The Safe

I sat alone in the living room, watching Empire Strikes Back for the third time in a week. I had already watched Godfather, Godfather II, and Terminator 2.

I was mostly just listening to Yoda now. During the Han/Leia scenes, I practiced my handstand, doing my best not to fall out of it and smash the coffee table again. Love stories were so last spring for me.

I had recently developed a fascination with telekinesis. No matter how much I meditated, I didn’t make any progress with it, but perhaps there was a metaphor in there somewhere. The ability to influence things from afar. That felt like something worthwhile to me. But for the time being, it was Darth Vader’s words that resonated with me.

Of course we all know that Vader is an anti-hero, and not a true villain. That much becomes clear at the end of Return of the Jedi. But even before that, I always thought he was misunderstood. He wants to bring peace to the galaxy and he believes that the ends justify the means. What’s so wrong with that?

When we were little kids, Cullinan and I spent a lot of time in our parents’ room. Our mom would read stories to us, then send us to bed in our room. She had a hard time getting around on account of her health, so story time was in her room. Dad would usually sit at his desk, poring over some police files. He wasn’t the best at leaving work at work.

After finding our mom murdered in her own bed, that room became John’s batcave. It was his dark place. I hadn’t gone in again until my 18th birthday.

I decided to find the truth about my biological parents. If there was information anywhere, it was in there. John said he would tell me everything, and I trusted him as much as I trusted anyone. But this was a truth I wanted to discover on my own.

The lock on the door was a simple one and gave me no trouble. I had picked a few locks in my childhood.

Inside, the room was literally dark. The walls were painted grey. The bed and desk were made of mahogany. The sheets were a dark blue and his desk chair was a deep green velvet wingback. I used to sit in that chair when Mom read to us.

I sat in the chair and faced the desk. No one was home, but I still slid the drawers open as quietly as possible, memorizing the location of everything I touched, being sure to place it back exactly where I’d found it. Not a millimeter out of place or a degree of rotation.

The drawers were filled with files. Mostly recent police files, news clippings. The top right drawer was filled with sentimentality. A newspaper clipping about our Little League team. A science medal that Cullinan had won and given to Dad for his help, even though C was explaining more to Dad than Dad was explaining to him.

None of this was what I was looking for. On the left of the desk was an old oak filing cabinet. The drawers were locked. When I found the key to the filing cabinet in the center drawer of the desk, I knew that I’d have to look elsewhere for what I wanted.

Still, I went through all of the files. More copies of police reports. The bottom drawer contained old clippings about the Vietnam War. Here was something I was interested in, but I didn’t have time for it now. Maybe another time.

To the right of the desk was something like an end table, with a red cloth draped over the whole thing and a small ficus tree on top. It was a weirdly-shaped piece of furniture.

I raised the cloth to reveal a heavy metal safe rather than an end table.

The large metal safe had one of those old dials with numbers and hash marks. This was not within my area of expertise, but I’d seen a few of these cracked in the movies. So I grabbed Cullinan’s stethoscope from our room and tried it out on the safe.

It turns out that this is not an easy thing to do. Cullinan was coming home sooner or later, so I decided to resort to guessing. Truth be told, I was a little sad when I guessed right. Mom’s birthday.

Inside the safe was an accordion folder filled with files on the murder of Ruby Diamond. I guess those were different times and I loved my mom as much as life itself, but what was she thinking when she changed her name?

Beneath the accordion folder was a slimmer file bearing the name Michael Lexington. Another murder. I read it front to back, shed a single tear, then tried to shake the papers dry.

Also in the safe were my adoption papers, listing the legal names of my biological mother and father.

I went back to the living room and my handstands. Being upside down gave me an idea and some perspective. I called Dave.

“Dave. I need your help.”

“What’s up Mike?”

“I need one of those fake IDs. There’s something I have to do.”

“But you don’t drink.”

“Make it a motorcycle license.”

“Have you been watching Easy Rider again?”

“No. And that’s not how my story ends, anyway.”