I Mean You No Harm

by Beth Castrodale

  “Yes. My mom’s. It was in the parking area, a short hike away.”

  “Did police see signs of any vehicles other than the dog walkers’? Fresh tire tracks or anything?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Layla sensed the conclusion Bette was heading toward: that her mother’s trip to Ross Woods was a solo journey all along, or at least not an abduction. A solo journey whose purpose was not necessarily to sketch trees.

  “Do you know if the dog walkers, or the police, found any of your mom’s possessions at the scene—a purse, maybe? Or her drawing supplies?”

  Layla had to think back to what her grandparents had told her. As she put the pieces together, she realized that Bette had her again.

  “There was nothing at the scene, nothing but her. They found her purse on the seat of the car, and there was a sketch pad and some pencils in the trunk, where she always kept extra supplies. But—”

  Layla couldn’t get the words out; she was too choked up. But she ran through the list in her mind:

  Her mother hadn’t been showing signs of depression. Alice and Roy were sure of this.

  She’d made plans to visit a good friend the next day.

  She’d baked cupcakes for the visit and planned to ice them the next morning. Before heading to her diner shift, she’d left the icing recipe on the kitchen counter.

  She’d never leave me. Not by her choice.

  “Forget it,” Layla said. Talking this over with Bette was a big mistake. It was only making her feel worse.

  Bette rose from the chair and sat at the edge of Layla’s bed. Closer up, her features were clearer, and Layla saw regret in them.

  “Listen,” Bette said. “I’m not ruling out murder. I’m just trying to understand the situation a little better. And the fact that your mom’s art stuff wasn’t found at the scene doesn’t mean it was never there. Maybe her sketchpad got taken as a trophy or something. That wouldn’t be uncommon, and if it had some of her drawings in it, that might have made it even more appealing.”

  Layla supposed this was possible. Or maybe Bette was just trying to make her feel better.

  “That guy from your mother’s diaries, the one you think’s in the drawing she did.”

  “The Wolf.”

  “The Wolf. Do you know if anyone saw him in the diner during your mom’s shift, or around that time?”

  “The manager had asked him to stay away, because he’d been bothering my mom.”

  “Oh yeah. You told me that.”

  “But after my mom’s death, another waitress at the diner—a good friend of my mom’s—got in touch with my grandparents. She wasn’t on my mom’s last shift, but she worked with her the day before. And during that shift, both of them saw the guy who used to bother my mom outside the diner, sitting in a parked car. He was just watching the place, as if waiting for my mom to get off her shift. Once again, the manager went out and asked him to leave.”

  That good friend was Bitsy. By the time Layla heard about her contacting Alice and Roy, it had been years since her visit to the Red Rose. Now the diner was long gone, and maybe Bitsy, too. At some point, Layla Googled her nickname and its possible origin, Elizabeth, along with “Red Rose Diner” and its location, and came up with nothing.

  She turned her attention back to Bette, who looked different somehow, as if she’d gotten news she hadn’t expected. Troubling news.

  After a moment, Bette asked, “Did your grandparents tell the police about this?”

  “They did, but it was a dead end.”

  “Oh yeah. Case closed, right?”

  “Right.”

  Bette had that same troubled look on her face.

  “What are you thinking? Layla asked.

  Bette met Layla’s eye, tried to smile. “I’m just trying to process all this. It’s a lot to take in.”

  “I didn’t mean to burden you.”

  “You didn’t. It’s just the kind of information I wanted.” Bette clapped her hands to her knees, then rose up from the bed. “I’ll keep thinking things over, see if there might be other avenues to pursue. Maybe we could work on this together, once we get back home.”

  “I’d like that.”

  “But now I need to get some water.”

  As Bette headed to the bathroom, Layla thought again of the scene she’d awoken to: Bette sitting on the window ledge, peeking out the curtains. The old questions, and more, arose: plain old insomnia or road anxiety? Or ongoing grief for Vic?

  Or was she on the lookout for someone?

  By the time Bette was out of the bathroom, Layla was too tired to ask any of these questions. They’d have to wait for another day.

  Chapter 10

  Red Rose Diner

  Early September 1986

  She’d come to remember how certain regulars moved—with a shuffle or a swagger, maybe. Or a stiffness suggesting age or injury. While she hustled trays and plates across the floor, or delivered orders to the kitchen, she could tell which one of them had arrived from the corner of her eye.

  Now, scrubbing sticky rings from a tabletop, she spotted him approaching from her left, slow and steady as usual, gaze fixed on her. Always, it was as if he were seeing her for the first time.

  Without turning to face him, she bolted for the kitchen, nearly colliding with Bitsy and her pot of coffee.

  “He’s back.”

  Bitsy looked over Sara’s shoulder, tracking his movement across the floor. “And he’s up to his same old shit.”

  Sara didn’t need to turn around to see what Bitsy meant. Always, he paid no mind to the hostess station, sitting wherever he wanted—always in the corner booth, whenever it was unoccupied, which it was at the moment. It was part of Sara’s station.

  Bitsy looked back to Sara. “Take your break now, and cover me later.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “I’ll go grind some glass for his eggs.”

  Always, no matter the time of day, he ordered three eggs over easy, with “close to burnt” hash browns and a large Dr Pepper, no ice.

  “Hah!” Bitsy said. “Don’t waste your time. I got cyanide in my magic ring.” She wiggled her jeweled pinkie finger at Sara, then moved along with her coffee pot.

  Sara continued through the kitchen, dropped her rag into the laundry bucket. With no appetite for lunch—it was too early for that, on her clock—she grabbed her sketchpad and drawing pencil. Then she headed out back to the picnic bench, the unofficial employee break area, weather permitting. Finding the bench empty, she sat down and flipped to a blank page of the sketchpad.

  Staring at its emptiness, she tried to remember the idea she’d got on the floor that morning, for a new drawing. Instead, the man’s face rose up in her mind, blotting out everything else. A face that might have been ordinary, if not for his voracious stare.

  She hated that he knew her name. She hated how he said it. His voice, like fingers raking through her hair, chilled her blood.

  The first time, he’d read her name badge out loud: “Sayr-ah. I like the sound of that.”

  She’d kept silent.

  “I go by Mr. Wolf, not for any malevolent reasons. Wolf is simply an old family name. A lingering tie to German royalty.”

  Then and since, she called him nothing, to his face. In her mind and to Bitsy, she came to call him the Wolf.

  The last time he appeared at the diner, the week before, she’d had no choice but to serve him. When she reached for his empty plate, he tried to grab her wrist. She yanked her hand away, just in time.

  He smiled in a self-satisfied way, as if he’d nearly gotten away with a prank. “I just want you to slow down.”

  She and the other waitstaff had been advised to not talk back to “guests.” But most everyone outside of management knew that with certain customers, a
nd in certain situations, there had to be a line. Sara, Bitsy, and the others were left to define it for themselves, and decide when it had been crossed. Like now.

  “That’s not really possible. As you can probably see, my station is full.”

  He kept his eyes on her, still smiling. “Might I ask you just one question?”

  She said nothing, just stared him down.

  “Do you like outdoor activities? Hiking?”

  She kept silent.

  “I personally find nature restorative. And I’m betting you do, too.”

  She hoped the look on her face was making her point: Get to your damn question.

  “So, I’m wondering if I might interest you in a hike somewhere. Nothing too strenuous—maybe just a leisurely stroll through Grandview Park. Then I’ll prepare us a nice meal, with a fine bottle of wine.”

  Although she’d been expecting him to ask her out, and had tried to prepare herself, this particular proposition stole her words, at first. “I have a boyfriend.”

  His smile dissolved, and he pinned her with his stare. “Boyfriend? That’s a bit childish, isn’t it? For a woman of your sophistication? It doesn’t quite square with reality.”

  Did he know she was lying? Or was he just calling her bluff?

  “Yeah? Well, I don’t really care what your reality is.”

  Not waiting for his response, she fled to the kitchen, leaving him with his dirty dishes.

  It had been June when he first appeared—reappeared, in fact. Sara felt she’d seen him someplace else, then realized that someplace else had been here: at the diner, in Vic’s former booth.

  Until late winter, when Vic left town, he and one or more of his “business associates” lunched at the Red Rose every Tuesday. Every Thursday night, they dined here, sometimes staying till closing. Through Vic, Sara had met a few of his other boothies—Dave, Wes, Luke. On and off, there were other men, most of them not memorable.

  Among these others, a staring, dark-eyed man—the man who would be the Wolf. Back in the booth days, he wore a beard. Back in the booth days, he paid her no mind, except one time when Vic had stepped away for a moment. While she warmed coffees at the booth, leaning a little too close to this stranger for comfort, he grabbed her free wrist, whispered something she couldn’t hear, didn’t want to.

  Then something behind her caught his eye, and he dropped her wrist. That something was Vic, returning to the booth.

  Eventually, the man who would be the Wolf became part of a low-boiling, low-voiced argument during one of the Tuesday lunches. An argument that had Vic leaning toward him, red-faced, making Sara keep her distance.

  She heard only two words of the argument: “Get lost.” Vic’s voice. Then the man who would be the Wolf bolted from the diner, vanishing until June.

  Did he return only because Vic was gone? That seemed more than likely.

  “Call me if you need anything. Anytime.” Vic had said this more than once after they split, before he headed back to Reedstown.

  Anything, she was sure, would include making the Wolf vanish from the diner, for good. But did she really want to have a man beat up? Or worse?

  In the brief time she’d lived with Vic, while she’d been expecting Layla, Sara grew certain that he was capable of such a thing, or of seeing that it got done. Not from what he’d revealed to her but from what he’d tried to hide.

  In their early days, his quiet sullenness appealed to her. She admired that he “never wasted words,” her father’s saying. When he did speak to her, in private, he was often tender or funny, rarely heartless, never cruel. But the quiet sullenness was also a barrier, one she’d never been able to cross.

  In the rented house they’d shared, Vic kept late nights in the “office” he’d made of the attic room. Behind its closed door, he’d mumble into the phone at all hours, or in person to Dave, Wes, Luke, or assorted strangers who rambled in and out of the house whenever Vic was there.

  Occasionally when Vic was gone, Sara tried the attic door and found it locked, every time but the last. That time, she pushed it open.

  Inside, the beat-up wooden desk was clear of anything other than the phone—too clear to be trusted, she thought. The desk’s drawers were locked. So were the safe-like metal boxes on the floor to the right. But the suitcase next to the boxes, she unzipped it without a hitch and froze at what she saw. Guns. At least three, with parts of others: barrels, grips, things she had no names for.

  Salvage, honey, I’m in the salvage biz: Vic’s answer, when she’d first asked him what he did for a living. In his words, he “turned other people’s junk”—broken lawnmowers, saws, lathes, and other handyperson tools—“into gold.” Were guns just another part of that business?

  Sara had understood that asking Vic about the guns would give away her snooping. So from then on, whenever she caught him mumbling behind his office door, she crept closer and listened but rarely made out a word. Whenever he and one of his visitors headed out to the drive, she snuck upstairs to the window overlooking it, tried to see what was being swapped between the back of the visitor’s truck and the trunk of Vic’s car. But everything was hidden, in a box or bag, or under the cover of night.

  In frustration, she began to ask questions.

  What have you been salvaging lately? Same old shit, he said. Nothing exciting.

  Is it ever anything dangerous? Of course not.

  Is it ever anything that might have been stolen? No, no, no. What makes you think that, Sara?

  Eventually, all questions led to his quiet sullenness, his wall. She’d nearly given up on asking them, until about a year ago. That night, his voice rang clearly through the office door.

  “No, I don’t listen to you. You listen to me! He comes through for us, or it’s lights-out. Understand?”

  She froze before the linen cabinet, terrified to make a sound. She didn’t put away the clean towels until he was busy with another call, this one at the usual mumble.

  As she turned to leave, the baby kicked—once, twice, a third time. Hard. Like something trapped and asking for her help. She stopped and pressed a hand to her belly, felt her own fear of remaining in darkness. How could a man who’d been so gentle with her be capable of what she was now imagining?

  The next day, she told him what she’d heard.

  Are you going to kill someone? No. I was just angry, and I got a little dramatic.

  Have you already killed someone? Of course not. Who the hell do you think I am? (She didn’t know, really, and that’s what she told him.)

  You’re lying about your “salvage” business, aren’t you? I’ve never lied to you, Sara.

  I’m sorry, but I don’t believe you. It’s time for you to come clean with me about it. Come clean with me, or we’re over.

  In the end, he never came clean—even as he watched her throw a few days’ worth of clothes into a suitcase: the first step in dividing their lives from his, completely. Though he pleaded with her to reconsider, and would continue to do so for weeks, she sensed resignation in his eyes, an understanding that their split was for the best, at least for her and the baby.

  Now, calling on Vic for help against the Wolf felt dangerous, like it would only stir up more trouble, the type of trouble she couldn’t predict or control. So, that would have to be a last resort.

  What about Wes, then?

  Though he’d moved back to Reedstown with Vic, he showed up in the diner now and then, presumably because he had local “business” to attend to. He seemed the Wolf’s polar opposite: polite, and even more reserved than Vic, limiting his words to greetings, food orders, and farewells. Always, he tipped generously and left little drawings on the receipts: a rabbit, a brogue shoe, a teacup, a violin. Quite good drawings, done quickly. To Sara, they suggested someone who, if his life had taken some other turns, might have chosen quite a different line of work. Someone n
ot violent by nature.

  He might be able to help me, Sara thought now. Discourage the Wolf without resorting to threats, or worse.

  No. He was too close to Vic, who would surely see his involvement as a betrayal. For now at least, she’d have to look out for herself—and Layla—on her own.

  She turned back to her sketchpad, to the blank page. This time, she remembered a bit of advice from her high-school art teacher: Don’t be afraid to draw things that are bothering you, things from your nightmares. Give them form. Then stare them down or rip them up. Exorcise them.

  Once again, the Wolf’s face rose up in her mind, this time inspiring anger. Now, her pencil felt like a weapon. With hard, dark strokes, she began to commit him to paper.

  Chapter 11

  Playland, East of St. Louis

  Bette sniffed both sleeves of her shirt, then her sandwich.

  “What?”

  “Just wondering if I took any of that smell with me. I mean, holy shit.”

  Layla didn’t stop to sniff herself or her tomato-and-cheese sandwich—she was starved, and she dug right in.

  The rest-stop Mini Mart, the source of their sandwiches and the lingering essence of weed, lacked indoor or outdoor seating. So, they’d decided to dine at the adjoining Playland, with its slides and tubes of bleached plastic and its rickety swing set, where they now occupied two of the ass slings.

  Bette unwrapped her BLT but eyed it as if it might be contaminated. “That dude in there, he’s asking to get fired.”

  That dude: the Mini Mart’s sole employee. Darkly handsome and mussy-haired, he’d barely emerged from his state of indifference to ring up their pre-made sandwiches, drinks, and chips. Behind him, a guitar case had been propped against the cigarette display. To his left, a beat-up paperback lay overturned on the counter: Sartre’s No Exit.

  Jesus Christ, Layla thought, then and now—There’s no escaping my type: the unapproachable artist, on uneasy terms with capitalism and with most of humanity. There was only continual motion.

  “Maybe he wasn’t the source of the smell,” Layla said. “Maybe someone else left it behind.” These days, it seemed like people were smoking pot—or eating it—everywhere.