by Diane Kelly
I left the box where it was and turned to the opposite shelf to address the abandoned shoes. Per posted policy, any shoes left more than thirty days would be donated to charity. I always attempted to contact the customers before disposing of their shoes, but often found phones disconnected, the feet that had once occupied the forgotten shoes having traipsed on to other places.
A pair of Timberland hiking boots sat on the bottom shelf, forgotten by their owner who, after making several literal hikes, had apparently taken a figurative hike. The thick rubber soles had been cracked when the man brought them in six months ago, but I’d replaced them and they were as good as new. I checked the index card stuck in the right boot. My notes indicated I’d left three messages on the customer’s answering machine, the first five months ago, the second four months ago, and the last three months ago. The guy couldn’t claim he hadn’t been warned.
“Bye-bye boots.” I picked up the boots and put them in a shopping bag. Humming These Boots Were Made for Walking, I made my way down the shelf, stacking the rest of the forgotten shoes neatly in the bag to be dropped off later at Saint Anthony’s thrift shop.
The final pair of forgotten shoes was a brand-new pair of cherry-red satin stilettos, what Tammy would call “fuck-me pumps.” I remembered the woman who’d brought them in, a barely legal bleached blonde with a lit cigarette dangling from her glossy lips, ashes dropping onto the floor Riley’d just swept. She’d handed me the shoes along with a package of rhinestones, asking whether I could trim the edges of the shoes with the gems.
“Sure,” I’d said. Anything for a buck. After all, I had a growing boy to feed.
She’d prepaid for the service all in singles, signaling either an exotic dancer or a waitress who worked for tips. Given the oversized store-bought breasts threatening to pop out of her undersized hot pink tank top, my money was on the former.
As slutty as the shoes were, they’d be perfect for my performance in the wet T-shirt contest. If I decided to do it, that is.
Would I?
Could I?
Blarney had woken from his nap and lay in the doorway, his head resting on his paws, watching me with his big brown eyes.
I glanced at him and groaned. “Stop looking at me like that.”
His furry forehead furrowed in question.
“I have to do it, don’t I? For you? For Riley?”
Blarney didn’t answer me. But I already knew the answer. I couldn’t very well let that sweet dog die, let my son suffer unnecessary heartache. Sometimes the ends justifies the means, right? Besides, could God hardly blame me for dancing if he didn’t provide me with an alternative. Probably not the right way to look at the situation, but frankly I was peeved. Too many struggles. Too much heartache. Too many unanswered prayers. It can really piss a woman off.
I slid out of my sneakers, kicked them aside, and pulled off my mismatched crew socks, one white, one yellow. That’s what happens when you get dressed at six a.m. before a cup of coffee. I slid my feet into the shoes.
“Wow!”
It was a Cinderella moment. The stilettos fit perfectly, formed to my feet as if custom made just for me.
I looked down at the shoes, the rhinestones glimmering in the florescent lights. I took a few steps in them, surprised to find myself still upright rather than on my butt on the floor.
I’d worn my dance attire today so I could work on some choreography in my downtime. I went up on tiptoe in the shoes and executed a pirouette. The pumps were smooth on the bottom and flexible, my turn easily executed. I tried a double pirouette next, then a triple, each of them perfect. I ran through a series of turns, then tried a few leaps, even a tricky switch leap. Still on my feet. Just for kicks, I tried a high kick, then a fan kick, then a pitch kick.
Amazing. Despite having such high heels, the shoes were great for dancing in. There was no doubt in my mind now about the blonde who’d brought them. She was definitely not a waitress. She’d bought these shoes to dance topless in. I wondered why she hadn’t come back for them. Had she found a different job?
I checked the index card I’d stuck in the shoe. Per my notes, I’d tried calling the customer twice, both times getting an automated message informing me her voicemail box was full. Popular girl.
The bells on the door tinkled and a heavyset fiftyish woman came in, struggling with an armload of shoes. I hurried to the door to help her. She plunked the assortment of shoes down on the counter. “Darn shoes shrunk,” she said. “I need them stretched.”
“Gladly.” Shrunken shoes, indeed. More likely her feet had expanded. Not that I faulted her. Time and age had a way of rearranging a body. Even with the rigorous workouts I got dancing five hours a week, I’d put on a few pounds over the years, my tights now living up to their name.
Still, for my age, I was in good shape. Dance was an emotional release for me. I often joked with Tammy that it was a substitute for drinking and sex. I’d tap out my frustrations, twirl away my worries. I’d nearly worn a hole in the parquet floor of the rec center once when a customer had bounced a high-dollar check to me, the bank account long-since closed. I hope the jerk had earned a special place in hell where he’d be condemned to wear uncomfortable shoes, his toes pinched for all eternity. Let’s just say I’m working on that whole forgiveness thing.
I rummaged through the woman’s shoes, counting the pairs, ten in all. “I can have them ready for you by Friday.”
The gray winter clouds broke then, and a burst of sunlight streaked through the front window, glinting off the rhinestones on my shoes. The woman looked down at my feet. “Oh, my.” She gave a whistle. “Those are some sexy shoes.”
I turned my ankle, modeling them. “Are they too much?”
She tossed her graying curls and leaned toward me as if to share a secret. “Flaunt it while you still got it, hon.” She shot me a wink.
“Good advice.” I stepped back around the counter and wrote up a bill, giving her a ten percent discount for the flattery. I handed her a claim ticket. “Have a wonderful day,” I called as she went out the door.
***
At lunchtime, I turned on the portable television to watch the noon news and settled on my stool with my peanut butter and apricot jam sandwich, the slutty red shoes still on my feet. I’d just taken my first bite when something green appeared in my peripheral vision. Something—someone—was looking into the front window of my shop.
CHAPTER NINE
LITTLE GREEN MEN
The man had crouched down and was peeping at me from the bottom corner of the window, apparently hoping I wouldn’t spot him.
Holy crap! I could hardly breathe. Should’ve asked the landlord to install an alarm system.
My heart pulsed a rapid tempo in my chest. I forced myself not to look, waiting to see if he would creep further into my vision where I could see him more clearly. I stared at the TV screen. The anchorwoman said something about yesterday’s unusual rainbow, then segued into a report on a three-alarm apartment fire. But I wasn’t really listening. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the green man move a few steps closer.
When the green creature neared my door, I snapped my head to look at him. Our eyes met through the glass. There, looking back at me through the window, was the garden gnome from Dr. Delgado’s.
What the hell?!?
Was I really seeing what I thought I was seeing? Or had I gone nuts? Statues don’t just come to life. Do they?
The gnome’s eyes popped wide. “Shite!” He took off running down the sidewalk, one hand holding the green top hat on his head.
Instinctively, I leapt from my stool, ran to the door, and threw it open. The door slammed back against the frame, the bells tinkling furiously as I set off after the gnome. Ignoring the cold, I rushed down the sidewalk, making surprisingly good time in the stilettos.
The gnome ran down the walkway ahead of me, his warm breath forming puffs of condensation in the chilly air.
Rrr-awf! Blarney emitted a half-growl, half-ba
rk as he bounded past me, chasing the little man.
I tried to yell “Stop!” but the peanut butter I’d forgotten to swallow had glued my tongue to the roof of my mouth and my cry came out as “Thtoff!”
The little green man darted between parked cars, heading into the street, Blarney hot on his trail. Damn! The thin heel of my shoe caught in a crack on the sidewalk, pitching me onto my hands and knees in the gutter.
Tires screeched and I screamed Blarney’s name, hoping the poor dog hadn’t just been hit by a car. I put a hand on the bumper of a brown sedan parked at the curb, pushed myself to a stand, and ran into the street. Blarney was nowhere to be seen. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. He hadn’t become road kill, but I had no idea where he’d gone.
A silver pickup was stopped in the road. The driver unrolled his window and pointed across the street. “Your dog went that way.”
“Thank you. Sorry!”
“No problem. Glad I could stop in time.”
My palms and knees were scraped raw, my jazz pants torn at the knee, my dog gone. Some day this was turning out to be.
I dashed across the street. “Blarney!” I cried, frantically looking for him along the row of businesses that lined the street. “Come here boy!”
A few frantic seconds later, the dog poked his head out from between the auto parts store and the gas station on the corner, something small and black clenched in his teeth. As I ran to him, he trotted back toward me and dropped the item at my feet as if presenting me with a gift.
I shook a finger in Blarney’s face. “Bad dog!” I cried. “Bad dog!” I was worrying myself sick about this darn dog and his tumor, trying to come up with the funds to save his life, and here he was trying his best to get himself killed.
Blarney sat on his haunches and extended his paw for a shake, the doggie sign of repentance. He looked up, turning his big brown eyes on me again.
Ugh. Hard to stay mad at such a sweet dog.
“You know just how to play me, don’t you?” I ruffled his ears and gave him a kiss on the head.
Forgiven, he stood and wagged his tail. Woof! Woof-woof!
I bent down and picked up the black thing he’d had in his teeth. It was a shoe. A tiny black leather shoe with a bright gold buckle. I hadn’t wanted to believe it, but there was no denying the evidence in my hand. There was no doubt now about what I’d seen.
The garden gnome had come to life. Or, more likely, the little green man had always been alive, had posed as a garden gnome yesterday at the vet’s office. I’d been only inches away from the undersized creep. Janey Mack!
I grabbed Blarney by the collar and dragged him back to my shop, slamming the door behind me, setting the lock, and turning the blinds until they were tightly closed. I was afraid enough of confronting the gnome on the street where there would be witnesses, but if the peeping pervert cornered me alone in my shop there was no telling what he might do. He could have a weapon in his pocket. I grabbed the phone and dialed 9-1-1.
The dispatcher answered. “What’s your emergency?”
“I’m being stalked,” I cried into the phone, both my voice and hand shaking. “A man just looked into my window. He ran away when I spotted him. He’s been following me since yesterday afternoon.”
The operator advised me to stay by the phone and promised to have officers en route as soon as possible.
While I waited, I stood at my front window, putting a finger through the slats of the blinds and peeking out, watching for any sign of the peeper. I took several deep breaths in a futile attempt to calm myself. A stranger was stalking me. He knew where I worked. He knew what kind of car I drove. Did he know where I lived, too? Did he know I had a son? Oh, my God! What did he want? Did he intend on hurting me? Hurting Riley?
Blarney seemed to sense my unease, sitting at my feet, looking up at me and whining softly, occasionally licking my hand as if to reassure me everything would be fine.
Fifteen minutes later, a squad car pulled up in front of the shop. Two beefy young men emerged from the cruiser, one a tall and lanky blonde, the other a dark-haired African American, both of their heads shaved in military-style buzz cuts.
I rushed to the door, unlocked it, and let them in. “Thank God you’re here.”
The blonde looked down at my feet. “Woo, doggie. Those are some sexy shoes.”
The shoes fit so well I’d forgotten I had them on. But my footwear was the least of my concerns right now. “I’m being stalked.”
The black cop pulled a notepad and pen out of his breast pocket to take notes. Minutes later I’d finished my spiel, telling them how the tiny green man had first appeared at the vet’s office, then twice at my shop. I had no doubt now that he was the green blur I’d seen when I arrived at my shop yesterday after stopping by the bank.
“Let me get this straight,” the blonde cop said, barely containing a smirk. “You’re seeing little green men?”
“Man, not men. There’s only one of them.”
“Only one.” The other cop raised a dark brow and turned to his partner. “That makes the story much more believable, don’t it?”
The blonde cocked his head. “He didn’t get you with his anal probe, did he?”
Clearly they weren’t taking me seriously. “It wasn’t an alien. It was a little green man. A human.”
“You sure he was human?” asked the black cop. “Not a troll, or an elf, or a fairy?”
What a couple of jerks. I was scared to death of that little man and they were treating this as some big joke.
“He may have been Irish,” I said. “He had red hair and he used the term ‘shite.’” Not something you hear often in the United States, but a fairly common phrase in Ireland.
The blonde bent over and looked intently into my eyes. “Are you on something, lady? Some type of drug?”
“No.”
“Then, should you be? Maybe you missed a pill or something?”
“No!” These men didn’t believe me, thought I was mad. Desperation flooded through me, my stomach clenching so tight it hurt. “I’m telling you the truth. Please, I’m scared.” I grabbed the black buckle shoe off the countertop and thrust it at them. “See?” There was no way they could ignore this hard evidence. “He was wearing this shoe. My dog chased him and came back with this.”
The blonde officer took the shoe in his meaty hand and looked it over. “This is too small for a person to wear. It looks like a doll’s shoe.”
Weren’t these men listening to me at all? “I told you he was a dwarf.”
“A midget with bad fashion sense. Should be easy to identify.”
“’Course we’ll have to do a line up,” the black cop added, grinning outright now. He made a circular motion with his index finger. “Is there someone you can call, ma’am? Maybe a family member or a friend?”
Clearly, I’d get nowhere with them. To serve and protect my arse!
They jotted down a few more notes, agreed to file a report, and left. For all they cared, the green freak could return, chop me into a hundred pieces, and eat my liver for dinner.
I really hoped that wouldn’t happen.
I looked down at the small shoe clutched in my hand. The black leather bore four holes where Blarney’s teeth had sunk into it. I’d told the cops the man was a dwarf, but he wasn’t truly, was he? Unlike Tammy, whose limbs were disproportionate, this man had been tiny but normally proportioned. He looked more like a miniaturized human. In fact, with his red beard, green clothing, and top hat, he’d looked like a Leprechaun. But there wasn’t such a thing, was there? Leprechauns didn’t really exist. They were merely mythical fairies, no more real than pixies, or brownies, or sprites. Right?
CHAPTER TEN
SHOOT FIRST, ASK QUESTIONS LATER
Unsure what to do, I did what I always did when I didn’t know what to do. I picked up the phone to call Brendan. The call rang three times then went to voicemail. Damn. I glanced at the clock. No wonder. Brendan would be at
juvenile hall now, working with the kids.
I left him a message, trying not to sound as freaked out as I was. “Hi, Bren. It’s me. Um . . . call me as soon as you get this, okay? Something weird is going on.”
Next I called Tammy.
“Let me get this straight,” she said after I told her the entire story. “A three-foot tall man dressed like a green pilgrim has been stalking you?”
“Yes.”
“Other than dressing like a dork, was he cute?”
“Tammy!”
“Just asking. Y’know, the size thing and all. I wouldn’t have to look him in the belly button during sex.”
“This guy is stalking me, probably planning on killing me in some sick, gruesome way, and you’re considering having a relationship with him? Are you nuts?”
“Hey, you’re the one who told me I’m too picky. Make up your mind, Erin.”
“Tammy!”
“Never fear, Erin. I’m on my way with weapons of mass destruction.”
“Please hurry.”
“Won’t even take the time to put on panties.”
Tammy arrived ten minutes later, still in her fuzzy pink slippers, nightgown, and robe, her hair yet to be brushed. I watched through the blinds as she hopped out of her red VW Bug, reached into her trunk, and backed up with a sawed-off shotgun clenched in her small hands. Two women from the yoga studio next door walked past her, too wrapped up in their conversation to notice the tiny armed woman heading toward my shop.
I rushed to the door and unlocked it for her, glancing nervously up and down the street for the green perv.
Tammy brandished her weapon. “Brought you my guaranteed-never-to-miss gun.”
“Great.” The gun terrified me almost as much as the little man, but it couldn’t hurt to have a weapon on hand in case I needed to defend myself.