by Nina Wright
“How do you know about my Twitter account?” I asked Mom.
“Oh, please,” she said. “I’m on Twitter like everybody else.”
“But why are you checking my account?” I said.
“I’m following you. That’s how we say it on Twitter.” Mom added, “Chester texted me your log-in info just in case. We all know you’re not thinking straight.”
I heard the unmistakable click-click of doggie toenails on wood flooring and remembered with a sinking sensation that we still had one canine at home and accounted for. Woof, snort, fart. I fanned my face.
“What did you feed that dog? She stinks worse than ever!”
MacArthur’s nose twitched. “With all due respect, Sandra Bullock smells the same as always, Whiskey. In your advanced state of pregnancy, your nose is hyper-sensitive.”
“Maybe, but look how she’s dressed.”
Sandra was wearing what could only be described as a beige-colored long-sleeved maternity dress, one that looked suspiciously like the very outfit now covering my body.
“Is her dress just like my dress?” I demanded.
Sandra must have thought I was pleased because her stubby tail wagged even faster than usual.
“Her dress is much smaller,” Mom pointed out. “Sandra doesn’t have your weight problem.”
“She’s a French bulldog. I’m a tall human in her ninth month of pregnancy.”
Ignoring my comment, Mom said, “Jeb texted me to change her clothes so she could greet you like that. He hoped it might help your mood. So did I.”
“How would that help my mood?”
“Oh, come on. Sandra’s so ugly she’s cute,” Mom said. “She lives to make people happy.”
“She lives to fart, snort and slobber,” I mumbled.
I eyed Sandra more closely.
“Is she wearing a fake pregnancy bump?”
Mom shrugged. “I had to fill out the dress somehow.”
She explained that Jeb had ordered the outfit from Curvy Mommy, the upscale maternity clothier from whom he’d bought most of my current wardrobe. Who knew they had a Pregnant Pet Department? So Jeb was now dressing both his wife and his dog.
In my own defense, I’d never cared about what I wore, so why argue when Jeb took over? If it gave him pleasure, we had a win-win. However, Sandra in maternity clothes was absurd. I could only hope I looked better than that.
Overwhelmed by fatigue, I suddenly yearned to collapse into a sleep so deep that only the most acute labor pains would stir me. Sandra must have assumed she could offer comfort by moving in close and slobbering all over my feet. Although my huge belly blocked the view, I could feel her doggie saliva on my ankles.
“Need a chair,” I gasped. “Now.”
Before I could blink, MacArthur scooped me up and whisked me to the sofa, where he deposited me as if I were a mere slip of a girl. He wasn’t even breathing hard. No doubt he worked out by lifting Avery.
“Oh my,” Mom said, studying the screen of her new phone. “You’re tweeting with UberSpringer, Whitney, and I think you’re winning.”
“I don’t know much about Twitter,” I admitted, “but I’m pretty sure it’s not a sport.”
“Then why do they post all those scores?” Mom asked.
“What scores?”
“How many tweets and followers you have,” she said.
The doorbell rang. MacArthur offered to open it, which pleased Mom because she was tweeting. Chester stood on my porch, phone in hand. I could not have been less surprised. Sandra rushed to see him, snorting and wagging all the way.
“Before you say anything, understand that I am far too tired to care,” I warned Chester and closed my eyes.
“You might care about this,” he said. “Anouk tweeted me back. She has Helen and Abra.”
“Is she requesting ransom?”
“No. She’s offering to return them both.”
I thought about it, my eyes still shut.
“Tell her to keep Abra and return Helen. Tomorrow.”
MacArthur cleared his throat. “Abra is a sworn deputy of the Magnet Springs police force involved in the investigation of perishable odors. We need to retrieve her tonight and resume our search.”
“Fine. But if she gets away again, it’s entirely your problem. Jenx promised me a waiver.”
“Understood.”
“One more thing,” I said. “I’m going to need help getting up the stairs.”
The Cleaner didn’t help me. He carried me all the way to my bedroom, again, without panting.
On second thought, panting might have been nice. It would have reminded me of those pre-pregnant trips to the boudoir when I was swept away by Jeb. Of course, one of those trips had turned me into the hulk I was today.
Mom and Chester tagged along, followed by you-know-who. Mom wanted to fluff my pillows; Chester wanted to read me my tweets; and Sandra wanted attention.
The entire exchange of tweets between Mattimoe Realty and UberSpringer consisted of abbreviated claims and counter-claims about my company’s concern for the community.
“You’re saying all the right things,” Chester remarked happily. “You come across like a Magnet Springs cheerleader. UberSpringer sounds like a whiner.”
“You do realize,” I said, “that neither tweeter is a real person.”
“You’re Mattimoe Realty,” Chester insisted. “We’re just not sure who UberSpringer is.”
“I’m not Mattimoe Realty. I own Mattimoe Realty, and my only connection to those tweets is paying the guy who writes them.”
“Mere semantics,” Chester huffed.
For an instant I wondered if “Mere Semantics” was one of his online Harvard seminars, then I understood.
“The tweets sound personal because they’re supposed to,” I concluded. “Ben knows what he’s doing.”
When Chester glanced up at me, I was surprised how smudged his glasses were. Abra, Sandra and a couple other dogs had licked his face today.
“Tweeting is the right thing to do, Whiskey,” he said earnestly.
Mom folded back my comforter while MacArthur paused in the doorway, my reclining self in his arms. When my husband’s face floated before me, I blushed hot with guilt.
“Lay her here,” Mom instructed MacArthur. Thank God nobody could read my mind. Then Sandra barked so fiercely I wondered if she could.
“Do you need me to help you into your nightgown?” Mom inquired.
“I’ll wait for Jeb,” I said.
Chester picked up the Frenchie on his way out. He and the Cleaner were off to retrieve Abra and resume the smell search.
“Call us if you need anything,” MacArthur said.
“Or text us. Or tweet us,” Chester added.
“Not gonna happen,” I murmured, thankful to be canine-free and drifting toward deep sleep.
18
I awoke when the voice I most loved crooned a sweet little ditty featuring my name. Jeb sang it softly right into my ear, and that tickled.
“What time is it?” I whispered without opening my eyes.
“Almost time for our baby,” he said.
He kissed my forehead, my nose and, deliciously, my mouth.
“What time is it really?” I said.
“A little after ten. Do you want to sleep in your clothes?”
“I’m already sleeping in my clothes,” I said. I recalled Sandra Bullock’s identical outfit. “What’s with the Curvy Mommy clothes for the Frenchie?”
“I wanted to make you smile,” he said meekly. “Back to your clothes. May I remove them?”
“Go for it.”
He did, kissing and caressing my skin as he peeled off each garment.
“I’m taking you to your appointment in the morning,” he whispered.
“What appointment?” I murmured, wishing he would just keep on kissing me.
“With your doc, remember?”
I did remember. Of course I did. However, at that moment I was a sleepy, needy, happily married
pregnant lady who wanted only to cuddle with her man. We could deal with appointments, French bulldogs, and other forms of reality after the sun came up.
Jeb rustled a piece of paper. “You stash notes in your bra now? Your breasts could leak, you know.”
“They’re just legal papers,” I repeated. “Nothing important.”
I dozed off before Jeb finished undressing me. That didn’t vex either of us because we both got the best night’s sleep we’d had in weeks. Jeb’s closeness soothed me and Baby like nothing else could. My body was resting up for big work ahead.
Morning changed some things. Before the sky was closer to blue than black, the bedside phone rang. How rude. My days of sleeping late were markedly numbered. Jeb kindly took the call, but the other party insisted on speaking with me.
When I pulled the covers over my head, Jeb whispered, “It’s the state fire investigator. He needs to ask you some questions.”
I mumbled something even I couldn’t understand. I heard Jeb promise the caller that I would get back to him as soon as possible.
The instant the call ended, I knew I’d never go back to sleep.
“What time is it now?” I muttered.
Peeling back the blanket, Jeb floated our digital alarm clock before my foggy eyes.
“It can’t be 8:40,” I moaned.
I did return the phone call, but not before Jeb had assisted me in getting vertical, showered, dressed and fed, although not exactly in that order. By then I was closer to coherent, though not sharp enough to catch Randy Dupper’s exact job title. It had something to do with investigating fires. Only a government official could be so terse.
“Are you saying the Mullens’ fire looks like arson?” I asked after answering several questions.
“I’m not saying anything,” Dupper said, which wasn’t accurate. He was talking, wasn’t he?
“The kinds of questions you’re asking suggest that you think it was arson,” I said.
“Just doing my job, ma’am,” he replied.
“Which is investigating arson, right?”
“Investigating fires, ma’am.”
“Humph,” I said.
Arson or not, I wasn’t sure how my input could help. Since I was the agent of record, Dupper wanted me to verify what he apparently already knew—what the house was made of, who owned it, who listed it for sale and how well I was acquainted with them. He also wondered when I’d last seen Todd and Lisa Mullen, and how I would ‘grade’ the condition of their property.
“Their property seemed to be in excellent condition,” I said, hastening to add that I was licensed to sell houses, not inspect them. “The fire was caused by a propane tank explosion, right?”
“Who told you that?”
For the first time Dupper sounded interested.
“Everybody at the scene,” I said. “We all smelled that rotten-egg odor.”
“The propane tank did explode,” he conceded. “We’re trying to figure out why.”
I wondered if he also meant how and by whom, but I figured he wouldn’t tell me since he was skirting the whole arson issue. I asked instead when he expected to complete his report.
“When it’s done, ma’am.”
“Cute,” I said. “I assume our local police will get a copy?”
Dupper mumbled a response that could have been either “thank you” or something crude. To whatever it was, he added “ma’am.”
As soon as he clicked off, my cell phone rang.
“We found a third shell casing,” Jenx began.
“Don’t you even say hello anymore?” I said.
“Why waste time? Your dog was helpful last night.”
“We must have a bad connection. It sounded like you said Abra was helpful.”
“That is what I said. Abra led us right to it. Well, almost right to it. First she showed us where she and Napoleon did the dirty.”
“Why didn’t she show you that the first time around?” I wondered.
“Where they made love, or where the shell landed?”
“Both. Either.”
“Dunno. Chester thinks she was distracted.”
“Abra’s always distracted. She’s a sight hound.”
“The point is we got the shell, it probably matches the others although we don’t know for sure yet, and it landed close to where the dogs were making out.” Jenx sounded way more satisfied than fatigued.
“Where was that?”
“To be exact, Abra showed us three places—under a bush, next to a tree and out in the middle of the field. MacArthur’s nose backed up her story.”
I noted that Napoleon was quite the stud.”
“We found the casing closest to the last location she showed us,” Jenx said, “so we figure the dogs were doin’ it for the third time when the shooter fired and scared ’em off.”
“That’ll teach Abra to be less of an exhibitionist,” I said. Of course, I was kidding.
Jenx said, “Based on the bullet pattern, I’m pretty sure the shooter’s after Napoleon, not Abra.”
“Bad news for the poodle. Does MacArthur’s sniffer agree?”
“The man’s nose is a gift, Whiskey. Don’t sneeze at it.”
I didn’t ask where Abra was now, but the chief told me anyway.
“Chester took your hound home with him last night. He’ll bring her back after school.”
“He should keep her pending further investigation,” I said.
“We know where you live.”
I asked Jenx if she’d interviewed Todd Mullen last night.
“I wanted to, but we had to deal first with the perishable odors. Mullen was too pissed off to wait around or make an appointment to come back later, even though I asked him real nice. He’s an A-one a-hole.”
I asked if she planned to talk to him today.
“Gonna try, but he’s not taking my calls, and I’m not sure where to find him. If I do get hold of him, I expect he’ll want his lawyer present, and his lawyer will tell him I got no right to talk to him.”
“Is that true?”
“Technically. It’s the State Boys’ case, but, dammit, it happened in my jurisdiction.”
I could hear her teeth grind, a sure cue to change the subject. When I told her about the call from Randy Dupper, she made me repeat his name.
“I know everybody in the state fire investigator’s office,” she said, “and there’s nobody named Dupper.”
“Maybe he’s new.”
“There’s a hiring freeze.”
I told her I was sure of his name but not who he worked for.
“Good thing you’re on pregnancy leave, or I’d have to reprimand you for sloppy police work,” she said. She demanded Dupper’s number.
Cracking open the bedroom door, Jeb tapped his bare wrist to remind me it was time to leave for my doctor’s appointment.
“Gotta go find out when Baby’s coming,” I told Jenx.
“Where do they keep that fact, and why would Jeb trust you to find it?”
Her own joke amused her. When she stopped chuckling, I gave her Dupper’s number.
“That’s not a state office,” Jenx said. “That’s somebody’s private cell.”
“Maybe he’s working in the field today.”
“Maybe he’s working for the other side,” she said.
Before I could ask who “the other side” might be, Jenx said, “Good luck at the doc’s,” and disconnected.
In fact I did have good luck at the doc’s. However, Jeb spiked my blood pressure by observing, correctly, while we were still in the waiting room that my OB looked and sounded like a younger version of my mother.
Why had I never noticed before? True, I am the Queen of Denial, but this was deeply troubling. Had I unconsciously sought out a clone of my mother to deliver my baby? Horrors. Even Doc’s mannerisms were indisputably like Mom’s, although, of course, Doc was nicer. Except when it came to nagging me about gaining too much weight.
Thinking about the “
momness” of Doc distressed and distracted me during the whole examination. Although Doc’s voice seemed far away, I was aware that Jeb was tracking her comments. I took a deep breath and tuned back in.
Doc pointed out that Baby’s head was in my pelvis, leaving less room for my bladder, which—hello!—I already knew. Jeb voiced his concern that I kept falling asleep.
“I’m nearly narcoleptic,” I admitted.
“It’s not unusual at this point,” Doc said, “although some women get a burst of nesting energy about now.”
That cracked me up until I realized she wasn’t kidding. Doc warned me against driving if I was as sleepy as I claimed. We assured her I had a driver.
“Baby seems quieter than before,” I observed. “Is that normal?”
“Your baby’s at least 20 inches long and weighs at least eight pounds,” Doc said. “There’s less room in there to move around than there used to be.”
We covered my usual roster of complaints, ranging from itchy belly to swollen feet and loose bowels to backaches. Nothing new going on there. Nothing delivering Baby wouldn’t resolve.
Doc asked if I was having Braxton Hicks contractions, also known as “practice contractions.”
“None yet,” I said. “Should I be worried?”
She shook her head decisively.
“Braxton Hicks contractions are more common in subsequent pregnancies,” she said. “Worry is a waste of everyone’s time.”
Jeb and I locked eyes. That last sentence sounded just like Mom talking.
“Your breasts are not leaking colostrum,” Doc noted.
“No, but they’re bigger than ever,” I said.
“They’ll get bigger yet.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jeb grin.
Doc continued, “The lack of colostrum doesn’t mean you can’t breastfeed.”
“I don’t want to breastfeed,” I said, sounding slightly petulant even to my own ears.
She frowned, or I thought she did, and made a note in my file. Again with the Irene Houston-isms.
She warned me to watch out for “bloody show,” which is not a British expression, and the loss of my mucous plug, which sounded just plain gross.
Let’s be honest. The whole pregnancy and delivery thing is disgusting, and nobody is more squeamish than me. Not to mention the fact that I was doing this for the very first—and only—time at age thirty-five, which seemed perilously close to forty and old age.