Rachel Alexander 09 - Without a Word

But when I turned around, Madison was holding the flowers, standing in her doorway, watching me.
    “I guess maybe he could sleep right here,” I said, touching the bed, Dashiell sailing up there without further invitation.
    “Coffee?”Leon called from the kitchen.
    “No, thanks. I don’t have time.” Checking my watch, thinking about the traffic on the way to the airport, the road looking like a crowded parking lot unless you were on it at three in the morning.
    I pulled Madison in and closed her door.
    “Read the note,” I said.
    Madison carefully turned the bouquet around, looking for a little envelope stapled onto the wrapping paper, and then she turned it upside down and gave it one quick shake. The envelope with her name on it fluttered down to the floor. She bent and picked it up, putting the flowers under one arm as she opened it and pulled out the card. There was a picture of some flowers in one comer, white daisies with yellow centers, three of them. What I’d written was beneath that. She read what was on the card, then looked up at me.
    “That’s my cell phone number,” I told her. “In case you have any questions, or think of something you want to tell me. You can call me anytime, day or night. I’ll keep it on.” Serious now. Madison, too. She wasn’t talking, but she wasn’t shutting down either. “Or if you don’t feel like talking but for some reason you want to call anyway, that would be okay, too. I’ll know it’s you. I’ll keep the line open until you hang up,” I said. “Sometimes it’s nice to know someone else is there, you know what I mean?” I smiled, but she didn’t smile back.
    She was holding the flowers in the crook of one arm, looking up at me. For a moment, we stayed like that, neither of us moving, the air between us sweet and rich with the smell of roses.
    “Thank you for the loan of the picture,” I whispered.
    I reached out and put my hand on top of her head and let it stay there a second. “And thanks for this, for taking care of Dashiell for me.” I walked over to the bed and put my hand on Dashiell’s head. “You stay here and take good care of Madison,” I told him, walking out and closing the door behind me.
    Leon was waiting near the dining room table. There was so much I wished I could tell him, not about where I was going and what I was hoping to find there, but about Madison, about what we’d done and how it had worked out. I wanted to tell him that she needed some responsibilities so that she could feel essential, that she needed more time with him, quiet time, giggling time, all kinds of time. I wanted to tell him how she’d come into my office in the dark, how she’d crawled into bed with me, how hungry she was for a little affection. But I kept my mouth shut because it wasn’t my place to tell him how to raise his kid. I was the detective; he was the parent. And because even if I did, who says I was right? And if I was, who says he could do it anyway? Who says he wasn’t doing the best he could, like everyone else? Besides, I had a plane to catch.
    I was standing near the dining room table, looking at the pictures of Madison. “Do you have anything recent?” I asked him.
    “You want to see some?”
    I nodded.
    He pulled open the top drawer of one of the file cabinets and pulled out a thick folder, one of those hanging ones with pleats on the bottom. I began to look through the photos, picking out two five-by-seven pictures of her, walking over to his desk and looking at them under the light.
    “May I borrow these?” I asked.
    “Sure.”
    “Did you get the medical report?”
    He turned and picked up the envelope from his desk.
    “Any trouble?”
    “None at all.”
    I unzipped my bag and slid the photos into the book I’d taken to read on the plane, putting the copy of Madison’s medical records next to it. Then I turned around to yell something back to Madison, but there she was, Dashiell standing next to her, his tail wagging. She walked over to my bag and looked inside, reaching in and pulling out my bathing suit. Then she folded it carefully and put it back, slipping off her heart-shaped sunglasses and putting them into my bag, too, zipping it closed for me.
    I nodded. “Thanks,” I said. “They’ll come in handy.”
    I picked up the bag, hoisted it onto one shoulder and headed for the door. Then I turned around one last time. Madison had her hand in Dashiell’s collar, letting him know he was supposed to