No Hiding in Boise Read online

  She was weird about me moving to Boise. We had something of a fight about it—a spat, I guess you’d call it. I don’t know what she has against Boise. I felt like she was being critical just to be critical, questioning my choices because I’d never made that many on my own before. I told her, “I can’t just stay here and be your third wheel. My life is so much more than you.” I regretted it the second I said it, wished I could reach out, grab the words, shove them back into my mouth. I can still see the pained expression on her face, the hurt. I haven’t told her I work at a bar because I know she’d have that same expression. I told her I got a scholarship to Boise State. I didn’t want her to feel bad about the fact that she doesn’t have enough money to help with my tuition.

  I text back:

  Mom, everything in Boise is close to everything else. But I’m fine.

  I don’t know why I tell this blatant lie. I guess if I told her the truth, I’d have to admit it myself. Denial is easier.

  She responds:

  I just can’t believe it—a shooting in Boise. Please stay safe, my girl xo

  Ryan comes back with a bottle of Benadryl in his hand. He shakes out two pink pills and hands them to me.

  “Take these,” he says. “They’ll help you sleep.”

  He thinks the mildly sedating effects of an allergy medicine will be enough to quiet my mind. I roll my eyes at him.

  “If you say so,” I say, humoring him.

  When I first met Ryan, a little more than a year ago, I thought he was one of the smartest people I’d ever met. He scored a 172 on the LSAT; he starts law school at the University of Idaho in the fall (meaning, we will have a long-distance relationship; the university is in Moscow, a five-hour drive from Boise). He’s good with textbooks, I guess. He’s good with the black-and-white world of the law. When it comes to the gray area of emotion, he is somewhat of an idiot.

  I close my eyes so he’ll think I’m sleeping and leave me alone. Even with my eyes closed, I can feel him staring at me, worrying about me. It’s a lot of pressure to have someone concerned about you in this way.

  “Can you get me some ice cream at the store?” I ask him, eyes still closed.

  I figure an errand will do us both good—he wants to feel helpful, and I want to be alone for a few minutes.

  “Sure,” he says. “Chocolate chip?”

  He knows that’s my favorite flavor. It was one of the topics we covered on our first date. He confessed later to going home after that first date and creating a spreadsheet of information about me, including my ice cream flavor preference. I wonder if he’s kept the spreadsheet, if he updates it on a regular basis. I wonder if, after today, he will type “In crisis, she needs space.”

  We have never dealt with a crisis together before. We are only twenty-three years old.

  “Yes,” I say. “Chocolate chip.”

  I feel his weight leave the couch and hear his footsteps cross the room. He takes his keys off the table by the door, the door opens and shuts, and I am alone.

  I wait a few minutes, until I’m sure he’s taken the elevator down to the lobby and left the building. Then I turn on the TV.

  Ryan was right—it is all over the news. All the major channels have reporters standing in front of the bar. I decide on channel 7 because the reporter, a youngish Asian guy, reminds me of a friend from high school, Kevin Lang.

  “For anyone just joining us,” the Kevin look-alike says, apparently talking to me directly, “there was a shooting at Ray’s Bar last night, around eleven fifteen. Five people were killed and two injured.”

  He throws it back to the news desk, where the female anchor asks if there is any information about the victims. Kevin says that information has not yet been released. The woman then asks about the perpetrator. Kevin looks down at a notepad in his hands, then back at the camera.

  “We have the perpetrator as twenty-eight-year-old Jed Ketcher. We’re told he used a .45-caliber Glock 21 semiautomatic pistol. As we’ve reported, Ketcher died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound when police arrived at the scene.”

  Ryan was right. I shouldn’t be watching TV.

  I switch it off, but I keep hearing the Kevin look-alike’s voice.

  Five people were killed and two injured.

  I think about Dan, the guy who was behind the bar with me. I barely knew him. He’d just started working at Ray’s.

  I reach for my phone on the side table, google “Ray’s Bar shooting victims.”

  The victim information may not have been released to the broadcast media yet, but it’s available online, like everything is these days. It’s probably unverified; the internet cares more about speed than it cares about accuracy.

  The online article includes names, ages, and photos of each of the five victims, photos likely taken from publicly available Facebook profiles, Instagram feeds, LinkedIn networking pages.

  Robert Lang, age 62

  I recognize him as a regular. He went by Bob. I never talked to him much. I’m not that chatty, which is one of the reasons Ryan says I’m in the wrong line of work. He was well liked, nice. I remember him dancing whenever we had classic rock cover bands.

  Jason Maguire, age 36

  He looks a little like my first boyfriend, Rich, but, besides that, he’s not familiar to me. This fateful night could have been his first time visiting Ray’s. If he’d only chosen another bar.

  Leigh Maguire, age 37

  Jason’s wife, I’d guess. It doesn’t say. I suppose she could be a sister. Probably wife. I wonder if it’s better that they both died, that they’re still together, wherever they are. I hope they didn’t have kids.

  Rick Reed, age 63

  He’s another regular, a friend of Bob’s. He’d been diagnosed with Parkinson’s, so whenever he held a glass of whiskey—his drink of choice—it would rattle against the wood top of the bar. He’d told me recently, “One of these days, I’m just going to ask you for a straw.”

  And there he is. The very last person on the page:

  Dan Velasquez, age 26

  They have him listed as “the bartender,” as if there was only one, or as if they don’t want to mention that the other one is okay; it might upset his family. I try to remember where he was when I ran to the storage closet. Did I run right past him? Could I have grabbed him, taken him with me? I just can’t remember anything. I don’t think I saw him. Maybe he ran to hide somewhere else. Maybe his hiding place wasn’t as safe as mine. Maybe I got lucky and he didn’t.

  THE BENADRYL IS starting to make me a bit woozy—not tired, just woozy. I want to cry, I instruct myself to cry, but it’s almost as if my body lacks the energy to do so. I wonder about Cale, the “trendy lettuce stuff” guy. Did he save my life by telling me to run? If he hadn’t said anything, would I have just stood there at the bar, paralyzed? Is that what Dan did?

  I’m relieved Cale isn’t listed as one of the victims. If he’d died, I’d have to wonder if the seconds he spent telling me to run were what got him killed. I’ll have to thank him, somehow. Maybe I will write him a letter, like little kids write to firefighters who save their homes from destruction. That’s what I feel like right now—a little kid, a helpless human.

  I hear Ryan’s key in the lock and put my phone back on the table. Then I close my eyes and pretend to be asleep.

  JOYCE

  I SIT IN A dimly lit hallway of the Ada County Coroner’s office, waiting for the medical examiner to summon me. They want me to identify my son—the most torturous task any parent could endure. I finger the turquoise pendant hanging around my neck, rub the stone between my thumb and index finger.

  It’s not him. It’s not him.

  That’s what I keep telling myself.

  I am hoping beyond all hope that the person they show me is someone else’s son—a terrible thing to hope for, I know. I want to believe this is all a misunderstanding, a mix-up of wallets and IDs in the midst of the chaos at that bar. I want to believe Jed will be there when I get home, that
he will say, “Mom, the craziest thing happened.” I want to believe he’ll be so distraught that he’ll hug me, something he hasn’t done since he was a small child.

  The medical examiner introduces himself as Barry—not Dr. Walker, just Barry. I thought he would be wearing a white coat, like a doctor would, but he’s dressed in gray slacks and a button-down blue shirt. He’s younger than I expected—in his forties. Too young to be named Barry.

  “Ms. Ketcher?” he says. “We’re ready for you.”

  When they called to say they needed me to identify Jed’s body, I was picturing being led into a cold, gray room where my son’s body would be on a stainless steel table. One wall of this imagined room would have giant drawers, storage for dead people. I watch too much TV, apparently.

  It’s not like that, thank God. Instead, I’m seated in a small room and Dr. Walker (I cannot bring myself to refer to him as Barry) is telling me that I will see a photograph of my son’s face—just a photograph, not his actual body.

  “The gunshot wound was to his temple, so his face will appear unharmed,” he says.

  I stare at the photograph, facedown on the table in front of him.

  “Are you ready?” he asks.

  Ready? How could I be ready to see a picture of my dead son?

  I nod anyway.

  He slides the photograph across the table, still facedown. He sits back in his chair, his hands clasped. I wonder how often he has to do this. I wonder if he is doing this with each of the victims’ families. I wonder if he ever cries.

  I lift a corner of the photograph, slowly. The only thing that motivates me to reveal the whole thing is the delusional belief that maybe—just maybe—it’s not him.

  It is him though.

  It’s Jed.

  His eyelids are closed, but it’s clear he’s not just sleeping. He’s so white. The life is gone from him. I think back to when Ed—my husband, Jed’s dad—died. I was holding his hand; we had hospice at home. I knew the second he left us, before the nurse even said, “He’s gone.”

  I can’t manage to verbalize “It’s him,” so I just look up at Dr. Walker and nod my head, my eyes begging him to let the nod be enough. He tucks his lips into his mouth and nods in return.

  I assume they will let me go home, but Dr. Walker says the detectives want to meet with me to ask questions. “Time is of the essence,” he says with a sigh, expressing exhaustion on my behalf. I don’t know what he means at first; then it occurs to me that the police must be wondering if Jed had other plans for doing harm, bombs set to go off in unknown locations. Or maybe they think he was working with a partner, or multiple partners. Maybe they think the Ray’s Bar shooting is the first in a series. They have to presume the worst. What a terrible occupation.

  Dr. Walker escorts me back to my waiting location in the hallway. I cannot let myself feel anything yet. I must just go through these motions. Perhaps if there are enough motions, I will never have to feel a thing.

  A tall, formidable man in a long-sleeved black Boise Police Department shirt and black tie walks down the hallway toward me, his steps loud and deliberate. He is coming for me. When our eyes meet, he gives me a tight smile. He looks like that actor who played James Bond. What is that actor’s name? Not Pierce Brosnan. Not Sean Connery. The other one. Jed and I had watched the movie together; he streamed it on his laptop, and we sat on the couch together and watched. He refused to pay for Netflix or any of those other online sites. He had a way of downloading movies for free, something I didn’t want to know about because I suspected it was illegal. I had presumed those downloads and some marijuana were the extent of his dark side. People will tell me not to blame myself for all this, but how can I not?

  “Ms. Ketcher?” the man says.

  Daniel Craig. That’s the actor’s name. He looks just like him. For a split second, I wonder if we are just in a movie, if this isn’t real.

  “Yes,” I say.

  I stand to greet him because his presence seems to require such a thing. He is two heads taller than me, burly.

  “I’m Detective Matt Kinsky,” he says. “I apologize that we’re meeting under these circumstances.”

  His voice is as deep as his stature demands.

  “Do you mind if I ask you some questions about your son?”

  I do mind, but I don’t get the sense I can say that. “Okay,” is all I say.

  He shows me into a small room that must be used for exactly these circumstances—discussions with the loved ones of dead people. There is a round table and too many chairs— eight of them. I look around, wonder if the walls are really mirrors, if a team of people is watching me. I figure that probably isn’t the case. This is the coroner’s office, not the police station. I suppose Detective Kinsky wanted to spare me the ten-minute drive, a drive that would go by the mall with the Cheesecake Factory Jed and I visited for special-occasion dinners.

  I sit in one of the chairs, and he sits at the table across from me.

  “I’m so sorry about the loss of your son,” he says. The words come out monotone; his face displays no signs of empathy.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  He launches into all of the questions that a mother in my situation should ask herself. The questions pain me because I have no valuable answers.

  Did your son talk to you about any plans to shoot others or himself?

  No.

  Did your son have any history of violence?

  No, not that I know of.

  To your knowledge, did your son own firearms?

  No, not that I know of.

  Did your son have any mental health issues?

  He had some depression at times, but nothing major. Or not that I know of.

  Are you aware of any personal incidents in your son’s life recently?

  Not that I know.

  How long has he been living with you?

  He moved back home about two years ago.

  What was his reason for moving back home?

  He said a business deal in Santa Cruz fell through.

  What kind of business deal?

  I don’t know. I didn’t really ask.

  Did he have a significant other?

  Not that I know of.

  Did he leave behind any notes or writings?

  Not that I know of.

  Was he in communication with certain friends or associates recently?

  I don’t know.

  THERE ARE SO many questions. My brain stops registering them. I just keep responding “Not that I know of.”

  By the end of it, Detective Kinsky seems slightly agitated with me. You are his mother, how could you not know more? That’s what I hear, though all he says is, “I know this is hard. If you think of anything that could help our investigation, give me a call. Any time. Day or night.”

  He hands me his card.

  “Also,” he says, “we have a warrant for the search of your home.”

  I hadn’t thought of that, hadn’t presumed my home would contain anything they would need.

  “Oh,” I say. “When is that going to happen?”

  He looks at his watch, and I realize it will happen today.

  “Within the next couple hours,” he says.

  “Can it wait until tomorrow? I’d like to go through his room and—”

  “Ms. Ketcher. I’m sorry. It’s imperative we get in there.”

  To make sure Jed didn’t have further plans.

  To make sure bombs are not set to go off somewhere.

  To make sure Jed wasn’t part of a larger group.

  To make sure this shooting isn’t the beginning of a spree.

  He doesn’t explain these things, but I can guess.

  “Okay,” I say.

  What else can I say? My son is dead. They can turn my house upside down if they like, take whatever they want. None of it matters.

  I DON’ T KNOW how I get home. It’s one of those drives made by muscle memory. I am in a fog, a trance, a nightmare. I am thinking abo
ut how I want to go through Jed’s room, look for a letter, clues, something. But as I turn onto my street, I see seven news vans parked in front of my house.

  I consider driving past my house, but where would I go? They are going to wait there for me, however long it takes. So I push the button on the garage door opener, pretend like this is any other day, like I’m just coming home from the grocery store. There is a group of reporters congregating on the sidewalk. When they see the garage door open, when they see my car, they run toward me, not minding my flower beds, my herb garden.

  I’m so harried that I pull too far into the garage, hit the front edge of the work bench that hasn’t been used since Ed died.

  “Joyce!”

  “Ms. Ketcher!”

  They are all yelling at me.

  In my rearview mirror, I can see them on my driveway. I push the button to close the garage, watch it slowly angle toward the ground. A couple of them look like they might dive under the closing door, but they don’t. Then they are gone, from my view at least.

  I sit in the driver’s seat, afraid to move.

  This is my life now.

  I GO INSIDE, and the phone in the kitchen is ringing. I pick it up, not thinking, and say, “Hello?”

  A woman says, “Is this Joyce Ketcher?”

  And I understand, again. This is my life now.

  I take the phone off the hook, set it on the counter. I don’t even use that phone, generally. The only reason I have a landline is because it was included in my cable package and I figured, “Eh, can’t hurt.” Jed made fun of me for having it, said it made me “ancient.” I told him, “Well, I am pretty ancient. And, besides, a landline might come in handy in an emergency, if all the cell towers are down.” He said, “Yeah, but you won’t have anyone to call because nobody else has a landline.” It was a good point.