When he left, I threaded the dark film into the viewer and pulled up the first page. I expected it would be the headline article, but there was nothing. I scrolled through all of Sunday, just to be sure, then moved on to the Monday edition. Sure enough, it was the lead story:
LENNOX PROFESSOR KILLED IN THREE-CAR ACCIDENT
Daniel Renfield, 38, of Chestnut Street in Bering, was pronounced dead at the scene of a traffic accident Sunday afternoon. Two passengers, his wife, Georgia Renfield, 30, and the couple’s young daughter, Cassandra, were taken to Metro-West Medical Center for treatment.
The car, a Chrysler sedan, was reportedly hit from behind and pushed into oncoming traffic. Bystanders said that Mr. Renfield, a professor at nearby Lennox University, was stopped at a traffic light when his car was rear-ended into an intersection and hit by a white delivery van.
The accident will be the subject of continuing investigation by the Bering Police Department and the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.
The car was a gruesome, mangled mess, the driver’s side completely mashed in, the windshield splintered outward from a clear impact above where the steering wheel would have been. I had never considered that I was in the car with them, but of course I was. Where else would I have been?
I scrolled through the next couple days, looking for more: the results of the investigation, reports on my mother’s condition and mine. There was a brief snippet about my being released to Nan’s custody and, a day later, my mother was released. That same day, my father’s obituary was printed:
RENFIELD, DANIEL
Daniel Renfield, 38, died on Sunday, April 3, in a traffic accident.
Born at Wilcox Memorial Hospital, Daniel graduated from Bering High and earned a BA at the University of Pennsylvania. He returned to Kansas to complete his doctorate in ancient history at Wichita State. He began as an instructor at Lennox University the following year.
Daniel is survived by his parents, Samuel and Paula, of Bering, one sister, Andrea Soto of Atlanta, his wife of 10 years, Georgia, and his 2-year-old daughter, Cassandra.
The funeral service will be held Friday, April 8, at 11 a.m. at Community Unitarian Church, Maple Avenue.
That was it. I got the librarian to fetch another two weeks’ worth of film, but there wasn’t another mention of it. My father’s death faded away, replaced by news of the annual Easter parade and debate over new road construction.
It was what I had expected, the story I’d always been told. Except that my mother and I both survived, left the scene together, but for some reason, hadn’t remained that way.
“All finished?” the librarian asked as I approached his circular desk.
“I’m finished with those films. I was hoping to see another date.”
He nodded. “Why don’t you give me all the dates you’re looking for and I can pull them all at once. I can’t leave the desk too often.”
I glanced around the deserted library. “Um, okay. I think this is the only one.” I handed him the date of my mother’s death. “But maybe pull the week before and week after.”
I started with February 5, the date on her headstone, a little less than four years after the car accident. Nothing. I checked the sixth, then the seventh. Still nothing. I wondered if maybe there was some mistake. The grave actually was wrong or I’d somehow misread it. Then on the eighth I found it.
RENFIELD, GEORGIA
Georgia Renfield, 34, died suddenly Tuesday evening. The cause of death was not immediately released.
Ms. Renfield, a resident of the Joan Barrow Center in Ridgevale, previously lived with her husband, Daniel, a Lennox University professor who was killed in a car accident.
Ms. Renfield is survived by a 6-year-old daughter, Cassandra, and her mother, Nanette Dinakis, both of Ashville, Pennsylvania.
Funeral services will be held today at Community Unitarian Church, Maple Avenue.
“More dates?” the librarian asked as I approached.
“No.” I handed him the boxes. “I’m all set.” He started to skirt the desk to return them to their appropriate homes. “Do you know what the Joan Barrow Center is?”
He paused. “I do. It’s a mental health hospital. I think it’s in Norton or Martinville.”
“Ridgevale.”
He shrugged. “Yeah, okay, they’re all pretty close. About an hour south of here.”
The pieces were coming together: why I’d been with Nan when my mother was still alive, why Nan hadn’t told me the truth, though I still thought she should have.
“Do you know how to get there?”
“I do.” He went back behind his counter and rummaged underneath. He pulled out a map. “You go …”
I stopped him. “I don’t have a car. Is there public transportation? A bus or anything?”
“I doubt it,” he said. “It’s not exactly a popular destination.”
I thought about asking Lucas to borrow his car. He’d probably let me, but I couldn’t bear the thought of all his questions and prodding. It would be an expensive ride, but a cab seemed my only option.
I was nervous on the ride there, a little about what I’d find, but more that I wouldn’t be able to fill in the blanks. I had no idea what the laws were. Was I privy to my mother’s medical records? Would they even have something from so long ago still on file? I felt sure that, at some point, I’d learn whatever secrets the Joan Barrow Center held, but I didn’t want to wait for some point. I needed to see them now. Today.
“You want me to wait?” the cabbie asked when we pulled up to the front steps, his tires crunching on gravel.
I did, but I didn’t know if it’d be five minutes or five hours. I decided to be optimistic. “Nah, that’s okay. Thanks.”
He nodded, took the fifty I gave him, and rolled slowly down the long drive. I had expected either a country club or institution, but the Joan Barrow Center was neither. The fenced grounds were pleasant, but not so secluded that neighboring homes were hidden. The main building, where I now ascended three cement steps, was flanked by two smaller ones, all of them brick. I could see more of the same construction—sturdy and sensible—scattered along cement walkways. I entered through the double wooden doors into a bright and clean foyer with a reception desk squarely in its middle.
“May I help you?” The woman looked as sturdy and sensible as the buildings, neither welcoming nor unfriendly.
I tried to be as warm as the hollowness in my gut would allow. “I’m hoping to look at some records. Of a patient. My mother. She was here about ten years ago.”