3 Revenge of the Crafty Corpse

by Lois Winston

  Sally’s floodgates gave way at that point. I placed my hand on her plump shoulder, unsure what else to do as she sobbed.

  “She killed him,” said Bargello Lady. “Lyndella killed Sally’s husband.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “Those damn little blue pills,” said Sally between gulping sobs.

  “Viagra?”

  “Lyndella talked George into getting a prescription,” said Mabel, “but Sally—”

  “We hadn’t had sex in years,” said Sally. She pulled a tissue from her pocket, dabbed at her eyes, and blew her nose. “It hurt. Lyndella knew this would happen. She lured George into her bed, and he had a massive heart attack.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Now you know,” said Mabel. “We didn’t kill that whore, but we’ll throw a party for the person who did.”

  At that moment Reggie reentered the room. She carried another couple of cartons, the top one shifting precariously. The needlework women stopped talking the moment they saw her and resumed their stitching. I hurried to meet Reggie and grabbed the top carton before it fell.

  With a loud oomph, Reggie placed the remaining box on the nearest table. “Do you want her books, too?” she asked.

  “Shouldn’t they go to the library?”

  “I suppose.”

  She didn’t seem too happy with my answer, probably because the library was situated farther from Lyndella’s room than the arts and crafts room. “Why don’t you bring them here?” I suggested. “I’ll sort through them.”

  “Okay.” Reggie headed back for another armload of boxes.

  As soon as she left the room, I returned to my group of needlework women. “One thing puzzles me,” I said.

  “What’s that?” asked Mabel.

  I hesitated, unsure how to broach such a delicate question without offending anyone.

  “Spit it out,” said Mabel. “None of us is getting any younger.”

  I inhaled a deep breath, then took the plunge. “A woman of Lyndella’s advanced years, how did she … I mean, I didn’t think it was even possible—”

  “For her to have sex?” asked the baby sweater knitter.

  I nodded.

  “Hormones,” said Mabel. “The rest of us were too scared of cancer, especially after that women’s health study came out a few years back. Those of us who’d been on HRT got off it at that point. Not Lyndella.”

  “No hormone replacement therapy means no libido for many women,” said Sally. “You dry up in more ways than one.”

  “Try explaining that to the Viagra generation,” said Mabel. “Those randy lotharios want a hell of a lot more than hand-holding and cuddling nowadays.”

  “And they got what they wanted from Lyndella,” said Bargello Lady. “Any time, night or day.”

  Holy TMI! But I’d asked, and these women certainly weren’t shy about dishing all the lascivious details. I had to admit, though, part of me was totally fascinated by the late Lyndella Wegner. In a macabre sort of way.

  By the end of the needlework class, Reggie had deposited fifteen extra-large cartons in the room, eight filled with Lyndella’s crafts and seven containing an assortment of craft books, fiction, and loose-leaf binders. I decided the arts and crafts room should have a library of its own.

  After walking Mephisto, I took the remainder of my lunch break to sort and shelve the craft books while scarfing down a cup of store-brand cherry yogurt I’d brought from home. Maybe the yogurt would balance out the Cloris-fueled calories I’d gobbled up Friday.

  A set of built-in bookcases ran the length of the room under the windows. I straightened out the various items on one section of shelves to make room. Then I separated Lyndella’s books, placing the craft titles on the shelves and stacking the fiction and the loose-leaf binders on a table.

  After sorting the books, I picked up one of the binders and began flipping through the pages, which turned out to be a crafts journal. The pages contained notes, drawings, and photos for many of Lyndella’s craft projects. What a treasure trove for a crafts editor! I placed all the binders back into cartons and moved the cartons to the floor near my desk to study them more at length later.

  Lyndella’s taste in fiction matched her taste in artwork. I suppose her collection of erotic novels shouldn’t have surprised me, but I still had difficulty wrapping my head around a ruffles and lace-bedecked, ninety-eight-year-old woman reading the Marquis de Sade.

  I wondered if I should bring the novels to the library but quickly decided against doing so. What if some resident’s grandchild pulled Anne Rice’s The Sleeping Beauty Trilogy off a shelf and began reading? I didn’t want to be responsible for introducing a ten year old to the world of BDSM. So I began placing the novels back into one of the cartons. Although I hated to trash any books, Lyndella’s fiction collection probably belonged in the Dumpster.

  The question remained what to do with Lyndella’s various craft projects. I decided to discuss the subject with my next class of crafters—after I told them about my gallery idea. First, though, I quickly cut up squares of colored construction paper.

  “For those of you who haven’t met me yet,” I said after they’d all entered the room and seated themselves at various tables, “my name is Anastasia Pollack. I’m the craft editor at American Woman magazine, and I’ll be filling in on weekends for the next few months while Kara Kennedy is out on maternity leave.”

  I then passed around the colored paper, markers, and safety pins I’d found in the supply closet. “Unfortunately, I’m really terrible with names,” I continued. “So I’d appreciate it if you’d make yourselves name tags until I get to know all of you better.”

  “Getting old like us, huh?” said a tall, thin woman with ginger- colored hair pulled back into a low ponytail. She laughed. “Hate to tell you, dearie, but it only gets worse the older you get.”

  The others chuckled and nodded in agreement. I laughed along with them, although on the inside I worried. With all I juggled and all the stress, my brain had already begun to turn to mush. I hated to think what it might be like fifteen or twenty years from now.

  “Construction paper?” said a woman with red-framed glasses and a thick head of obviously dyed, midnight-black hair that hugged her head like a helmet. When she turned up her nose and pushed aside the supplies I’d passed out, not a hair moved, thanks to a thick coating of hairspray. “We’re not in kindergarten. You want name tags? We’ll make name tags we’ll be proud to wear. Right, girls?”

  Everyone agreed. I should have known. These were my paper crafters and scrapbookers. Much like their younger counterparts I’d come across over the years, they had a near obsessive love for their particular craft of choice. They set about pulling supplies off shelves and from the closets—rubber stamps and pads, decorative papers, paper punches, specialty scissors, stickers, and assorted trims.

  Like the classes before them, they needed no help from me, so as they worked, I told them about my gallery idea. Everyone loved the idea, but once again someone brought up Shirley Hallstead.

  “You’ll have to clear it with her,” said a woman I assumed was named Barbara from the BAR she’d so far rubber stamped onto her name tag.

  “So I’ve been told,” I said. Then I brought up the subject of Lyndella’s crafts. “Shirley told Reggie to throw them out. That seems like such a waste. Anyone have a suggestion as to what to do with them?”

  “Do as Shirley said.”

  “Use them for target practice.”

  “Burn ’em.”

  “Smash them to smithereens.”

  Wow! I’ve known people who weren’t well-liked by others. My own mother-in-law headed the list. But the anger these women felt toward Lyndella Wegner bordered on rage. After what my last class had told me, I suppose I couldn’t blame them for not wanting any reminders of the woman hanging around Sunnysi
de.

  “There’s an enormous assortment of fabric yo-yos,” I continued. “Would any of you want them to decorate your card and scrapbooking projects?”

  “Did Lyndella make them?” asked the woman who’d suggested burning Lyndella’s crafts.

  “Most likely. They came from her room.”

  “Hell no,” she said. The others nodded in agreement.

  I certainly wasn’t going to toss a perfectly good crop of yo-yos. If no one at Sunnyside wanted them, I’d take them home with me. I hadn’t featured any yo-yo crafts in the magazine in several years. With hundreds of pre-made yo-yos at my disposal, now seemed as good a time as any for a fresh batch of yo-yo projects.

  _________________________

  lyndella’s yo-yo embellished cardigan

  What’s old is new. Give retro life to an old cardigan by adding a decorative yoke of coordinating yo-yos.

  Materials

  cardigan sweater

  basic yo-yo supplies to sew approximately 20–30 coordinating

  yo-yos made from 5" circle template

  equal number of coordinating or contrasting 7/8" buttons

  straight pins

  invisible thread or fabric glue

  Directions

  The number of yo-yos needed will depend on the size of the sweater. Make the yo-yos following the Basic Yo-yo directions (pp. 18–20). Stitch a button over the center hole of each yo-yo.

  Lay the sweater flat, front side up. Place the yo-yos along the neckline of the front of the sweater, overlapping the yo-yos slightly. Pin in place. Turn the sweater over. Continue placing and pinning yo-yos along the back neckline.

  Using invisible thread, slipstitch the yo-yos onto the sweater or attach with a small amount of fabric glue at the middle back of each yo-yo. Note: if using glue, slide a piece of waxed paper inside the sweater so you don’t accidently glue the front to the back.

  _________________________

  The remainder of my classes were much like the earlier ones. Everyone loved the idea of a gallery show; no one wanted anything to do with crafts or supplies that had belonged to the late Lyndella Wegner. Since the craft books all had her name written on the inside cover, I suspected they’d remain where they sat on the shelf, gathering dust for years to come.

  After my last class, I carried the boxes of yo-yos and notebooks to my car, having to make one trip for each of the cartons due to the weight of the notebooks. The triple digit temperature had turned the asphalt parking lot spongy, and heat waves radiated from the cement sidewalks. By the time I’d finished, I had just enough room left in the Hyundai for me and Mephisto. The cartons of crafts would have to wait until tomorrow.

  Because the elderly are always cold, Sunnyside’s air conditioning didn’t cool enough to satisfy me. I spent a good deal of the day fanning myself. (Not to mention offering all sorts of inducements and bribes to the menopause gods to target someone else. I was so not ready for that stage of my life and prayed I was merely reacting to the warmth of Sunnyside and not experiencing my first hot flashes.) Meanwhile, many of the residents walked around in long sleeves and sweaters.

  Still, Sunnyside felt like Siberia compared to the wall of heat that hit me each time I stepped outside the building. By the time I headed back for Mephisto, I felt like I’d spent an hour in a sauna. While wearing a parka. I needed to wring out my entire body.

  I found both Lucille and Mephisto deep in siesta mode, each loudly snoring away on the bed. I decided to duck into the bathroom, hoping Reggie hadn’t thought to clean out Lyndella’s toiletries when she bagged her belongings. Sure enough, the medicine cabinet held a tube of vaginal estrogen cream and a package of hormone replacement patches, both prescriptions in Lyndella’s name and from separate mail-order pharmacies, one located in Canada, the other in Mexico. The meds, along with a certain battery-operated device filling up the remainder of the shelf, left no doubt about the tales I’d heard today.

  I closed the cabinet, walked back into the bedroom, and grabbed Mephisto’s leash from Lucille’s dresser. He woke as soon as I clipped the leash to his collar but instead of growling at me, he wagged his tail.

  In all the years I’d known him, Mephisto had never wagged his tail at me. He must have had one s’mothering of a day at Sunnyside.

  “Let’s go, you big lummox.”

  He lumbered off the bed as Lucille continued to snore. Instead of waking her and running the risk of a leash tug-a-war, I jotted a quick note, to inform her no one had dognapped her precious pooch.

  As I stepped from Lucille’s room, I heard yelling coming from the direction of Shirley’s office. “What! How dare you disobey me? When I tell you to do something, you do it. I don’t give a damn what anyone else says. Do you understand me?”

  I couldn’t hear a reply. Either Shirley was reaming out someone over the phone, or the subject of her wrath hadn’t answered her. A few members of the staff lurked in the hallway, obviously eavesdropping. Shirley should learn to close her office door and lower her voice.

  “This is my facility,” she continued. “I make the rules. No one else.”

  I wondered what Shirley was even doing here today. Maybe it had something to do with Lyndella’s murder, but I had a sneaking suspicion Shirley Hallstead had no life beyond Sunnyside. Contrary to her comment about not working on weekends, I suspected she spent a good portion of her weekends at Sunnyside. Her entire self-worth seemed tied to her job. Something told me the woman had few, if any, friends. Part of me felt sorry for her. However, that didn’t excuse her acting like a tyrant.

  “I’ve had enough of you. Get out of my building. You’re fired.”

  A moment later those of us lingering in the hallway saw Reggie Koltzner run out of Shirley’s office and make a beeline for the back of the building. Poor kid. However, she’d be much better off without Shirley in her life. Maybe she’d even stop abusing herself.

  I gave a tug on Mephisto’s leash and headed for the front entrance. Mephisto hesitated as a brutal wall of heat hit us. He yelped as he stepped from the walkway onto the parking lot asphalt and immediately yanked me toward a patch of burnt grass at the edge of the curb. Once he planted all four paws on the dead grass, he held his ground, refusing to budge, no matter how hard I tugged at his leash.

  Finally, I understood why. The temperature of the black parking lot surface had to be a good twenty degrees higher than the hundred and two degrees beating down on us. Sandals protected my feet, but Mephisto wore no doggy foot coverings on his paws. The only way I was going to get him into the car was by hauling him into my arms and carrying him. Ugh! Nothing like lugging twenty-odd pounds of hot, panting dog in triple-digit heat.

  “You owe me,” I said as I deposited him in the passenger seat of the rust-bucket sauna on wheels. I cranked down all four windows, then settled in behind the steering wheel. Mephisto rode home with his head hanging out of the car, doggie slobber blowing in the breeze.

  We arrived home to an empty house. I filled a fresh bowl of water for Mephisto and a glass of ice water for myself. He lapped up all of his water before I took my first sip. I’d have to remember to bring a water dish for him when I brought him back to Sunnyside. After his second bowl, he waddled over to the nearest air-conditioning vent and planted himself directly under it. “Not a bad idea,” I told him.

  According to the message board next to the phone, Alex and Nick planned to attend a pool party after work, then head over to Clark for the fireworks. Westfield never has fireworks. We have more highbrow summer entertainment like concerts in Min-dowaskin Park and downtown street corner jazz. So laden down with blankets and folding chairs, we hike over to the next town for our yearly dose of rockets’ red glare and bombs bursting in air. Tonight I’d forego the fireworks for a long soak in a cool tub.

  The message board also contained a short note from Mama: Be back late. Don’t wait up. Unfortunatel
y, that could only mean one thing with my mother—she’d set her sights on Husband Number Six.

  To verify, I checked her room. Sure enough, cast aside Chanels (Mama’s designer of choice) were strewn over her bed and Lucille’s. A sea of cardboard shoeboxes, tissue paper, and designer heels covered the floor. The evidence screamed loud and clear that Flora Sudberry Periwinkle Ramirez Scoffield Goldberg O’Keefe was once again in full husband-hunting mode.

  I pitied the poor guy. Except for my own father, Mama’s husbands never lived long after the wedding. The last sucker hadn’t even made it to the altar before someone thrust one of my knitting needles into his heart.

  The good news was that I had the house entirely to myself for the next several hours. I drew myself a cool bath. Knowing if I started to read a novel, I’d never find time to finish it, I grabbed the cartons filled with Lyndella’s notebooks and placed them on the floor next to the tub. The craft editor in me was dying to peruse them.

  After setting the caddy across the edge of the tub, I grabbed the top loose-leaf from the carton nearest to me, settled into the water, and flipped open to the first page. Lyndella took meticulous notes on each of her projects. In a very tight, neat, flowing script she had recorded materials, directions, and cost, plus her start and completion dates. She included sketches, diagrams, fabric and yarn swatches, directions, patterns, and photos of both the finished projects and the inspiration pieces where applicable. A sheet protector held the contents of each page.

  Although I hadn’t realized it earlier, almost all of Lyndella’s work contained some element of the erotic or pornographic, even the appliquéd quilt on her bed. It was just far less in-your-face than her lint David, the X-rated elements hidden among floral motifs.

  I would have loved to examine the quilt closer, but I didn’t remember seeing it in any of the boxes. Reggie must have bagged it up with Lyndella’s clothes. I hoped someone shopping at Goodwill didn’t mistakenly buy it for a little girl’s bedroom.