by Alana Terry
“Wow.” Lorie sighed. “I would never have guessed. When I read your books, I experience it with the characters. I can smell the earth or cooking food—even the scent of a character’s hair. I tense when I know something is going to happen, even before the first overt triggers, because you put those tiny little nuances in beforehand. It’s just amazing.” `
“Keep writing, Lorie. I can hear the writer in you.” She leaned back, examining the girl before her. “You are unusually articulate for a teenager.”
“Really? Cool.” Lorie tried to keep her face expressionless, but failed.
Alexa laughed, shaking her head. “Don’t ever play poker. Your face may cooperate, but your eyes...”
With a little prodding from Alexa, Lorie described her friends, her family, and how she passed the time during her hospital stays. Alexa took her on an imaginary tour of Hartfield Cottage and Fairbury. They discussed Alexa’s wardrobe and Lorie’s cocker spaniel until a nurse arrived to check on her. Between intermittent calls for various doctors over the PA system, Lorie and Alexa compared childhoods in Chicago and California’s desert.
As the afternoon wore on, Lorie grew weaker, her words slowing and occasionally slurring. “I should probably go. I brought a copy of the book your father asked me to sign. Now that I know you, I know what I want to write.” She dug through her bag for her pen and the book. “I leave on Thursday, but would you mind if I stopped by on Wednesday?”
Alexa signed the book as they discussed the merits of morning versus afternoon and settled on a morning visit. She leaned the book against Lorie’s side and left the room as quietly as her clacking heels would allow. If she wasn’t careful, she’d wake the entire floor with her machine gun-sounding shoes.
Left alone in her room, with eyes closed for a minute, Lorie sighed—delighted. Alexa Hartfield! A glance at the clock told her that her friends would be out of school soon; she couldn’t wait to call and tell them. Her arm moved and rubbed against the book. Oh, and a personally autographed book. What more could a person want?
She picked it up, the weight of the volume making it harder to hold than she had expected. The reminder that she was weaker than she thought sent a wave of discouragement over her, but the inscription made her smile.
Lorie,
You inspire me. I admire your intelligence, your friendliness, and your positive attitude in the midst of what must be a difficult thing for a girl your age. Please keep writing. I’d love to meet those characters. Share them with the world. As my editor always says, ‘It’s selfish to keep them all to yourself.’”
God bless you. I’ll keep you in my prayers,
Alexa Hartfield
AKA, Madame Laundry List
WEDNESDAY MORNING, Alexa arrived in the black cashmere dress she’d worn to dinner with James and Martine. Lorie’s enthusiasm for her previous ensemble had prompted her to wear something a little more elaborate than the plaid bias skirt and angora top she’d chosen for her first visit. Lorie sighed her approval as Alexa whipped her cape from her shoulders with an exaggerated model stance. “What do you think?”
“It’s so you. If I ever get well, I’m going to change my style to things more like that—sleek, simple, and sophisticated. You look like Audrey Hepburn.”
“Well, that was the idea...”
For most of the morning, Lorie and Alexa debated plot strengths and weaknesses. A few of Lorie’s ideas were impressive. Despite Alexa’s expectation of a sappy romance, medical suspense, or even science fiction, Lorie’s tentative outline was of a western—one set in the Nevada desert.
“Well, Nevada isn’t the same as California’s Mojave Desert, but they’re close neighbors. From pictures and what of it I’ve seen, they’re similar. If you ever need help with plants or describing the heat, the wind, the heat, or even the heat...” Alexa winked. “Just zip me an email. If there’s one thing I know it’s life in the desert.”
Before Lorie could reply, the door opened and Lorie’s father stepped inside of the room. Alexa and Lorie glanced up from the laptop between them, laughing as he said, “So, she has you critiquing her work already.”
“Dad!”
The blush that crept into Lorie’s already pale cheeks made her look, if possible, even more delicate and fragile. The only thing that marred the girl’s appearance was the yellow in Lorie’s eyes.
Alexa glanced at her watch. Lorie’s father likely had an hour for lunch. “I should go.” She reached behind the curtain separating an empty bed from Lorie’s and retrieved a large silver-wrapped box. “I do have a surprise for you, though.” She passed the box to Lorie saying, “I hope you like it. I have your email. I’ll write. I’ll call too, if you like.”
“Oh! That would be so great.” The girl sighed. “I wish you lived closer.”
Alexa hesitated, a new idea forming. The moment she spoke, she couldn’t take back the offer on her lips. Shaking herself for being overly protective of her emotions, she leaned close and whispered, “If I lived here, I wouldn’t have an excuse to visit and stay at my favorite hotel.” She squeezed the girl’s hand. “I’ll come when you’re out of here again and we’ll have lunch.”
Lorie toyed with the ribbon on the package until her father pulled a digital camera out of a basin of miscellany on her table. “You open, I’ll take pictures.” To Alexa he added, “Would you mind getting in there with her? I won’t sell pictures to tabloids or—”
Alexa’s laughter filled the little room. “Tabloids don’t take much notice of me. Magazines—occasionally Reader’s Digest—but the paparazzi are more interested in actors, singers, and British royalty to bother with writers.”
“You’re so well known. Your movies—”
“How often do you see Stephen King on the cover of one of those things? People care about the producer or director of the movies—not the writer of the book.” She winked at Lorie. “Thankfully.”
As Lorie pulled the ribbon and lifted the lid of the box, Alexa joked, posed, and made silly faces to get the girl to laugh. A quilted satin bed jacket lay between the layers of tissue paper. Alexa helped her adjust it, showing how the sleeves unsnapped to make room for IV lines and any other medical paraphernalia.
“It’s so pretty,” Lorie whispered, running one hand over the fabric. “It looks like something from a Loretta Young movie I saw last week. Thank you!”
With a quick squeeze of Lorie’s hand, Alexa waved goodbye to the Thornes and slipped out the door. As she exited the elevator and crossed the lobby, a voice called out to her. “Miss Hartfield, please! Wait!”
DARRIN THORNE FELT like a character in an old movie. As the elevator doors opened, he had seen Alexa Hartfield as she reached the front entrance. With little regard for his location, he shouted to catch her attention before she stepped through those doors. She whirled to face him, looking like some a model with her cloak rippling around her knees.
He dodged a courier as he rushed up to her. “Sorry if I startled you. I just wanted to thank you.” As she started to speak, he rushed on, wanting to finish before she disappeared from their lives. “I can’t tell you how much your visits have meant to Lorie—and the robe thing. That was really thoughtful. I left her upstairs examining every bit of the embroidery. She even tried to make her hair flip up so the headband thing looks just right.” He swallowed hard. “Thank you.”
Alexa tucked her purse under her arm and reached for his hand, grasping it in both of hers. It seemed strange that she should take his hand like that when he would have done it himself had he felt it appropriate to touch a woman he hardly knew. “Mr. Thorne—”
“Darrin. A woman who has been so kind to us does not need to address me with any formality.”
“Good. Then we understand each other. I won’t respond to Miss anymore.” She smiled at him before adding, “Your daughter is delightful, and I am pleased to know her.”
“You offering to write—to call. It means so much. Sometimes I can see her starting to give up. It terrifies me
. Looking forward to a note from you now and then might stop that.”
“I meant it. I will write. I will call.”
Darrin nodded. “I know. In the store when you passed me that business card, I knew if you said you’d do it, you would.” The compassion in her eyes prompted him to add, “She gets so lonesome here. I have to work to keep up the insurance, so she spends all day alone most days.”
“It’s none of my business—”
“I won’t be offended at any question.”
“Where is her mother?”
Darrin’s shoulders slumped, but bitterness rose in his throat. “She left. The first day she spent in the hospital with Lorie was too much. She just kissed Lorie goodbye and walked out—out of the hospital, out of our lives. I don’t even know where she is.”
“Maybe when Lorie is better—”
“No.” The relief he felt when he said it comforted him. Maybe it meant the bitterness might someday be gone. “I was granted a divorce on grounds of abandonment—had to do it for custody and such. Lorie’s maternal grandmother still comes, though—she tries.”
“I’ll keep you both in my prayers. Drop me a line whenever you feel like it. It would be nice to get to know her father too.” She glanced at her watch, shaking her head. “Go visit with your daughter. I’ve eaten half your time with her already.”
Before he could respond, Alexa slipped through the automatic doors and into the filthy, slushy, Chicago streets. Something about her—the glamor, he assumed—brought back the feeling of being in a scene from an old movie. As he turned to go, he glanced back over his shoulder. I’m glad this isn’t a movie. If it was, Alexa would be the woman I loved and that exit would mean I’d never see her again.
All the way up the elevator to Lorie’s floor, Darrin smiled to himself, feeling foolish at his crazy imagination. As he stepped inside Lorie’s room, he muttered to himself. “The good news is, this isn’t a movie, and we will see her again.”
“What?” Lorie looked up at him expectantly.
“I just said we’d be seeing her again.”
“Good. I like her. She’s real.”
Darrin laughed, kissing his daughter’s forehead. “And from you, there is no higher praise.”
Chapter 9
AS SHE FOUGHT THE ROCKLAND traffic, Alexa tensed. There were times—just often enough to make her doubt her choices—that tempted her to pursue her writing more aggressively. If she gave James free rein over her career, she could easily triple her current earnings. However, she liked her quiet life, and the idea of milking the creative process until she stripped it dry did not appeal to her.
“I’m not a cat; I only get one life. I can choose to become obscenely wealthy in order to secure some comforts, but in the process, I’ll lose others. For now,” she groaned, “I guess I’m stuck driving in Rockland traffic.”
Alexa braked hard as a car ahead of her jerked into her lane. As she glared at the car, a new thought occurred to her. She had spoken aloud. She never talked to herself. Even though she spent ninety percent of her waking hours alone, she did not talk to herself. Mental commentary—sure. Internal conversations? Often. Running through options for a new book? Always. But the most vocal she ever became was humming an off-key song now and then.
Alexa relaxed as the exit for Fairbury loomed. She whipped her car onto the off ramp. “Almost home.”
Her voice startled her; she’d spoken again. Her mouth opened and her vocal chords rumbled as she started to comment again on her unusual behavior. Alarmed—slightly—she clamped her mouth shut.
Confusion clouded her thoughts. Had she always talked aloud to herself and somehow never noticed? Was it possible to hide such an obvious facet of her personality from herself? She shrugged, determined to ignore it. Many people talked to themselves—nothing odd or unusual about that. Who knew if they were aware of their private conversations with themselves?
The parking lot at the Fairbury Medical Center prompted a groan. Only two empty spots remained. With a sigh, she grabbed her book from her carry-on and locked her car.
As she walked to the building, the freezing air stung her nose. “It’s as cold here as it was in Chicago.” She snapped her lips shut, groaning. She’d done it again, and she felt ridiculous.
Fortunately, Dr. Weisenberg didn’t make her wait any longer than necessary. Within ten minutes, she sat with her arm on the table, looking away as the doctor pulled stitches from her hand. “You could have done this yourself and saved a trip back.”
Alexa resisted the urge to squirm and shook her head. “Not possible. I simply could not do that for myself.”
“Any doctor’s office—”
“Thanks, but it wouldn’t have mattered. I have a meeting with Chief Varney anyway.”
Dr. Weisenberg nodded. “He asked me to call when you arrived.” Another snip of the scissors tugged at the stitch, making her wince. “You’re not in trouble, are you?”
“No. It’s just routine after the thing with the light bulb.” She wriggled her fingers for effect. “Oh, I do have a question, though.”
Alexa explained as she described the recent self-talk phenomenon. “I never talk to myself—never. Well, as far as I know, anyway. I’ve been doing it at least since I hit Rockland.”
After a series of questions, Dr. Weisenberg assured her that it is common for persons under stress to begin talking to themselves. He wrote out a prescription for valium. “If you’re still doing this after you hit New York, take one to see if it makes a difference. If it does, it’s probably stress related. Otherwise, only take one if you cannot function.”
She nodded—relieved that he didn’t think it was serious. That is, until he said, “I want to see you when you get back.”
CHIEF VARNEY PASSED her a cup of what appeared to be an attempt at coffee. Just the smell of it reminded her of a similar concoction she’d read about only that morning—“Cowboy Espresso.” Of course, a horseshoe would stand up in it! That was not the question. The question was whether it would ever come out again. One sip verified her suspicions, and she filed away the experience for the appropriate time.
The chief’s voice jerked her out of her reverie. “—you thought about it? Does anyone have a key to your house? What about your agent or your editor? Do they have access to your computer—to an online data storage bank? Do you email your work to anyone? What about—”
Alexa interrupted the barrage of questions. “No. No one had access before it happened. You’re the only one I even mentioned the idea to, and I didn’t mention how I planned to use it. The restaurant was full—I suppose anyone could have heard it, but I doubt it. We weren’t exactly shouting.”
The chief’s shoulders sagged. He picked up a pen and pulled out a stenographer’s notebook—the chief still did things old school. “Ok, do you remember the name of our waiter?”
“Theo.”
“Who was in the dining room—do you remember anyone? What about drink refills at the time we talked about it?”
Alexa’s mind whirled, trying to keep up with the chief. She’d never seen him so animated. Then again, the last murder in Fairbury had been long before she ever arrived—and came after a speed chase from Rockland. Before she could answer, Varney tossed another dozen questions at her.
Joe knocked twice and entered before the chief could answer. “Are you through with her?”
Alexa tossed him a grateful glance. Joe’s expression, while professional and somewhat reserved, held a trace of understanding in his eyes. The chief, still making notes of her series of negative responses to his questions, missed the silent conversation before him.
“I’ll be done in a minute. “Why don’t you go on over to her house and make sure no one tried to break in since the last check.”
Alexa raised her eyebrows at Joe as he turned to leave the room. “You think someone will try to get in?”
The officer shook his head. “Not really. It’s a precaution. We just don’t know what this guy is thin
king, so we have to be prepared for anything. I’ll check the perimeter, and when you get there, we’ll go through it together.”
Left alone with the chief, Alexa felt strangely vulnerable. Perhaps being on the other side of questioning unnerved her; then again, it might have been the chief’s suspicious manner. She quelled the uneasy feeling in her stomach and tried to smile.
“Well, I think that’ll do for now. I just need your contact information in NYC and you can go.”
She scrawled her cellphone number, name of her hotel, and the dates she’d be gone before hurrying from the office and nearly running to her car. Children and teens flooded the sidewalks and streets on their way home from school, making navigating the streets a nightmare—one reason she rarely drove in town.
As she turned onto Sycamore Court, Alexa realized that she’d kept a running conversation with herself all the way home. “This has to stop!” she snapped. After a pause and a deep breath, she forced herself to finish the thought silently. Now.
Joe stood leaning against her doorjamb. As she reached for her key, he said, “Sorry about that. If I didn’t know he thinks you’re pretty much perfection, I’d swear that he had convinced himself that you’ve moved from writing about murders to committing them.”
“Really? You think he thinks I skulked back from Chicago, three days in a row, once killing someone, and then rushed back so that no one would catch me? That’s even more far-fetched than the scene I wrote.”
Joe followed her into the house as she unlocked the door and swung it open. “Far-fetched. You mean, you don’t like what you wrote?”
Alexa flipped on the furnace and shivered her way into the kitchen. She opened three cupboards before she found the one that had held her coffee since the day she moved into the house. Joe watched her, making her movements even more awkward. She opened the can of coffee, took a deep sniff of the aromatic grounds, and then stared at the can, confused.