“If you have to do it . . .” Eyes still restless.
“Thank you.” Decker turned on the app on his phone and pointed to the sofa. “I’m ready when you are.”
“You don’t want to sit?”
“No, I’d rather stand.”
“Why?”
Because I don’t trust you and your place is a friggin’ disaster. But Decker realized that his height was an impediment to rapport. “I have a bad back.” He pulled the chair from the table and leaned forward so as to lessen the impact of his six feet four inches. “Anytime you’re ready.”
Bennett pushed away papers from a sofa cushion and sat down. His eyes became faraway. “It was a long time ago.”
“I’m betting you still remember it in detail.”
“Wish that I didn’t, but I do.”
“Why don’t you start on that Thursday, when Zeke, Max, and you were preparing for your camping trip.”
“A camping trip that never ended for me.”
Harriet was banging around in the kitchen. Decker said, “Would you mind holding off, Harriet. I need to hear what he has to say. I don’t want to miss anything.”
She stopped and sighed. “I’ll clean the bathroom.”
“You don’t have to clean anything, Ma.”
“It’ll give me something to do.” Harriet closed her eyes. “I’ve heard the story before.”
The implication being too many times. Decker said, “Go on, Bennett. You have my attention.”
The man sat back and continued scratching his crusted arms. “It was Parents’ Weekend and we wanted out.”
“Who’s we?”
“You know. Zeke, Jack, and me, initially. Someplace not too close, someplace not too far. Something in driving distance. I suggested camping. The weather was nice.”
A pause.
“We wanted to try the mountain man thing. Zeke and I knew how to shoot, but neither of us had a gun. That’s where Max fit in. He had a gun. I used to borrow it whenever I went shooting at the college indoor range.”
“You invited him to come?”
“Yeah. We knew he’d say yes even though his parents wanted to see him that weekend. He didn’t have a lot of friends. Not that we were really friends.” He breathed in, then breathed out. “I told him we were dividing up the labor. I was going to take care of the food. Jack would be in charge of finding the perfect spot: he was a hiker. Zeke would provide us with the car, and he’d pay the gas. I told Max that he was in charge of the equipment, including the gun. He had no idea what kind of gear to buy, so I gave him a list.”
“That’s a lot of outlay,” McAdams said.
“Yeah, I told him to keep the receipts and we’d divide up the cost afterward. We did that a lot with Max.” A breath and more scratching of his arms. “Course he agreed. Then Jack crapped out. His parents were coming in. He was pissed.” Bennett paused. “Guess he was the lucky one.”
Decker nodded, encouraged him to continue.
“Anyway, the three of us met up Thursday afternoon before the weekend events started.” Another faraway look. “Max did his job, including the gun. I got the food. At three in the afternoon we were packing Zeke’s car. We figured we’d find a good spot once we were in the hills.”
“Did you take a tent?”
“Yeah. A tent and three sleeping bags and backpacks with things like medicine and bug spray and shit like that.”
“That’s a lot of stuff crammed into a BMW.”
“Yeah, it was stuffed. We put the food in the trunk, and the gear was in the backseat with Max. We weren’t going too far.”
“How did you decide where to camp?” Decker asked.
“Just hiking around.” Bennett pointed to the papers. “It’s all in my memoirs.”
“And I will read it. But now we’ve got to talk. What attracted you to the spot?”
“It wasn’t too far from the public trail, and it was private enough where we could get high in peace.” A pause. “That’s wasn’t the only purpose . . . to get high. But without girls, you’ve gotta entertain yourself.”
Decker said, “Got it.”
McAdams said, “You all shared one tent?”
“We did.”
“You didn’t care about the lack of privacy?”
“You get high enough, you don’t care about anything.”
“Drugs or alcohol or both?” Decker asked.
“Does it make a difference?”
“I don’t know. Does it?”
Bennett sighed. “Zeke and I brought some vodka, tequila, and beer. Max brought the weed and the pills and cocaine and acid. Another reason we invited him. He had money to buy good shit.” His eyes misted. “Good old Max.”
“What went wrong?”
Bennett’s voice turned soft. “It was Thursday night. We’d finished getting the tent up, we’d finished eating. Max brought out some tabs . . . I think he had a pane.”
“You mean LSD,” Decker said.
Bennett nodded. “Zeke brought out the vodka. It didn’t take too long before . . . we got really high.” His eyes were staring at the wall—a TV in his mind. “I was fine. Seeing everything in bright colors and slow motion. Zeke was fine. Max . . . I think he was seeing things. Bad things. He was hearing noises. He ran outside. He took the gun . . .”
Bennett swallowed hard.
“Both Zeke and I heard this popping noise.” His lips blew air. “Pop, pop, pop.”
He stared at the wall. He was covering his ears.
“Then there was this screaming . . . this painful screaming.” His eyes redirected to Decker. “The stupid motherfucker had shot himself in the foot.”
He threw his hands over his face and started to rub his eyes.
“We knew we should get help. But Zeke and I were in warp speed, you know. I couldn’t drive. Neither could Zeke.” A long silence. “We figured we’d just take care of it when we came down . . . when things went back to normal. I guess we weren’t thinking too well. The motherfucker was bleeding.”
He puffed up his cheeks and blew out air.
“Max kept screaming. It bothered me, but it was really bothering Zeke. He got angry—weird because Zeke wasn’t an angry guy. But things change with shit in your system. He marched up to Max and took the gun, waving it in front of him, telling him to shut up.”
A pause. While Bennett was talking, he was gesticulating the action—waving an imaginary gun.
“We were in the tent. I guess Max came inside after he shot himself. He was yelling at Zeke to do something. That he was in pain.”
Another pause.
“I was like, watching. I could understand, but I couldn’t react.”
Couldn’t or didn’t want to. Bennett had turned quiet. Decker prompted, “Go on.”
“I’m thinking.”
“Take your time.”
A minute passed. Then Bennett said, “At some point, Zeke had enough. He dragged Max outside. I heard noises. Zeke had fired off some rounds in the air trying to convince Max to stop screaming. Like I said, we weren’t thinking too clearly.”