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Chapter 11
It rose, gigantic and majestic. A single mound of volcanic rock dominating the coastline, six hundred feet high.
We could see it from miles away, before we even reached the quaint coastal town. I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Partly because of its vast size. And partly because of what happened there.
‘This is crazy,’ Gabriella said, hiding her face in her hands and glancing toward Charlie. ‘I can’t believe I’m actually doing this. Going to the spot where my son died.’
The massive rock was situated on a narrow strip of land, overlooking the tiny fishing bay. Sherwood had said to drive all the way to the parking lot along the south side of the rock, then go through a chain-link gate and across the shoals. A narrow path snaked up the rock face there. He said to look for a ledge, about a hundred feet up, above the jagged rocks.
The place where a couple of early-morning clammers had found Evan.
My heart poured out, thinking of Evan being drawn to the site as he walked there, alone and confused, voices clashing in his head.
‘Now you see, you see what my poor boy climbed?’ Gabby turned to me. ‘In the fucking dark. You have to be crazy to do that, right?’
I didn’t answer, but there was nothing in me that disagreed.
We parked the car and walked out onto the rocky shoals in the shadow of the mountain. A handful of people were milling around. Fishermen tossing out lines, tourists snapping photos, a few makeshift souvenir stands. The breeze picked up, and Charlie and Gabriella seemed to waver.
My brother said, ‘Maybe he went up there to see God. Evan was like that. Maybe that’s what he wanted to do.’
I had heard about as much of this ‘Evan was Jesus’ stuff as I could bear. ‘The kid was disturbed, Charlie. He wasn’t looking for God. He was sick.’ I heard myself echoing Sherwood. ‘What the hell do you think he was doing up there anyway?’
‘I don’t know if I can do this,’ Gabby said, suddenly white as a ghost.
I went over and put my arm around her. ‘You don’t have to, Gabby. We can go back.’
‘No, I do. I do have to.’ She brushed back her hair and fortified herself with a breath. ‘Let’s go.’
We walked, Charlie trailing, until we found the chain-link fence Sherwood spoke of. There was a gate to walk through, but also a sign: NO VISITORS PERMITTED PAST THIS POINT.
There was no park ranger around, no one stopping us. Sherwood had said to keep going as far as we could walk.
‘I think it’s over here!’ I shielded my eyes and looked up. A craggy overhang protruded high up the cliff face, nothing in its way to break a fall to the rocks below. I noticed a loose path winding up the face and another sign that cautioned against climbing.
Gabriella looked up, tears massing in her eyes. ‘I can’t believe this, Charlie, I really can’t. I can’t believe our boy would do this.’
Charlie leaned against me, his long hair whipped by the wind. ‘He didn’t kill himself. I know it. Don’t you see, that’s why they never found the other sneaker. He slipped somehow, climbing up. Maybe it lodged in the rock. It’s up there somewhere. He wouldn’t have jumped. I have to believe that, Jay, you understand?’
I wanted so much to tell him, Stop it, Charlie, just stop. Evan’s dead. Like Sherwood said, accident or suicide, what did it even matter now? Instead, I just squeezed his shoulder and nodded. ‘I understand.’
Gulls cawed, flapping in the breeze. We stood there for a while with my arms around both of them, solemnly staring at the place where Evan had fallen. Pain was etched in their drawn, anguished faces as they relived the image of their son’s backward descent, picturing him landing hard onto the unforgiving rocks. They had seen the photos: the blood on his face, his spine shattered.
Having to think of him lying there all night. The surf washing against him. Gulls picking over his body.
I remembered Gabby’s words: Your brother feels responsible, Jay.
Of course he feels responsible. Evan had become him. Charlie had passed his legacy of disease and blame onto him. Fanned it, like a brushfire, with their anger and how they lived, pointing the finger at everyone for what had gone wrong in their failed lives.
And not to mention they were the ones who had called the police and sent him away.
Gabriella shook her head in frustration and balled her fists. ‘Oh, Jay, you don’t know how tough this is. I held him in my arms. That first day. Every parent has a dream for their child. I told my son, “You are going to make us proud. You are going to live the life we’ve never led.” A child is supposed to go farther than their parent. That’s how it’s supposed to happen, right? That’s the law of nature. Not this . . .’
I gazed up at that ledge and knew whatever hope they still harbored that their son had simply slipped was just another of their delusions. Why would anyone have climbed all this way, other than to jump? Why would he have remained up there through the night? And, ultimately, like Sherwood grimly said, why did it matter? Evan was dead. No one would ever tell us what was in his mind.
Suddenly Gabriella picked up a stone and flung it against the rocks. Then another, freeing her pent-up rage. ‘You bastard!’ she yelled into the wind. ‘Damn you!’
Damn you.
I didn’t know if she meant Evan or God, or maybe even the giant rock.
She yelled, ‘I want to know why my son had to die! I know we’re poor. I know we don’t matter. But I deserve that, don’t I, Jay? Evan deserves that.’
She was right – this wasn’t the ending that had to be. It was the ending Evan received, because the system looked the other way
We all did, in our own way.
Gabby hurled another stone against the rocks.
Yes, Evan deserves that, I answered her in my mind. That’s the least he deserves.
Watching her, I knew why I was there.
Chapter 12
The Harbor View Recuperation Center was a converted, white Victorian house with a large front porch and a green awning on a quiet street, a few blocks from the town’s touristy center.
If Gabby wanted answers, this was the place to begin.
‘You’re sure you want to go in?’ I asked Charlie and Gabby as we pulled up across the street.
‘This woman killed our son!’ Gabriella declared bitterly. ‘She let him leave – when he was supposed to be in the care of people who would watch over him.’
‘Okay,’ I said. We parked the car and headed in.
A couple of Adirondack-type chairs with chipped paint sat on the porch. The lawn was thick and a bit overgrown, in need of trimming. Inside, we found a couple of elderly people milling about, just as Evan had described. I didn’t see any guards or orderlies around.
‘Look at this place,’ Gabriella said, her eyes flashing with barely controlled rage. ‘I can’t believe they dumped my son in this shit hole.’
I knocked on an office door and a squat, pleasant-looking woman in black pants and a floral blouse glanced up from her desk. She appeared Filipino.
‘My name’s Dr Jay Erlich,’ I said, introducing myself. ‘Evan was my nephew.’
Anna Aquino’s almond eyes grew wide. ‘Oh . . .’ She jumped up, came around the desk, and took my hand. ‘I am so, so sorry about what happened. I’ve run this facility for eight years. We’ve never had anything like that happen here before.’
‘These are Evan’s parents . . .’
Instead of being defensive, Anna Aquino took Gabriella’s hands warmly in hers and gave her a compassionate hug. ‘I spoke with you the night he disappeared. When he didn’t come back, I was so worried. He seemed like such a good kid, your son. If I knew he was in such a state, I never ever would have allowed him to be admitted.’
Gabriella pulled away. ‘What do you mean, if you knew he was in such a state? You let our boy just walk out of here. We trusted you to take care of him and now . . .’ She glared at the woman with reproach.
Over the years, I’ve seen my share of indifference when it came to caregivers. Nurses just going through the motions, care facilities doing the minimum, bilking the insurance companies. But Anna Aquino wasn’t like that at all.
‘Ms Erlich,’ she said, ‘I know how you must feel, but look around . . . This is an open facility. We don’t keep people here against their will. We’re not set up for that sort of thing here. We can’t even force our patients to keep on their medications. It’s strictly voluntary.
‘That first day, your son was like a zombie here. He was totally snowed on so much Seroquel he could barely talk. He wouldn’t even eat. But by the afternoon of the next day, he seemed so much better. I know he called you –’
‘Yes,’ Gabriella said, ‘he said he wanted to make the best of it here, but . . .’
‘That afternoon, he came up to me and told me he was going to go for a walk. I was actually excited to hear it. I thought he was coming back to life. He said he was just going to walk around the town. When he didn’t come back, of course, we were worried, and that’s when we called . . .’
‘I think what my brother and sister-in-law would like to know,’ I asked plainly, ‘is just how a violent, bipolar kid on suicide watch only a couple of days before could simply be allowed to walk out the door.’
Anna looked into my eyes and shook her head. ‘Because no one ever informed us of that, Doctor Erlich.’
I squinted, not sure I’d heard her properly. ‘What?’
‘No one told us your nephew had been suicidal. Or about any of his behavioral history. I had no record on him at all, other than he was bipolar and had spent time at County and was placed on a high dosage of Seroquel. Believe me, if I thought he was a danger to anyone – or to himself – there’s no way I would ever have admitted him here. You can see for yourself we’re not equipped for that sort of thing.’
‘You’re telling me you received no patient history?’
‘No.’ Anna shook her head. ‘Zero. They just drop them here. Like baggage. With a two-line diagnosis and a medication chart. When they saw I had an open bed, they brought him here. I’m a state-funded facility, Mr and Mrs Erlich, so I can’t simply refuse. This is my biggest frustration. They never give me any history. You see my patients here . . . We specialize in dementia and Alzheimer’s care. Believe me, if I knew your son was schizophrenic – not to mention suicidal! – I would never have let him stay here even for a night. Poor kid, I’m heartbroken over this . . .’
My anger was increasing. No history. Not even a medical report from the hospital. They might as well have pushed him off that ledge themselves. What was the hospital hiding? ‘Do you mind if I see his charts?’
‘Not at all,’ Anna Aquino said. ‘I have them right here.’ She went around the back of her desk and came back with Evan’s file.
A two-page transfer form from the County Medical Center read, ‘History of bipolar behavior.’ It listed his medication, Seroquel, and the dosage, two hundred milligrams. A hundred milligrams was normally the prescribed dose. A drop-dead maniac would be turned into zombie on that! The form said the patient had been released from care and was being transferred to the Harbor View Recuperation Center on a strictly voluntary basis.
It was signed Brian Smith, Social Worker, cosigned Mitchell Derosa, MD.
My blood stiffened. I saw that Evan had signed it too.
I had to restrain myself from crumpling it into a ball and hurling it against the wall.
There was no history of his previous psychological behavior. Not a single word about the nature of his treatment in the hospital. Nothing on the violent actions he had manifested when the cops took him away. Or his attempt to purchase a firearm.
Not even a mention of his urge to kill himself.
They had basically just thrown him here! As soon as a bed opened up. Like Anna Aquino said – baggage.
What had happened to the restrictive facility they had promised Charlie and Gabriella? Where their son would receive monitoring and attention? They were right – everything just fell between the cracks because no one felt they mattered.
‘Can I have a copy of this?’ I asked, handing Anna back the forms.
She shrugged. ‘I don’t see why not.’
‘Look,’ I said, ‘I don’t know how we’re going to handle this . . . But would you go on the record on any of this? What you just told us. To the head of the hospital, or even to an attorney? It would be helpful if we could count on your support.’
‘I’ve been on record on this for years,’ Anna Aquino replied. ‘Just look at the people who are here. They’re not threats to anyone . . . Look at our staff. We couldn’t even restrain someone like your son. It’s almost criminal . . .’
Yes it was. It was almost criminal!
She turned to Gabriella and, with tears in her eyes, said, ‘I’m so sorry . . . I thought I was doing the right thing . . .’
Charlie looked at me as if to be saying, Now you see, you see what it’s like to be poor. You see what it’s like to be in a place where no one cares . . .
I checked my watch. It was four now. No one from the hospital had called me.
But at this point, I was no longer giving a shit about procedures.
Chapter 13
Charlie and Gabriella had mentioned a local television station where they had first seen the story of the Morro Bay jumper, then a John Doe, two days before.
‘You’ve got to be careful, Jay,’ Charlie said, cautioning me. For twenty years they had lived under the radar, afraid that the state would cut them back. ‘You can’t just stir up trouble for us here. It’s not like with you. We live off the state. We can’t make waves.’
‘Sometimes you have to make waves!’ Gabby said. ‘This is about our son, Charlie. We need to do this.’
He sat back down.
I looked up the number for KSLN and asked for the news department. For the reporter who had handled the segment on the Morro Bay jumper. I gave my name, identifying myself as an uncle of the dead boy.
It took a couple of minutes, but finally a woman came back on. ‘This is Katie Kershaw. I’m an assistant producer in the newsroom.’
‘Katie, hi. My name is Jay Erlich. I’m a doctor from back in New York, and I’m the uncle of Evan Erlich. Your station did a story on him.’
‘Yes, of course. That was terrible.’ She knew who he was immediately. ‘We would have followed up, but it’s a policy here, for family reasons, we generally don’t report on suicides.’
‘I guess I can understand that,’ I said. ‘But listen, Ms Kershaw . . . I think your station is missing the real story behind what happened with Evan.’
Two hours later a reporter named Rosalyn Rodriguez and a colleague with a handheld camera knocked on Charlie and Gabby’s door.
Gabby seemed lifted. She had changed, washed her face, and applied a little makeup for the first time since I’d been there. Finally someone was going to take their side.
Charlie seemed a bit edgy. ‘Are you sure this is the right thing?’
‘You always want to do nothing,’ she said to him. ‘You’re always afraid the state will find us. They’ll discover your brother is helping us with the rent. Our disability will be cut. Yes, I want to do this. It’s for our son, Charlie!’
When the reporter arrived, we all sat in the small living room. Her questions closely followed the narrative I had given their producer on the phone.
How did you first find out what happened to your son? What do you feel about what happened? Do you think the doctors at the hospital bore any responsibility? Do you think your son belonged in a more restrictive facility?
‘That’s what they promised us.’ Gabby nodded. ‘Yes.’
Charlie just sat there, not saying much.
Gabby started with Evan being released from the county psychiatric ward after just three days. Three days after having attempted to acquire a gun. How they were being stonewalled from getting even the simplest answers to their queries. How the Harbor View facility didn’t even have a clue what kind of patient they were dealing with.
