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Jean Armstrong lives in a traditional brick colonial on a quiet, tree-lined street just outside the western beltway. I ease to a stop at the curb, gazing out my car window at the lace-hung windows, the perfectly clipped boxwood hedges that lead to the front door. So this is the house where the Armstrong boys grew up. Where they took first steps and left for first dates, where they swung from a tire on the hundred-year-old magnolia and roughhoused on the wide, grassy lawn, where only ten months ago, a solemn-faced chaplain and uniformed CNO trudged up to the sunny yellow door, carrying a task heavier than holding the front line.
I reach for my bag and climb out of the car, smoothing my skirt as I make my way to the door. For some reason I didn’t give too much thought to at the time, I dressed to impress. Makeup, hair, heels, the works. Part of my effort is that the more that I read up on Jean, the more I really like her. The few quotes she’s given the media have been so smart and thoughtful, and I’ve always been drawn to smart, thoughtful people. And besides, it’s hard not to feel affection for a grieving mother.
But there’s more to it than just wanting Jean to like me. As much as I hate to admit it, I can’t deny my glossy hair and five-inch stilettos are also a teeny tiny bit for Gabe. To remind him of the first time we met, before my accidental discovery torpedoed our connection, when he seemed to like me enough to ask my name. I don’t know what that says about me that I want him to like me again, but there it is. I do.
I climb the few steps to the door and aim my finger at the bell, but before I can make contact, the door opens and Gabe steps out, swinging the door shut with a soft click. He’s in those same faded and worn jeans, but he’s traded his apron for a T-shirt and nice wool sweater, and accessorized them both with what I’m beginning to recognize as his trademark scowl.
“Here’s how it’s going to go down,” he says without so much as a hello. “We go inside, you give Mom the papers and answer our questions, and then you leave. You don’t get to ask us anything, and you sure as hell can’t use anything we do or say in your article. All of it, every single second, is off the record. Do you understand?”
“I’ve already told you—” and at least a dozen times “—I’m not writing an article.”
He gives me a get-real look. “Right.”
I’m getting awfully tired of his assumptions and accusations, but in light of what happened with his brother, I’m also giving him a long, long rope. I let it go.
“Did you bring the transcript?”
I pat my bag and summon up a smile. “Got it right here. Along with my notepad, digital camera and voice recorder.”
“Jesus, seriously?”
“Of course not. Journalists don’t use paper these days, not since Evernote.” I give him a toothy smile to let him know I’m kidding, but when his scowl still doesn’t relent, my eyes go wide. “Come on, Gabe, it was a joke. I’m not... You know what? Never mind. Let’s just get this over with, shall we?”
“Gladly.” He flings open the front door and takes off in long strides down the hall.
I breathe deeply and step inside, taking in what I can of Jean Armstrong’s home as I follow in Gabe’s fumes toward the back of the house. Light, rambling rooms filled with flowers and painted in warm, sunny colors. Thick carpets and overstuffed couches begging to be sunk into. Smiling family photographs everywhere, decorating the walls and covering corner tables. It’s a home filled with laughter and love, much like the one I grew up in, though you’d never know it from the man marching in front of me.
We emerge in an enormous kitchen on the back of the house, where it smells like flowers and vanilla and something else, something warm and delicious. Jean Armstrong hovers over a whistling teapot at the stove, lost in thought.
“Mom,” Gabe says, his tone warm and obliging, much like the first day we met. It’s such a drastic transformation from the one he used with me just a few seconds ago that I feel almost disoriented, at the same time as this new animosity between us wrings my insides in a way I don’t want to consider too closely. “Abigail is here.”
Mrs. Armstrong switches off the gas. She’s much prettier in person than on screen and in print, her auburn hair richer, her eyes brighter, her skin more glowing. She’s smaller than I expected, too. Her sons must have inherited their height from their father, who died when Zach was still in grade school.
I cross the room and wrap both palms around her tiny, birdlike hand. “I know these are not the happiest of circumstances, Mrs. Armstrong, but I hope you don’t mind me saying, it’s an honor to meet you in person.”
She pats her free hand over mine. “Now, why would I mind you saying something so lovely? I was just making some tea. Would you like a cup?” At my nod, she reaches for her son’s arm. “Gabe, be a dear and get the mugs, would you?” She turns back to me, points me to a washed pine table by a wall of windows. “Have a seat, Abigail. We’ll be right there.”
I head over and drop my bag on the table, looking out at a garden worthy of a Martha Stewart magazine cover. Even now, when most plants should have wilted and shriveled in the last of the Indian summer’s heat, Jean’s garden is still full and lush and filled with color. It’s the kind of garden that can belong only to a master gardener, one who spends the bulk of every dry-sky day coaxing plants out of the ground.
While Gabe pours the tea, I sink onto a padded chair across from Jean. “I assume Gabe’s told you why I’m here.”
Jean and Gabe share a look, then Jean says, “He told me you have information you’d like to share about Zach’s murder.”
Though it’s not the first time I’ve heard Zach’s death referred to as “murder” from one of the Armstrongs, it startles me all the same. I take it in with a nod and move on.
“As I told Gabe earlier this week, I’ve found evidence of a thirty-sixth soldier in Zach’s unit.” I slide the transcript from my bag and across the table. “His name is Ricky Hernandez.”
Gabe flips the papers around, and he and his mother bend over them. I give them all the time they need, sipping at my tea and taking another good look out the window. Jean’s garden really is beautiful, meticulously maintained and wild at the same time. As picturesque as, well, a picture.
Gabe is the first to speak, and the hard edge is back in his voice. “Where did you get this?”
“Someone left it on my doorstep.”
“Who?”
I give him one of his own get-real looks, a pretty decent imitation judging by the way the creases in his scowl fold in on themselves even further. “He didn’t exactly stick around to introduce himself.”
“Then how do you know it’s real?”
“Because, first of all, why would anyone go to the trouble to doctor up a fake version for me? Especially since I’m not a journalist. And second—” I slide another packet of papers across the table, the censored version from the DOD’s website “—it matches up exactly to this one. Word for word, letter for letter. Except for the blacked-out ones, of course.”
There’s a long, stunned silence. Finally, Gabe swipes a palm up the back of his head. “Those motherfuckers.”
Mrs.
