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away, to give up. I would be very disappointed in you if you
took the easy way out.”
    Sophie had a knack for inducing guilt. I
found I couldn’t meet her gaze.
    She tapped the other shoebox. I looked up to
see her frown, her brow furrowing. “What about this fancy
shoe?”
    “I saw it, too,” I said, grateful for the
change of subject. “But I don’t know what it means.”
    Sophie nibbled on her cookie, her expression
thoughtful. “Feet.”
    “Huh?”
    “The man who died had one of those feet
things.”
    “Feet things?”
    “You know—he was fascinated by toes.”
    Understanding dawned. “A foot fetish?”
    “Yes!” She popped the rest of the cookie in
her mouth, chewed, and swallowed, quite pleased with herself; then
her expression soured. “Why would anyone want to suck on another
person’s smelly toes?”
    “Ya got me.”
    Sophie shrugged, selected another macaroon
and winked. “These are better.”
     
    # # #
     
     

CHAPTER 4
     
    He was dead. Chest, clothes saturated with
blood. A lifeless body stretched out on the cold, stone floor. No
hope of revival. No hope at all.
    Dead.
    Forever gone.
    Like everyone else I’d ever loved.
    My father. I don’t even really remember him.
Not his face. Nothing.
    My mother. The haggard-faced Madonna with a
whiskey glass clutched in one hand, pleading for release from this
life.
    My wife—Shelley, her eyes glazed and vacant,
lips smiling after a line of blow.
    And now . . .
    The image of the dead dissolved, replaced by
a pair of masculine hands covered in blood. Palms away from me,
rivulets of blood dripping down the wrists, snagged by a forest of
dark forearm hairs—someone’s life blood gone, as though in a
slaughterhouse. Just like—
    I jerked awake, sweating, muscles
quivering—my heart pounding like the rhythm of a rap tune.
    I rolled over onto my stomach, hugged my
pillow. The scarlet numerals on my bedside clock read 4:09. I
closed my eyes and tried to get my ragged breathing under
control.
    I didn’t need a shrink to tell me the
significance of the nightmare. It came to me a couple of times a
week, only now it had a new ending. But the dream lied. Unlike my
parents and ex-wife, Richard hadn’t died.
    Another reality was that
Richard could’ve died because
of me. He’d been willing to sacrifice himself to save me, and I
wasn’t sure if I was worthy of that. Worse, if I’d find the courage
to do the same for him.
    Those circuitous thoughts were unproductive.
I had a new problem: the vision of the bloodied hands. What did it
mean and how was I going to prevent seeing them in reality?
     
    * * *
     
    Warm, incandescent light washed over the kitchen table where I’d scattered the
envelopes of financial information Richard had appropriated at
Walt’s apartment. The contents—heavy on receipts—indicated Walt had
fallen into the trap of credit card debt. He’d maxed out four major
cards, with finance charges far exceeding the monthly minimum,
which he dutifully paid. Top creditors were Erie Professional
Laundry, Sunoco Gas, a smattering of family restaurants, and
Macy’s. He also had a car loan with Bison Bank. His disability
payments were direct-deposited to a checking account regularly
drained by ATM withdrawals, and had an ending balance of
forty-seven cents for the previous month.
    I sipped my second cup of coffee. Disability
payments would’ve saved me from my current deadbeat existence.
Richard had consulted an attorney about my filing a Social Security
claim, but taking a job at the bar had probably killed my chances
at ever seeing a check.
    I pushed the thought aside as I shuffled
through Walt’s monthly credit card statements. Pay-per-view was a
favorite with Walt, and I could guess the content of the movies he
chose—not that they were listed. Was that the total extent of his
sex life? Had his disability prevented him from performing with
women, or was he shy about a scar or other infirmity? Revealing a
colostomy bag or stoma would