by Молли Харпер
We still kept our distance. Monroe generally stayed inside, working at his computer, unless there was some pressing reason for him to come out. I was careful not to be the reason he had to come out. But now, instead of glaring at each other from across the yard, we smiled and waved. Monroe wasn’t pressured into socializing, which made him happy. And I was getting fewer dirty looks, which made me happy.
And apparently there were heretofore unknown advantages to Mike being so anal-retentive about money. It had taken him and his lawyer very little time to turn over his financial statements.
Samantha called to say she would be “coming by” to discuss Mike’s financial disclosures. She made it sound like it wasn’t a big deal to drive fifty miles of back roads to visit a client, but I was paying for her time… and mileage. Hmm. I think she wanted to check out my living arrangements and make sure I wasn’t writing “Die, Mike, Die” on the walls.
It felt sort of weird to see her in my natural habitat, because my natural habitat involved me wearing sweatpants, but no makeup, at 3:00 p.m. I was sitting on the porch, reading over my “how my marriage died” statement, when I heard her car pull up.
My big bad divorce attorney had her hair drawn up into a ponytail, her jacket slung over her arm, and was hefting an oversized picnic hamper along with her briefcase. Her sleeveless silk blouse was rumpled and wrinkled. She looked about twelve years old. Her voice was stretched very thin as she said, “Hi.”
“Long day?” I asked, offering her a glass of iced tea, which she downed in a few gulps.
She flopped into the wicker chair across from me. “Do you know what it’s like to spend six hours with two grown adults fighting over custody of Star Wars action figures?”
I shook my head, pouring her another glass. “No, I honestly do not.”
“Well, count your blessings.”
“One by one,” I agreed as she took a manila file out of her briefcase.
“Did you know Mike organizes your credit card statements by year, month, card, and the color of the card?”
Sadly, I didn’t know that, because I never looked at the statements.
She handed me the folder, which seemed sort of scant. “The bad news is that we didn’t find anything illegal or even slightly shady. As advertised, Mike is as dull as a box of mud, but clean as a whistle. The good news is that you don’t have any joint debts that you weren’t aware of. He hasn’t bought a house in another state or mortgaged the one you have without telling you. The interesting news is that you own both of the Hardee’s franchises in town and the Baskin-Robbins. They are turning a handsome profit, by the way.”
“And to think I’ve been paying for my frozen yogurt all these years,” I muttered.
“The iffy news is that there are no suspicious charges on your personal credit cards. No jewelry receipts, no out-of-town restaurants, no hotels. But his lawyer, Bill Bodine, is giving me grief about handing over the cards for the accounting firm, so I’m thinking that’s what he used.”
“You’re probably right,” I told her. “He went on a golf weekend in Destin with some friends a few months back. There should be a charge on one of our personal cards for that. And in February he went to a bachelor party for a college friend. There should be a charge for the restaurant in Nashville, plus a hotel stay. I don’t see anything here. And you’re right, it makes sense that he might consider money spent wooing a staff member a business expense.”
“Nice,” she chuckled. “Just give me a little time. It shouldn’t take too much persuasion to get those statements.”
“Why?”
“Because otherwise, we will reproduce every e-mail Mike ever sent Beebee, blow them up to poster size, and review them in open court. Where Mike’s mother will see them.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “So we’re using the I’m-telling-your-mom! strategy in court?”
She nodded solemnly. “I didn’t go to a fancy law school for nothing.”
“So I finished my version of events.” I said, handing her one hundred and twenty typed pages. “My characterization is not at all balanced. I come out looking naïve, but brave.”
Samantha snickered. “Wow. You had a lot to get off your chest.”
“Yep. And I skimped on my ‘vengeance’ period.”
She read over the front page and grinned. “Well, keep going. If nothing else, it’s good therapy. And it’s evidence of your frame of mind. Oh, yeah, any idea why a Maya Drake has been calling me, begging me to ‘give you the encouragement you need’ but refusing to tell me what that means?”
“Because she’s resourceful and incredibly creepy,” I told her. “She wants me to go into business with her … in a way that would not make you happy.”
“You should stop there, so I have plausible deniability,” she said, holding up her hand in a Diana Ross-ish gesture.
“Agreed.”
Samantha lifted the picnic hamper with a grunt. “Also, this is from your mother.”
“My mama sent me a care package through my divorce attorney. I’m going to have to hand you my grown-up card when you leave.” I opened the hamper to find carefully wrapped parcels of fudge, banana bread, cookies, divinity, hummingbird cake, molasses cookies, and a cheesecake. “Apparently Mama wants me to emerge from this divorce weighing four hundred pounds. Want some fudge?”
“No, but I’ll take a brownie,” she said. I tossed her a Saran-wrapped lump of chocolate-frosted future cellulite. “Don’t worry, my mother expresses emotions exclusively through carbs. It’s why I was the only freshman on my floor to drop fifteen pounds as soon as I moved away from home.”
“So how goes the lawsuit?” I asked.
“Well, through some fairly impressive legal maneuvering, if you don’t mind my saying so, the lawsuit has been postponed until we’re finished with the divorce case,” she said.
“You subpoenaed her thigh, didn’t you?” I asked, grinning, feeling suddenly superior in my legal knowledge.
“No, but I convinced a judge that it would be a waste of the court’s valuable time to pursue a libel lawsuit if we could prove in the course of the divorce case that Mike did, in fact, have an affair with Beebee. The judge prefers fishing to presiding over the court, so it wasn’t a hard sell.”
“Using a man’s laziness against him; that is impressive,” I admitted.
“It’s a gift,” she said. “Now we just have to find the documentation proving Mike had an affair with Beebee, but that’s nothing to worry about. So how is life in exile? Do you need anything?”
I shook my head. “I’m doing pretty well. I’m enjoying the writing. I’m learning to appreciate slasher films. My neighbor doesn’t seem to hate me anymore. Apparently, the way to get a man to stop sneering at you is to follow a gay man’s advice.”
She chewed thoughtfully. “There’s background here that I am unaware of, isn’t there?”
******
It was 3:00 a.m. and I was just nodding off when the storm struck. I started awake as thunder rumbled right overhead. The cabin was dark. The clock face was blank and the air conditioner was stonily silent. I jumped as another bolt of lightning shook my walls. My heart hammered in my chest. Still bleary, I crawled out of bed and checked the backyard.
It was normal for a sudden squall to kick up over the lake in late summer, though that didn’t make it any less startling to be jolted awake by atmospheric conditions. When I was a kid, Gammy would take advantage of the spooky atmosphere by lighting candles and telling me ghost stories. Ghost stories that would scare me so much I forgot how badly the storm scared me.
Clearly, this was where Emmett got his dark streak.
I stumbled to the window. The glass was so distorted by raindrops that the world outside looked like a dark, impressionist painting. Sheets of rain were falling over the lake. Windblown tree branches batted violently against each other. I was caught between conflicting emotions: the rising anxiety in my chest and the strange urge to go outside and feel the wind and the rain on m
y face. Where the old Lacey would have gone running for candles and a weather radio, some perverse little pocket of my post-Beebee soul was fascinated by the potential for destruction. The storm was a living thing, angry and hungry, rippling with unrestrained power.
Opening the door a crack, I saw that my dock had come unmoored. The ancient wood was pitching and rolling in the storm-tossed waters. I slipped into a pair of sneakers. I doubted I could save the dock, but the rowboat was tied to it, bobbing frantically. I didn’t want to lose it. A lot of memories were tied up in that boat.
I figured I had only a small window of opportunity to go after the boat before the black waves swallowed it whole. I stewed for a few seconds as my rational brain tried to send “Are you insane?!” messages to control my limbs. But I overcame common sense and self-preservation, throwing on a jacket as I dashed out into the rain.
My tennis shoes squishing and slipping in the mud, I skidded down the hill toward the water. I squealed, falling on my butt with an undignified splat at the water’s edge, my feet sliding into the mud and slime. Groaning, I pushed up with my hands and sprinted down the dock. It felt like some sort of American Gladiators challenge, the wood bobbing and bucking under my feet with every step, soaking my feet to the ankles. My shoes were so slick, I almost went flying off the end of the dock when I tried to stop. Lightning split the sky just across the shore, striking a tree.
“Great,” I muttered, barely able to hear my voice over the roar of the storm. “Water, metal boat, lightning. Nothing can go wrong here.”
My soaking wet clothes plastered to my skin, I struggled to unravel the wet rope from the docking post. The boat clanged against the dock under the force of the waves, adding another layer of noise to the already deafening storm. It was taking on water, making it that much heavier to drag along the side of the dock toward shore. The wet nylon cut into my hands as I struggled to pull it. My shoes slipped out from under me and I had already prepared for the plunge into the icy, black water, when those now familiar hands caught my shoulders and stopped my skid.
“What the hell are you doing running around in this!” Monroe yelled. “Are you crazy?”
“I think I’ve made that abundantly clear!” I shouted. He laughed, shook the soaking wet hair out of his face like a shaggy dog, and took the rope from my hand. With him pulling the rope and me pushing the bow, we managed to drag the boat to the shore and pulled it far up out of the water.
“Thanks! Sorry for putting your life in danger, again!” I cried, making a break for the house.
“Come on over,” he yelled. “I’ve still got power.”
Sure at first that I’d heard him wrong, I hesitated. But he pulled on my arm until I followed him to his well-lit cabin. He even held the door open for me, so I had to assume he had actually invited me in. Monroe shrugged out of his jacket and shook the water out of his thick black hair like a dog. “Wanna beer?”
“Please. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a thunderstorm get this bad up here. Hey, why is it that I lost electricity and you didn’t?” I asked, sliding out of my sodden shoes and jacket. My jeans were soaked, but I was not going to ask him to borrow a pair, because a beer and an implicit offer not to hate each other does not a pants-borrowing relationship make. “Totally unfair; you’re a renter for God’s sake.”
“I’ve got a backup generator,” he said. “The McGees warned me about the thunderstorms.”
“Oh, sure, bring logic and forethought into it,” I grumbled.
“It’s clean, I swear,” he called, tossing me a towel from the bathroom. I made an “uhff” sound when it hit me in the face. He grimaced. “Sorry.”
“Don’t worry. I’ve got bad reflexes. And a beer would be great, thanks,” I said, studying what he’d done with the McGee place. Not a lot. The furnishings were the same, clean and old and worn. I’m pretty sure the blue rag rug in front of the fireplace was older than me. But there were new bookshelves lined with several editions of every title by a crime writer named F. Monroe, plus a smattering of Carl Hiaasen, Edgar Allan Poe, and Mickey Spillane. On the walls, there were a couple of posters touting upcoming releases of Dead as Disco and Drunk Tank Duets, both by F. B. Monroe. Editorial memos from an S. Taylor of Fingerprint Publishing were neatly stacked next to his laptop.
“Either you are F. B. Monroe or you’re doing a damn fine job of stalking F. B. Monroe,” I called.
I heard Monroe grunt in response. I’d read Monroe’s first book, Cross Creek, years before. He’d been touted as the emerging author of 2002, penning the tale of two teenage boys fleeing a foster home to hitchhike cross-country and find their wayward parents. It was heartbreaking and haunting, and passages still came floating back to me on occasion years later. Unfortunately, I bought it from the super-discount table of my local bookstore, because despite a massive marketing push by his publisher, the book failed miserably.
It felt like there were tumblers in my head, falling into place. It was bizarre trying to reconcile my mercurial neighbor with the gentle storytelling I’d enjoyed. I felt like I’d been inside Monroe’s head, that I’d invaded his privacy somehow … beyond what I was doing at the moment by inspecting the contents of his desk and walls.
From what I’d read, it took Monroe two years to write anything else and then, when his next novel was finally picked up by a publisher, he refused to do any press for it because he didn’t want to talk about Cross Creek’s gigantic failure. He refused to have his picture on the dust jackets, even when his quirky, absurdist crime stories became huge hits. It was as if he was rejecting the public before they could reject him again. Or he was just a hermit who hated attention. Now that I’d met him, I realized either option was plausible.
Wandering along the edge of the room, I studied the pictures of the people I assumed were Monroe’s family, smiling dark-haired brothers with their arms slung around a grinning Monroe. It was strange to see him with short hair and under-control sideburns. He looked… happy, which was kind of off-putting.
There was a framed picture with a bunch of guys in police uniforms posing with a uniformed Monroe. And in another shot, the same cops seemed to be mooning the camera in a hospital room. Stacked in a pile on one of the bookshelves, I found a half-dozen awards and plaques honoring a Sgt. Francis Bernard Monroe of the Louisville Police Department with special service awards.
“Your real name is Francis Bernard?” I asked as he handed me a beer. “I would want to be called Lefty, too.”
“I didn’t exactly want it,” he grumbled, taking a plaque out of my hand and putting it back on the shelf. “But you can’t stop cops from giving you a nickname when you get shot in the ass stopping a liquor store robbery. I got off better than my buddy, Uniball, though. I got home that night and I am grateful for it.”
My jaw dropped. “You got shot in the ass?”
Well, that explained the limp. And now I was thinking about his butt again.
“Left cheek.” He nodded, taking a long pull of his beer. When I laughed, he got indignant. “You know, some people have died from being shot in the ass.”
“Well, I can’t call you Lefty, especially not now that I know how you got the name. Can’t I just call you Francis?”
“Nobody calls me Francis,” he growled, flopping on his couch.
“Wolverine?” I suggested.
“Huh?”
“Never mind, I’m just going to stick with calling you Monroe,” I told him, carefully sitting so my wet jeans didn’t rub against his upholstery. We were sitting in opposite corners, as far from each other as humanly possible. It was like a first date, only he’d already seen me naked, which served as an incredible ice breaker. There was no way I could be further embarrassed after that.
“I read your first book,” I said.
“So you’re the one,” he snorted.
“Tragic coming-of-age tiles are a hard sell these days.” I shrugged. “But I liked it. I’ve never spent time with a homeless teenage boy before, but somehow I feel
like I’ve known one. Besides, you can’t be too bitter; you seem to be doing really well with your sardonic crime stuff.”
“People love inept criminals.”
“It’s more than that, Mr. False Modesty,” I teased. “The New
York Times called you a softer Elmore Leonard. It says so, right on that poster.”
He made a face, but I could tell he was pleased that I’d noticed. “I hate that quote. It’s irritating as all hell. Just because I don’t write about drag queens getting dismembered with a hatchet doesn’t mean I’m soft.”
“I said softer.”
“So I take it you’re adequately impressed?”
“Oh, no, I haven’t read anything you’ve written since Cross Creek,” I assured him.
“Well, thank you for your support,” he muttered.
“It’s just that the crime books seem so macho, I guess,” I said. “I thought about buying Karma Collects. But then I saw the cover and didn’t know if I would like it.”
“I knew it!” he cried. “I knew the puddle of blood shaped like a peace sign was too much. I told my editor I didn’t like it, but, no, he said it fit the market.”
“Sorry,” I told him. “Loan me a copy and I’ll read it, I promise.”
He grumbled. “Now you’re just humoring me.”
“A little bit,” I admitted. I grinned at him. He smiled back. Monroe wasn’t really such a bad guy when you got to know him. He was actually very funny and helpful and … Gah! No penis policy. I had to remember the no penis policy. I would think of something else. The ocean? Too subliminal. Wombats? Well, that’s just weird. Johnny Depp? No, that won’t help matters. Urn, Leslie Nielsen… He’s not exactly my type. He was in, uh, Tammy and the Bachelor, Prom Night. The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! Naked Monroe. Damn it!
Monroe was waving his hand in front of my face, trying to snap me out of my trance. “Not used to being up this late, huh?”
“Here, lately, I’ve had to get used to it. Why are you up at three am.?” I countered.
“Because I have a rare genius that works best when I’m the only person on the planet who’s awake. Your being awake is obviously what’s throwing me off. So what’s your excuse?”