I’ve never put Christmas lights or decorations up at my house. Vandals would have just torn them down, or worse. They don’t hesitate to paint nasty words on my garage door or to toilet paper my trees, I can’t imagine what they’d do to decorations I actually cared about.
I pat the smiling face of one of the penguins and imagine what it must be like to live a life like this. Where I could have something nice in my yard and not worry that some superstitious, hate-filled person would come wreck it. That dream is about as likely to come true as my dream of moving to where it’s warm all the time.
Lucas had given me a key to his house a few weeks ago, a treasured piece of metal. I’ve never actually used it, have only been here with him.
I slide the cold key into the lock and turn, half expecting it to not work. The lock unlocks easily and the door swings open. The rush of warm air and the faint smell of his cologne invites me in. I don’t need to turn on any lights, the Christmas tree lights fill the front room with a happy glow. It’s so tall, it almost touches the ceiling. The tree at my house fits on my kitchen counter.
Being alone in Lucas’s house feels even more like a violation against him than driving his car did. I’m not used to being part of a couple. I’ve known Lucas most of my life, and on some level have always cared for him, but this new “couple” dynamic is taking some getting used to.
I’m enjoying the getting used to it part, though.
Now that I’m at the house, I suddenly realize, I have no idea where Lucas hid Olivia’s presents. She’s too old to use the obvious places like his closet or under the bed. She’s at that age where she’s not quite sure Santa’s still real, and might go snooping to prove her suspicions right. Knowing Lucas, he’d do everything he can to keep the fantasy alive as long as possible.
I don’t want to go snooping myself either. Using my key to get in is one thing, but digging through his things without him here is another. I could text him and ask, but he’s busy with actual hard work. I should be able to handle this small task without his help. I walk slowly around the dim house, wondering where he’d hide them. I try to think like him, like a parent. That’s a jump of imagination I can’t make.
The house isn’t that big, there can’t be too many places to look. I check the coat closet, the top shelf of the linen closet, even get desperate and look under his bed.
No presents.
I think back to when Dustin and I were kids and we did the inevitable snooping. Where had we looked? As I recall, Dustin always did the snooping, not me. I liked to be surprised by my gifts. He liked to know what was coming. Usually he’d find them without me, then tease me about knowing what I was getting and hold that knowledge over my head for days. One year, I’d desperately wanted one of those toy dogs that you could make bark and wag its tail. Dustin told me he’d found the stash and I wasn’t getting one. I’d sulked for days and even secretly hoped Santa actually was real and would bring me one.
On Christmas morning, Dustin had been especially excited. He even grabbed the first gift and handed it to me. Confused, I’d taken the package wondering why he wore such a happy, expectant look.
As soon as I saw the fur in the package, I realized Dustin had lied about the dog toy.
“Surprised?” he asked with glee. “You said you wanted to be surprised. For once I didn’t ruin it.”
Mom seemed concerned, “Do you like it, Gabby? You’ve been begging for one for weeks.”
I wasn’t sure how to react. It was obvious Dustin meant well, hadn’t wanted to ruin my surprise the way he had in years past. He’d been trying to be a good brother.
The surprise came at the expense of days of sulking, thinking my parents had ignored the one thing I truly wanted that year.
To cover my mixed reactions, I forced a wide smile to my face and squealed with pretend glee. “You really got me,” I told Dustin as I tore at the paper. “My very own puppy,” I said to my parents. “Thank you!”
Mom, Dad and Dustin all smiled real smiles. It should have been a perfect Christmas morning, a warm family memory.
I remember feeling duped. Dustin really was trying to be nice, but I felt like the butt of a bad prank. I played with the dog that day, because everyone expected me to. The next day, it ‘accidentally’ got shoved under my bed and I never touched it again. It had become a physical representation of Dustin’s and my relationship. Even when he meant well, he hurt me. Even when he did something nice for me, I took it the wrong way. We were little kids then, but still the same now.
I pull my mind back from the memory. A few years later, our family had been torn to shreds by something much more important than me and my over-sensitive feelings about a gift. We survived that, so Dustin and I must be making progress somehow.
As soon as I find Olivia’s gifts, I’m taking them to my brother’s house. We may not be the best brother and sister, but at least we still have each other.
If I can find the stupid gifts.
Discouraged, I sit on Lucas’s couch and look at the brightly lit tree. “Where did he hide them?” I ask the tree.
With my heavy hoodie and my coat on, I grow hot. I pull off my coat, and a trickle of glitter lands on my lap. “Crap on a cracker,” I grumble brushing the glitter onto the carpet. “Wait, not on the carpet either.” I can’t stop the flutter of glitter onto Lucas’s freshly vacuumed carpet. The only thing I can do is put my coat back on and zip it tight. I’ll just have to be hot. I pull off a glove and start fanning my flushed face. The sight of my bare hand gives me an idea.
I’ve never used my gift for something like this. Rarely use it at all if I can avoid it.
Hoping God will forgive me, I hold up my bare left hand and think about the presents.
Nothing happens. Finding murder victims or saving people is one thing, but this?
“I’ll be saving Olivia’s Christmas,” I rationalize. I stand up, hold my left hand high and open my mind to the universe. I don’t question, I just follow the slight urges. I slowly make my way through the kitchen, shuffling my feet, my eyes squinted nearly closed. A solid metal door leads from the kitchen to the garage and my hand draws me to it.
With my left hand held in the air, I turn the knob with my right. The metal of the knob is cold, but the handle turns. The plastic, weather seal sticks and I have to shove my shoulder against the door to get it to open. Once it does, I shuffle into the dark garage. I find the light switch and the overhead flourescent bulbs hum to life.
I don’t see any tell-tale bags or hidden piles that might be presents. A battered fridge hums to life and I jump slightly. Lucas keeps sodas and a few beers in this fridge. My mouth suddenly feels dry, thinking of the stash of Dr. Pepper or Cherry Pepsi he probably has in there for me. I take a break from looking for the gifts. He has both.
“Bless you,” I say and take one of each. I stash a Dr. Pepper in the pocket of my coat and crack the top of the Cherry Pepsi. The hiss and the miniscule bubbles that escape fill me with more satisfaction than they should. The first drink from a fresh can is the best. The bubbles sting my nose and the sugar coats my tongue. I drink greedily, sighing afterward like they do in the commercials.
“You have a problem, you know,” I say to myself, then take another deep drink. “Girl’s gotta have a vice,” I rationalize and down the rest of the soda.
I sneak another out of the fridge and put it in my other coat pocket. It might be a late night, and I might need the caffeine.
There’s nothing else but a few shelves, some shovels and a lawn mower in the garage. Nothing that looks like gifts. I try anyway and lift my hand again and focus.
Feeling like the freak I’m often accused of being, I continue to scan my hand around the room, desperate for a clue.
The cable that hangs from the pull down steps to the attic bumps against my bare knuckles.
“Aha.”
I wrap my hand around the cable and pull the steps down. They unfold into a rickety ladder leading to the black hole of the atti
c. I’m not super fond of rickety steps, but the gifts have to be here, I’ve searched everywhere else. Halfway up the unstable ladder, I see two black plastic bags near the opening to the attic.
“Found you,” I exclaim. Slightly ashamed, but also triumphant, I slide my gloves back on. Vowing to never tell anyone what I just did, I pull the bags of presents out of the attic and hastily fold the attic steps back up into the ceiling. They close with a bang.
“Good hiding spot, babe. Olivia can’t even reach the cable to open the steps.”
Proud of Lucas’s hiding abilities and proud of my finding abilities, I drag the bags of gifts outside. I carefully lock up behind me. The blow-up penguins watch me load the heavy bags into the backseat of the Charger.
Judging by the amount of gifts in the two bags, Olivia must have chosen nice over naughty this year.
Chapter 6
GABBY
I had been impressed with Lucas’s blow-up penguin decoration. Dustin’s neighborhood puts that display to shame. Lucas and I both live in small houses in the older part of town. Dustin lives in one of the newer neighborhoods with curving streets with odd names like Cider Mill Run and Rainwater Cove. Each house struggles to be different, to stand out, but the houses end up all looking the same.
Christmas time is when the owners can really shine. The displays of lights here are spectacular, with each neighbor trying to outdo the next. Flashing and dancing stringers, automated figures that move, lightshows played out on rooftops and garage doors. Some even have music that the lights dance to. For most of December, people come from miles around and crawl through the streets, ogling at the light displays.
I can’t imagine having the passion or energy to put up such displays. The electric bills alone must be higher than my mortgage.
This late at night, the lights are all on, dancing and flashing for all they’re worth, but the streets are empty of cars. The brightest houses remind me of showgirls past their prime. Older women decked out in finery, dancing their hearts out to an empty room. I focus my eyes on the asphalt and not the blinking lights.
Most of these houses have young families in them. Lucky children are asleep in their rooms, sure of fabulous treats waiting for them in the morning.
I can only hope and pray the three missing children are safe somewhere, too.
One little girl in this neighborhood isn’t in her own bed, not even her own house. I can’t help the missing children right now, but I can help Olivia.
Dustin’s house is at the far back of the neighborhood, his backyard borders a strip of undeveloped land. Beyond that is the sight of a new housing development that’s being built, despite a major setback earlier in the fall. His street ends in a cul-de-sac, and the caravan of spectator cars rarely comes this far, so the displays are not as elaborate as the ones closer to the entrance.
Even so, it’s obvious Dustin’s is one of the few houses that have chosen not to compete in the unofficial lighting contest. His subdued strings tossed on the front bushes and candles in the front windows makes his house seem like the quiet girl in the corner compared to flashier dancing girl houses. It also has a homey, lived in, loved in feel. Something the large displays lack.
The wreath on his front door brings forth a wave of nostalgia. I haven’t seen the circle of plastic greenery and fake pine cones since we were kids. Mom hung that same wreath on our door every year. The oversized red bow is a bit tattered now, the streaming ends blowing in the wind. I’d assumed the wreath had been thrown away at some point, hadn’t really given it a thought since the night our lives shattered.
Dustin couldn’t bring himself to visit our mother in prison, but he hung her wreath on his door. Does he hang it every year or did he dig it out of storage somewhere now that Mom is home? The fact that he hung onto the cheap display at all surprises me. Dustin’s been doing a lot of things that surprise me lately.
Parked in his driveway with my headlights off, I realize I have a bigger dilemma than wondering about Dustin’s wreath. I’d overlooked a small detail of this playing Santa gig I agreed to. I don’t have a key to his house or Alexis’ phone number. I could call Dustin to call Alexis, but it seems a tiny problem that I should be able to handle without interfering in their police work.
I could knock on the door, but that might wake the kids.
I could leave the bags of toys on the front step, but who knows when Dustin will be able to come home. If Olivia sees the bags on the step, any lingering childhood fantasy will be ruined for her.
“Crap on a cracker,” I mutter. I open one of the sodas in my coat pockets and sip while I think. I try to think of a plan, not of how sad it is that I don’t have my own sister-in-law’s phone number. We’ve just started taking baby steps towards being friendly. We’re a long way from the exchange-numbers-and-text-each-other-once-in-a-while stage.
I’ve only been inside Dustin’s house one time, and that was a few years ago, but if my memory is correct, the window on the right goes to the master bedroom. I could knock on the window and wake Alexis.
That idea makes me think of scenes from romantic comedies where the lovesick male tosses rocks at his girlfriend’s window. I can’t picture myself in a romantic comedy, my life is more of a dark humor movie.
Deciding my best bet is to at least check if the doors are locked, I suck down another drink of my soda then get out of the car. Maybe Lucas told her I was coming and she left the door unlocked for me?
No such luck. The front is, of course, secured. Growing up at Grandma Dot’s farm, we never locked the doors. She still rarely locks them. But this is a far cry from the secure farm where Grandma Dot lives. Dustin grumbles at Grandma for her lack of security. There’s no way he’d let his own house go unlocked.
Since Alexis’s window is on the right, I go left around the house. The lighted displays of the neighbor’s are all in the front yards. As I enter the backyard, I’m plunged into relative darkness. The patio door glows in the dim. Sheer curtains provide privacy, but the lighted tree inside makes them glow.
I push on the sliding door, but it’s locked, too. Cupping my hands around my face, I look inside to get an idea of the layout. As I remember, this part of the house is basically one big room. Kitchen, dining and living room all open. Mostly, I’m hoping Olivia isn’t sleeping on the couch, leaving me no options.
Through the sheers, I can’t make out details, but the hulking L-shaped couch in the center of the room doesn’t have a girl-shaped blob on it.
I push on the sliding door again, hoping it was just frozen shut, not locked. It slides a fraction of an inch, then catches. The small movement is encouraging, I will get in, somehow.
I hurry back to my car and dig a credit card out of my purse. The card has been maxed out for two months, ever since I lost my job. At least now it can serve a purpose. I pull the two filled present bags along with me, sliding them through the snow. With the bags lugging behind me, I feel like the Grinch dragging all the toys away from Whoville. At least I’m dragging the toys the opposite direction.
Opening the sliding door with the credit card is unsettlingly easy. I once watched a few YouTube videos on lock-picking when I was killing time at the shop, but I’m by far not an expert. If I can break in after a few jiggles of my maxed out Visa, Dustin needs to invest in a new lock.
For now, I’m happy it was easy.
I slide the door open. The door slides easily, but the faint scratching sound makes me cringe. I stick my head inside the door and the soft fabric of the sheer curtain clings to my curls. I pull it away, and the combination of my gloves, my hair and the curtain causes a flurry of static electricity snaps. Charged now, the curtain again clings to my hair. Swiping at the stupid fabric, I step inside onto the tiled entrance.
A sound and a movement on the far side of the room near the hall makes me duck low, hidden behind the couch. The sound is rhythmic, not threatening. I raise myself enough to see over the couch. On a table near the hall, an elf with an oversized red hat c
limbs a ladder up a tree, slides down, and climbs again. I imagine Walker gets a kick out of it, but the climbing elf got my heart pumping.
“Get a grip, kid,” I say to myself, then return to my mission.
Feeling both naughty for breaking in and nice for bringing the presents in the first place, I shove the door open and drag the bags inside. The crinkle of the plastic bags seems to fill the quiet house, setting my nerves on edge. The first bag comes through no problem, but one of the boxes in the second bag is wide and catches on the door. “Stupid box.”
I bend over to turn the box so it will fit.
Something crashes to the tile under my boots. A loud hiss mixes with the sound of my startled cry. The second soda can from Lucas’s explodes, spraying dark liquid in all directions, spinning and squirting sticky streaks on the white sheers and pale carpet.
“Stop, stop,” I whisper to the spinning can, watching helplessly as the mess grows. My tired brain finally catches on to what happened. I grab the can and toss it out the door onto the patio. It continues to hiss and sizzle, but the snow doesn’t care if it gets sticky.
I look at the mess with a sinking feeling. Cherry Pepsi pools in the grout lines of the tile, a pool of it near the edge, where it poured onto the carpet. Dark liquid looks like blood spatter on the white curtains. Soda pours off the plastic bags when I move them.
“Crap on a cracker,” I whisper. “What a mess.”
The quiet of the house is suddenly shattered.
“Freeze. I have a gun.”
I’ve never heard Alexis’s voice so firm and in control. I’m actually impressed by her. Crouched by the patio door with my back to her and the couch between us, it’s no wonder she thinks I’m a burglar.
I put my hands up just to be safe. Standing slowly, I turn around. “It’s just me, Alexis,” I say in the most soothing voice I can manage facing the business end of a gun.
Alexis doesn’t drop the small pistol, keeps it pointed at my chest. A horrible thought jumps through my head. Alexis has never liked me. She could easily shoot me now, and claim she thought I was a robber. I did break in, after all.
Message of Murder 04-Message in the Snow Page 4