by Penny Wylder
Sure enough, right there is the packet of pills. And when I count, I realize, I’m off by two. Two days of skipped pills, two days I forgot about them. It happens from time to time. I never really think much of it. Take two again the next day. It’s not like I’m hooking up all the time.
I toss the pills onto my desk and pull out my calendar instead. Right there are the little asterisks I use to mark it. The day my period starts. My last one? A month and a half ago. Two weeks before my hookup.
My current one? Hasn’t started yet. Won’t start for another eight months, I realize.
Holy fuck.
I’m pregnant.
7
Gil
As I take my normal path down into the village—the main road, through the city center, en route to Tommy’s hardware shop—I can’t help but notice how everything has changed.
There’s old Mrs. Baker on the first corner I pass, out doing her weeding like she does every Tuesday. But today when I walk by, she doesn’t shout at me or wave. She casts a nervous glance over her shoulder, then hauls herself upright and scurries into the house. I’m sure if I stopped and asked what was wrong, she’d say she just needed a glass of water. Like everybody does now—treading lightly, being cautious, checking over their shoulders constantly, and lying about what they’re feeling.
Because the truth is, Bailey Village just isn’t the same anymore. Not since the murder.
You can feel it in the air, like a constant thundercloud stuck over the town. Everyone is side-eying everyone, wondering if they had a hand in it. If they’re the ones who dragged that lawyer out into the woods and strangled him to death, then emptied his wallet. Whoever it was even tried to cover their tracks. They left a note in his hotel room, typed up and printed out, a letter saying he was bailing on this lame festival and heading out of town.
But his coworkers knew no matter how much he hated this town or the event, he’d never bail completely on such an important meeting. They reported him missing on Sunday morning, as the festival was closing down, once they realized he’d missed the entire retreat, something that had been on their calendars for almost a year.
Unfortunately, the rain on Sunday washed away any scent trail. The police had to call in everybody for help, and we combed the woods for days.
Until the following Saturday, when little Jimmy Anderson found a shoe out by the old pine grove, near the path I walk home every night. He told his daddy, his daddy told the cops, and next thing we knew, coroners were digging up a body in a rolled-up tarp and giving us all the ninth degree.
I reach the main stretch of town, and smile and wave to Mr. Fisher who runs the barber shop on the corner. He cuts my hair every month, first of the month, like clockwork.
Today, however, when I wave, he just smiles a little half-smile, one side of his mouth, like he’s not sure. Doesn’t want to commit to a full smile, not in case I’m the type of person he oughtn’t to be smiling at. He bobs his head, though, and I’ll have to settle for that over his usual exuberant wave and invitation to come in for some morning tea.
I dig my hands deeper into the pockets of my coat and keep walking.
Doesn’t matter. Eventually the police will sort this out, and everyone will get friendlier again. They’ll stop eyeballing me, that crazy old hunter and farmer guy who builds his own furniture and kills his own meals, and they’ll learn who really did that poor city kid in. Then everything will go back to normal.
It bugs me though, how quickly people I’ve known my entire life jump to conclusions. Just because Sara Potts started a rumor she saw me wandering off into the woods the night the guy was killed (I did, but only to follow the hottest girl I’d seen in years into said woods), just because the body was buried closer to my property than anyone else’s (hardly my fault my grandfather decided to build a cabin on the far, antisocial end of town), and because nosy old Kyra Grace, a woman my mother’s age with more time on her hands than sense, says she took her dog for a midnight walk on Friday and heard screams coming from my cabin (she might have, but they definitely weren’t screams of pain).
Those few rumors were enough to make my whole village want to throw me under the bus.
I shake my head.
I spoke to the cops already of course, at length. I gave them my alibi. Air-tight, if difficult for me to track down.
Jenna.
Just the memory of her is enough to dispel my current foul mood, if only for a moment. The memory of my hands on her body, her body writhing underneath mine. The sensation of her legs wrapped around my waist, her lithe hips thrusting against me. The throaty sound she made when she screamed out in ecstasy…
Fuck. It still gets me. Even now, a month later.
I can’t tell you how many late nights and early mornings those memories have come in handy since. I keep that mental image of her in mind as I wrap my fist around my cock in the shower. Hell, even now, on my walk in to start work, I’m getting hard thinking about her.
Think about something else. Anything else.
Because as amazing as my one night with Jenna was, it was just that. One night. I’ll never see her again. She’s a city girl—she doesn’t belong here, not with a guy like me.
I’m starting to wonder if I do anymore, after all this.
Anyway, the detective leading the case, Hartman, she promised to track Jenna down and confirm my alibi. So that will be that. Jenna will prove I’m innocent, and we can all move on with our lives.
Hopefully sooner than later, I think, as Mrs. Grant and her irritating little hamster of a purse dog cross the street to avoid me.
Finally, I reach the hardware store where I’m headed. I’ve got about a million back orders stacked up from the festival—one of the other great things about that weekend, I took in enough pre-orders for specially-made furniture from out-of-town people, city slickers like Jenna who want to add a rustic touch to their penthouses—that I’ve already paid my mortgage through the end of the year just with their pre-payments.
Now, I just need to actually make the damn things. Which means restocking on the supplies I ran myself clean out of building other display pieces in advance of the festival.
The little bell over the top of the hardware store door tinkles as I enter, announcing me to the clerk inside. “Morning, Tommy,” I shout as I walk in.
From the back of the store, Tommy pops up and waves. As usual, he’s set up behind the counter with his breakfast—a bag of BBQ-flavored potato chips, a Diet Coke, and a microwaved Hot Pocket. If Jenna thinks I eat like a bachelor, she ought to see Tommy here.
Stop thinking about her, I remind myself. That’s becoming a daily ritual, at this point.
“How’s it going?” I ask as I head for the supply aisle, and grab a cart en route. Once there, I start to stock up on various grades of sandpaper, which I need for the table I just started yesterday.
Tommy groans in response.
“That well, huh?” I joke.
“These fucking cops, man. They don’t understand what they’re doing to the vibe out here. They’re up our asses, all day every day, one million question sessions…”
“Did they stop by here again?” I frown and reach for some nails, next.
“Not here, no. Interviewing Barb next door about her ‘whereabouts.’”
I glance over to see Tommy doing elaborate air-quotes on that word, and snort. “As if that old lady could lift a… how big did they say the city kid was? Two hundred-some pounds? As if Barb could’ve carried him out into a grave.”
“I dunno.” Tommy shrugs, looking suddenly amused. “Maybe if she had help from a giant gorilla or something…” He rolls his eyes, then leans on the counter, his half-eaten Hot Pocket forgotten. “It’s just bullshit, man. The cops are scaring everyone away. Half the tourists who’d planned to stay on after the festival fled the minute they caught wind of a missing person, and now half the locals are planning sudden new summer trips too. Even the Larsons!”
My jaw drops at that. Mr.
and Mrs. Larson are a fixture in town. I don’t think they’ve set foot outside Bailey Village limits in the last 30 years. I didn’t even know they knew what the word trip meant. “You’re kidding.”
Tommy shakes his head. “They’re headed to the beach, they say, down in Florida. They’ll come back when things quiet down, they said. But then Mrs. Larson did that ‘Maybe’ thing of hers. Makes me think they might join the Jonases in moving away.”
I sigh. Bailey started out as a small town, but in the past few years, it’s been shrinking by leaps and bounds. My parents weren’t the only locals to high-tail it out of town for a bigger, faster-paced life in the city. “Guess if it’s what’s best for them…”
“What about what’s best for me?” Tommy asks through a mouthful of Hot Pocket. He swallows with a gulp of Diet Coke. “Nobody’s buying anything. Gil, you’re the first customer I’ve seen in here in a week—you might be my only customer at this point. Summer is always slow, and I know we’re approaching it now, but this is worse than my worst week of low season now. It’s only going to get worse if the cops keep doing this, pitting us all against one another, making everyone suspect everyone…”
“I thought everyone just suspected me,” I say wryly as I plunk my cart down on the table. I toss in a few extra supplies I don’t strictly need just yet, like an extra screwdriver set and some sanding blocks, because I know it’ll help Tommy out.
Tommy snorts. “Nobody really listens to Sara Potts. Remember that time she told everyone her parents died in a car wreck, about twenty minutes before they pulled up outside the house perfectly fine?”
“She was sixteen back then, Tommy.”
“Yeah, well, some people never change. Hell, just two months ago she was spreading rumors that Barry was sneaking out with old Mrs. Baker.”
I burst into laughter. Barry is about eighteen to Mrs. Baker’s eighty. “What is she, a GILF suddenly?”
“What’s a GILF?” Tommy asks.
“Grandmother I’d Like to Fuck, of course!”
Tommy about dies. “Good one, Gil,” he says when he recovers enough to breathe again. “Jesus.”
“Well who do you think did it?” I lean over the counter. “If you’re one of the few left in town who doesn’t buy it was me.”
Tommy glances around the shop, exaggeratedly, even though he just finished telling me I’m the only customer he’s had in a week. Obviously there’s nobody listening. Then he bends down, close to my ear. “Well,” he says. “There were about a million out-of-towners around that weekend. And half this guy Bradley’s coworkers hated him, from what I hear. How hard would it have been for them to gang up, get rid of him in a place where nobody would trace—”
He breaks off when the shop bell tinkles. We both turn to see Sara Potts, speak of the devil, stride into the store.
“Tommy, I need some light…” She freezes in place, staring straight at me. “Bulbs,” she finishes, eyes huge as saucers. “What’s he doing here?” she asks, voice going nasally and sharp. “Tommy, are you working with him? After what I told you?”
Fuck this. I toss my money on the counter for Tommy. “Keep the change,” I tell him, and scoop my purchases into a bag before I stride out. I’m not sticking around to get accused of shit I didn’t do, especially by the town’s biggest gossip-monger.
She makes a huge show of jumping out of my way as I approach, and I storm out the door, angrier than ever now. Tommy’s right. That wide-eyed show of Sara’s looks just like the ones she used to put on as a kid, when she’d lie about who stole the liquor her parents found in her bedroom.
I’m over it right now. In fact, I’m feeling pretty over this whole damn town. Maybe city life wouldn’t be so bad after all. You’re pretty cut off in a city, pretty isolated from the people who know and raised you. But maybe that’s a good thing.
Maybe I need a fresh start.
I’m thinking that through, storming up the street back the way I came, back toward home, when I nearly trip over my own feet.
I must be hallucinating. Because I’m pretty sure I just heard…
Nope. There it is again. My head jerks upright, and there she is, just twenty feet away from me, chatting loudly to another familiar face.
The world narrows to a point. The same way it did when she was in my bedroom, in my arms—suddenly there’s nothing else here, nobody but Jenna.
I’m staring, I realize dimly, somewhere in the back of my mind. But I can’t help it. I thought I’d never see her again. Now here she is, chatting away. That’s what caught my attention at first, the familiar cadence of her voice.
Funny how fast you can get to know somebody. How one night can rearrange your whole priority list.
I watch Jenna nod at something Detective Hartman is saying. Then I watch her tuck her hair behind one ear, self-conscious, and the movement brings back a million more memories.
Jenna spread-eagled on the bed before me. Jenna arching up into me as I licked and sucked on her clit. Jenna’s perfect fucking pussy, and the breathy little moans she made…
I tear my gaze away before Jenna or the detective notice. But I glance back when I see the pair turn, and watch long enough to see them head into the station.
Of course. The detective told me she’d need to confirm my alibi. They must have asked Jenna to come into the station to do it.
I should steer clear. Let the detective get what she wants. The last thing I want to do is seem guilty, like I’m interrupting the investigation. But I can’t help it. My feet seem to have made up their minds all on their own. Next thing I know, I’m walking straight toward the station, heart in my throat.
Last time, I fucked up. I didn’t chase her, didn’t ask her to come home with me Saturday night too, hell, Sunday night, all of the damn nights.
I’m not going to miss another opportunity. I’ve got one more chance at the girl I’ve spent a month thinking about. This time, I won’t fuck it up.
8
Gil
One glance inside the station window tells me I’ll need to wait a while.
Our precinct is tiny, so there are usually only one or two cops on duty. Today, that’s Graham Denver, the ancient old former police chief, who stays on now and mostly works the desk. He’s constantly trying to relive his glory days—not to mention mistaking himself for years younger than he actually is, and constantly hitting on anyone who moves, even if they’re barely of legal age.
It’s a wonder the station hasn’t fired him for inappropriate conduct yet.
Besides Graham, the waiting room is empty. Jenna must be in the back with the detective.
For a moment, I linger at the window, hesitant. Then I decide sitting across the street will be far less obvious, and I force myself to retreat. Only for now, I promise myself. If I have to chase Jenna to the train station after this to get a shot, I’m not above that.
I grab a coffee at Erin’s place across the road—she, at least, doesn’t seem suspicious of me, and makes of point of smiling a little too much, adding a little extra milk and sugar to my coffee, to show she doesn’t buy these rumors. Well, that, and because I’m sure she’s hoping for a repeat of the one drunken night we had a few years ago after a party at Rick’s house.
I like Erin, really I do. But she’s not my type. I flash her a smile and take a seat near the window, propping up a newspaper that I barely even read the headline of, mostly as an excuse to keep one eye trained on the precinct.
It doesn’t take long for Detective Hartman to reemerge, surprising me. I’d have thought she’d want to grill Jenna, if she’s my only alibi, and I’m the most whispered-about suspect. But then again, last time I spoke to the detective, she reassured me that the precinct doesn’t take into account bad press when they do their investigations. It sort of seemed like her way of reassuring me that she didn’t buy the rumors—she was running this case by facts and facts only.
I appreciated that. Still do.
I watch the detective stride away up the stree
t, and then glance back at the precinct, pulse picking up. Where’s Jenna?
One glance through the window makes me stand up and toss my tip for Erin onto the counter. “Leaving already?” she calls after me.
I wave over my shoulder. “Perfect brew as ever, Erin,” I call back. But I have eyes only for the station. Inside, I can see Graham circling around the desk to stand next to Jenna. Without even being able to hear their voices or see much more than their heads—his constantly bobbing closer and closer to hers—I can tell he’s up to his usual shit.
I don’t even bother to knock. I just fling the precinct door wide, the handle on it crashing into the far wall. Jenna jumps at the sound, leaping about a foot away from Graham.
He doesn’t move. Just turns to glare at me, and then steps closer to Jenna. “With you in a minute,” he mutters gruffly. “Now, Ms. Walker, where were we?” He reaches for her elbow, which she twists out of his reach.
“You needed my information?” she asks.
“Yes, Ms. Walker, your local address.” His leer drops to her chest. He smirks. “Wherever you’re staying while you’re in town. And your number. Promise I’ll only use it to ask you for drinks.” He winks.
I want to strangle him. I step forward and plant myself firmly in between them. “She’s not interested, Graham.”
“That’s for her to decide,” he replies, trying to crane around me to smirk at her.
“Thanks but no thanks,” Jenna tells him. “You needed my hotel address?”
Graham glares at me, then huffs out an annoyed breath, and crosses back to his side of the desk. “And phone number.”
“Hotel phone will be fine,” I tell Jenna. “Trust me.”
“That’s not what—” Graham breaks off, scowling. “Fine.” He scribbles down the information Jenna reads off to him—the main hotel in town, near the fair, and then a landline at that same hotel. As we turn to leave, however, Graham starts muttering under his breath. “Cock-blocking little—”