Chapter 29

Back at the mall, the officer took statements from the five teenagers and the two guards. Then, seeing that Bobby was unable to talk, was having much trouble swallowing, and had labored breathing, she called for an ambulance. With a puzzled look, she took a few steps away from the teens and exchanged several sentences with dispatch.

Coming back to the group, she told Bobby "I'll drive you to the hospital. There's been an accident just down Perimeter, and two ambulances are on the way there. Would you like to ride along, Miss?" Rebecca tearfully nodded her head. Greg's friends were dismissed and the woman showed the couple to her patrol.

The route to the hospital did not pass the accident site, and the trip was only four miles. Being brought in by the police was as good as arriving in an ambulance, and Bobby was able to get help quickly while Rebecca headed straight for the phone to call Jan and Mel.

Jan and Mel arrived at the hospital not long after the injured truck driver from Greg's crash had been wheeled in. By a coincidence, one of the EMT's was at the park for the rape attempt. He and his partner were waiting by the ER door when the Armstrongs came in. It was Mel who overheard the snippet of conversation.

"Who's the DOA?"

"Would you believe it's Greg Overland, the football player?"

"No shit? Didn't you wheel him after he tried to rape that girl last fall?"

"Yeah. God, what a waste!"

Jan had hurried a couple of steps ahead of Mel, so she did not hear the exchange. Catching up with his wife, Mel pulled her to a stop and told her quietly "I heard the ambulance guys talking. One said Greg is dead. Must have been a car crash."

Jan's face registered shock, then a series of different emotions. Mel pulled her close and asked "You OK?"

"Yeah. I'm sorry. For a minute there, I was glad. I forgot that his mother will be grieving, even if he was a terrible person."

Just then, Rebecca, who had been chased from the treatment area, spotted the Armstrongs and hurried up to them. "It's not serious," she told Bobby's parents with obvious relief. Then, she lost it and started crying. "How many times do we have to go through this?" she wailed. "Won't it ever end?"

Not sure if he should have said it or not without better proof, Mel wanted to comfort the distraught girl. "Rebecca, I overheard the ambulance guys talking. They said Greg is dead. If they're right, it's over for good."

Rebecca just stared at Mel for a moment, mouth open. Then, her tears increased. "I feel awful," she moaned, "but I can't help it. I'm glad. Now Bobby will be safe."

Bobby was soon released and hugged his parents, still not able to say much. Rebecca saw the police officer who had helped them and hurried over.

"The ambulance guys were saying that Greg is dead. Is that true?"

Reluctant to give out unverified information, the officer had been in contact with dispatch and had heard about the accident. "All I know for sure is there was one dead at the scene, in a red Mustang convertible. I shouldn't even have told you that." The officer should not have felt badly. Rebecca just had that ability to get people to do things for her.

Without even thinking about it, Rebecca revealed her true nature. "If it's true," she told the officer, "can you just forget what happened at the mall?"

"What? Why do say that?"

"It won't make any difference if he's dead. Let it just be a drunk driving accident. That's bad enough for his family. I know who one of the other guys is. I'll call him."

"But I haven't told you that he is dead," the officer objected.

"But he is. I just know it," Rebecca answered as Bobby nodded in wonder at his lover.

"Could I speak to Mr. or Mrs. Overland, please?" the uniformed sergeant asked as Wilbert opened the door to him.

"Wait just a moment, please," Wilbert responded with an annoyed look before leaving to find Brandon or Penelope. It was Penelope that he encountered first. "There's as a police officer asking for you or Mr. Overland, Ma'am," he informed her.

"What more could they want from us now?" Penelope complained, not expecting an answer as she stomped off toward the entryway. "What do you want from us now?" she demanded angrily of the officer.

He was only minimally familiar with the Overlands' legal odyssey, and was taken aback by her attitude, particular in light of the news he bore. He was there because it was departmental policy for a sergeant or lieutenant to deliver news of a fatality.

"I'm sorry, Ma'am, but there has been an accident."

"A... accident? Greg?"

"Yes, Ma'am. I'm terribly sorry, but he was fatally injured."

"Greg?... fatally?..." what followed was a primal scream of agony and despair ending only when Penelope ran out of breath and consciousness and collapsed in a heap on the floor.

Rebecca and Bobby both insisted on waiting at the hospital until Greg's fate could be confirmed. The officer, touched by Rebecca's spontaneous consideration for Greg's family, decided to wait and help them find out. She remembered most of the story about the attack at the park and the one at the Pizza Hut. It took almost a half hour and three more calls to dispatch before Greg's death was confirmed.

Leaving Bobby's car at the mall, Jan and Mel took the kids directly to the Banners' to give them the news. Martin and Elaine were as stunned and unsure of how to react as the others had been. Cal and Cheryl were on their usual Saturday outing with Cheryl's brother and sister. In spite of the booming photo business, Cal had insisted on maintaining the Saturday ritual. Rebecca wanted to be the one to inform Cal, and she called on his cell phone. She only told him that Greg was dead. The details could wait until later.

Elaine was the one who saw the need for something 'official' for the teenagers - the parents, too, for that matter. She invited the Armstrongs to come back Sunday noon, and then got on the phone to Teri, Laura, and Emily Smaak. Then, she called caterer and ordered for fourteen. She talked briefly with Cheryl about inviting the Carson family, but both agreed that it would not be appropriate.

Cal and Cheryl cut short their outing with her siblings. Cheryl told her parents what had happened and that she would be staying overnight with Cal.

Just after the early evening news broadcast, which covered the horrendous crash, a call came to the Banner house for Cheryl.

"Cheryl, you don't know me, but we have something in common. My name is Robin Beckwith. I have been working as Greg Overland's physical therapist since the first of the year. I apologize for disturbing you - I got this number from your mother.

"Cheryl, I... I don't know how to say this... is there any chance we could get together somewhere this evening?" The tension, almost to the point of panic, was evident in the woman's voice. Cheryl herself was not in great shape emotionally since hearing the news, but the 'fixer' part of her felt instant sympathy for anyone who had worked with Greg. Cheryl knew instinctively that this woman had been through the same battles with Genevieve that she had.

Unwilling to leave the support of Cal and his family, Cheryl told Robin to hold and found Elaine. After hearing Cheryl's brief explanation, Elaine took the phone to speak to Robin.

"Hello, Robin. This is Elaine Banner. Do you know who my daughter Rebecca is?"

"Of course, Mrs. Banner. I've... I've learned almost everything about Greg. I know about Bobby, and... and Cal."

"Well, it sounds like you're going through some of the same things all of us are feeling. You're more than welcome to come here and visit with Cheryl."

As Robin drove up the Banners' driveway, she felt nervous, but she also felt a bit antagonistic. After all of the time she had spent in the opulence of the Overland estate, she had begun to associate wealth with a lot of negative things. This house was not on the same scale, but she could not help wondering if she was walking into another nest of arrogant, manipulative people.

When both Cheryl and Elaine met Robin at the door, Robin's fears were immediately allayed. She could see exactly the same mix of emotions on their faces that she was struggling with. In one of those inexplicable, spontaneous emotional outpourings that occasionally happen, Cheryl and Robin had barely said hello when they fell into a tearful hug.

Elaine had planned to take Robin around and introduce her to Martin, Cal, Rebecca, and Bobby, but that was obviously not the first priority. Instead, she led them to the study where they could close the door and use the comfortable couch.

"Cheryl, I know a lot about you, so why don't I tell you about my time with Greg, first. Besides, in three months, there hasn't been anyone that I could tell. I feel like I'm going to burst."

"Elaine's a really good listener. Would you like her to sit in?"

"N... no, please. Maybe later. You and I h... have something so unique. I didn't give up what you did, but... I am feeling terribly guilty about his death."

"I don't understand why you should feel guilty," Cheryl said. Robin spent thirty minutes recounting her relationship with the Overlands, right from the beginning.

"So you see, Cheryl, it's almost like I goaded him into killing himself. I kept hammering on him about going to prison. I kept telling him that the only way out was to kill himself and that he was too big a coward to do that."

"But it was an accident - he was drunk."

"I know, I know; but maybe I planted the idea so strongly that he - I don't know - maybe it was on his mind. Maybe he was halfway convinced. Maybe it made him reckless."

"Look, Robin; I've had almost eight months to deal with this. I'll never be over it, but I've been seeing someone, and I've got a lot more peace."

"Seeing someone? You mean Cal? Greg was always bitching about how you dumped him and started going with Cal."

"Oh, yeah. I'd be a real mess without Cal. It's a long story, but I used some of my money for a psychiatrist. She's the one who helped Cal a long time ago."

"What happened to Cal then?" Cheryl explained about Khalid. She was going to talk about the kidnapping attempt, but decided Cal should be the one to tell that, if anyone did.

"Do you think she'd have time for me?" Robin asked. "I always thought I was a strong person. After the rape, I..."

"Rape?" Cheryl exclaimed in surprise. Robin spent another twenty minutes telling about how she was attacked returning from an evening class in her junior year of college.

"Robin, from my own experience, I can tell you that you should have seen someone ten years ago. It helps in ways you can't even imagine. But I think you really need it now."

"I guess. When I saw that news report, I thought I was going to stroke out. It was almost like a physical blow. I honestly hated Greg, but still..."

Right then, there was a tentative knock on the door of the study. When Cheryl opened it, Rebecca and Bobby were there, on their way to spend the night at Bobby's. Cheryl did brief introductions, and the couple left.

"Come on, Robin. You need to meet Cal and Martin. Then, I think you and me and Elaine should get in the hot tub."

"Oh, I should have brought a suit."

"Well, we don't really need suits..."

"But, the guys!"

"Oh, they'd give us privacy. But there are lots of suits around, anyway. You know, you look like you could be a Banner - guess we both do. Either Elaine or Rebecca should have one to fit you, and there are some tank suits out by the pool."

The three women spent a little time exchanging stories. When Robin heard about Elaine's athletic background and Cheryl's anticipation of a volleyball scholarship, her interest helped get her mind off of Greg's death for the first time. "If you want, Cheryl, I can help you add four inches to your vertical. I'll bet we could get another ten miles per hour on your spike, too."

"Really?" From then on, it was jock talk until they had to leave the hot tub.

Elaine could see that Cheryl and Robin were very quickly bonding in a unique way. As she watched them, she reasoned that Cheryl had never had anyone who really understood what she had gone through with Greg. She knew that Cal was as understanding and considerate as he could be, but there were limits to how much he could really feel. Robin, though, had a special commonality of experience that Cheryl might never find in anyone else.

Watching the two, Elaine felt a flash of concern about more than just friendship developing between the two, and how that might impact Cal. That concern was brief, though. She had spent enough time with Cheryl to know how deeply the girl felt about her son. They had openly discussed the problems faced by a non-lesbian female athlete in college. From everything Elaine could pick up, Cheryl was completely straight.

With Robin, sexual preference was much more of an open question. Elaine had read about rape victims becoming lesbian in the aftermath. Besides, Robin was also an athlete, and in a very physical occupation, where lesbianism was prevalent.

After a short time of such speculation, Elaine chided herself. Robin was an attractive, talented, likable, very troubled woman whom they had just met. If she and Cheryl were good for each other, that's all that mattered right then. Especially since their tender interlude New Year's Eve, Elaine had considered Cheryl very much like an additional daughter. Cheryl's new friend would be more than welcome in their house, no matter what developed.

Elaine invited - more like forced - Robin to stay overnight, and included her in the gathering the next afternoon.

Although Elaine had set things up, it was Martin who took the floor when everyone had assembled in the Banners' family room Sunday. "Greg Overland has been a factor in most of our lives for at least two years, now. All of us have reason to hate him, to fear him. But, I think I speak for everyone when I say that no one wished for this.

"The reason Elaine called all of you here was to have some sort of 'ceremony'. For obvious reasons, it would not be appropriate for any of us to go to a reviewal or a funeral. I'm not sure that any of us would even want to.

"I don't want to pretend that this is our own memorial service, or anything like that. What Elaine and I want is for all of us to understand that others have the same feelings about Greg. Maybe it's hatred. Maybe fear. Whatever it is, I'm sure someone else here feels the same way.

"I'm certainly no psychologist, but I think we can all help each other by expressing exactly how we feel - no sugar coating; nothing held back. Let me start it off.

"As a parent, I feel sorry for the Overlands because they lost a child. As the parent of one of Greg's victims, I wish that he could have suffered through prison. His death just seems too... easy. Maybe that's perverse, but we need to be honest here.

"Daddy, much as I hate to admit it, I'm glad Greg is dead. I understand how you feel, but I just cannot believe that if he left prison, he would forget about us," Rebecca said quietly.

"I know it's wrong to hate," Jan spoke up, "and I can honestly feel sorry for the Overlands. But I have to agree with Rebecca. A mother cannot ignore the sight of her child battered and beaten. And God help me, but I cannot forgive it, either. I agree with Rebecca, especially after what happened at the mall. I cannot believe that anything would have changed him. Bobby would never be safe if Greg was alive."

"I know Cal and Vick have been with Greg at a lot of games, practices, and road trips," Cheryl said, "but I think Robin and I have had the most intensive contact with him.

"I think Robin would agree that he was the most purely evil person we have known." Robin nodded vigorously at Cheryl's comment. "For different reasons, he has left scars on us that will never disappear. Am I glad he is dead? The most honest answer I can give is that I am glad that his is permanently out of my life. And out of Cal's, too."

"I wanted him to suffer in prison," Vick said. "I wanted other prisoners to do to him what I was unable to do at the lake."

"I did not want to see him dead," Cal said after a while. "I wanted to see him pay for what he did. And I have also seen too much death already." Robin looked at him in surprise after that admission.

The discussion went on for an hour. In general, those most confident that they could defend themselves wished that he had lived to serve his sentence. The mothers, Rebecca, and Cheryl were glad to see his threat removed forever. When it was finished, everyone thanked Martin for bringing them together. Everyone believed that it helped them.

Greg's death hit Cal very hard. In some ways it was more difficult than THE DAY. He had never been able to shake the guilt over injuring Greg more severely than was necessary. Crippling Greg had clearly led to his downward slide, now culminating in his death.

There was no question in Cal's mind that Greg had been a uniquely evil person. Cal did not have the benefit of the psychiatrists' expensive evaluations, but his instincts and experience told him enough. Part of Cal was convinced that Greg did not deserve to live in the same world with inherently good people like Rebecca and Bobby, nor with courageous people like Cheryl. But Cal knew that it was not his right to make such a decision about Greg. He could not shake the feeling that, indirectly, he had done just that.

Greg dying was something that Cal had never even considered as an outcome. Though he was reluctant to admit it to himself, Greg languishing in prison was something Cal had looked forward to. Sunday's discussion with the whole group had not really made him feel better. He had noticed the division between those happy about Greg's demise and those disappointed that he missed punishment.

After THE DAY and the Pizza Hut attack, Cal felt he had experienced a lifetime's worth of death, at least as a resolution to dangerous situations.

Just as Ken had predicted, THE DAY had made Cal into a different person: mature far beyond his age and his peers; more introspective than most of the population; fanatically committed to fairness and opposed to injustice; less ego-driven than most men, yet fiercely competitive for the sheer joy of it. Unfortunately, his whole history with Greg had changed him in ways not so positive. While the slain Islamist kidnappers had never appeared in a single one of Cal's nightmares, the single kick at the lake and its aftermath had cost him many sleepless hours.

As perhaps the one person closest to Greg, Cheryl was deeply affected by his death, as well. She honestly told Cal that the event hardly made her think of Greg, the person, at all. It was as if she had successfully wiped him from her memory banks. What she could not erase was the person she had become because of Greg and the things she had done during her contract with Genevieve.

Without ever telling Cal about it, Cheryl sat down and composed a letter to Genevieve. In later years, she would regard it as one of the hardest tasks of her life, but she seemed driven to do it in a search for closure. Over and over in their sessions, Dr. Julia Waxman had told Cheryl how important closure was to keep events from scarring her later life. After several iterations, she ended up with the following.

Dear Genevieve,

I am writing this not as a former employee or as an antagonist in many verbal battles. I hope you will accept my sincere condolences on Greg's death as coming from a fellow human being.

There were times during our relationship when I did not consider your human side. Your one act of consideration in warning me about the disease potential showed me that I had misjudged you.

Regrettably, I feel no grief for Greg. However, I do feel sympathy for the grief you must be feeling. I saw how hard you worked on behalf of him and your family.

Sincerely, Cheryl

She put no return address on it and marked it 'personal'. On the way to the post office, she almost turned back twice, but the same compunction kept her going and the letter was posted a day after Greg's funeral. As the letter dropped into the slot, she felt as if an oppressive weight dropped from her shoulders along with it.

Cal, his family, and his loved ones had been through a turbulent interaction with the Overlands, stretching back over three years. It was not something they sought, and in fact had tried to avoid - all but Cheryl, that is. With no Greg, Penelope headed for a treatment facility, by all accounts, and Genevieve never an overt threat, it appeared that turbulent chapter in their lives was finally over.

Well, almost over. Unexpectedly, Cheryl received a call at home from Genevieve, who asked if Cheryl and Cal would meet with her. To say Cheryl was surprised was putting it mildly. "Why?" was all she could say.

"I'm sure that your therapist talked about closure," Genevieve answered. "That's what I'm looking for."

Hearing Cheryl's, silence, Genevieve realized the mistake she had made in scoring another verbal jab and did the totally unexpected. "Cheryl, I apologize. I am afraid that old habits die hard."

"You're... you're still keeping track of me?"

"I feel like I have a considerable investment in you," Genevieve stated, "but I should not have said that."