Burgundy and Bodies

by Sandra Woffington

  Cynthia let out muffled cries.

  Eugene rubbed Cynthia’s back. “There, there, dear.” He addressed Max, “This is simply too much. Two good friends, Anne and Shane. Gone.”

  Cynthia pulled up her head long enough to wail, “We were going to be married and live here with Papa. We would have been so happy. Oh, Shane. But I warned him.”

  Max asked, “Warned him about what?”

  Cynthia wiped her eyes and straightened up. “About those pain pills. Opioids, like you see in the news. He’s a pharmacist. He should know better.”

  “You think he abused them?” asked Joy, nearing the doll house and peering inside.

  “Not intentionally,” said Cynthia. “I just think he did whatever was needed to feel better. He was in a lot of pain yesterday when he visited, wasn’t he, Papa?”

  “He was,” confirmed Eugene. “But he told me he worried about medications. That’s why he was in a lot of pain. He didn’t like numbing himself.”

  “I suppose he just couldn’t take it anymore,” said Cynthia.

  “Cynthia,” said Joy to lighten the topic. “This is a lovely doll house. Did your mother buy it for you?”

  “No,” said Cynthia with a note of disdain, followed by pride. “Papa bought it for me.”

  Eugene gave Cynthia a squeeze. “Cynthia played with that house non-stop, unless she had homework.”

  Cynthia let out a nervous laugh. “Sometimes even when I did have homework, Papa. Remember the trip we made? When we found it?”

  “Every time I see it,” he said to Cynthia before sharing the moment with Joy. “We made a father-daughter trip to northern California one summer, and we found a delightful doll store and museum in Carmel. It hadn’t been open that long. Magical place. Cynthia begged me to buy the house, and she’s been furnishing it ever since.”

  Joy added, “Max, come see this. There’s a happy couple inside.”

  “Please don’t touch it,” said Cynthia. “It’s taken me years to get it just the way I like it.”

  Max finished his cake and set down the plate. He didn’t have any interest in seeing a doll house, no matter how exquisite, but he humored Joy, figuring her request offset the horrific news and deflected the conversation to a pleasant topic. When Max peered into the house, he had to admit he’d never seen anything like it. It had three stories, including an attic full of boxes and miniature trunks. One trunk was open. A framed photo lay face down on a folded quilt. The second floor had two bedrooms and two bathrooms. A man’s green robe hung on a bathroom hook, and a pink robe hung in the other bathroom. The first floor had a kitchen and living room. Floral furniture and burgeoning floral vases recreated the room in which Max stood. “Wow! Did you create the miniature house to match the big one, or the big one to match the miniature one?”

  “That’s an excellent question, Max,” said Joy.

  Eugene answered, “When we built this house, Cynthia used her house as a design. Of course this is single level, but we got close, didn’t we, dear?”

  “We did, Papa.”

  Max turned away. “We’ve taken up enough of your time.”

  Eugene gave Cynthia another squeeze. “We’ll manage. We always do, don’t we Cynthia?”

  “Yes, Papa. We do.” She nestled her head against her father’s shoulder.

  16

  Max turned off the road and onto a less traveled dirt path. He rolled down his window to hear the creek, although he didn’t need it for guidance. He instinctually knew it stretched out before him. As soon as he saw the flowing, brackish water, he turned to parallel the stream. He stopped at a place where three small trees afforded some shade. Without a word, he jumped out of the vehicle, walked to the bank, and plunked down beneath a tree. He faced the creek and wondered if it ever changed course—if in its history, some catastrophe—drought or flood or earthquake—had forced it to follow a new path.

  Joy reached in the back seat and grabbed a well-worn red, white, and blue blanket from the floor. She hopped out and headed toward Max. Joy spread out the blanket and plunked down near him. “Want to share my blanket. You don’t want to get your clothes dirty.”

  “That’s the point, Joy. I hate to burst your bubble—not that you had hoped to be related to me—but I do get my clothes dirty. I’m a mess, you’re tidy; I’m blonde, blue-eyed; you’re jet-back with brown eyes; I’m fairly intelligent; you’re a freaking genius.”

  “Is your birthday November 14?”

  “We don’t even know if that’s our real birthday—do we?”

  “I remember a hospital. Bright lights. Someone holding my hand.”

  Max tried to fight it off, but a memory bolted into his head.

  “You remember it, don’t you?” asked Joy.

  Max struggled with all of his might to forget, to push the memory back into the grave, but memories don’t work like that. A familiar scent, an image, a voice, a memento, a song—and the memory connected to them flashes on a mega-sized movie screen, and the person cranking the old projector laughs because he’s in charge, not you. “They tried to pull us apart.”

  “We were about three and a half,” said Joy. “You cried.”

  “You didn’t. You wouldn’t let go of the kitten. Or me.”

  “Did I kill it?”

  “I don’t know,” said Max.

  “Sam and David were there.”

  Max shook his head. He didn’t want to see any more, but the guy on the crank kept turning the handle. The projectionist let out a gut-deep laugh, as if to say “stay tuned, this is the good part.” The camera angle—which coincided exactly with Max’s gaze—panned upward from the gurney, and he saw David King’s fretful face, partially obliterated by the overhead lights, which blinded him and forced him to squint. David’s voice rang in his ears. “Hold on there, pardner. Ya hear?”

  And all of a sudden, a second face appeared and it came into focus—the man in the framed photo, holding the fish—Sam Burton.

  Max hunched over. The heavy memories bent his head down like a weak tree pushed over in a tempest.

  “Sam and David wouldn’t let them pull us apart,” said Joy.

  Max stared into Joy’s dark eyes, but they were suddenly set in a child’s face as she lay opposite him on the same gurney, which rushed down a hallway. She sucked her thumb. People around them shouted, but he only saw the movie; there was no sound, just frantic faces and moving lips, and he closed his eyes, while still locking his fingers into an unbreakable knot with hers. “You wouldn’t let them pull us apart.”

  “I remember a woman’s face, maybe our foster mother’s. She wasn’t at the hospital.”

  Max thought of his nightmare the previous night—the other face in his mosaic portrait. He couldn’t see the other face clearly—be it man or woman. “I don’t remember.”

  “Everything went black, and I never saw you again, until I came here.”

  Max plucked at two golden stalks of grass and started tying them together. His senses grew more intense. The gurgling water became louder. It haunted and overpowered him. He could not make it stop.

  “I understand,” said Joy. “You have Wine Valley. The perfect world. And perfect memories.”

  “Was Sam a good father? Why do you call him Sam?”

  “Sam could not have been a better father. But I call him Sam, because I never felt like I belonged to him. I didn’t fit. I don’t think I fit anywhere. I think I scared Sam. I scared myself growing up. Sam bought me Monty because…”

  Max suddenly had a tough time reconciling the girl lecturing with authority and the girl holding the Glock with the trembling, unsure girl that sat beside him now. Max reached over and took Joy’s hand, put it in the air, and interlaced his fingers with hers. “Why did Sam buy you a man-eating snake?” He’d hoped to make her laugh. It worked, for a second.

  “Because I’m fascinated with death.” She let that hang in the air for a minute. “Like watching a bird eat a worm or a snake swallow a mouse.”

  Max
remembered the way she had peered into Shane’s face when they had found him dead. Sure, she studied it for discoloration and other clinical clues of his demise, but there was a…a spark of something else…curiosity…allure...magnetism. Max wanted to pull his hand away, but he couldn’t. He remembered how she had locked her fingers with his long ago. She had protected him; kept him safe. But safe from what? Or whom? It was a gut feeling. No memories supported the feeling, so he gripped her hand tighter in his.

  Joy let her eyes follow the river. “You probably played with cowboy pistols growing up. I played with dead animals.”

  “Okay, I admit that’s kinda weird, but I remember finding a flat lizard in the road in front of my house once, and I played with it for a while. Unless you killed them?” He held his breath, hoping for the right answer.

  “No. But put me in a field like this one, and I’d find them. Dead insects, lizards, mice, birds. I’d poke them, turn them over, and get deeply lost in their dull fixed eyes. My real treasures, I’d take home, wrap them in a paper towel, and keep them in a shoebox under my bed. I had quite the collection.”

  “Maybe you wanted to help them, Joy.”

  “Dad said I just needed to make friends. So, when I was five, I took my shoebox to school to show the other kids. I actually thought they’d be as amazed as I was, and I’d be swimming with friends.”

  “Oh, man. For a smart girl, that was a totally dumb move.”

  Joy let go of Max’s hand and flopped onto her back. “Hard lesson number one.”

  Max lay on one elbow, facing her. “What happened? Here, tie this—it helps.” He handed her the two blades of grass, and she knotted them as she spoke.

  “I not only didn’t have any friends after that—ever—I earned a few nicknames. It felt like every time I walked down the hallway from then on, those names flew at me like a hot iron. I’d been branded. I did have one favorite though—Wednesday—you know, from the Addams Family. She was my hero—or anti-hero. She made me feel normal. I even decided ‘screw the other kids,’ and I dressed like Wednesday for Halloween. I’d watched the Addams Family movies a hundred times. I had her hair: dark, long and parted in the middle.”

  Joy gushed with excitement. “You should have seen their faces when I strolled in with a deadpan face. I knew Wednesday’s lines cold, like ‘I’m a homicidal maniac. They look just like everyone else.’” The next year, I secretly snapped photos of the mean girls and stuck their faces on Girl Scout cookies using icing. Dressed as Wednesday, I’d offer them one and say, ‘Go ahead. They’re made from real Girl Scouts.’”

  “I can get behind that. Bullies deserve pay back.”

  “I had less flattering nicknames too, like Joyless, Black Death, or, and this one was actually pretty clever—students would walk by me and say, ‘Hello, carry on.’ but they meant ‘carrion.’ As a nickname—Carrion. Maybe that’s why I shaved my head—to keep them away. I worked hard. I had to get out of school as fast as possible. I showed them all up grade-wise. Sam put me in private after-school classes, and I left for college at fifteen. Sorry, that’s bragging and vicious.”

  “Hey, that means you’re not like them.” The conversation lulled. Max thought again about his father’s two faces—the one in the hospital as he ran beside the gurney and the one in the ambulance when he died. Why had his father kept this a secret? There was only one explanation: Max and Joy had been in foster care together, so it was natural that his father and hers had figured that they were too small to remember a bond with a foster sibling. No one “kept them apart.” They just didn’t put them together. Did he need to find his foster mother? No. Did he need to find his birth mother? No. David King adopted him and raised him. He rode ponies—and yes, he ran through the house with cowboy pistols and a cowboy hat.

  “Dad brought Monty home, so I would learn how to care for something living. Of course, Sam used his profiling skills on that one. After all, Monty eats dead things—and for the record—I mean ‘dead’ things—I don’t feed her live animals.”

  “But you would feed Monty living things if you could?”

  “No, live animals can injure Monty. I keep Monty’s food—used to be mice, but now she eats rats—in the freezer.”

  “Okay. No dinner parties at your house.”

  “Sam and I buried my little shop of horrors, complete with a lovely funeral. Sam understood me. And for that, I will always love him. But, Max, I don’t understand me.” Joy sat up and hugged her knees.

  “Which led to your career choice?”

  “Psychology, sociology, forensics. And still, I don’t understand the girl in the mirror.”

  Max stood up and stretched. He took off his shoes and slipped off his socks. He rolled up his pant legs and stepped into the water, letting it run over his toes. The images of the hospital, of David’s face, came at him. “Hold on,” David had said to them. What did Joy have to hold on to? She had held onto him until she blacked out, and then he was gone from her life. But he had moved on without her. A pang of guilt punched his gut.

  Before he knew it, Joy had rolled up her pant legs. She stepped in the stream beside him. “It really is lovely here.”

  “Look, Joy. I’ve made up my mind—”

  “I know, Max. You don’t have to—”

  “Get the DNA kit from the car. I’ll do it.”

  “What? You will?”

  “One condition, though, and it’s non-negotiable.”

  “Anything. I promise.”

  “Keep the results to yourself. No matter what you find, I don’t want to know.”

  “I promise.” Joy’s lips swept into a bigger smile than he’d ever seen. He could see the weight that it pulled off of her shoulders. But it would not last. When the test came back negative for sibling status, it would crush her. Then what? Could she let the past go and live in the present, or would she grab the shovel and keep digging until she found a skeleton? Max got out of the water and sat on the blanket.

  Joy rushed back, tore open the kit, gave Max a vial, and cautioned him not to do anything until she read the directions. “Okay, so it says we should not have eaten for at least thirty minutes. It’s been at least that long since coffee cake. Then we spit until the vile fills up to the marked line. It says here about two milliliters.”

  “Not a cheek swab?”

  “This company runs a few other tests while they’re at it, so saliva is a larger sample size than a swab.”

  Max rallied up a gob of saliva and noisily spat. “You were going to talk my head off until I said yes, weren’t you?”

  “That was Plan A,” said Joy, quietly squirting spit from her mouth.

  “Plan B?” Spit.

  “Tie you to a chair. Put Monty around your neck, and when she constricted and you screamed like a baby, then I’d swab your cheek and go with another lab.” Spit.

  “Now that sounds like a Wednesday kind of plan. You have to admit.” Spit.

  “Only if I enjoyed watching you choke.” Spit.

  Max eyed her sideways.

  “Of course, I wouldn’t. I’m not a homicidal maniac. I just dress like one.”

  “As we both know, Joy, they really do look ‘just like everyone else.’”

  17

  Max found seats at the Black Turtle Asian Bistro, while Joy mailed the DNA kit from the shipping store next door. Just as their food arrived, Max’s phone rang. “King.”

  “Are you sitting down?” asked Captain Banks.

  “I am,” said Max.

  “According to Shane Drake’s phone records, the last call he made was to Chief Goldsby’s cell phone. The chief has been relieved of duty, so go to his home and see if he has an alibi.”

  “Maybe Shane called the chief for help,” defended Max.

  “He didn’t call 9-1-1, Max. He called the chief’s private number. Stop by and get his statement.”

  “Will do, captain.” Max bit into a pot-sticker. “Last call Drake made was to Chief Goldsby’s cell.”

  After l
unch, they headed to the pharmacy where Shane had worked and spoke to his boss, Kirsten Jessen, a tall, middle-aged woman with glasses, who had never outgrown a ponytail.

  “How can I help you?” asked Ms. Jessen.

  “Please remember that our questions are strictly routine,” said Max. “Have you had any drugs go missing?”

  Mrs. Jessen sounded confident in her response. “Never. We keep narcotics under lock and key. And, as you see, cameras are everywhere.”

  Joy added, “It sounds like Mr. Drake had chronic back pain.”

  “He did indeed,” said Ms. Jessen, “but Shane knew exactly what he could take, when and how much. He never came to work in a stupor or groggy. Quite the opposite. He came in sometimes in severe pain, because he refused to be groggy on the job. Can you imagine if he put orders together incorrectly in the pharmacy? The wrong pills in the wrong container? It could kill someone. Shane was a conscientious employee. He knew the outcome of addiction to pain relievers. We’re open twenty-four hours. He liked the night shift, because he could get off of his feet when he needed. In fact, he had consulted a surgeon recently. He hated the idea of surgery, but he wanted to stop taking any pain meds. ”

  “His doctor prescribed Fentanyl patches?” asked Joy.

  “Let me see.” Ms. Jessen stepped to a computer and pushed the keys. “Yes. In February. 100 micrograms. That’s a high dose, but Shane had already been taking pain pills, so he’d built up some tolerance. That was around the time Shane suffered a new injury. Poor guy, he’d gone out for a walk to try to lose some weight, and he slipped on a wet patch of concrete.”

  Max asked, “How many patches to a box?”

  “Five,” said Ms. Jessen.

  “Had he been acting strangely at all?” asked Joy.

  “No. Shane’s a go-with-the-flow kind of guy. Steady as they come.”

  Max handed her the usual card and said to call if she thought of anything else. He added, “I need the name of the doctor who prescribed his medications.”

  “Of course.” Ms. Jessen wrote it down and handed it to Max.