by Rose, Kristi
Overachieving was hard when written language was essentially hieroglyphics. Too much time and energy were spent deciphering, which left no time for overachieving. Instead, I spent my time exploring life. I got busted cow-tipping, got suspended from school for skipping (Precious and I went to follow up on a Bigfoot sighting), didn’t finish my master’s degree, and now I could add married a polygamist to the list. #Winning.
I rolled off the couch where I’d crashed the night before and shuffled to the kitchen.
Bright morning sun streamed through the patio sliding door. It was going to be another beautiful day in the Pacific Northwest. I loved when the natural light filled the townhouse. After our impromptu wedding, Carson and I agreed to start our lives in a new place, both of us giving up our small apartments. This townhouse had been an easy compromise.
The layout was simple. The front of the house opened into a foyer and staircase along the left wall. The foyer fed into the living room kitchen combo. The kitchen ran the length of the far right wall and ended in a small dining room. The space flowed right out onto a large deck that overlooked a wildlife refuge. Island seating for four broke up the space between the living room and kitchen.
I slid onto a barstool and rested my forehead in my hands, looking up through my brow at Precious. She stood in my kitchen, scrambling eggs for a breakfast burrito. Even though she wore the same clothes as yesterday, she appeared fresh as a daisy. I wore yoga pants and an oversized T-shirt and could be mistaken for being homeless. My hair was a mess of errant strands and greasy matted-down spots. There was even a patch of dried, clumpy hair from when, in a bout of tears, I’d dropped my head inadvertently into a bowl of ice cream.
She slid a burrito in front of me. “Eat something. It will help.”
“I’m not hungry,” I said and ignored the burrito.
“That’s grief.” She took the seat next to me. “How you feeling today?”
“Numb,” I said. “Angry. Sad. Confused.” Late last night, I’d gathered from around the house many pictures of Carson and me and burned them in the firepit on my back patio. For an odd second during that exorcism, I felt as if everything was going to be okay, that I’d make it through this one way or another.
Precious shifted on the seat beside me and sighed.
“What?” I asked. Something was on her mind. Being friends for more than two decades taught me this.
She pressed her lips together.
“Just spit it out,” I said.
She turned and placed her hand on my shoulder. “You know I don’t do inactivity well and I know you need to grieve. You’re hurting and confused. I’m going to walk every step of that journey with you. But I can’t let you sit here all day wallowing.”
“I deserve to wallow. I’m humiliated and… I’d say heartbroken, but I’m too damn angry to be heartbroken. What else can I do?” I said, worrying my hands.
Precious kicked out her long legs. “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that. If we’re going to hide the truth about Carson, we need to go about the business the same way a grieving widow would.”
I snorted with derision.
She continued, “So, um…given the situation, I’m guessing there won’t be a funeral?”
My hands stilled. I hadn’t even thought of that. “How do I have a funeral with no…?” I gestured to my body. “One of these.”
Precious grimaced. “That’s tricky. We have a few options. We could—”
A loud pounding came on the front door. Looking through the peephole showed an agitated Mr. Linn, my landlord. He kept glancing over his shoulder.
Linn, a retired railroad worker, was shaped like an old whiskey barrel, squat and round with short, stubby legs. He didn’t believe in money sitting idle in a bank and had sunk his retirement in a row of townhouses.
I made a halfhearted attempt to pat down my hair before opening the door.
“Girly, we’ve got a problem,” he said before I could say anything and pushed through the front door, slamming it behind him.
He held up several sheets of rolled paper. He thrust them at me. “Sign these.”
“What’s going on?” I asked, taking the papers.
“Some man left a message yesterday, said he represented your husband and that Mr. Holmes was deceased,” Linn said, looking at me for confirmation.
I nodded.
Linn ducked his head. “I’m sorry, girly. Kinda figured it was true when Precious here practically carried you inside yesterday.”
“What did the message say? Anything else?” I asked. “Did he say who he was?”
“Richie or something. He said that Mr. Holmes was dead and he was the executor of Mr. Holmes estate. He wanted to know if the lease was in Mr. Holmes’s name or yours. Said if the lease were in Mr. Holmes’s name, then the estate would like to terminate the lease, pay any accompanying fees, and evict the tenant. I’m to call him back, let him know, and he’ll send a company down to pack up and remove the furniture.”
I gasped. How dare they?
“Are you kidding me?” Precious said, jumping to her feet. “The nerve of these people.”
Precisely. This was my home. Who did they think they were? Then I remembered. The estate of Carson Holmes, or whatever his real name was, belonged to his wife. His legal wife who found out about my existence only a few days ago. She probably felt as humiliated and duped as I did. Only difference? I wasn’t taking my feelings out on her. Not that I knew who she was, but if I did, I still wouldn’t.
“What’s going on here? Who are these people?” Mr. Linn asked.
“Oh, ah, they’re—” I glanced at Precious. We’d agreed last night to omit some facts about my current situation. Clearly, we hadn’t figured out the small details. But one fact that couldn’t be leaked was the legal wife.
Ultimately, the less we said the better.
A lie tumbled from my lips. “It would seem Carson owed some people a lot of money.”
“But why aren’t you the executor of his estate?” Linn asked.
Yikes! A question I hadn’t even thought to prepare a lie for. I shrugged and went for something close to the truth. “We hadn’t gotten that far, Mr. Linn. We weren’t expecting to die soon and…”
Precious interjected. “And Carson never changed it from his old business partner, so here we are.”
Dang! Precious was quick. I caught her eye and gave her a mental high five. She winked.
“They’re moving rather fast, wouldn’t you say?” Mr. Linn looked skeptical. And rightly so.
Precious said, “Yeah, well, apparently the people he owed had already been in the process of collecting. His unexpected death leaves Sam to deal with them. She just found all this out yesterday.”
Mr. Linn reached out and patted my shoulder. He accompanied the action with the look of pity I’d been dreading. But better he thought Carson bad with his money than greedy with collecting women.
Time for a diversion. I planted my hands on my hips and leaned toward Linn. “You can’t evict me. This is my place. I’ve been a good tenant. We’ve paid the rent in full for the entire year.” That had been Carson’s idea. “And they can’t have my furniture. This is my stuff. This is my house!”
Mr. Linn tapped the papers I’d placed on the island. I stared down at the lease agreement.
“That is why I’m bringing these over. I’ve no intention of kicking you out. This is a lease agreement with you and only you listed. Far as I know, this agreement has been the only one I’ve ever had.” He took a pen and another folded paper from his back pocket and shook the paper out to open it. He held it up for me. It was the original lease agreement. “Make sure you use the same date that’s on here.”
I took the pen and the new agreement and signed under the line where Mr. Linn had already signed. “Thank you,” I said, my anger banked by his act of kindness.
Linn shrugged. “Can’t sit across the poker table and explain to your dad why I evicted you. He’d probably write an article in tha
t damn paper of his and call me a slumlord.” Mr. Linn smiled to show he was joking. “Besides, I liked Carson. He was a good guy. I don’t know what’s going on, and I’m awfully sorry for your loss.” He gave my shoulder a squeeze, an attempt at condolences, before scooping the agreement off the table and rolling it into a tube.
I walked him to the door. “I can’t thank you enough.” Word would soon spread about Carson. It’s not that Mr. Linn was a gossip, but he did like to hang out with the other retirees at the local hardware store in our small downtown. “Mr. Linn,” I said, “I hate to ask, but would you mind keeping this information to yourself for a bit? I haven’t had a chance to tell my family yet. I haven’t really processed it myself.”
Mr. Linn pressed his lips together in contemplation. “You better make quick work of it. I’m guessing anyone Carson did business with is getting a phone call.”
I nodded. He was right.
“Besides, you still have another issue,” he said.
I glanced at Precious, confused. She shrugged.
I asked Mr. Linn, “What’s that?”
He gestured to the door. “Looks like your car is being towed. Repo maybe?”
I gasped and ran to the door. Sure enough, a tow truck had hitched up the Jeep, a gift from Carson. The driver was walking to the cab.
“Hey,” I yelled, bursting from my house. “That’s my car. What do you think you’re doing?”
His hands were up as if to say it wasn’t his fault. “Just doing my job, lady. I was told to collect this here car because the title was in the name of”–– he glanced at his clip board–– “Carson Holmes.”
I deflated. Carson’s family was merciless. Precious ran up beside me.
“Give this to the person who hired you,” she said and showed the driver her middle finger.
The driver gave a half smile. “I’ll pass it along.”
I went back to the house, receiving a pat from Mr. Linn as I passed. Inside, I fell onto the couch.
“What am I going to do?” I asked Precious.
She pushed a notepad and pen toward me. “You’re gonna need a list. So far, you’re a few steps, if not more, behind these people. They’ve taken your money, your car, and wanted to kick you out of your house. What could be next?”
I narrowed my eyes, glaring at the paper and wrote. Have a tête-à-tête with T. Lockett. What kind of game was this lawyer playing? Who were the players and what was their endgame? I’d already lost so much.
“If we’re going to the lawyer, maybe you should get cleaned up,” she suggested.
Motivated by my anger, I moved to the hall closet where I kept my shoes and shoved my feet into slip-ons.
“No time. Let’s go,” I told her while reaching for my bag.
From inside my bag, my phone rang. I glanced at Precious as I took it out, afraid of what else was about to happen. Because it was an unknown local number, I answered with trepidation.
“Uh, yeah, so this is Toby Wagenknecht. I work at Holmes Security, and this number was listed as an emergency contact.” Toby spoke with a slow, easygoing pace, as if he were in no hurry to get out any words. It took a second for my brain to make the connection, but I was able to place the voice. Toby had graduated high school the year before me and was the town stoner.
“Hey, Toby, this is Samantha True. What’s this about Holmes Security?” I shrugged to Precious who was giving me the what’s-up look. I made like I was smoking a joint. She nodded her understanding.
“Oh, hey, Sam. I called the emergency contact number and got you. Guess you’re my emergency contact.” He chuckled and then sucked in a breath.
He was drawing on his vape. He liked to wear his vape pen around his neck, hanging from a lanyard. He might put weed in his pen, but anytime I’d run into him, he’d only been toking on vape juice.
“Emergency contact for what? I’m confused.”
Toby snort-laughed. “That’s a good one. Usually, I feel like the confused one. Carson listed this number in the company handbook. Guess that makes sense in case I can’t get ahold of him. Which I can’t. You know where he is? We got a sitch here at the office.”
I vaguely recalled Carson saying he hired Toby to do some tech stuff for him. Up until then, Toby’s only job had been that of an on-demand private driver. “A sitch?”
“Situation. Someone broke into the office, trashed the place. I tried calling Carson but couldn’t get ahold of him. So, I called the emergency number. You. What should I do? Call the police?”
I circled my index finger in the air, signally to Precious it was time to roll.
“Do nothing, Toby. I’m on my way.” I ended the call. “There’s been a break-in at Carson’s company,” I told Precious as I snatched my bag from the couch. I flung open the door, ready to dash out, but froze in place. Dash out to what?
“We don’t have a car,” she said. “Bob collected mine and took it to my house. I guess I could call him.”
I closed my eyes in disbelief, and then the solution dawned on me.
I swallowed a chuckle. Deadpanned, I said, “You’re going to hate this.” I shifted my attention to my one-car garage.
She followed my gaze, and when realization dawned, she shook her head, groaned, then said, “At least I’m not going to a meeting or somewhere important.”
I feigned indignation. “I think a break-in might be important.” But I knew what she meant. My ride embarrassed her. “You can stay here.”
She rolled her eyes. “As if.”
“Run in and grab the folder about the business,” I said as I ran to the garage. I flung open the door to expose LC, a 1991 Hunter Green Jeep Grand Wagoneer, faux panel siding and all. The first car I ever bought. LC, short for the explorers Lewis and Clark. He was as moody as Meriwether Lewis and as unrestrained as William Clark. Together, we’d had many adventures. Carson had replaced LC, claiming safety concerns. But when I fired him up, the rumble of LC’s engine ran right through me, and I was reminded of two things. First, how something magical happened to me when I sat behind his steering wheel, like the world had no boundaries. And second, LC would need a quart of oil soon.
When I backed out, Precious stood on the sidewalk, scowling. Secretly, I believed she was jealous of LC because I loved him so much, but she claimed the AC never worked properly. Precious didn’t do sweat stains.
She climbed into the Jeep and mumbled, “It’s like we’re back in high school all over again.”
“You had a great time in high school,” I reminded her. Not so much for me. “Tooling around in LC was a highlight for me. He made me popular. I had the coolest ride of all. Hue’s Mazda used to always get stuck in the fields when we’d go out partying. Not LC.” Bonfires and beers on deserted farmland had been the primary activity of my graduation class.
“Your popularity, or lack thereof, had nothing to do with this hunk of junk.” Precious huffed.
“Says the head cheerleader.” I groaned. Bringing up her cheerleading days inevitably brought up my baton-twirling days. I’d been a majorette. At least for half a year. The school cut me and the one other baton twirler from the band, stating funding issues. But we all knew it was because we sucked. When you knock out the band leader with a baton—twice—it doesn’t take a genius to do the math.
Precious laughed. “I ran into Chris Watt the other day.” Chris had been the band leader. “He said he has PTSD from getting hit by those batons. Every time he hears the school fight song, he wets himself. Can’t go to any of the games.”
“I’m sorry I brought it up,” I said.
“Oh, I’m not.” She laughed some more.
5
Saturday
Carson’s business was on the other side of Wind River. Wind River was bisected by Interstate 5. To the west was the old town with the city center, the river aptly named Windy River, and where my townhouse was located. To the east was the newer side that comprised a strip mall with a bank, Thai restaurant, a veterinarian, Junkie’s Bar and junky
ard, a gas station, and several new housing developments in their early phases of build. Scattered between were a handful of older, restored houses turned business. One was Carson’s.
I peeled out, curious as to what I would find.
LC’s fan was on the fritz again, shooting the occasional blast of cold air interspersed with dirt.
Precious slumped low in the seat. “I hate you, LC,” she screamed and covered her face with the manila envelope Lockett gave me yesterday.
I flipped off the fan and lowered the windows. “Make yourself useful and look through those papers,” I said, whipping through a roundabout, the Jeep listing in a way Precious hated.
I, on the other hand, was in my zone. I loved fresh air, and the slight nip to the wind was rejuvenating me. The day was beautiful, and the distraction a wonderful reprieve.
I’d spent twenty-four years of my life in Wind River, having moved here when I was six from California after my father, a sports reporter for a big LA paper, broke the story on owners making players use performance-enhancing drugs in the professional football league. He paid the consequences of narking on such a powerful industry, spending three years battling lawsuits, and he even spent time in jail, protecting his sources. Once the madness from the scandal died down, Mom and Dad happily waved goodbye to big-city life and their fast-paced careers to move two states north.
They settled in Wind River, a town of less than ten thousand with no stoplights, only roundabouts and speed bumps. Dad bought the local paper, added news coverage for the two closest towns, and increased circulation. Mom had worked as a local lawyer until a few years ago when she ran for Wind River mayor and won.
Wind River’s downtown consisted of an eight-block square, two blocks to each side. The farthest west side faced the Windy River and its marina. We had a farmer’s market, and kids painted rocks with words of inspiration and left them all around town. We weren’t a town where con men came to play.