Ollie Clark—Saturday, June 29, 2019
When Ollie woke up, it was still the most recent text from her stepmom: He doesn’t want to see you. Granted, it came after Your dad’s home, but it wasn’t exactly an uplifting end to her Friday. They showed them the photos from the basement, removed all the evidence, and then Cindy said it would probably be a good thing if Ollie and Eli left before Randy got home. It was part optimism, the idea that he would be released and come home, and part … well. Defensiveness? A need for space so Cindy could start to cope with this new information? A request to handle whatever Randy’s reaction was on her own, without outside interference?
It didn’t matter. Eli went down to clear their stuff out from the bathroom, Ollie went upstairs to throw things back into the suitcase, and they returned to his apartment for more packing. What else was there to do? He didn’t have a TV, so they watched the news on Eli’s phone, eating some of the last things from his freezer in a weird buffet of nearly-expired dishes. Houghton didn’t have its own news station, and the paper wouldn’t be out until Saturday afternoon, but Marquette picked up the story. Their reporter didn’t mention Len Wilcox at all.
Ollie supposed she slept better either because she’d finally been able to relax certain muscles or because she knew Eli’s bed and didn’t have to worry about Cindy being in the next room over. Eli had neighbors, sure, but that wasn’t the same. They could talk about Dad, for example, in normal voices without worrying she had her ear to the wall or something.
Eli leaned over to check her phone screen and then kissed her bare shoulder. “We could go,” he offered. “If we really buckle down, we could probably get the cars packed today. Tomorrow at the latest. Leave my key with Brad, head downstate … just go.”
“So, like, completely eliminate the possibility of some kind of reunion?”
He shrugged. “Take the pressure off. He doesn’t have to decide now. We just have to figure out how to pack the freaking plates.”
“Wrapped in newspaper, on their sides. And this is far from over. Jared confessed and they’ve got him in custody, but there are still so many steps.”
“Which I’m sure Serena will be there for, but you and I don’t have to. And I mean it—maybe Randy just needs the pressure off so he doesn’t have to feel guilty that he’s not bridging the gap when it’s so small. Downstate isn’t off the map, but it’s not like he can just walk around the corner and try to blurt out an apology when all he means is ‘Stop being ridiculous.’”
She raised an eyebrow at him. “So when I moved to Traverse City away from you …?”
Eli grimaced a little sheepishly. “I didn’t like it. I thought you’d be better off, going away and meeting someone else, but yeah. I mean, you know it took me a bit, but I got over myself.”
“So you think Dad’ll get over himself, too?”
He shrugged again. “I have no idea. He might not, ever. But, if I may point out: you’re the one who made those calls and canceled everything he’d paid for. Told him he didn’t have to save the date. So that kind of looks like you’d already accepted that he just wasn’t going to be in your life, anyway.”
Ollie sighed and leaned against him. “Do you think we’re allowed to leave? When there’s crimes and stuff, don’t they usually ask people to stay in the area?”
“First, we’re not exactly fleeing the country. They’ve got our phone numbers. And I can call and ask one of those detectives just to make sure. While you start packing the plates.”
“You know we don’t even really need your plates, right? I’ve got plenty.”
“We’ve both got plenty for a single person. I think we’d get really tired of running the dishwasher or doing them by hand.”
She nodded slowly. “Hey.”
“Yeah?”
“How are you doing with this?”
Eli took a slow breath and locked his arms around her, maybe partly to keep her from being able to see his face. “You mean the news that my cousin was prepared to kill my girlfriend and actually thought he had, because of the whiny rants of her annoying little sister, which no one listened to but him because everyone else realized they weren’t the truth?”
“Yeah. With that.”
He sighed and nuzzled her neck, seeking the warmth. “It’s pretty shitty, actually. I try to stop myself, but I keep replaying parts of the trial in my head. What his face looked like. Which is pointless, because you were all sitting behind me and I wasn’t supposed to look at you when I was on the stand, but I’ve seen some of those video clips, you know? All the body language experts back in the day, trying to read all of you, saying he’s clearly tense but arguing he didn’t want to have to face that his own cousin killed his girlfriend. Even though …”
Even though. There was a lot of even though.
“And then after, like, did he only start hanging out with me because he was sorry for me? Sorry he’d put me through that? And then I go and just blab about Birdy all the time thinking man, that must suck to have nobody to talk to about her. And I’m telling him all this stuff you’ve told me, or sharing some of your emails, you know? Like the one where Birdy told you that you could narrow down bridesmaid’s dresses to three, but then she’d pick one of the three, and how you were allowed to look better but she still had to look hot. All that teasing where you threatened to put her in polka dots and she said you had to give her three color options, too, and they couldn’t all be shades of pink. All the stuff she never told him because it was easier to turn you into one of Cinderella’s wicked stepsisters.
“And I guess part of me gets why he slit his wrists that night, carrying all that around, these two things that just couldn’t be true at the same time, but then also, did he ever think of killing me just to get rid of that? Of killing you, but the real you this time? Because he couldn’t have just been so stunned by the whole thing that the thought of violence totally went out of his head, right? A guy whose response to his girlfriend’s complaints is to track down a gun, carve their freaking initials on it, and shoot two of her family members isn’t just going to drop that approach, right? Especially because he got away with it.”
Ollie tilted her head. “If he’d killed me, he would’ve gotten away with it. But he killed Birdy. She was pregnant—he knew she was pregnant. Whatever else apparently went right that night, he killed the two people he so desperately wanted to save. You don’t think that would be enough to make every other choice self-destructive?”
He grumbled a little, but she thought he was honestly thinking about it. “Just because all we saw was the drinking and slashing his wrists—which he only attempted the once, by the way. And that was years ago. So if he was really that upset about it … I’m just saying. Neck’s surer than wrists.”
She shuddered because he said it so casually in a way that meant he had this information so close at hand for a reason. “They’ll probably force him to do some kind of therapy now. Maybe they’ll figure it out.”
“Therapy only works if the person going wants to put in all the effort. Lead a horse to water …”
“He kept it to himself for a freaking decade, but Dad’s arrest got it out of him. And come on—isn’t one of the AA steps confessing everything you’ve done? So, like … now that it’s out … what’s stopping him?”
“He wasn’t drunk when he killed your mom and Birdy.”
“How do you know? We don’t even know what he said. We just know they found a freaking murder shrine in Dad’s basement.”
Eli played with the edge of the sheet, still not moving anywhere she could see his face. “I don’t think it was a shrine to the murder. I think it was for Birdy.”
“He hid it.”
“Yeah, the way he had to hide exactly what he was so upset about. Just … I don’t know.” With a sigh he finally pulled back to look at her. “I don’t even know which side I’m arguing right now, except I wouldn’t mind getting the hell out of here for a while. And we do really need my dishes.”
Sighing, she checked the time. “You call. I’ll pack.” But first she caught his chin and pulled him in for a kiss.
Excerpts from Randy Clark’s interview with Sergeant Glen Waara, Deborah Binkman present, Saturday June 29, 2019
RC: What, Johnson and Dennis didn’t want to do this today?
GW: They thought you might be more comfortable with an unfamiliar face.
RC: You going to be dragging my daughter in for some of this, too?
GW: We’ve reached out to both Olive and Eli to ask if they could answer a few questions, yes.
RC: You mean explain it to you. Solve your case for you.
DB: Randy—
RC: Look, I know why you’re here, and it’s not to protect him, okay? We’re talking about the murders of my wife and my younger daughter, and they arrested me for that earlier this week, so come on. Let the record show I’m pissed off, because I am.
GW: I understand, Mr. Clark. You’re here because we’ve received a confession to those murders—
RC: Jared.
GW:—and we’re trying to determine if he’s telling the truth.
RC: Fucking Jared. You found that gun in my house and you still think he’s lying?
GW: The timing is … less than ideal.
RC: Oh, that’s a good one. Ideal would’ve been, what, June 19, 2009 at 11:45pm? Right after? Or, no, if we’re dreaming, he would’ve told somebody his plan before he did it and you would’ve stopped him. I’d be a grandfather. My wife would be a grandmother. Ollie’d be an aunt. Less than ideal? Jesus.
GW: Do you have any evidence to support his confession?
RC: To support …? I’m doing your job for you again?
GW: Mr. Clark, in order to properly prosecute the charges of murder against Jared Chapman—
RC: Yeah, yeah. I just … you know why it’s now, right? Because you arrested me, and that kid is so messed up he couldn’t handle it. His own cousin, fine, who cares? But me? That’s what did it. There’s your why for your less than ideal timing, okay?
GW: He did seem most concerned with making sure we let you go, but you can understand our confusion about why he would care about you when …
RC: God, we keep doing this. That was ten years ago. I barely knew the kid ten years ago. He’d stop in and say hi when he picked her up, and I knew his sports records, but we didn’t spend time together. We weren’t friends. God, like we’re friends now? This whole … Did he tell you why? About them. Did he give a reason why?
GW: He did, but we were wondering if you had any ideas of your own before we told you.
RC: You’re all backward, do you know that? No, I’ll answer, just … I’ve spent more time this past week thinking about that night than I have in years, okay? Add in the fight with my daughter, a couple nights suffering your happy hospitality, and this is just not a good time. Okay, so, you’re saying Jared’s the one who shot them, yeah?
GW: That’s his confession, yes.
RC: So he thought he was killing Ollie and Wendy. Do I have to go over all that again?
GW: No.
RC: Good. Okay. What else do you need? Birdy was pregnant, he was the guy dating Birdy, babies need money … and that kid … God. Birdy. She wanted to be gone. Grown up and out there. Just fast forward a couple years. I think … her mom and I settled young, you know? It happened fast with us. Then she saw Ollie and Eli, together forever, just that solidity … she wanted out. And Jared’s the kind of guy … I’m not saying he’s stupid, but if he’s confessing, then I’d guess he did it for money. Because he thought killing Ollie and Wendy would mean Birdy inherited their money. It’s childish reasoning, but they were still kids.
GW: Jared Chapman was twenty-one at the time of the murders.
RC: The legal definition’s your business. He was still living at home, working a part-time job, not supporting himself, and he still thought like a kid. Magical thinking. You telling me they didn’t see any of that yesterday? Hey, can I read it? What he said?
GW: We’d like to get—
RC: My opinion, yeah, sure, but after. Look, you know what’s happened since then, right? How I’ve … he’s like my kid now. Or was, I guess, but he just … he looked worse than I felt, you know? There I was, without my wife, without one of my daughters, and I told Ollie to go back to school because that was the plan, you know? The plan her mother and I had for her. First in the family. Go to school, get a good life … a better life than we have around here, and that’s … well. That’s personal.
GW: Mr. Clark? If it’s relevant …
RC: You don’t even believe his confession. Can you tell me what’s relevant?
GW: At this point in an investigation we don’t like to narrow things down too far. In case that means we miss something important.
RC: Ah. The way focusing on Eli made you miss Jared.
DB: Mr. Clark is a grieving husband and father who’s had a very stressful week. I suggest you allow him to draw his own boundaries in this interview and come back with more specific questions later, should you have them.
GW: The main concern is whether we have the right person. RC: This time. Stop kicking me, Deborah. I’ll talk. It’s the only thing I’ve been able to think of. My wife, Cindy … she didn’t know Jared before, so she’s having a harder time of it than I am, but we still talked it through. Things that make me think Jared’s story is real? Number one, he was in the hospital when he gave you that line about Eli being gone, and he was there because he saw Ollie and had a serious breakdown. Maybe the medics caught him saying some weird things. I mean, I lost both my wife and my kid and I didn’t need medical intervention, you know? Number two, he went and hid away from everyone, me especially. I figured I knew what the kid was going through, you know? He didn’t have twenty years with Birdy, but she was still the person he figured he’d spend tomorrow with, right? Then he tried to kill himself fast by slitting his wrists, and he’s still drinking a lot, and he’s still single because he only goes out to work or to drink, and he’s completely fixated on Ollie and Eli getting married. And I know, because before yesterday I would’ve told you, that it all just seems like a grief reaction to his first serious girlfriend’s violent murder. Hey, who am I to judge his mental and emotional whatevers? Just because he looks like Mr. Strong Sports Star, so on and so forth. But I can tell you, and still would’ve before all this, that it really looks like Jared’s life stopped on June 20, 2009. The moment he saw Ollie alive, nothing else mattered. Not even his own life.
Bury the Dead 31 – coming May 1
Rebecca Frost 