Hot Stuff

by C. J. Fosdick

  Evan loved his summer sanctuary like a bird loves its nest. In fact, he resembled a bird, long limbed and gangly with our father’s beak of a nose and the soft hazel eyes we shared from our mother’s side. Only my red hair set us apart from the resemblance of siblings. His hair had once been whitish blonde that eventually darkened into the soft color of a wood thrush.

  We both had freckles in odd places, knees and elbows and, of course, our shoulders and noses when exposed to the summer sun. People with green or hazel eyes, I was told, were more sensitive to sunlight. For this reason, I was careful to wear a brimmed hat outdoors while Evan preferred sunglasses. Even indoors, Evan wore sunglasses. I figured it was his attempt to be invisible—out of the spotlight, when they just made him more notorious. But Gran and I had learned to side-step too many corrections, laughing off most of Evan’s behaviors.

  The rookie continued to scribble something in his notebook.

  I found myself inching to his side, straining to see what he could possibly be recording.

  When he saw me craning my neck, he abruptly closed the notebook and stuffed it into his Dallas pocket, along with the pencil stub.

  “Satisfied with what you found?” I gave up my pursed smile.

  “Depends.” He peered down at me.

  “Depends on what?”

  “I’d like to check out the garage and the inside of the house, now that the yard is clear.”

  “Don’t you need a warrant for that?” I bristled with a quick shrug and stuck out my chin.

  “Only if I’m not invited inside.” He winked.

  Blue light special. “A wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse.”

  He tipped his head sideways, sending me a narrow look. “What is that ’sposed to mean?”

  I smiled brightly. “Do you like Snickerdoodles?”

  “Snicker…who?” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Is that some kind of amusing sketch known only to slogan writers?”

  I laughed. “Follow me.” When I saw him hesitate, I winked back, enjoying our little flirt. “Is Dallas your real name or the ‘down home’ you transferred from?”

  “You know, you are not easy to follow…ma’am?”

  “Oh, cut the ma’am stuff. I get from your drawl…and your boots…that you are not Midwest, but you’re trying way too hard to pump out the authority here. You’ll find Menomonee Falls is practically crime free—compared to Milwaukee—or even Dallas, I imagine.” I smiled demurely this time.

  He studied me a moment before his mouth twisted into another half-grin. “Both.”

  “Both?”

  “Named after the city I was born in. Dallas was my mama’s idea.” He straightened his shoulders and tipped his head, rubbing his jaw. “Johnson was my daddy’s handle. Lots of Johnsons bred in Texas, you know, some even famous.”

  I laughed again. “You’ll love Gran’s famous Snickerdoodles.”

  Chapter Three

  I learned long ago that cookies and charm go a long way to divert attention. Two cups of hazelnut coffee and a plate of warm, cinnamon sugar cookies were all Dallas needed to forget to search the house or add anything more than my cell phone number to his notebook. The unexpected bonus was an invitation to a benefit at our annual Falls Fest—after we ascertained some commonality. We both loved music, were single, and still on the good side of thirty. Hot Stuff was looking better all the time.

  Proceeds to the Friday evening musical performance benefitted the Menomonee Falls Youth Hockey fund. Stewart Copeland, the drummer of the old British group, The Police, was playing with his new quartet. Dallas told me The Police were once as popular as The Beatles, before disbanding when their lead singer went solo. Though I wasn’t familiar with the group, I was impressed enough to accept the invitation. Hello! I think I would have accepted if Pee Wee Herman was the soloist.

  Our conversation shifted to music genres and our personal favorites, and his new animation drew me to his eyelashes. Long and dark, fringing blue eyes deep and blue as a satin prom dress. Gran joined us, and Dallas shifted his “ma’am” address to her. I could tell she loved the respect. Enough to invite him to join us for lunch.

  He looked at his watch. “Aw, sorry, ma’am, I’m still on duty,” he said with a hand on his heart.

  I walked him to the door and watched him drive off after setting the pickup time for Friday night’s concert.

  “Well done.” My grandmother’s voice called from behind. “Though we probably won’t see Captain Billington anymore,” she said with a touch of regret.

  If Gran had her own ideal man list, she may have placed widower Billington at the top.

  “I don’t know. Maybe rookies just get the simpler assignments until they prove themselves. He was probably right about this being some kind of initiation. You know, start the newbies with something easy, though easy never flatlines in the village.”

  “This may not be that easy. Look what I found in Evan’s closet.”

  When I pivoted to face a little blue Dutch boy attached to a windmill, I gasped. “Oh God!”

  Chapter Four

  To his credit, Evan was remorseful when Gran and I confronted him at lunch. He told us the statue was sitting near the curb, and he figured it was a garbage pickup, seeing it had a damaged wooden shoe.

  Gran even believed his story.

  “On the curb or near the mailbox?” I asked, keeping my tone less skeptical.

  Because Evan hedged, I was sure he lied or twisted the truth. The Dutch boy could have been surrounded by a mailbox planting of daylilies or hostas. Half the village still had curbside mailboxes, many surrounded by some kind of perennial plant at the base. Because I suspected where it came from, I decided to take Dutch Boy home after midnight.

  At 2 a.m., I hauled him out to my little green beetle in a black plastic garbage bag. Streets were vacant, houses dark at that hour. I drove slowly, and when I came within a block of my destination, I cut my headlights and depended on a few scattered streetlights to find the silver mailbox I had scouted in daylight that afternoon.

  T. Koster was the name on the box. I noticed a dusting of powder when I pulled Dutch boy out of the garbage bag. I also noticed the loose cork that had been wedged in the toe of the broken shoe. When I poked it out, I could see the hollow shoe contained a couple of small plastic bags leaking white powder. Cripes! I tasted the powder on my finger, just to rule it out as flour or powdered sugar. Ironically, it tasted like baking soda, somewhat salty on my tongue.

  The Koster house didn’t resemble any of the Milwaukee drug haunts sometimes featured in The Journal or on the evening news. Trimmed hedges stood on both sides of the old farmhouse, and two large peony bushes flanked the front entrance. When an upstairs window in the house suddenly lit up, I froze until I fumbled the Dutch boy back into the bag and threw it in my trunk before speeding away without buckling my seat belt.

  A few blocks later, I noticed a car following me. I pulled into a dark alley and parked behind a large green Dumpster, thankful my little bug blended in.

  The car sailed past the alley entrance, a silver cruiser like one of the new models for the PD. No wonder the Falls were so safe. Thirty-three square miles patrolled twenty-four hours kept it that way.

  My heart lurched. Evan’s disorder and Gran’s Snickerdoodles would never save me if I was stopped by a cop with cocaine in my trunk. Even Captain Billington or the hot rookie couldn’t turn a blind eye to that little detail. I waited for what seemed like an hour before taking an indirect path as the safest route home. After locking my car in the garage, I paused behind a tall juniper in the yard to make sure no one had followed me. The street was dead quiet, except for a dog barking in the distance.

  Gran was waiting at the door in her pink terry robe. “What took so long? I was worried half to death,” she hissed.

  “Long story. Can we save it ’til tomorrow?” I gave her a hug with a pinch of reassurance, craving only the sweet oblivion of sleep. New ideas were always fresh in the morning. Ad line
s percolated as fast as morning coffee when I consigned writer’s block to my subconscious at bedtime. Hopefully, that would also work when I had to think like a criminal.

  Chapter Five

  Mr. Wiggins woke me at 9:20 a.m. by kneading my belly with his front paws. I squinted at the clock, wishing I had another hour to germinate ideas. The smell of coffee and bacon finally coaxed me out of bed.

  Gran commanded the kitchen table, doing the word jumble from last night’s Milwaukee Journal.

  I poured myself a cup of coffee and snatched a piece of crisp bacon off the plate she pushed before me. The scrambled eggs and toast were barely warm, but I ravished them anyway.

  “I didn’t want to wake you until Evan left for work.” She set aside the puzzle and searched my face, tapping her pencil. “So, what’s the story?”

  I got to the point, as I knew she expected nothing less. She groaned when I told her the statue was still in the trunk of my car. I hoped her innate optimism would dilute the gravity of the situation. Gran had been tested by life, but at age seventy-two, she was as sharp and vital as a woman twenty years younger—if you discounted her tired eyes and gray-streaked hair. She had made a home for Evan since he was six years old, after our widowed mother was diagnosed with cancer. We had lived in a duplex a block away, and I stayed with Mom until she died several years later, joining Gran when she was widowed. The three of us had grown tight, the closest family we had since both my parents and grandfather had died so prematurely.

  She tightened her robe, looking past me in thought. “Maybe Captain Billington would know what to do.”

  I grimaced as I poured myself another cup of coffee. “How could we ask him—or any cop—to manipulate the law they swore to uphold?”

  “Ply them with cookies?” She chuckled without mirth. “Maybe cookies baked with cocaine.”

  I laughed. “That doesn’t work with cocaine, Gran. Marijuana brownies, maybe.”

  “Couldn’t we just burn the Dutch boy—or add him to the garbage pickup?”

  “Burning requires a permit and would draw attention. Cute little trash sometimes ends up at the recycling center. I squashed my hands together with an appropriate motor noise. Didn’t Evan get a couple of his lawn ducks from there?

  Her chin receded into her neck. “How could that get back to us?”

  “You ever watch Columbo reruns on TV?” We both laughed, knowing Gran was as addicted to Columbo as Evan was to The Amazing Race. “Seriously, Gran, Menomonee Falls is the largest village in Wisconsin. Probably the safest. I think our cops work hard to protect that image. Probably why only petty theft and gateway drugs take hold here.”

  She slumped in her chair and sighed heavily. “Well, Katie, we’ve worked just as hard to protect Evan. He’s an adult now, subject to the law with or without Asperger’s for an excuse.”

  I clunked my head against the high back of my chair. “Maybe we’re just overthinking all this.”

  “Or maybe we need the advice of a lawyer?” Gran smirked over a sip of coffee.

  We decided the Dutch boy was safe in my locked trunk while we considered alternative actions that didn’t cost a whopping attorney fee—or implicate anyone. Both of us found it hard to concentrate on anything else for the next few days, with each of us periodically coming up with solutions the other shot down. Options became a running joke—bumping off a stupid lawn ornament that could put us in a police lineup.

  Friday afternoon, I washed my hair, creamed my face, and painted my toenails and fingernails Placid Peach, to compliment the peach flowers on my halter sundress. When I opened the door to Hot Stuff, I got the reaction I hoped for.

  After a low whistle, he found his voice to drawl, “Peachy as a Texas rose.”

  “I thought they were all yellow down there.”

  He smiled, showing all his polished white teeth. “Just one of those big ol’ myths.” His gaze fanned my sundress. “You make me feel like an old penny in a pocketful of new change.” He looked down at his T-shirt that read Homeland Security since 1492 above a picture of three Southwest Indians. “I thought this was appropriate for a police concert.”

  I thought he was right. Notwithstanding the clever slogan, the T-shirt fit like a glove, tight around his upper arms and emphasizing a contoured chest above a silver belt buckle big as a saucer. His jeans were just as tight, boots polished, and when he removed his police cap, a lock of his black hair curled on his forehead. I sucked in a delicious whiff of lime.

  For a few seconds, we stood there, staring at each other in silent appreciation.

  “You do clean up well.” He grinned. “No trace of swamp anywhere.”

  Heat rose in my face. “I don’t usually…wear a dress.” I almost admitted I only owned two—with few occasions to wear either.

  Gran came in the back door, preoccupied with an armful of cut flowers. “What about drowning him in Mill Pond?” she said before she noticed Dallas at the door.

  Holding his cap over his chest, he nodded. “Good evening, ma’am. I hope you’re not referring to me?”

  I laughed, fiddling with my watchband. “Gran teases all my dates like that. It’s probably why I’m, uh, still single.” I glanced at my watch and cleared my throat. “Shouldn’t we be going?”

  “Well, I surely hope we don’t have to drain the pond to find the truth,” he drawled. “Seein’ you all dressed to kill, I wondered about that myself, er, why y’all are still single, that is.”

  Another heat wave collared my neck and crept upward. Compliments, much less suitors, were as rare as a dress in my closet. I slipped into my sandals beside the screen door and stepped outside.

  He snapped his cap on and hurried to catch up.

  My smile quickly faded when I realized our mode of transportation was not a car, but a big black-and-red 600 cc cycle parked at the curb.

  “It was this or a police car,” he shrugged. “The deal was one I couldn’t refuse at the showroom in town. They even took my old coupe in trade for this floor model.”

  Wondering if I had time to change, I clutched my skirt. “I’m not really dressed for a hog ride.” His blue eyes went soft with apology.

  “I know. I figured you for a sporty chick.”

  I watched him reach out to rub the handlebar as if he were consoling an insult to his cycle.

  “I could have borrowed a police car when off duty, but thought maybe you’d take that as…too much authority.”

  Avoiding his look, I bit my lip and decided there was no alternative. “Do you know how to shift a beetle?”

  He handled my stick shift with ease. “Lots of pickup in this little car,” he said. “I could see it giving a precinct car a good chase.”

  I sucked in my breath. “Have you already had any, um, traffic chases here?”

  He shot me a sideways glance. “A couple. I’ve been told that’s about as exciting as it gets ’round here. Traffic violations and property thefts.” He noticed when I breathed a soft sigh of relief, but said nothing more until we arrived at the Fest.

  Chapter Six

  Since I didn’t bring a pocketbook, I deferred holding onto the car keys.

  He slipped them into his jeans pocket after locking the car.

  Even remembering what the trunk held, I felt safe knowing there was no reason for him to search my locked trunk, and as long as we stuck together, I would know where the keys were.

  The benefit concert was well-attended. We sat in a section reserved for MFPD to the right of the bandstand. When we took our seats, Dallas tossed off a few friendly greetings to cops he knew, and we both waved to Captain Billington a few rows behind.

  Drummer Copeland was probably the equivalent of Ringo Starr, both of them from an era that predated both of us by decades. We discussed how bands of that era were enjoying a resurgence of popularity from old and new fans. Some of the vintage tour groups were still defying expiration. I could see a lot of gray heads in the audience, matching the color of Copeland’s cropped hair. The musician prov
ed to be especially sardonic when introducing famous numbers and the history behind them.

  The crowd was engaged and equally enthused, quenching a thirsty demand for Milwaukee beer. The night air steamed around us like the inside of a local brewery. Dallas warmed to the music…and to me with each successive cup of beer. By the end of the concert, he had an arm locked firmly over my shoulders. Beer also had another notorious effect; I hit the rest rooms—twice.

  Though it was already July 22nd, the concert ended with ten minutes of spectacular fireworks competing with a medley of patriotic songs. “Do they have fireworks in Texas,” I asked during the grand finale.

  “Of course. All rumors aside, we haven’t seceded from the union yet. In fact, we also have fireworks on Texas Independence Day in March, and even for Lyndon B. Johnson’s birthday in August.” He looked beyond me with a slow smile. “My daddy used to tease me into believing we were related to the former President, and though we were never invited to any of his parties, we always celebrated the day anyway with one of Mom’s pecan cakes and a jug of Daddy’s home-brew.”

  “Very impressive.” I laughed. “I always heard Texas does things in a big way.” I playfully tapped his silver belt buckle with a fingernail.

  “Won that in a rodeo,” he snickered. “Nine seconds on a bull that nearly broke my arm. My hand was caught in the grip.”

  “Which hand?” I squeezed the one that held mine and took a deep breath when I felt his grip tighten. We threaded our way through a parking lot filled with cars idling toward the park exits. After locating my car, I noticed he had a little trouble getting the key in the door lock while still holding my hand. “You can let go of the grip, cowboy.” I chuckled.

  He bowed gracefully as he held the passenger door open.

  I slipped inside less gracefully, and leaned over to open his door.