twenty-five (I guess Nazism wasn't labeled 'bad behavior'). Counting the two years he did before the verdict, he could be freed in his mid-forties. Insane.

Chet leaned forward and spoke quietly, like we were confidants. "The leader of the group I pretend to be part of, his twenty years is done and he'll be released in five days. Despite his warped worldview, he has cared for me, protected me. But his successor hates me and will cast me out first thing. Then, I'm a dead man. He told me himself, he's having me killed next week!" Me, me, me, this snake called Chet.

A sensation came, one so long gone I didn't recognize it. Giddiness. Semi, anyway. "Wow, Chet, what can I say? I look forward to the big event."

He ignored that, said, "Gerry, I need to be moved to another facility, now. A few words on my behalf from you - to the authorities, the media, both - it would get me switched. And safe."

He repeated the pray/plead gesture. "Your testimony helped condemn me. What you said about me being a sociopath. About hearing me threaten your daughter, hearing me warn her not to get pregnant. You hurt my case." His eyes widened. "After all that, anything supportive from you now would be big! You could say you were mistaken. About some of it, at least. You could make my transfer happen. You have that power!"

I waved a dismissive hand. "It wasn't me who got you. It was the hair strands and blood droplets you missed in your truck bed. It was those cuts on your face, mixed with Angle's DNA. Watching your televised plea for volunteer searchers, people saw your cuts. Your lies."

I wasn't done. "It was that camping couple, Chet. They saw you hit Angie. Saw you drive away with her and return to the tent eight hours later, alone. Saw you pack up and leave, alone. They were up above you, using strong binoculars for birdwatching. You were their bird."

Chet wouldn't quit. "Most of what they said wasn't true. Your daughter hiked from there, alone. But the campers don't matter. YOU can speak up for me, Gerry. People will listen and I can get my transfer. Please, help me. Save my life!"

As I arose, I was almost glad to have come. My visit's purpose wasn't served but Chet would in mere days be dead, so there was that. I made it to the exit, turned the door handle, and got halfway out. Chet then shouted it: the frantic last-second, "Wait!" The shouted-at character sometimes does wait, other times keeps right on going. I hesitated, then chose the former - in the thin hope that he might still tell me.

I returned, stood over him, and with a small burst of theatrics, I cupped a hand behind my ear and waited. Chet said, "That solo hike she went off on from our campsite? I said she went south. But I'd forgotten something, and it only recently came to me." This did not sound like a confession, but I took a breath and kept listening.

"A couple days earlier, your daughter had mentioned a remote lookout spot she'd heard about. She said it was supposed to be gorgeous. I was still stomach-sick and had just vomited again, like I said at the trial. I must have misheard her. Maybe she hiked out to that lookout, Gerry. NOT south. North. Round trip, it's a full day's walk from that campsite."

I sat back down and did the breathing exercise again, my eyes shut tight to staunch any tears. The crying Chet saw from me at the trial; he wouldn't see it again. Eyes still closed, I asked him so softly, "Where is Angie's body? She was pregnant. Where is she now?"

"I remember now, more or less, where she said that lookout was. Search crews could check near it, give it a thirty-yard radius. I can tell you where to look. But I need to transfer from here. If you can make that happen and get it in writing that I won't be sent back, I can help you find her. I know that lookout is the spot, Gerry. I can feel it."

Eight years now since Angie went missing. Since Chet murdered her and their unborn child. Six since he was found guilty and stayed silent about where he buried her. Now he feared for his life and would make a deal. IF I lied to the world and said I now supported him, believed him. Then, my knowing day would come.

Angie and I were a joyful dad-kid duo from the start. Her mom, a French exchange student I met during her overseas semester at UT, got pregnant two months into our dating.

She chose to gut it out, stay with me at my off-campus apartment, then have the baby. Three weeks after Angie made her entrance, Jeanne declared she had no interest in the idea or practice of motherhood, then flew back to Marseille.

I wrote her letters about our little girl and we visited over there when Angie was two. After a nice enough stay, we said our goodbyes to Jeanne, went home, and got on with life. It was a good one. My daughter often exclaimed, "Single dads rock!" and each time it made me grin. She would grin at my grin and we'd escalate to goofy laughs. The years rolled along, with joyful, easy-flowing humor, trust, and love between us. Each day.

Yeah, I could be the cliched bereft parent, looking back with add­ons and embellishments, inflating the happiness to offset the heartbreak. Maybe there were fault lines I don't wish to remember. But I tell you, the relationship we had - it was real and good, and it was ours.

Even our rare instances of heated exchanges didn't come till Angie's late teens, and they were followed within ten minutes by the two of us laughing it up. No true darkness crept in until she finished at Walters State CC in Gatlinburg, where I taught, then moved forty miles to UT in Knoxville, where she'd been conceived. Where she met Chet.

I saw it in him, that darkness, when she brought him to meet me five months in. That the visit had taken that long had me wary already, as did my recent calls with Angie. Her once-effortless way with me was off kilter, forced. Furtive. Then I saw why. An almost touchable murk poured from Chet. That murk had glommed onto my daughter, colored her expressions, actions, even her appearance. And she seemed to be on eggshells with each step and utterance.

Chet was the last of Angie's four post-high school 'adult' relationships, and she had shown good judgement prior to him. I told myself my reaction was overblown, and I managed to stay quiet, mostly. But then one day Angie stopped by for some old outfits and I saw on her face for the first time a true expression of fear. It came when I asked her how Chet was doing. Witnessing that fear, I spoke up - how could I not? I did try to stay on the not-too-intrusive side, and I squelched my harshest judgements. Still, Angie wouldn't hear my observations, or my fears for her safety. Butt out, she blurted, and there was no laughing ten minutes later.

Just one month passed, and I don't know if she did it to convince herself or me or both of us that all was well, that it was love, but Angie married Chet. She gave me a single day's notice, said I could "give her away" and laughed at that. Not her old, perfect laugh; her newer, nervous one. I boycotted their little ceremony and Angie cut off all communication. I should've reached out, repeatedly if needed, but I avoided her, the two of them, and just stewed. It was ten weeks later when she texted me that she was pregnant.

I called her instantly and thanked her for telling me. But my righteous streak rose up and I didn't congratulate her, or apologize - for skipping her wedding, for ghosting her, for anything. I went right to case-making. It all was there, I told her. hi Chefs eyes, in his tone with her. He was sinister, a threat. I reminded her that, back on another day when Chet visited with her, I had eavesdropped when they went on the porch after dinner. I heard him hiss, "Don't stick me with a fucking baby. If you do, there will be hell to pay." I had immediately butted in, asked Angie into the kitchen, and repeated to her what I'd just heard. I requested - okay, demanded - that she break up with Chet. She stormed out and he went with her.

And so, on Angie's "I'm pregnant" call that I thoroughly screwed up, she just hung up. She then wouldn't take my every-ten-minute calls. Angry and hurt, I again just quit on her. Our estrangement continued and she stayed with Chet. Weeks later, Angie was the first to reach out. She called to tell me she and Chet were leaving on a "long walkabout" the very next day. A driving/camping/hiking trip for at least a month. Through the Great Smokies and Blue Ridge, plus large swaths of the Appalachian Trail. Maybe even further, she said.

I didn't bring up her classes or job, or the expenses of such a journey, or the fact that she was pregnant. I simply asked if she was looking forward to going. A long, nervous silence ensued. Angie wanted to talk to me, I could feel it. I could've waited her out and let that happen, but instead broke the silence with another question. "Whose idea was this trip, anyway?" Angie balked briefly then hung up one last time. I never again heard my child's voice.

****

Some might say I decided too hastily, but the correct course of action now seemed clear. There in the jarringly pleasant visiting room, I gave Chet my response. "No. No deal." His eyes narrowed; he thought I was making a dark joke. He looked closer and saw that I wasn't. "But, but, you won't get to know where she is, Gerry! That's what you've been living for, right? To know!"

I readied to do my breathing technique but some sort of peace had quietly washed over me. "I did think that, Chet, yes. But it turns out, I'm not living to find Angie's remains." I paused. "I'm living to remember her. To hold close her love and joy. Preserve those countless little moments, like the crackup-funny 'Notes To Dad' she would magnet to the fridge." I placed my chin in my hands and looked towards the floor. I sighed but didn't cry, then I confessed to Chet.

"I shunned Angie. I stayed away sulking at a crucial time. I should have been there. But I kept my distance and selfishly played the 'injured party.' I left her in danger. Left her with you." I looked dead straight at Chet. "And so, Angie's body is lost for good, it seems. But I'll hang onto her spirit till I die."

A sweaty, pungent stream of fear flowed from Chet and in a shocked whine, he asked, "That's it? You're not gonna go to that overlook? You're okay with leaving her there? But, every parent wants to know where their kid is, especially if that kid is dead! C'mon! What about closure?!"

I stood back up. "There is no closure, and Angie isn't at that lookout, her skeleton is. She doesn't need it, and I suspect I don't either. Angie's life, her essence - it lives on with me, so she's here. She is not all gone."

Chet sputtered, "If you don't help me, I'll die! You might change your mind, and it will be too late! You'll never know where she is! I'm about to be murdered and you'll be an accessory! You can stop it! Gerry, c'mon!" Chet was now just a bundle of frantic exclamation points. No more cold menace, only gurgling fear.

I said to him, "Your new gang leader, the next head Nazi or whatever. I just hope he's a man of his word." With that, I permanently left Chet's prison, and, I do hope, my own.