Pleasuria

by John J. Jessop

  Jason just laughed and hung up. He mumbled, “Well, I don’t know if this was an attempt on Mary Hutchinson’s life or not, but in this case it seems to have had a silver lining, at least for her husband. It would be helpful to know if this woman was taking a certain antidepressant drug, but I think I’ll just leave these two elderly love birds alone. Besides, if I interrupt them, Jim might hurt me.”

  CHAPTER 19

  While in North Carolina, Jason decided to stay a couple of extra days and drive his red rocket to Charlotte where the dead murdered construction worker had lived. He phoned the FDA to tell them he was still sick, as he was using his sick leave for this trip, and then he phoned Chelsea to let her know his plans. He wasn’t thrilled with the thought of speaking to her.

  When she answered her cell, he said, “Hello, dear. I found something interesting at the dead pilot’s house. Since I’m on a roll, I decided to stay in North Carolina for a couple more days to visit the home of a recently deceased steel worker in Charlotte, whose death was also reported to include strange circumstances. I hope that’s okay with you. I’m still on the case.”

  Chelsea sighed. “Jason, I don’t know what to do with you. This midlife crisis of yours is killing me. First, the private eye’s license, and you pick Jessica Fletcher as a role model? You realize that was just a TV show, right? Then, you want to quit your steady government job, and you bought the red rocket. Now you’re running around North Carolina breaking into peoples’ houses. If I hadn’t known you for so long, I’d think you have lost your mind. Please, be careful. What are you planning to do if someone catches you at your B and E? I have the girls and my job here, and I can’t just pack up and come bail you out of jail. You’re on your own. Good luck. Hopefully I’ll see you in a couple of days.” She sounded exasperated.

  When the call ended Jason thought, Gee, she sounds upset. I’m just trying to have some fun at my new career. His thoughts strayed to Tanya Grayson and that little black dress, but the fantasy that started with his talking to Tanya abruptly ended with visions of Chelsea and a meat cleaver. He mumbled, “Probably not a good idea to share my entire adventure with the wife.”

  It started to rain during his drive to Charlotte, so he had pulled his plastic rain cape and hat out of the trunk and put them on. As he drove in the rain, top down, he thought, This isn’t so bad. I’m staying fairly dry, although I’m going to need to take a hair dryer to the rocket’s upholstery when I get to the hotel to avoid mold. Hopefully, the rain won’t get any harder and short out the car’s electronics. The rain had stopped by the time he pulled the red rocket into a parking garage three blocks from the steel worker’s place.

  The address turned out to be one half of a duplex, one of many that covered two square blocks of the city. Jason surveyed the area. The front stoop was located very close to the sidewalk, so it would be too conspicuous for Jason to stand at the front door trying lock picks for forty-five minutes. Instead, he would walk around to the back of the building and try to enter there.

  In the back, he found a small patio that led to a set of sliding glass doors. He quickly climbed over a white rail fence, apparently more for show than protection, and approached the sliding glass door. Being a clever detective, he tried the door first, and to his surprise it easily slid open. Wow, this is too good to be true. I’m getting the hang of this. On TV they usually use lock picks, or break down the door.

  He walked across the threshold into a nice, large living room, complete with oak-paneled walls and ceiling, tile floor, comfortable furniture and a large flat-screen TV. Jason mumbled, “This guy lived well for a construction worker. I should live so well.” As he gently shut the slider behind him, he heard a low growl. He immediately smelled the odor of dog, turned, and saw a large Doberman, teeth bared, sitting in the archway to the kitchen only a few feet away.

  Jason turned slowly toward the dog, hands out in front of him, and said quietly, “Easy there, fella. Good dog. I don’t mean you any harm. I’m just here to take a look around, and then I’ll get out of your way. Please don’t eat me.”

  The dog approached, growling. Jason backed slowly away toward the sliding glass door, placing his hand on the door handle as he did so. He stood in front of the door and taunted the dog.

  “Come get me, you big dumb brute.” He actually barked back at the dog, hoping that in dog-speak he was challenging the Doberman to attack. “Woof, woof,” he said loudly. “Grrrrr. Come and get me, you big bastard.”

  The dog lunged and Jason jumped out of the way, yanking open the sliding glass door as he did so. As soon as the dog was through the opening, Jason violently pulled the door closed.

  “Yes! Take that, you beast. Wow! I’m smarter than a five-year-old and a dog.” The dog stood on the patio barking fiercely for a few seconds, until it realized that it was outside, and free. Once that realization set in, it got briefly distracted by a cat that had the misfortune of wandering in the yard before heading up the street. Jason breathed a sigh of relief, turned back to the living room, and, once the adrenaline rush subsided, began his search.

  He searched the kitchen, living room and the master bedroom. The place was a mess. Piles of dirty clothes everywhere, a musty smell and the distinct odor of sweaty construction worker. This guy was definitely not married, or else his wife was a slob too. This place reeks of chaos, and I hate chaos.

  Jason wandered into the master bathroom. It was a mess in there, too. He said to the room, “Someone forgot to flush the toilet, and it smells like a sewer. The shower curtain surrounding the tub is full of mold, and there’s a pile of soggy towels in the middle of the floor, a delightful combination of sewage and musty smell.” Jason went to the medicine cabinet, in a hurry to get out of there before he barfed.

  He opened the medicine cabinet, and several items fell out into the empty sink.

  “Let’s see, lots of old pill bottles, Q-tips, toothpaste, dental floss, loose bandages, and a bunch of other bathroom-related crap.” This guy never cleaned anything. There was mold growing on the shelves, and some more musty smell, not normal for a medicine cabinet. Hope to hell I don’t catch something contagious from this mess. He sneezed as he started going through the pill bottles, those in the cabinet and the ones that fell into the sink. He said, to the sink again, “The usual meds again. Zocor, Nexium, Xanax, and this time a heart medicine. I’ll just take this Xanax.” Now I’ve got two full bottles to combat whatever grief Chelsea has in store for me when I get home.

  As he was about to give up the search, he noticed a fat pill bottle on the far right of the top shelf. He took it down and read the label. It said, Investigational Drug, Happiness, Dose: 200 mg, CureStuff Pharmaceuticals. Jason was elated.

  “Freakin’ awesome,” he mumbled, and patted himself on the back, hurting his shoulder in the process.

  Jason smiled, pocketed the bottle of pills, and walked back to the living room with the intention of exiting through the sliding glass door. However, he heard something, a key in the door. Someone was entering through the kitchen. Oh shit! Better get the hell out of here. He moved quickly toward the sliding glass door. Oh crap. The beast is back, and he doesn’t look happy. The Doberman stood on the patio, snarling. Jason quickly headed back up the stairs to the other bedroom. He saw a large closet door, opened it with the intention of hiding there, and, surprise—shoes, wigs, women’s clothes, makeup, fake eyelashes, earrings, jewelry. And this guy really liked blue; dark, navy-blue pants suits, neon-blue dresses, light-blue blouses, every shade of blue imaginable.

  “This would be disturbing if I weren’t about to die or be arrested for a B and E.” Then he thought, Oh crap, did I say that out loud again? Think, don’t talk, or you’re gonna get caught.

  Then Jason remembered what his two older daughters had done to Lucy, painting her to look like a Smurf. Jason thought, forcing himself not to mumble out loud, Jason, old man, it’s Smurf time. He grabbed two tubes of blue lipstick and some blue eyeliner off of one of the shelves and quickly
painted his exposed skin, hands and face as blue as possible. He even painted his eyelids so they would be blue when he closed his eyes. Then he quietly closed the closet door and positioned himself just behind a rack of blue dresses and blouses, with his head sticking up above the clothing. His face was all blue, and he had taken a floppy blue hat from another area of the closet and placed it on his head to cover his graying hair.

  Jason heard footsteps on the stairs, and someone entered the bedroom. The person opened and closed a couple of dresser drawers and made the sounds of someone undressing. Who the hell is this? Must be the dead construction worker’s roommate?

  Just then, the closet door opened and the light came on. Jason froze, his blue head protruding above the rack of blue clothing. He was amazed. A man in his fifties, medium height, large round head, rough-looking face, big shoulders, bigger beer belly, dropped the bath towel that had been wrapped around his body. The man stood there stark naked, reached into the closet, and removed a black wig with long, straight hair, several articles of makeup, high-heeled shoes, and a flowing blue gown.

  The man was singing happily, and Jason heard him say, “Tonight’s the night. I’m going to perform my new number, and I’ll be the star of the show.” Then he blurted out a few lines of some song that Jason didn’t recognize. At one point, the man approached the rack of clothing directly in front of Jason, took a blue blouse off the rack very near Jason, looked up directly at where Jason was hiding and said, “I wonder if I should dress in my formal gown, or go more casual, like jeans and blue blouse. Nah. My song calls for a more formal look. I’ll go with the blue gown.”

  Jason had closed his eyes, and was furiously thinking, I’m invisible. I’m invisible. He can’t see me. My eyes are closed. The man looked right at him and didn’t see him. Jason was amazed. The Smurf look was working. When the man continued the discussion with himself concerning whether he should dress in formal attire or go for a more casual look, Jason almost answered. It just seemed natural. With a body like that, go casual dude. You just aren’t built for a formal gown. And if you go with the gown route, you definitely need to shave those legs.

  Eventually the man finished dressing and applying makeup, and Jason heard his footsteps as he went back into the other upstairs bedroom, just up the hall. He didn’t seem to notice that the dog was outside on the patio. I guess he must really be looking forward to his performance tonight. I still have to get out of here without being caught. Then he remembered the slippers that Chelsea had given him, and his plummet down the basement stairs. If I can figure out a way to make the stairs slippery, I can run down the stairs and out the door, and this guy won’t be able to follow me if he falls on his ass. They’re carpeted, so he probably wouldn’t break anything. Just slow him enough that he can’t catch me. Jason stepped from behind the rack of blue dresses and quietly searched the shelves for something slippery. He found a tube of Vaseline, probably used to remove makeup, or for other purposes he didn’t want to think about, and his plan took shape.

  He heard the man in the bedroom up the hall, practicing the song for his upcoming performance while presumably dressing for the evening. Jason quietly slipped out of the bedroom, went to the top of the stairs, applied a large glob of Vaseline to the top two carpeted steps, and then rapidly fled down the stairs toward the sliding glass door. He heard the man say, “What the fuck? Who’s out there?”

  Jason turned to look behind him as he ran toward the patio, and they saw each other. The large man in his black wig with red lipstick, large gold earrings, long dark eyelashes, and his prominent beer gut easily visible through the flowing blue gown yelled, “What the fuck are you doing in my house? And what the fuck are you?”

  “No worries. I’m just a private eye on a case. And I’m normally not blue.”

  Jason kept running, and the large man sprinted down the upstairs hall toward the stairs. He hit the top step in his high heels, his foot slipped, and he plummeted butt-first and bounced down the stairs, starting on his ass and ending in an impressive barrel roll. As he fell, he cursed, “You motherfucker. If I catch you I’m gonna kick your ass.” Then he hit his head at the bottom of the stairs and lay quiet.

  “Jesus, you are one crazy violent man, and you move fast for a guy with a beer gut running in high heels. I’m glad I used the Vaseline.” When Jason reached the sliding glass door, there sat the large Doberman, so he turned and bolted out the front door.

  • • •

  When he got home, he parked his soggy red rocket in the garage. It was partially dried out as the sun had come out halfway through the trip. He entered the kitchen through the mudroom. Chelsea was sitting at the kitchen table with Lucy, helping her with first-grade homework. Jason tried to sneak past them with a quick, “Hello, how are you? I love you guys.” But Chelsea never missed anything, and she immediately noticed the blue tint of her husband’s skin.

  “Welcome home, dear. The girls missed their PI daddy. Did you catch the bad guy? Find any new clues? Paint yourself blue?”

  Jason sighed, walked to her, kissed her on top of the head and said, “If you must know, I’m getting close to cracking the case. I found evidence that two of the recent victims of murder in North Carolina are probably linked to CureStuff and may be participants in one of their clinical trials. I still haven’t put all the pieces together, but I’m getting close.”

  “Glad to hear it. You might want to take a look in the mirror. The visible skin on your face is bright red, I’m guessing from sunburn, what with driving for hours with the top down on the red rocket. And the rest of your face is bright blue. If you painted your eyelids white, you’d look very patriotic. I shudder to think why you painted yourself blue, but I don’t have the courage or the stamina left to ask, so please keep whatever bizarre secret this is to yourself.”

  Lucy, sitting at the table next to Chelsea, said, “Mommy, does Daddy have to go to his room and stay grounded for a week? That’s what he did to Lizzy and Lilly when they painted me blue. It’s only fair.”

  “Yes, Lucy. I think that Daddy should go to his room and try to get whatever blue stuff that is off of his face and hands. But there’ll be no grounding him. Daddy needs to go back to work tomorrow, or we’re going to be living in a box under one of the Beltway bridges.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Jason was watching the national news when he saw another report of a bizarre death in North Carolina. This time, it was a NASCAR driver. The onsite reporter said, “Jimmy Jeb Johansen, one of the newest drivers on the NASCAR circuit, was running in a Sprint Cup Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway in Concord, Virginia when his car suddenly turned into the pit area doing 150 mph and crashed, killing Jimmy Jeb and several members of another pit crew. During a brief interview with Jimmy’s pit crew, this reporter learned of a strange conversation with their driver just before the crash, but police told the crew that the specifics of the conversation were not to be released, pending further investigation. Studies have shown that there’s a less than 1 percent chance that a race car driver will take a wrong turn during the race and head into the pit area at full racing speed. In fact, it’s actually quite difficult to do, since the track is an oval, and all the driver has to do is go around the same road over and over.”

  Chelsea walked into the living room just as the news report began and heard the report.

  “Oh no! Not another one. I guess you and the red rocket will be off to Charlotte again. Can you at least do it over a weekend so you don’t miss any more work? They’re going to fire you, and you aren’t making enough as a private eye to feed yourself, let alone the rest of us. I wish you’d get a grip and let go of this ridiculous private eye thing.”

  All Jason heard her say was the part about doing it over the weekend.

  “Yes, dear. I’ll drive down to Charlotte next Friday after work. I’ll get there late, but I can investigate on Saturday and Sunday if need be. I’m gonna crack this case or my name isn’t Jessica Fletcher.”

  Chelsea just r
olled her eyes and headed for the kitchen to fix the kids breakfast. All three girls came downstairs together, still in their pajamas. Lizzy said to Chelsea, “So how’s Detective Daddy doing? Have you knocked him in the head yet, like you said you were going to?”

  “No, sweetheart, not yet. But the day’s still young.”

  That Friday afternoon, Jason loaded up the tiny trunk of his red rocket with a toothbrush and toothpaste and headed for the Charlotte Motor Speedway. He arrived at the Holiday Inn late at night, got a few hours of sleep, and then it was up and off to the races. He went to the track, conned his way into the garage by pretending to be a reporter, and found Jimmy Jeb Johansen’s pit crew prepping their back-up car and driver for the next race. He approached the crew.

  “Guys, truth be told I’m actually a private detective looking into the possible murder of Jimmy Jeb. I heard rumors that he was talking a little crazy from his car, just before the crash. Can anyone elaborate for me? What did he say?”

  The pit boss, Todd Masters, answered. “Well, I didn’t think you were a reporter. You look more like a giant nerd. So, you think Jimmy Jeb might’ve been murdered too? A police detective stopped by and asked a lot of questions yesterday. He told us not to say too much until he had a chance to investigate, but fuck him. Besides, you ain’t no reporter, this ain’t the first fatal NASCAR crash to ever happen, and the cops usually don’t come snoopin’ around. I don’t know what happened to Jimmy Jeb. It don’t make much sense, and I don’t like to talk bad of the deceased, but I thought he was losin’ his mind. During the race, I heard his voice on the radio, but he weren’t talking to me. He seemed to be talking to someone else, like there was someone in the car with him, but I know for a fact there weren’t. That’s not possible. There’s only one seat in them things, for the driver, and there’s barely room for him in there.”