Chapter Six: A Secret is Revealed
Streets of NYC
Thursday, December 4, 2003
12:21 pm
Detective John Clark finished photographing the DOA and stood back while the Medical Examiner drew up the pale yellow sheet. The victim had blood matted all over her hair, her skull was fractured, and there were strangulation marks on her neck. This look familiar to you? He mouthed to his partner. "Any witnesses?" he asked the uniform.
"Step back, people!" She instructed the crowd before turning to the detectives. "My partner and I were on patrol. We found the body."
"What's your name?" Detective Andy Sipowicz asked.
"Tamara Quentin. You see those two girls over there?" She nodded toward two young women leaning against the concrete steps of the next building. "They've been hanging around – all lip and no brains. You should …"
"Thanks, we got it," Andy interrupted. They approached the two girls. "You mind telling us what you're doing here?"
"I live upstairs," one of the girls answered.
"What happened?" her companion smacked her bubblegum. "Did someone die?"
"I heard it was Lois," the first girl said. "I can't believe she's, like, gone."
"Who's Lois?" John asked.
The girl he had dubbed "Ditz #1" answered. "Some junkie that lives on the second floor." Suddenly her jaw dropped open. "Oh, my god! Hilary, look!"
Clark and Sipowicz whirled around, trying to see what the girls were looking at. "What's wrong?" Andy wanted to know.
"You look just like him," Ditz #1 said. "Doesn't he look like …"
"Holy shit!" Ditz #2 shrieked. "He does."
Andy wrinkled his forehead. "Who looks like who?"
The two girls jumped up and down excitedly. "Has anyone ever told you you look like Zack Morris?" Ditz #2 asked the younger detective.
"Who?" Is that some member of the Backstreet Boys?
Ditz #1 rolled her eyes. "Only the hottest character on Saved By The Bell," she informed the clueless detective.
He vaguely remembered watching the television show on TBS after school, but he couldn't understand why anyone would want to compare him to the endearing troublemaker the two girls were speaking of. "No, actually, people tell me I look like Caligula."
Now it was the girls' turn to be puzzled. "Who's that?" they asked.
"You take Bubblehead #1 and I'll take Bubblehead #2," Sipowicz said under his breath.
Clark and Ditz #2 (renamed Bubblehead #1 by his partner) remained near the steps while Sipowicz and her companion walked a few feet away. "What's your name?" Unfortunately, I can't call you "Ditz" or "Bubblehead" to your face.
"Hilary," she answered.
"You're saying the woman who was murdered this morning was named Lois?"
She flipped her hair back. "That's what's, like, going around." His pressed a hand to his ear to stop the ringing.
"How'd she get along with the neighbors? She have any problems with anyone?"
"Oh, good god, no!" Hilary gasped. "Everybody loved Lois. She was so sweet. When she wasn't high, I mean."
"Did you see anybody suspicious hanging around recently?" Grimy cement waves lolled around a pavement ocean. He squeezed his eyes shut and attempted to steady himself against the wavering sidewalk.
"Some jerk who keeps flirting with Zoe," she answered.
He opened his eyes. "Is that …" he almost said Ditz # 1 but caught himself. "Your friend?"
Hilary nodded. "I don't know his name and I don't care. The man gets such a freakin' boner every time Zoe walks by."
The waves were increasing in frequency. Not here, he swore. Damn it! Not here. Sweat was pouring down his forehead. He swallowed the nausea and focused his attention on the information Hilary was giving him. "Can you give me a description?"
"He's short," she said, bringing her hand in front of her chest. "And his breath reeks."
"What color is he?"
"White – but with a real dark tan. And he always wears this ugly green Army bandana," she added. "You wanna find him, all you gotta do is look for someone with bad …"
By now, the sidewalk and the people were hazy blurs and Hilary's voice was senseless cacophony. He gripped the wide cement banister with a shaky hand.
"… Gonna call the cops if he doesn't lay off," she was saying. "Are you okay, Detective? You look positively green."
"I don't feel too good," he muttered. The sidewalk raised up to cradle his body and tall buildings and blue skies swam fast circles around his head. He felt a hand shaking his shoulder. Detective …what happened? … he just, like, said he didn't feel well and then he, like, went down … someone call the paramedics! … voice gruff yet familiar: what's going on over here? … the guy who looks like Zack Morris just collapsed! Everything spun around in one more violent circle and then his world faded to black.
* * *
Bellevue Hospital
Thursday, December 4, 2003
1:11 pm
"Hey, McAllister, you got anything for me?" the man inquired at the admin desk.
The man Andy assumed was McAllister lifted two charts out of the bin. "Would you like a sixty-seven-year-old woman with hemorrhoids or a twenty-nine-year-old man - leukemia with L.O.C.?" Oh, so you docs get to pick and choose, huh? I'd love to be able to pick and choose what scumbag I want to go after, but I don't have that choice, now do I?
The doctor grabbed one of the charts. "I'll take the leukemia. What room?"
"Exam two."
A tap on the shoulder brought Andy's attention away from the conversation at the admin desk. "How is he?"
"I don't know," he told the Lieutenant. "Still waiting to be seen."
Tony took a cheap plastic seat next to the detective. "What happened?"
"He was interrogating a witness and he just collapsed. She said he looked sickly a few minutes beforehand." He shook his head. "If that kid's gonna keep passing out like that …"
"You saying this wasn't the first time?"
"He fainted a month or two ago," Andy explained. "But he came to right away. Wouldn't let us take him to the hospital. Said it was a dizzy spell. Couldn't argue with us this time - he was still unconscious when the bus got there. You get a hold of Ortiz?" Maybe she knows something I don't.
"She and McDowell were checking out a lead on a case. I told Irvin to give them a heads up."
"What the hell's taking so damn long?" he grumbled. He flagged down a nurse. "Hey, you! We've been waiting here for – I don't know – at least half an hour now. You mind telling …"
"We're backed up right now," she said. "A doctor will be here to examine you as soon as they can."
"My partner was brought here by ambulance and we haven't heard zip since we got here."
"Oh. If you give me the name, I'll check up on it."
"Now you see what listening gets you?"
Tony grabbed his arm. "Andy, take a seat," he ordered. "His name's John Clark, Jr.," he told the nurse. "He's a detective on the force."
The nurse checked the board. "He's in exam two," she told the detectives. "Dr. Rossetti should be out in a few minutes to talk to you."
Exam two? Why does that sound familiar? A surge of memory nearly sent him propelling to the ceiling. Twenty-nine-year-old man – leukemia with L.O.C. … Exam two. "Ah, no!" he groaned.
"You okay, Andy?" Rodriguez asked.
He ignored him and headed toward the exam rooms. What the hell were you thinking? You let me think you were on drugs. Now I find out you're sick and you never let on? "Where's exam two?" he asked. Someone pointed to the left. "Thanks." I'm your partner for Christ sakes! How could you keep something like this from me? He pressed his hand against the doorknob. I could deck you for this, Clark. Part of him wanted to lace into the stubborn young man for making him find out the news via a third party. Another part of him wanted to envelope his partner in a hug and let him know he was there for him. He was seething mad and he wasn't sure what was worse – the fact that yet another person he cared about was ill or the fact that John didn't trust him enough to confide in him. He opened the door to the exam room and took in the sight of his young partner on the bed with IV's and tubes running in and out of his arms and the oxygen mask on his nose. He opened his mouth to speak, but the only words he could get out were: "How long …"
"I'm sorry, Andy. I couldn't … I couldn't … I didn't want you to worry about me."
Too late for that. "I was already worried," he informed him. He pulled up a plastic orange seat next to the bed. "You had me thinking you were on drugs, you know that?" John turned and faced the wall. "How long?" he repeated.
John sighed. "About two months now."
"Have you told the boss? You could take a medical leave …"
John shook his head. "You're the first person in the squad I'd tell something like this to. You know that."
"Does Rita know?"
"She hasn't cornered me yet," he sniffed.
"Have you told anyone?" he inquired. "Who knows about your condition?"
"Me, my oncologist, and now you."
"You mean to tell me you been keeping this to yourself this whole time?" No answer. "Ah, John."
"I gotta … I got to take care of myself, don't need people worrying about me."
"You can't handle this alone, John."
"I … at first … I thought …" he sputtered. "I thought I was tired all the time cause of all the nightmares after Pop …" He took a deep breath, unable to finish the sentence. "Why'd you make me tell you, Andy? I was doing just fine on …" His voice cracked and he collapsed into heaving sobs against the older man's chest.
Part of Andy wanted this partnership to last so he could disprove the Andy Sipowicz is bad luck myth circulating the precinct. One partner involved in dirty action and two dead wasn't good. He'd lost too many people to be able to lose another without a complete loss of sanity. Another part of him cared about the kid. Twenty-nine-years-old could scarcely be considered a "kid," but at his fifty-four-years, anyone below the age of thirty qualified. Andy, Jr. would have been two years older than him if he was still alive. If there hadn't been a rift between Sipowicz and Clark seniors, would the juniors have gotten along? He liked to think so. John was like a second son to him. A partner, a son, and a friend … all rolled into one. And he'd be damned if he had to watch him die.