by Tess Rothery
“It must be tough on you,” Taylor reflected. She thought it might not hurt to actually try to listen. Like she had done with Lorraine.
“I’ve got Grandpa Quinny and Ernie to keep me company, but who is looking after everyone else?”
Taylor didn’t repeat her earlier mistake of saying Sissy Dorney was here to do it. The two women with big personalities had never taken to each other. “You know Deputy Maria, right?”
“Yes.”
“She wishes you were here too.”
“Really?” It was rare for Grandma Quinny to sound surprised, but this seemed to have hit her.
“I remember one time you told me you used to listen to the police scanner for entertainment. But I never knew you had been a deputy.”
“Some things are on a need-to-know basis.” She was curt but seemed to repent of it with her next sentence. “Next time you come over I’ll tell you all about it. But right now, what do you need me to do?”
“I don’t know. What do you think?” She passed the ball back. She hated asking for help, in a general way.
“I’ll go see Maddie’s husband. I’ll bring a casserole and ask some questions.”
“Thanks, but be gentle.”
“I’m always gentle.” Her words were the opposite of gentleness and Taylor almost laughed. Could her grandma be so unaware of herself?
“When I’m interviewing, that is. I’ve been trained. Trust me. I’ll call you when I get back. Do you want to talk to Ernie?”
“Oh, yes please!” Taylor’s voice broke on the oh.
"What's that Jonah been doing?" Grandpa Ernie's question threw Taylor for a loop.
“What hasn’t he been doing?” Taylor didn’t know where to start. How did she explain TikTok, Snapchat, or Twitch to her octogenarian grandfather?
"Quinn showed me some things on his phone. Some real short YouTube Things. I didn't like what I saw.”
She suspected these were TikTok videos. The things he was in the content house to create. "What was he doing?"
"He was flirting with too many girls."
"Oh." Taylor wasn't sure what to say. Her grandpa was right. Flirting with any girls was too many when you lived in a house with those girls and not with your wife.
"You gotta bring that boy home before he breaks our Belle’s heart."
"He wouldn’t, I swear.”
Grandpa Ernie harrumphed at her false promise, and she couldn’t help but agree.
Chapter Fourteen
The conversation haunted Taylor the rest of the day. She should probably check out more of Jonah's videos herself, but she didn't want to. She knew if she was the one who told Belle about the flirting, Belle would resent her. The last thing Taylor wanted right now was to be held responsible for anything Jonah was doing on the internet. And yet, who else did Belle have to help?
She pondered this from her new favorite safe space in the library. Perhaps the library was always empty because the murder weapon had come from there, but whatever the reason, the echoey chambers of the tower room that still waited for its books, felt safe.
She wanted to call Graham to get his opinion on things—on the murder and on the situation with Jonah, but she knew there was no point. He would be in his own head about his current story. She didn’t like to think she couldn’t make up her own mind, but she did value second opinions. Other perspectives could shine a light in a dark situation, and this situation was dark.
But Graham wasn't her only friend, and perhaps one of the other people she’d become close to through the years might have some insight. Maybe even John Hancock. But it was the middle of a working day, so instead of calling or texting, she sent a lengthy email detailing all her worries. The subject line was: Not urgent, read when you have time. After she hit send, she felt sick to her stomach. She should have reread it at least two more times and edited it.
It was too lengthy.
Too emotional.
Too vulnerable.
She had said a whole lot of things that maybe shouldn't have been written down.
She reread the email trying to see it from her friend’s point of view. Perhaps a little emotional, but John had never been bothered by her emotions before.
It was maybe a little indiscreet when discussing her lack of trust in Jonah. But also, it wasn’t as bad as it had felt. She closed her computer before she could re-convince herself that the email was a disaster.
Even with all the food John Hancock had donated, there was plenty of kitchen work to do, so she headed downstairs to see if Aviva needed any help.
Down in the kitchen Aviva was laying frozen, breaded fish on a jelly-roll pan.
"Need a hand?" Taylor made her way to the sink and washed her hands.
"Sure. I think they fried these and then froze them just to send to us." Aviva smiled about the fish, but her eyes were shadowed.
"Maybe so." It seemed unlikely to Taylor, but not worth being disagreeable about. Especially since she still needed to wiggle a confession from the girl.
"They look nicer than the ones we get at the diner." Aviva tapped one of the breaded fish fillets with her fingertip. "Not that the food we have at the diner is bad, but they do use frozen fish instead of fresh for the fish and chips. These are way better than that."
"He has always been generous. What can I do for you?"
"Do you mind peeling potatoes?"
"Not at all." Taylor rummaged around for the potato peeler. "Do you follow Jonah in his TikTok and stuff?”
"There's a mess I wouldn't step into if someone paid me." Aviva pulled a sack of potatoes out of the pantry. "Your sister is a trusting girl. I don't need to tell you this, but Comfort is a really small town."
"Very true." Taylor threw the potatoes in the sink and rinsed them off.
"I know this is just dumb teenage stuff," Aviva spoke with hesitation, "but when you marry a teenager, that's about all you have to work with. Jonah left school when he turned eighteen and eloped with your sister."
"I will never forget that, trust me.” Taylor tried to laugh but it came out in a weird little strangled noise.
"Like I said, I know this is going to sound really childish, but Jonah wasn't a particularly faithful boyfriend."
Taylor pressed her lips together to prevent herself from saying anything about teenage boys. Aviva was correct, when you marry a teenage boy, you marry his teenage boy behavior.
"We were a pretty small class growing up, but lots of kids from out of the area drove into Comfort for high school. We had a great track team. Jonah dated as many of them as he could."
“Just the kids from out of town?”
“Yup. The rest of us knew he'd always been in love with Belle. When I say love, I'm not kidding. I think it was first obvious when he was in fifth grade. He always looked at her with big, dopey eyes, followed her around, bought her things. Since his mom and her mom were such good friends, they'd known each other forever, and he was a little younger, so it seemed natural. All of us girls from Comfort thought it was sweet. For a lot of that time, she only had eyes for Cooper, so Jonah was stuck in the friend zone. He obsessed over Belle, but dated anyone who was single, more than one at a time, if he could."
"I know you warned me this would sound juvenile, but it does sound childish.” Taylor pulled the peeler across the potato. A long thin strip of russet skin fell into the sink.
“I don’t mean to sound rude, but Jonah is pretty juvenile. Belle deserves better.”
“She does seem to love him…” this conversation wasn’t making her life easier. She needed to turn it to Aviva’s secret.
"She does. That’s why this sucks.”
“So, you think he’s probably just prone to cheating now? Even though he’s loved her for so long?”
“I worry about it. I shouldn’t, but they’re both my friends. It’s hard to find true love, don’t you think? Every now and then you meet someone with that deep, true love like Tansy and her husband. Sure, they grew up together, but it was true lov
e. Maybe even you and Hudson, if I'm being honest.” Aviva lifted an eyebrow like she was attempting to be cheeky, but it didn’t go well with her drawn, worried face.
Taylor shrugged. "Hudson did always seem sincere."
"It would be great if Jonah was faithful to Belle, since she’s all he’s ever wanted, but I’m afraid he developed some really bad habits.”
"I wish he hadn't gone off to that stupid content house," Taylor said. "Relationship drama is the last thing we need right now.” She was making a nice little pile of potatoes on the sideboard of the sink. Probably more than they needed.
"I don't want my friends to go through bad times. I'm not, like, wishing the worst for them, but I can't see their marriage lasting." Aviva took a handful of potatoes to the butcher block and began cutting them into cubes.
"How do we get him to come home?" Taylor asked.
"He can't until this quarantine is over, can he?"
Taylor peeled in silence. She wondered if her sister's marriage would have had a better chance without the pandemic or if teen marriages in general were just destined to fail.
Sissy joined them before Taylor could settle that question in her mind.
"What are you making with the potatoes?” Sissy asked as though she were the general inspector of food.
"I wanted mashed potatoes. I didn't think anyone would want deep-fried anything.” Aviva sounded defeated. Her early failures as head cook and bottle washer had left a mark.
"We’d better do roasties." Sissy pulled open the pantry door and found a large bottle of vegetable oil. "Fancier and easier than French fries, but with the same kind of vibes."
Aviva looked to Taylor as though for support.
"I like mashed potatoes and fish sticks." Taylor thought she owed her friend for all the information she'd gotten.
"You're not normal." Sissy found a 6x9 Pyrex baking dish and poured a quarter cup of oil into the bottom of it. "I’ll need about ten more of these pans, unless you've got some more of those cookie trays."
Aviva sighed, but opened the cupboard door and pulled out several more jelly roll pans.
"Sheriff Rousseau wants you upstairs. I can handle roasties and fish if you're not back in time."
Aviva curled her lip, wrenched off her apron, and stomped upstairs.
"Aren't we lucky every man you've ever met is madly in love with you?" Sissy said with a laugh as she spread handfuls of cubed potato across the oil filled Pyrex. "I don't think any of us could have taken Aviva's menu ideas for a full two weeks."
Aviva’s menu ideas were the least of Taylor’s worries, but she watched Sissy manage the kitchen and wondered if perhaps Sissy had spilled Pyper’s worries to the sheriff.
Taylor, Sissy, Aviva, and Belle were having a late supper in the kitchen. The guests, including the sheriff and Maria, had all been fed and gone off quietly to entertain themselves.
"I talked to Cooper today." Belle gave herself a second scoop of potato roasties. "He said the whole town is talking about us. Obviously not in a good way."
"I would've thought he had more sense than to engage in gossip." Sissy slashed at her breaded fish fillet.
"It's not just the murder." Belle ignored Sissy’s complaint. "It's almost like Comfort’s gotten used to murder. They’re arguing about whether we should be allowed to leave or not."
"That's absurd." Sissy had a way of saying it that made it sound like that was the end of the discussion. "Everyone who's here chose to be here."
"Anyway, I talked to Cooper and he said the whole town is freaking out. He was at the market getting groceries for him and Breadyn and an actual fist fight broke out between our old gym teacher Mr. Clough and Jeff who works at the grocery store."
"Fist fight about us?" Aviva seemed to choke on her dinner.
"Mr. Clough said that the quarantine was an overreaction and we were being falsely imprisoned. Since the sheriff is here, everyone thinks we’re being held against our will. Jeff stood up for us. Said we chose to be here."
“Sounds like Jeff has insider information,” Taylor mused. “But how did that turn into a fist fight?”
"Mr. Clough said Jeff was a pawn of the system. Then he said Jeff was in the pocket of the man. That was a direct quote, Cooper said. For some reason Jeff took that as a major insult. He thought it was a slur because he’s gay, and he punched Clough in the face."
“That seems more like pandemic stress coming to a head, don’t you think? It’s not about us.” Sissy seemed to want to dismiss the idea that their troubles had leaked into the town.
"I'm not sure we can draw such a fine line," Belle said thoughtfully.
“Doug Clough is a pretty active member of the teacher’s union," Sissy stated like it cleared things up.
"What on earth does that have to do with anything?" Aviva asked.
"It seems like that means he's a fairly liberal Democrat." Sissy shrugged. "He wouldn’t use a slur. Jeff overreacted because of pandemic stress."
“Pawn of the system is a pretty big insult, too, even if Jeff misunderstood the pocket of the man thing. This isn’t all Jeff’s fault. Mr. Clough was being a jerk.”
“Exactly.” Sissy nodded like Belle had gotten the answer right. “Neither of them were themselves. They’re stressed by the pandemic and it just came to a head. Nothing to do with us.”
Taylor snorted. Mr. Clough had been a gym teacher forever. And he had never been beloved by the kids. She and Jeff were about the same age, and it didn't strike her as odd at all that they would get in a fist fight. "Jeff's absurdly manly. He has an unbeaten axe-throwing record down at that club at the beach. I could see him beating the gym teacher just because Clough had been such a jerk back in school."
"He’s had years to do that and didn’t,” Sissy maintained her firm stance.
Belle waved Sissy’s words away. “My point is that it's crazy outside of these four walls. Cooper and I agreed it’s far more likely one of the overheated locals broke in and killed Maddie than that one of our guests and friends did it."
"I hope that's true,” Aviva whispered.
All eyes turned to her.
She blushed and continued. “Because we have a lot of nights left here and there’s no lock on the door to the room I sleep in.”
"Oh, kiddo what could we have been thinking?" Sissy sounded absolutely remorseful. “Please pull that sleeper sofa into my bedroom. My door locks just fine."
Aviva didn’t look relieved.
“But who in Comfort would want Maddie dead right now?” Taylor couldn’t take her eyes off Aviva.
Aviva pushed her plate away. “Excuse me a minute….” She rushed off toward the basement bathroom.
Belle and Taylor exchanged looks.
“I hope she’s not sick.” Sissy took her plate to the sink. “It’s bad enough eating here with you all. If she’s got covid, I don’t want her in my bedroom too.”
Chapter Fifteen
Taylor and Belle were snuggled on the foldout sofa this time, with Taylor’s favorite Dove in the Window quilt resting lightly on their legs. It was too warm to wrap oneself safely like you did as a child to keep the nightmares away. This was summer when you could only bear to use a top sheet at night, which was weak protection against the fears that clung in the shadows.
“I’ve always liked this one.” Belle sat with her arms tucked around her knees. “Mom believed we could reach mastery. Not just with quilting, but with anything we loved.”
Taylor rested her chin on her knees. Her laptop was perched on a small stack of pillows just beyond their feet.
“She knew you’d get snapped up to corporate before you were thirty,” Belle said.
“She was so optimistic,” Taylor agreed without thinking. Optimism was a nice word. A comforting word. A kind thing to say about someone who was delusional.
She wrinkled her nose at her own thoughts.
Her mom hadn’t been delusional, but she didn’t know how big national corporations worked or what slim chances there wer
e for some girl from Oregon to breach their shores without knowing the right person.
The video of their mom had continued while they were talking about her, and now the long-deceased Laura Quinn’s warm, loving voice whispered, “You all watched me do that wrong. We could have edited it out, but if I had, I wouldn’t have been able to show you the right way to fix it.” The camera closed in on her hands as she took her seam ripper and placed it with the sharp pointy side on top of the seams and the little ball under it. With one swift motion she slid it across the stitching releasing the two fabrics from each other. “Smooth, isn’t it? And simple. You aren’t kids anymore, picking at stuff and making it worse. You are an expert now, a surgeon who can use their tools to heal.” The camera showed the action of ripping the seam again but in slow motion. “Time spent learning how to heal properly is more valuable than time spent learning to match corners.”
“Have you spent time learning to heal properly?” Taylor asked her sister. “I’ve been in a lot of counseling lately, and it’s been good. But it’s not all created equal.”
“I have. Don’t worry about me.”
Ha. As if she could ever stop doing that. She turned off the video and put the computer safely on the bedside table, her mother’s words ringing in her heart: “You are an expert now, a surgeon who can use their tools to heal.”
She was a decent quilter. And she was okay at running her family business. But after the last several years, she was pretty much an expert at amateur detective stuff, and she needed to use those skills to heal now. She needed to figure out who’d killed Maddie Carpenter.
In the distance, something crashed with a sick thud that seemed to echo in her ribcage. Taylor flung the cherished quilt away and walked slowly, hunched over as though she was a cartoon spy to the family room.
Raised voices seemed to be coming from the front of the house, so she headed that direction, faster now, slipping on the wood floors in her sock feet. She needed to keep ahead of Belle, to be a physical barrier between her and whatever madness was out there.