Talking Heads by John Domini

“Manny.” He’d declared up front that the name was an amalgam, a fiction.
    You had to do something. There were stories like that, top-page possibilities soft in a couple of spots. Kit however had never done it before, cooked up an amalgam.
    â€œYeah,” the mother told him now. “But it’s not just any reporter woulda done what you done.”
    â€œWell … thank you.”
    â€œNot just any reporter look out for my boy.”
    â€œThanks, Mrs. Rebes.”
    Kit began to think he knew why the mother had called. She needed bucking up; she’d developed a dependence. How’s that feel on the conscience, Viddich?
    â€œI’m working on a follow-up, Mrs. Rebes.” The constructive tone didn’t ring unredeemably false, at least. “Maybe next time we can meet at your place.”
    â€œUh-huh well now you mention it Missah Viddich, you know that’s kind of why I called. About the, the follow-up.”
    â€œDon’t worry. Please. Nothing’s going to happen until you and I get a chance to talk.”
    â€œI hear that. But see and cause like, see, now there’s another newspaper call me.”
    The phone-static rose and fell, surf and undertow.
    â€œWas the Globe . Somebody from the Globe call me.”
    Kit checked the outer office. The workspaces remained quiet, the women head-down at their desks. Junior’s mother assured him she hadn’t told the other reporter anything. Missah Viddich be the only one look out for her boy till now, she not about to start trustin somebody else.
    He couldn’t just go on saying thank you. But what Kit came up with—“You have to do what you think is best for you.”—tasted even flatter.
    â€œUh-huh well see, I ain’t talkin’ to somebody else, don’t fret. Oh see. Somebody else just lookin’ out for themself. ”
    Kit continued to labor toward clear thinking, ripping through the papier-mâché of the last couple of days. He asked the mother if she’d gotten the Globe reporter’s name. Mrs. Rebes recalled a syllable or two, maybe the first initial, but she hadn’t thought to make a note. Kit cut her off when she started to apologize: “Don’t, don’t … ”
    Too loud. The glass walls echoed.
    Lowering his voice, loosening his grip on the receiver, he told her there was no harm done. “If you told them you won’t talk,” he assured her, “they shouldn’t pester you.” Meantime he faced up to the news—bad news but hardly unexpected. Sea Level had never been more than a couple of phone calls ahead of the pack. Sooner or later somebody else had been bound to find Junior’s mother. All things considered, it was better to hear it from her, the source, with her smoker’s squeak and nervous honesty. Better Mrs. Rebes than reading it in tomorrow’s paper.
    â€œI told em,” she was saying. “Told em. Oh see, I was thinkin the whole time, ain nobody been good to me like Missah Kit Viddich.”
    â€œThat’s … thank you.”
    â€œYou done some good for me, good like in the Gospel. My boy was dead and you made him live.”
    â€œThank you.”
    Afterwards Kit sat back from the silent phone. For the first time in a while he noticed the things he’d taped to the glass rather than the glass itself.
    He’d put up a couple of table-teepees, goofy stuff he’d found in restaurants out West. One came from Wyoming, some hole in the wall where every booth had a photo of “The World-Famous Jackalope.” The shot was almost as overdone as Zia’s postcards. A cowboy in two-hundred-dollar chaps lifted a saddle onto a huge horned rabbit. They’re tough to handle , the logo read, but you won’t find any animal faster .
    A gunslinger saint, riding on a fantasy. Yet now Kit sat there with a hard-to-figure new energy. He was suddenly hands-on around the workspace. He touched