by Anne R. Tan
Raina leaned against the front counter in the lobby. She closed her eyes and took deep breaths. Someone pushed a warm mug into her cold hands. Her nose twitched at the burnt day-old coffee scent. She inhaled it greedily. This was something she understood.
She opened her eyes to thank the person, expecting the policewoman. A jolt went up her spine and Raina stiffened. A tall Asian man in a knit polo with an embroidered badge stood in front of her. Their eyes locked and a low buzzing sounded in her ears. Little spots of light danced before her eyes as her brain registered who she was seeing.
E. Matthew Louie?
He gave her a curt nod. “Rainy.”
The coffee mug slipped from her hands and clattered on the floor. Her eyes followed its downward descent. She stared in horror as the dark liquid spilled across the floor, splattering brown droplets against Matthew’s brown dress shoes and khaki pants. Her mind had to be playing tricks on her, digging up her past at this stressful moment. She glanced at her hands. No hives yet.
Raina stared at the golden flecks in the familiar warm brown eyes. His expression was no longer as carefree as she remembered. A dead body had a way of doing that. His lips were pressed into a thin line and the furrow between his eyebrows reminded her the years apart made him a stranger.
“Matthew?” She crossed her arms to stop her hands from shaking. The police officers milling around the hall were unaware that her world had stopped spinning. A shudder overtook her as gooseflesh popped up on her arms and shoulders.
He grabbed the blanket and tucked it more firmly around her. “Did you find the body?”
Raina shook her head.
Matthew wrapped her hands around the ends of the blanket. His warm hands sent another jolt down her spine. He was real.
“Please don’t leave before an officer gets a statement from you.” He walked away without a backward glance.
A police officer greeted Matthew. They conferred and disappeared around the corner. To everyone else he might look normal, but Raina noted his ramrod straight back and stiff walk. He was just as disconcerted at seeing her again.
Raina picked up the pieces of the mug and placed it on the front counter. The sour scent of vomit made her swallow the bitter tang in the back of her throat. She peered into the interior of the office. Gail hunched over a wastebasket and dry heaved. Raina backed away and fought for control of her stomach.
She shifted her weight from foot to foot. What if Matthew came back to take her statement? What if he left without talking to her? Her heart skipped a beat at the thought.
“Raina!” Eden stood on tiptoes, trying to get around a pug-faced policeman blocking her entrance to the lobby.
“No reporters. This is a crime scene,” said the policeman.
Eden grabbed her swinging press pass and stuffed it in her pocket. “I’m here to take my friend home. She called to say she needed a ride.”
“You can wait here. She’ll come over when she is allowed to leave.”
Eden pushed against the policeman’s extended arm. “Look at her. She needs me.”
“Stop. Or I’m going to have to arrest you for obstruction.”
Eden dropped her arms and stalked over to the benches next to the wall. “Raina, I’ll wait for you here.” She pulled out her cell phone and ignored the chaos in the hall, but aimed her phone at the two medical examiners arriving at the scene.
At any other time, Raina would have laughed at her friend’s antics. The floating sensation left her body. This was normal. This she understood. The more Eden pretended to be absorbed in her phone, the more the police should worry. She was probably using the video camera feature to record the police activities and any conversation within earshot. Raina walked back to the front counter and peered inside the office.
The policewoman tucked her notepad and digital recorder under her arm. “Give us a call if you remember anything else. Do you need to call someone for a ride home?”
Gail brushed a strand of hair back with a shaky hand. “My husband is out of town. I can get home.”
The policewoman shook her head. “I don’t think you’re in any condition to be driving.”
“I’ll drive you home,” Raina called out.
The policewoman squinted at her. “I don’t think you should be driving either. I’ll find an officer to take both of you home after I get your statement.”
Raina gestured behind her. “My friend is in the lobby. She can take both of us home.”
The policewoman stood up and looked over the counter. She frowned as she watched Eden working her cell phone and whispered into her walkie-talkie. She gestured for Raina to come inside the office.
Raina gave her contact information and described what happened after she set foot inside the building.
“What were you doing here this late in the day?” the policewoman asked, her expression more guarded than she’d previously shown.
“He sent me a text asking to meet with me. I thought he forgot to give me something when I met with him about my classes the day before.” Raina hadn’t technically lied.
“I see.” The policewoman studied her.
Raina bit her bottom lip to prevent herself from talking to fill the silence. She clamped her hands together to resist the urge to fidget and tried to slow her breathing.
After asking the same few questions again in more creative ways over the next hour, the policewoman said, “We’ll be in touch if we have further questions.”
Raina grabbed Gail’s elbow and guided her into the lobby. The woman was still trembling. Eden glared at the pug-faced policeman still standing sentry in the hall. Her phone was M.I.A.
Eden wrapped her arms around Raina. “Ready to go home?” she asked, her eyes softening with concern.
Raina nodded. “Where’s your phone?”
Eden jerked her thumb at the policeman. “Mr. Pug took it.”
Raina looked behind her. Matthew kept his eyes on the three of them as he talked to the policewoman. They both had on professionally blank expressions. When she met his dark eyes, she shivered. What was her ex-boyfriend doing in Gold Springs? And with the police no less.
4
NO NEWS IS BAD NEWS
Raina jerked up, heart racing and fists clutching the tangled lavender cotton sheets. She flicked on the lamp and looked around her bedroom. As her eyes inventoried her belongings, her heart rate slowed and her chest stopped heaving. The digital alarm clock next to the lamp read 3:30 A.M.
She flopped back onto the queen-sized mattress and stared at the whirling ceiling fan, trying to keep her thoughts away from what had happened a few hours ago. Her sweat-drenched body eventually cooled and Raina padded to the kitchen to get a drink of water. Leaning against the counter, she kept seeing the still body.
She sniffed. How could Holden be dead? He’d spoken to her just yesterday morning. They’d sat next to each other. He’d touched her. A tear leaked out the corner of an eye. Darn allergies. Her conscience chafed at the evening spent laughing with Eden about the pregnancy lie. With shaking hands, she set the glass on the table, grabbed a tissue, and blew her nose. Holden didn’t have any family left, just a few distant cousins. Would anyone plan a memorial service for him?
Placing the cool glass on her forehead, Raina closed her eyes. Her life had morphed into a soap opera in the last forty-eight hours. All this because she’d blurted out that she was pregnant. What was she thinking? She should have told Holden the truth when he cornered her by the vending machines. Then she would have gone home after her shift. Closure was overrated.
And Matthew wouldn’t reappear in her life again. It didn’t matter now. He’d disappear from her life soon enough when the police released Holden's body. She just had to avoid him until then.
Raina dragged her tired body back into the bedroom and drifted off into an uneasy sleep until her cell phone woke her several hours later. She peeled her gummy eyes open and lifted her heavy head to glance at the number on the display. Wincing, she turned off the
volume. Her grandma would only add to her stress this morning
Raising her hands, Raina found two pink bumps on her right pinkie finger competing with one bump on her right ring finger. Surprise, surprise. The hives were here. A sure sign she’d reached her stress threshold. What she needed was a spa day, but she’d have to sell something to afford that and not many people were in the market for third-hand furniture.
Raina swung her legs off the bed. Crumpled tissues littered the bed and carpet. She trudged to the kitchen to start the coffeemaker and slathered a thick anti-itch cream on her hands. It’d suffice until she could stop by the Student Health Center to refill her prescription.
Rapid fire taps on her front door dragged Raina’s attention from the aromatic brew squirting from her coffee maker. Her grainy eyes and heavy heart didn’t want company today. The taps came again. But it looked like company wanted her. She shuffled to the living room to peer through the closed drapes above her sofa.
Eden bounced on her toes as she took a long gulp from her large traveler mug. Yellow paint on the mug brazenly declared “No news is not good news.” With a sigh of regret, Raina opened the door. It was bad news to be Eden's friend today.
“I’m on my way to Gail’s. Want to come with?” asked Eden.
“No.” Raina trudged back to her kitchen to pour her coffee and carried it to her sofa. She sat and curled her legs under her. When the first sip of the hazelnut-flavored coffee hit her taste buds, she closed her eyes in bliss. If she didn’t open her eyes, she could almost pretend she was alone. The birds outside her window chirped like they did every morning. Normal. Everything was normal.
Her perfect moment was interrupted when the plush cushion on the sofa shifted beneath her, forcing her to tighten her grip on the cup just in time to stop the coffee from pouring onto her lap. Eden could not sit on a sofa like a normal person. No, she had to throw herself on it like she was playing whack-a-mole with her butt.
“Don’t you want to know how she is doing?” asked Eden.
“My guess—poorly. There's no need to traipse over to her house to verify it, especially with a reporter in tow.”
“I’m not going there as a reporter. I am going there as a concerned friend.”
“No.”
“I’m not doing this for me. Look at you.” Eden waved in her direction. “You’re a mess. You need to talk to someone who was there. This visit is not for me. This visit is for you. I've already sent in my article last night.” She smiled. “Healthy man drops dead in his prime. Isn’t that a wonderful headline?”
Raina took a sip of coffee to hide her frown. She hadn’t thought about how Holden had died. She figured he had some kind of health problem. “Cut the bull. What are you trying to find out?”
Eden bounced on the sofa as she leaned forward, wiping the expression of faux concern off her face. “All right. I want to know if Gail knows how Holden died. The police are having a hard time finding the next of kin, so they wouldn't release any info.”
Raina lowered her gaze. “I have a lot of stuff to do today. I need to buy my textbooks, get a new cell phone, and get new tires. Sorry. I don't have time to go with you.”
Her credit card would be bloated by the end of the day, but she needed retail therapy. She didn’t want to stop and think. Her thoughts fluttered between Holden and Matthew, swirling in a confused windstorm that she didn’t want to deal with at this moment. But spending money she didn’t have? This she understood.
“We should strike while it’s hot. It’ll take the police another day to announce foul play. I need this exclusive, Raina. I need the promotion.”
Raina stared at the gleam in Eden's eyes. So sensitivity was not one of Eden's strengths. But foul play? Was this hopeful thinking on her friend’s part or did she know something Raina didn’t?
“I’m going with or without you. I probably would inflict less damage if you’re with me.” Eden leaned back, a smile on the corner of her lips.
Raina stared at the mug in her hand. There were no answers in the coffee. It would be wrong to inflict Eden on a friend at a time like this, even though her friendship with Gail was questionable at times. The only way to rein in the intrusive questions was to go with Eden.
“You are just as curious as I am to find out how Holden died,” said Eden.
“No, I’m not. I want to forget the whole thing.” Pants on fire. With Matthew in the picture, Raina had to stay off his radar.
“There’s no shame in a little curiosity. It’s not like we’re ambulance chasers.”
Raina pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut. Did that really just come out of Eden’s mouth? Couldn’t she just pretend to feel something for Raina’s sake? The lingering emotions from last night must have made her more sensitive than usual. This aspect of Eden’s personality had never bothered her before.
Eden touched her knee. “You okay?”
Raina opened her eyes. “I need to take a shower first.”
Thirty minutes later, Raina pulled her thirteen-year-old faded red Accord out of the driveway. She had inherited the car in high school after her dad passed away from prostate cancer. It still had the dent in the rear bumper where her teenage self had backed into a pole. Her dad’s reaction to that particular incident had been a raised eyebrow and a new bus pass. From that moment on, each time she got behind the wheel, she felt his comforting presence. The new transmission and fuel pump meant the Accord would probably last until Raina was well into her thirties.
“He’s not worth getting upset over,” said Eden.
Raina shrugged, pretending a nonchalance she didn’t feel. “A man I know is dead. I may not have liked him at the time of his death, but I liked him enough at one point to loan him money and let him see me naked.” She clamped her mouth shut as her voice trailed off. Eden wouldn’t understand the confusion she felt.
“You should think about that yummy detective instead. I saw the way he looked at you last night.” Eden wiggled her eyebrows and smacked her lips.
“Eden! Get your mind out of the gutter.”
“You should join me. You’ll have more fun that way.” Eden chuckled and splashed coffee on her shirt. “Damn!” She pulled her shirt away from her body and glanced at the brown spot. “I need to get you a wide cup holder for your birthday.”
“You mean you need to get a cup holder for your extra-large traveler mug.” Her friend was trying to help, but thoughts of Matthew only made Raina want to scratch her hands. “When was Matthew watching me?”
“Like that, huh?”
“What?”
“Matthew.” Eden rolled the name off her tongue. Her grin was bigger than a moon pie. “When did Detective Louie become Matthew?”
When Raina punched him for stealing her sister Cassie’s lollipop at eight. When she saw him naked at sixteen. When he left her tied up in a hotel in Rome at twenty. Or maybe it was when he got their marriage annulled in Vegas when she was twenty-four. She and Matthew went way back and not all the memories were peaches and cream.
She parked in front of a ranch-style house with bright blue curtains. The quiet street had a handful of minivans parked on the driveways. A young mother with an infant on her hip and a large diaper bag on one arm locked her front door, while a strawberry blonde preschooler jumped on the raked pile of leaves on their lawn. Normal. Everything was so normal for the rest of the world.
Raina patted her own unkempt ponytail, tucking a ringlet back into place. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“Neither did you.” Eden leapt out of the car and jogged up the driveway.
Raina trudged after her friend, scratching her pinkie. Right now the last person she wanted to think about was Matthew. She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. The visit with Gail wouldn’t be a pleasant one.
Raina might have looked as if she’d spent the night dragged through an alley by a stray cat, but the bruises below Gail’s eyes and the sagging jawline were prime examples that age didn’t lik
e loveless nights with Mr. Sandman.
The brick-red accent wall of the kitchen and festive dinnerware behind the frosted glass cabinet doors made Raina feel even worse to be sitting across from the distressed woman. After the required small talk such an occasion warranted, Eden dove in for the kill.
“What made you decide to go into the men’s restroom?” asked Eden.
“If you rather not talk about it, that’s okay,” said Raina, earning a dirty look from her friend.
Gail bit her lip, her finger tracing the rim of her mug. “The women’s restroom ran out of toilet paper. I found a dead body because of toilet paper.” She gave a mirthless laugh that dissolved into a cackle, which thankfully ended when she jammed her mug to her mouth.
Raina shifted in her seat as the hair on the back of her neck stiffened. Did she want to hear the rest of the interview?
Gail's hands trembled as she placed the mug on the table.
No. Raina couldn’t wait outside. Gail might need her to intervene when the questioning became too intrusive.
Eden waited while Gail took several more calming sips of tea, but the gleam in her eye and straight posture belied her show of kindness. “What was the first thing you saw?”
“I’m not supposed to talk about this,” said Gail.
“Don’t worry. I could say you’re an anonymous witness. I protect my sources.”
Gail dipped her chin. “Anonymous sounds good. I don’t want to lose my job.”
Raina opened her mouth but promptly shut it when she caught Eden’s eye. There were only two eyewitnesses at the scene. It wouldn’t be hard for anyone to guess who talked to the press. Even if she flashed a red stop sign, she doubted Gail could stop the stream of words from coming out of her mouth.
Besides, who was Raina to second-guess Gail’s desire to talk to Eden? Gail had fifteen more years of life experience than she did. Raina had to admit a small part of her did want to know how Holden had died. It was humbling to find that she’d become one of those drivers who would slow to see an accident on the side of the road.