by A W Hartoin
“No shirt,” he said. “Why are people calling you Smelly?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Swell.
“If I tell you, will you please toss me the roach spray and let us cut those chains?” I asked.
He thought about it and it took more consideration than I would’ve thought. Maybe the teeth chattering was inhibiting what little thought he could muster.
“Okay. I’ll do it. For you. Nobody else.”
So I told him, a mentally ill, half-frozen kid, why people were calling me smelly, even though I didn’t think it would help and might possibly push him farther over the edge.
“I’ve got this uncle—”
“Is he drunk?” asked Heaven.
“Not usually. But that is a part of this story.”
“Okay. Go ahead.”
My Uncle Morty, hacker, gamer extraordinaire and best-selling author, had done what no one ever expected. He fell head over heels in love with Nikki, a Greek lady, who, for reasons no one could ascertain, fell in love with him, too. Then he did the one thing she couldn’t stand. He lied to her about helping me with the Porter Weeks case. He didn’t have to lie, but he did, and she found out. Nikki dumped him like toxic waste and skipped town. She went to Greece and would not respond to anything or anyone.
Uncle Morty blamed me. My case, my fault. I had to help get her back. He insisted and bought tickets for us to go to Greece and I was going to talk the love of his life into forgiving him, presumably by taking the blame. Whatever. It was a free trip to Greece and I had some snooping that I wanted to do on a little side interest of mine. So I packed my bags and took an Uber to the airport. That’s when it went south. Like all the way south. Antarctica south.
Uncle Morty was there, waiting at the check-in counter and looking like no human I’ve ever seen, outside of a body in the morgue. He was drunk, crusted with food, and had body odor that could drop a deer at ten yards. He belched and farted up a storm while he argued with the airline rep. I stood there in shock. I hadn’t seen him in a few days and I had no idea it had gotten so bad.
That was a time when I would’ve liked to have called my parents, but my mom was recovering from a stroke and the attack that caused it. My father was recovering from being a lousy husband and father, so they were out, and I was on my own.
I thought we’d have to turn around and go home, but somehow Uncle Morty talked his way onto the plane. He pulled out the celebrity card, my so-called celebrity card. That’s how we became the Mercy Watts party, despite the fact that Uncle Morty paid for the tickets and was the lead passenger. I think he also bribed people. If he did, it must’ve been a whole lot of people. Did I mention there was gagging?
On the upside, I’ve never gotten through security so fast. The line cleared. People were ducking under the stringers and voluntarily going to the back of the line to avoid us. I was apologizing to everyone in sight, which elicited anger from Uncle Morty and more belching.
Someone must’ve called ahead because our seats smelled strongly of Febreze and I thought maybe we could get away with it. The plane took off. We weren’t in the air fifteen minutes before Uncle Morty was asleep and began to snore like a gorilla with a deviated septum, only slightly less hairy and with worse table manners. I stuffed tissues up my nose and in my ears, as did everyone else. It didn’t help. Kids were crying. The flight attendants’ eyes were watering. I think I heard the lady in front of us retching.
Then we banked hard and the captain announced that we were returning to Lambert due to a situation in the cabin. Since all the regular gates were full, we went to a gate where you had to use one of those old-fashioned ramps. I couldn’t get off that plane quick enough. It took three flight attendants and the co-pilot to get Uncle Morty out of his seat and down the aisle. I hustled off the plane first. I was so glad to get away from the cheers and clapping. I thought I couldn’t get more embarrassed. I was wrong.
When the pilot radioed the tower, he named me, specifically. The man said, “We have a party with unusual odor. Flight is unsustainable. Party of Mercy Watts will have to be removed.”
Then I stepped out on that ramp. Alone. There were cellphones everywhere, catching me doing what was deemed a smelly perp walk down the steps. Did I still have tissues up my nose? Yes, I did. The lead on the local news, which was quickly picked up by the national news, said, “Mercy Watts can’t stand her own smell.”
Yeah, Uncle Morty got off the plane. Yeah, he was photographed. Yeah, he looked like a rotting wildebeest, but did he make the news? No. That was me. If it gets worse than that, I’d like to know how.
“So that’s why people call you smelly?” said Heaven.
“That’s why,” I said.
“Where’s your uncle?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care. He can bite me.”
Heaven looked at the firefighters. “You guys suck.”
The guys fidgeted and looked at their boots.
“How about throwing me that spray can?” I asked.
Heaven tossed me the can and Carrie cut his chains. Together we got him into dry scrubs and gave him hot tea in the waiting room after the clinic declined to press charges. It wasn’t as easy as it sounds. Heaven was pretty wasted and kept trying to kiss me. While I was giving Logan his shots, we found out that Heaven was really named Thomas Wright III and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, which he tried to self-medicate with a wicked combo of pot, whiskey, and LSD. Why he thought that would help remains a mystery.
“Mercy?” Thomas Wright III looked at me as I picked up my sad, little bag of crap to once again try to slip out the back unnoticed.
“Yeah?”
“I see things.”
“What kind of things?” asked Carrie.
Thomas kept looking around me. I got the odd feeling that there were bees swarming around me. I just couldn’t see them.
“People,” said Thomas. “I can smell them, too. They smell good, like candy.”
“Weird,” I said.
Carrie chuckled. “Dude, that’s Mercy. She smells like candy. It’s her lotion.”
Thomas frowned. “I see people. Right now. Around Mercy. They’re in the pictures.”
A chill went up my back. “What pictures?”
“You have people around you.”
The entire waiting room stood up and stepped back.
“This is freaking me out.” Steve got on the phone and started talking to someone about needing a bed ASAP.
“I’m sure you see a lot of things,” I said.
“People,” said Thomas. “You have the most people. I wanted to tell you.”
“Is that why you came here?” I asked.
“They love you.”
“Well, that’s good.”
“Not all of them. Some want to hurt you.”
Swell.
“Thomas, we’re going to send you to a hospital so you can get the right kind of medicine. Okay?” I asked.
“But then I won’t see the people,” he said.
“That’s probably a good thing.”
“I don’t think so. I like seeing what other people can’t.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.” Thomas slumped down. The tranquilizer Shawna gave him finally took effect. “She’s nice.”
“Who?” I asked.
“The one touching your hair.”
The waiting patients took another step back, but I noticed they couldn’t look away.
“Who’s touching Mercy’s hair?” asked Carrie.
Jordan helped me get my coat over my cast and said, “Don’t encourage him.”
Thomas’s head lolled to the side. “She’s got red hair all piled up and an old-fashioned dress with an apron.”
Jordan turned me toward the door. “That’s enough.”
“She loves you. She wants you to know her.” With that, Thomas Wright III went to sleep.
Jordan opened the door for me an
d hustled me out. “Now get in your car and forget this ever happened.”
“You make it sound like that’s a real option,” I said.
“It is, if you want it to be.”
“I want a lot of things.” I walked down the steps with chills still running up and down my spine. A red-haired woman. That was plausible.
“Anything I can help you with?” asked Jordan.
I turned around. “You could stop calling me smelly.”
Jordan flushed to the roots of his hair. “Done. I’m sorry about that.”
“Good. I’m glad.”
I went for Mom’s car and I made it. I got in, closed the door, and turned on the ignition. I put the gear shift in drive and a woman ran up to pound on my window.
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered.
“Mercy! I need to be seen. It’s an emergency.”
I rolled down my window. “What is it, Mrs. Lundberg?”
“It’s an emergency.”
“Go to the ER.”
She wrinkled her nose. “That takes forever. It’s so inconvenient.”
“Emergencies usually are.”
“Can you get me in? Steve says they’re booked, but I have to be seen.”
I did my best not to sigh dramatically. I may have failed. Mrs. Lundberg always thought she had whatever was on the evening news. I kept expecting her to show up claiming that she got a shark bite in the Black river that would turn out to be a couple of chigger bites.
“I can’t get you in. They really are booked.”
Mrs. Lundberg started wringing her hands. “But this is serious. Can you take a look?”
“Shawna fired me. I don’t even work here anymore.”
She was already taking off her coat and didn’t hear. “This won’t take long. I know Shawna will see me if you confirm my diagnosis.”
“Have you been looking on WebMD again?”
“I did. That site is so useful. I don’t understand why you don’t like it,” said Mrs. Lundberg.
“I know you don’t. What’s the diagnosis?” I asked.
She straightened up and put on her suffering-with-a-terrible-disease face. “I have Lyme Disease.”
Breathe, Mercy, breathe.
“Well that’s…something. Why do you think you have Lyme Disease?”
“I had a headache. I’m so tired all the time and I have a rash.”
“This just happened?”
“Yes.”
“It’s almost Thanksgiving.”
She nodded vigorously. “I know. To have this happen right before the holidays. Can you believe it?”
No.
“People don’t tend to get a tick in November,” I said.
“I’ve always been unlucky.”
Are people calling you smelly? I don’t think so.
“Okay. Where’s your tick?”
“It’s gone,” she said with an odd amount of pride. But removing a tick wasn’t exactly rocket surgery as my dad would say.
“When did you remove it?” I asked.
“I didn’t.”
“Then what happened to it?”
She shrugged. “Must’ve fallen off. But I have the spot, like on WebMD.” She rolled up her sleeve and thrust her arm at me. “See, it’s warm to the touch and everything. What am I going to do? Lyme Disease is fatal. Fatal.”
“It’s rarely fatal. Very rarely fatal.”
“But I’m very unlucky,” she said, a tear rolling down her cheek.
“You don’t have Lyme Disease, Mrs. Lundberg,” I said. “Can I leave now? ‘Cause Ben and Jerry are calling my name.”
“What’s this then?” She pointed at the reddish lump on her forearm. “It’s got the bullseye.”
“That is an ingrown hair,” I said. “No big deal.”
Her face went blank. “An ingrown hair?”
“Yes. That’s it. You will live to peruse WebMD another day.” I put the car back in gear.
“But wait.” She thrust her arm in front of my face and I fought the urge to bite it. “It’s hot and tender.”
“It’s infected,” I said.
She drew back in horror. “Infected?”
That’s when my bad angel poked me in the brain. “That’s right, Mrs. Lundberg. You have an infection. In your skin.”
“What do I…what is...an infection?”
“Yes and, on second thought, you should go into the clinic and demand to be seen. Right now. This instant.”
“You think so?”
“I do. You might need antibiotics,” I said with a sly smile.
Fire me, will you? Let’s see how you like this.
“Antibiotics?”
Antibiotics are music to a hypochondriac’s ears. Mrs. Lundberg once asked for antibiotics for menstrual cramps. Because that’ll help.
“You never know.” Then I said the magic words that would undoubtedly send the entire clinic into a tizzy. “Better safe than sorry.”
“You are absolutely right.” Mrs. Lundberg ran for the clinic, shoving people out the way and throwing the door open so hard she nearly took it off its hinges.
Some people might say this wasn’t very nice to Mrs. Lundberg, but they’d be wrong. Yes, I got her all worked up over nothing, but, honestly, getting worked up over nothing was her favorite thing. I gave her a parting gift with a side of revenge for me. Nobody got hurt and I needed less ice cream.
If Thomas was less schizophrenic and more psychic, there might really be a red-haired woman hanging about in my car. If so, she was probably quite disappointed. I was good with it.
CHAPTER TWO
AN HOUR AND a shopping binge later, I pushed the self-park buttons on Mom’s dash and allowed myself to be the tiniest bit disloyal to my sweet truck going through agonies of reconstruction over at Egon’s Cherry Pit, so-called because when a vehicle comes out of there, it’s cherry.
I have to admit having self-park, power steering, power brakes, and a banging stereo were pretty nice. Don’t tell my truck.
While Mom’s car parked I pulled my sad bag of crap and my happy bags of crap onto my lap. I bought it all. Ice cream (four kinds), butterscotch chips, potato chips, disgusting pre-made onion dip, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Hershey’s chocolate syrup, a frozen pizza—the kind my mother said ought to come with a warning label—and a bag of carrots to ward off the guilt. I wasn’t planning on eating the carrots, but I felt more virtuous knowing they were there, just in case I went insane and wanted fiber.
The car helpfully beeped to tell me we were parked and I looked around to see if anyone was watching from the construction at the apartment building behind me. It looked clear, so I jumped out and ran for the door. I did not make it. I got called “smelly” and a new unpleasantry “rank slut”. I keyed myself in, amidst raucous laughter. This had to wear off. It’d been over a week.
Maybe there were rules I wasn’t aware of. I’d never been bullied in school. Whitmore Academy didn’t tolerate that kind of behavior, thankfully. If it had, I’d have been in some trouble, a cop’s daughter who developed a lot and early among the flat-chested elites. It would’ve been bad. Now I had a small sense of what that kind of harassment was like and I didn’t care for it. Time for sticks and stones. I wanted to break some friggin’ bones.
“Mercy?”
I turned around to find my neighbor hobbling down the stairs with his recycling. “Mr. Cervantes, what are you doing?”
“Was someone yelling at you?” he asked.
“No. It’s fine.” I dropped my bags and grabbed his. “I told you I’d take this stuff out.”
“You’ve got a broken arm.”
“You’ve got a broken toe.”
He smiled. “It was my own fault.”
“Same here.”
“Now that is just not true. You help people. I kicked my coffee table.”
“Porter Weeks doesn’t think I was helping him and since his family is a total mess since I showed up, I can’t blame him,” I said.
“I
blame his father. A grown man should have more self-control,” he said.
“Self-control is in short supply these days.” I went for the door and Mr. Cervantes called out, “Don’t go out there.”
I went out there and was rewarded with a shout about how I should be a no-fly zone. Clever, coming from a guy with an infected nose ring. I closed the door on a discussion about how much they’d have to be paid to “do” me. A lot, I gathered.
“Why did you go out there?” asked Mr. Cervantes.
“Recycling has to be done, even if there are douchebag construction workers watching,” I said.
“I don’t want you going through that.”
“That makes two of us.” I picked up my bags and he eyed them suspiciously.
“Are you celebrating?” he asked.
Let’s go with yes.
“Sure. Why not? I, the smelly slut, have gotten through another day.”
“Don’t call yourself that, Mercy. I don’t like it and I have half a mind to go out there and tell those worthless—”
“Alright. Alright. I won’t say it anymore.” I went slowly up the stairs with Mr. Cervantes, hoping my ice cream didn’t melt beyond that perfect point of gooeyness and wondering how long that stupid construction was going to go on.
“I think your phone’s buzzing,” said Mr. Cervantes.
“Yeah, it does that.”
“Aren’t you going to answer it? I’ll take your bags.”
“Not a chance. There’s no one I want to talk to.”
Mr. Cervantes didn’t look too happy about that, but I offered an ice cream party and movie watching, his pick, and he cheered right up. He hadn’t been getting out much with the toe and his daughters-in-law kept bringing him healthy food to aid in his recovery. He was too sweet to say “Bring me a cheeseburger or leave me the hell alone,” but I could tell he was thinking it.
We made it up to our floor and he gave me a pat. “Old movie or new?”
“Let’s go with old,” I said.
“Have you ever seen Schindler’s List?”
Noooo!
“I have, but I can see it again,” I said.
He chuckled. “I was joking. Nobody ever knows when I’m joking.”
“It’s because you’re so sweet.” I kissed his cheek and went for my door.
“I can bring enchiladas.”