The Bone Bed

grateful that Bryce chose my attire for the day. I’m reminded of how unexpected it is that I’ve grown accustomed to a chief of staff who cares about my wardrobe. I’ve come to like what at first I resisted, although his attending to me encourages forgetfulness on my part, a complete disinterest in relatively unimportant details he can easily manage or fix. But he was right, I will need the jacket because it will be cold on the boat and there’s a very good chance I will get wet. If anyone has to go into the water, it will be me. I’m already convinced of that.
    I will insist on seeing for myself exactly what we’re dealing with and making sure the death is managed the way it should be, precisely and respectfully, beyond reproach and in anticipation of any legal accusations, because there are always those. Marino can help me or not, but he’s no diver and doesn’t do well in a wetsuit or a drysuit, says they make him feel as if he’s suffocating, and he isn’t much of a swimmer. He can stay on the boat, and I will take care of things on my own. I’m not going to squabble with him or anyone. I’ve had my fill of squabbling and worrying about the slightest thing that can be misinterpreted. As if I would have an affair with Anna Zenner’s nephew, who, even if I were single, would be far more compatible with Lucy, were she inclined that way.
    I’m not Luke’s de facto mother, and what continues to cut me to the bone about Benton’s remark is the suggestion that I’m old.
    Old like a Eurostile font evocative of a past era, the fifties and sixties, which I scarcely can recall and don’t want to believe I’m from.
    I feel Benton’s implication like an internal injury that chronically smarts, a depressing symptom of being damaged and not knowing it until he spoke those angry words to me in Vienna. I’ve perceived myself differently since he said it, and I’m not sure I can get over the deeper wounding it has done.

six
    I FLIP UP THE HINGED BOX COVER OF THE BIOMETRIC reader mounted on the side of the building and lightly press my left thumb against the glass scanner. The torque motor purrs, and steel roller chains noisily begin lowering the half-ton sectional shutter bay door.
    “The Coast Guard should have drysuits,” I say to Marino, as I settle into the Tahoe’s front passenger’s seat, and I know him.
    He picked whatever was most recently washed and filled with gas, which likely was what Luke Zenner observed when he noticed Marino scouting out various vehicles in the parking lot. I smell the pleasant scent of Armor All and notice the dash is glossy, the carpet spotless. Marino likes a V8 engine, the bigger and louder a vehicle the better, and I’m reminded of how much he loathes the new fleet of SUVs I picked, Toyota Sequoias, fuel-efficient, practical, what I drive every day because I don’t need to prove anything to anyone.
    “We always keep a couple drysuits in the storage lockers. I make sure of it with every scene truck.” Marino reminds me of his diligence, and I sense an unpleasant conversation coming on. “There’s two in back. I checked.”
    “Good.” I fasten my shoulder harness and find my sunglasses as he backs up. “But hopefully whatever the Coast Guard has on board is better than ours, which isn’t saying much. The suits we have are pretty awful, intended for very basic search and rescue, and not evidence recovery.”
    “Government surplus,” Marino complains, and he has something on his mind.
    I can always tell.
    “Crap that’s the lowest bid for Homeland Security or DoD, and then they don’t want it and it gets passed down the line at a deal,” he says. “Like those cartons for organ sections that said
Fish Bait
? Back in our Richmond days? Remember?”
    “It’s not exactly something one could forget.”
    Marino started tweeting, maybe started drinking again, not long after I hired Luke, and I wonder if Luke said something to him in the parking lot a few minutes ago. I wonder if Luke asked where we were going and added the reminder that he is PADI trained and certified at a professional level, is a master instructor and rescue diver.
    “Because you needed a shitload of plasticized cartons and it went out on bid?” Marino remembers fondly.
    “And we used them, had no choice.”
    “Yeah, if that happened now a defense attorney would have a field day with it.”
    I think of Mildred Lott and what I likely face. Court is still on for me, as far as I know. If