Growing Up Next to the Mental Read online

I turned to see the same female officer standing at the bottom, holding up my notebook. Shiiiiit. Talk about salt in the wound.

  I managed to utter a “yeah” and carefully descended to that first nuisance stair that got me on the way up. Stopping there also allowed me to remain at eye level with the six-foot officer of the court.

  No words were exchanged as she handed me the booklet, shot me an unsympathetic smirk, and spun back to her desk, her golden blonde ponytail flicking and bouncing in tandem with her confident stride.

  I was about to head back up when the heavy main door flew open, almost ripped from its hinges by the howling nor’easter. A blast of snow and wind preceded the entrance of a Daily News photographer.

  He reached back just in time to catch and pull the door shut behind him.

  Weather never bothered any of our photogs. On the contrary, they embraced the hazardous or risky as any real newsman or -woman would.

  The one who just flew in through the door we called “the Major,” a.k.a. Randall Willicott, whose family had a lane named after them downtown. In any other life he would’ve been an air force pilot, his knowledge of all things airborne and military a tad over the top at times. It’s the reason he was once tapped to go up with the Snowbirds to snap what promised to be some pretty spectacular shots during their St. John’s show. But in an embarrassing irony, the Major couldn’t stomach the G-forces and lost his lunch in the jump seat.

  It was just a messy outcome all around and a tough one for the big guy to swallow, so to speak.

  He was also secretly voted most likely to “go postal” in the office some day, which was the first thing I thought of whenever I laid eyes on him—even now, as he flicked back the ice-encrusted hood of his parka and stomped his boots free of snow.

  He was reaching into the camera bag dangling off his shoulder when he looked up to see my apologetic frame limping toward him.

  “Sorry, man, he’s not here,” I stammered, still wincing from my knee pain. “We just found out. They’re keeping him at the Waterford for another week—at least.”

  “Shit. All right. What happened to you?” he asked, re-stowing his gear.

  “Tripped and nailed my friggin’ knee on the stairs,” I answered through clenched teeth.

  He stared at my leg long enough to suggest I should, too.

  “You sure you’re okay?”

  I glanced down and was taken aback by the long, dark stain now showing itself through my new beige dress pants. I realized I’d have to make a trip home, and maybe even a stop for sutures at St. Clare’s.

  I ducked into a washroom to see how bad it was, determining it was nothing that a good, wide Band-Aid couldn’t handle. (Band-Aid, incidentally, fell into the same category as Ski-Doo. Had to be capitalized and could only be used if it was that brand.)

  The Major got me to my nearby downtown apartment for a quick change.

  “Back to headquarters?” he asked militarily upon my return to the company four-by-four.

  “Guess so,” I said, still frustrated by bucko’s no-show at court and my wounded knee. It was sore and bandaged, but I could get around.

  “No, wait. Drop me down at the Waterford, will ya? That’s where he is, after all. Ya never know, I might even get in to see ’im. Worst they can do is say no.”

  Over time I’d stepped foot on every floor of the Waterford, except the fourth—home to the forensic unit, which housed the real badasses. The hospital on this day was working with a skeleton crew on account of the weather, providing unencumbered access to the stuttering old elevator we had affectionately dubbed “Otis,” since that was just the name on the thing.

  I’d always made a point of checking Otis’s best-before date on the inspection certificate when we rode him as kids. This one was only expired six months, still a vast improvement over years past. And a story for another day.

  Otis’s age was showing as he struggled to the fourth floor, finally arriving and opening to a different layout than the others.

  There were several secure-looking doors to choose from. I pushed a little white button that rang a bell, and a quarter of someone’s face appeared in the small glass pane.

  “Can I help you?” asked a man on the other side.

  “Ah, yeah, Aloysius Mooney, with the News, to see Wallace White?”

  This was the moment of truth. Anything other than another question would mean I had at least a chance.

  “One minute, please.”

  My heart raced with hope, only to be dashed in an instant.

  “I’m sorry—who are you again?”

  “Aloysius Mooney. Wish Mooney. I tried to call ahead, to his lawyer, but he’s in chambers with the judge.”

  “Just a moment.”

  I’d been way too cute by half and assumed the guy had left to run it by a supervisor, which would likely mean the end of the road. Instead, a different door opened to my left and another staffer in all white motioned me over.

  “He’s in here, Mr. Mooney. But it’s up to him.”

  I could not believe it.

  I looked through to see White himself behind a canteen counter, milling around with others waiting to be served lunch.

  I knew better than most that appearances could be deceiving, but White was every bit the portrait of a man in legal limbo in the immediate aftermath of a serious crime: the shaved head and blondish scruff, teardrop tat under his left eye, and a long red scar that started at his chin and disappeared down into the neck of his black and white Umbro sweats.

  “Just wondering if you’d like to talk for a few minutes, about the conditions in here. Nothing about what happened, because I know you still have a trial to go through and I know how all that works . . .”

  He laughed, encouraging his cohorts to join him.

  I didn’t want him to think I was just there for the gore and the glory of scoring the interview, even though that was the mission. The strategy instead was to convince him in one sentence that I was on his side, that I’d primarily focus on what he wanted to say. And if he wanted to eventually get into what drove him to do what he did, then that would be fine, too.

  “You want to be alone with me for a few minutes?” asked White, garnering another group laugh.

  “Yes, sir,” I replied confidently.

  No sooner had I spoken those words when an alarm sounded, emitting intermittent blasts not unlike those that summoned firefighters to their trucks up at Brookfield.

  The door unceremoniously closed in my face and a female voice urgently announced, “Code White, Code White, Code White” through the speakers in the ceiling. My first thought was that he was so dangerous he had his own emergency code. I’d heard other colours announced with urgency in hospitals before—blue, red, even yellow—but never white. And a real funny one at St. Clare’s one day:

  “Dr. Hurry, Dr. Cum, and Dr. Killam to OR, stat. Doctors Hurry, Cum, and Killam. Hurry, Cum, and Killam. Stat.” So I was told.

  The elevator doors opened, and a tall suit inside, security card clipped to his breast pocket, told me to come with him.

  “What’s going on?” I asked, fearing this was all the result of my brazen breach of security.

  “We have a situation, and you have to leave. All visitors. You weren’t supposed to be up here in the first place.”

  “What kind of situation?” I dared ask, but to no avail as we arrived back on the main floor.

  We were passed by a troop of constabulary officers in riot gear as they kicked their way through the oversized fire door leading downstairs. The buzzer continued to blare as previously invisible nurses and other staff helped the infirm and disoriented out into the frigid air and choking exhaust from an old school bus that was idling in front for temporary lodging.

  It had finally stopped snowing, but there was still a wicked wi
nd chill.

  The suit escorted me right to the main doors by the elbow.

  “Sorry—everyone has to leave right now.”

  A red and white pickup pulled up with a screech between the mess of other first responders—the words incident command plastered on the front, back, roof, and both sides. And who should get out but Cap’n Mike—now Superintendent Mike Byrne. Didn’t have the same ring to it.

  “Aloysius Mooney,” he said, dropping the rear gate of the truck to grab some gear. “How did I know I’d see you here?”

  His speech had become even more laboured over the years, but I still knew my name when he said it.

  “Been a while, young man. I see you followed in the old man’s footsteps. No time to chat now, I’m afraid.”

  “No, I know . . . just, what’s on the go?” I asked discreetly.

  “10-39. But you didn’t get it from me.”

  21

  I often wonder how that day would’ve played out had I had a cellphone.

  For the life of me I couldn’t remember what the hell a “10-39” was, a cop code that could’ve been cracked with one quick call or text. And I was so flattered that he presumed I knew that I couldn’t bring myself to tell him I didn’t.

  But I had to get info back to the office as soon as possible, and my old house was five minutes away—clearly the quickest of available options.

  My parents were still living there, but the for sale sign was up. Mom was away visiting my sisters in Ontario, and Dad, I knew, was at the office.

  I decided the sidewalk would be fastest, and easiest since I was certainly not dressed for a laboured slog through the Mental Field. Not sure my knee would’ve made it, anyway.

  The basement door—the same one we once left unlocked around the clock—was now bolted tight as a drum, of course. It was pure luck that the spare key was out, hidden on the same tiny hook under the back veranda just so the real estate agent could show the place.

  Despite my knee, I raced in and up the stairs two at a time from memory, into the kitchen and right to the wall for the phone, which unbeknownst to me had been replaced by a cordless set on the counter.

  The newsroom, once I finally got an answer, knew something was afoot at the Waterford from the scanner, but the transmissions had been unusually cryptic, years before they went encrypted altogether.

  Meanwhile, I’d noticed lately I couldn’t readily identify people that I should know, on the phone or out in public. It could take a while to put the voice or the face with the name, if at all. That alone could make you think you’re losing your marbles.

  It’s not like I was eighty and leaving the keys in the fridge or something. I should be a little sharper than that at not even half the age.

  It was always a thing with my five brothers and sisters; everyone said we sounded and looked alike, anyway. But I had to start using that in my defence.

  “I can’t come up with my siblings’ names on the fly, let alone yours!”

  Sometimes it washed, other times clearly not.

  In any event, I was drawing a complete blank on the colleague I’d reached in the office.

  “Yes, 10-39 . . . that’s what my guy said, but I can’t friggin’ remember what it’s the code for. I can probably tell ya every other one, though,” I added with Murphy’s Law frustration.

  A good thirty seconds passed before the mystery colleague returned.

  “We think it’s a hostage-taking.”

  I almost dropped the phone.

  It couldn’t be. Although it most certainly could be.

  “Mooney—you still there?’

  “Yeah, I’m here. I was in there when the alarms went off and they started evacuating.”

  “Where is ya now?”

  “Parents’ house, just up the road. But I’m goin’ back down. Send a photog.”

  Click.

  I stood there staring at the strange phone I’d just hung up, wondering what had just happened. What had I done? Where did I think I was going? I couldn’t cover any story about him, Jerry with a J, if in fact he was involved.

  I could hear the courtroom exchange now:

  “And Mr. Monchy, was there anyone else who knew about this secret space that you used to carry out your crime?”

  “Yes. That reporter right there. Aloysius Mooney. He’s known all about it since he was twelve.”

  Now wouldn’t that be something—for me, my family, my career. No wife or kids, thank God. Not near mature enough for that yet.

  “That’s correct, m’Lord. I was a twelve-year-old boy hanging out in this hidden room with a dude in his forties with a penchant for waving his willy at kids.”

  Yes, fine display of judgment there, young Mooney. Bravo!

  I just wasn’t sure anyone could ever understand that the promise, on top of no real reason to ever tell anyone, had stopped me from doing so all these years. I couldn’t really see him dragging me into it, anyway. I’d kept up my end of the bargain—never told a soul a thing. So wasn’t it kinda his turn to return the favour? I sure hoped so.

  Wow. And Monchy was supposed to be the paranoid schizo.

  Maybe it was a leap to assume Jerry with a J was the taker. I hadn’t laid eyes on him in at least fifteen years. Could be dead, for all I knew.

  Or maybe it wasn’t a leap at all. What was it he said to me that day? “Not yet, anyway.” Maybe this was “yet.”

  Regardless, I felt like I was uncomfortably close to this story and had to get out.

  Maybe I was coming down with something. It was true I hadn’t been feeling well ever since I’d learned what a 10-39 was. The hospital’s Code White, by the way, meant the same thing and had nothing to do with White himself. Total coincidence, freaky as it was.

  I arrived back near the main entrance to find the Major and a cub reporter attempting to extract some deets and colour from staff and spectators alike.

  “Hey, what’s up?” I said, greeting them with as much fake enthusiasm as I could muster.

  “Just getting Kevin’s feet wet here,” said the Major, introducing me to the eager little beaver.

  The male cub jumped in.

  “Yeah, your dad . . . oh, sorry, Mr. Mooney said for you to stay on the hostage thing while I chase the hospital and the health board about Wallace White.”

  Oh my God, if I closed my eyes he was Beaver Cleaver.

  Wait. Who said what to whom about what?

  “Are you sure?” I replied most politely. “Because I kinda just got the scoop with White before they kicked everyone out for this other thing . . . what is it? Someone trapped in the basement or something?”

  “A hos-tage-taking,” he replied with non-“Beave”-like attitude, not believing I couldn’t remember.

  “Look, your dad—oh, shag it all—your father thought you should cover that because you have more experience with breaking news, contacts, sources. And because you kinda know the place inside and out.”

  This was true. Well played.

  “So, do we know anything about the hostage or the taker?” I asked, anxious to learn whether I could cover it at all.

  “Nothing. But the constabulary is supposed to scrum in a minute,” piped the Major.

  I could see the latest media relations officer sitting in a grey ghost car being fed whatever information her superiors deemed safe enough to release, which was sparse at the best of times, let alone while the drama was still unfolding.

  The car door opened and the young woman got out, adjusting the peak of her hat down as far as she could without blocking her vision.

  “Hello,” she greeted the throng of us kindly. “I’ll just make a brief statement and then take a few questions. Everyone ready?”

  There being no dissenters, she began.

  “Good aft
ernoon. At approximately 11:35 a.m. this morning, Newfoundland Constabulary patrol services, with assistance from the tactical unit, responded to a report of unlawful confinement here at the Waterford Hospital.

  “Upon arrival, it was determined a male patient had physically assaulted and restrained a member of the hospital staff and was holding the person against their will at an undisclosed location within the hospital.”

  Uh oh.

  “The constabulary’s K-9 unit was also dispatched, and a search in the basement area of the hospital revealed a hidden living space that staff were previously unaware of. We have confirmed that both the suspect and individual he’s holding are in this area . . .”

  Cheque, please! That was all I needed to hear.

  “Sorry, guys,” I said, turning to my co-workers. “You’re gonna have to take this. I gotta go. Sick to my stomach . . .”

  I didn’t even wait for a response as I turned and began walking back to the “safe house.”

  I couldn’t help but pinch myself along the way. Several times, actually, but to no avail.

  What a day, to say the least.

  And dare I say it was just beginning.

  I’d call the office as soon as I got back to the house, to at least get ahead of the shitstorm that was likely coming for going AWOL. I’d heard it was easier to ask forgiveness than to get permission, though, so we’d see.

  “You did what?!” my father shouted through the phone, loud enough for the newsroom to hear even if his door was closed. “Since when did you become the assignment editor?”

  “I just thought that . . .”

  “Don’t think. Just get over here now.”

  “Over here” was the transplanted Daily News offices on Pippy Place, now just a stone’s throw from printers Robinson Blackmore on O’Leary Avenue.

  I dreaded calling a cab, but I couldn’t very well ask someone from the office to pick me up. I might as well just can myself on the spot and get it over with.

  Northwest Taxi it was.

  “Out to the Daily News, out on Pippy, please. But can we do a pit stop at Tim’s along the way?”

  “Sure thing. You’re the boss,” he said.