by Clea Simon
“Yeah, well, I’m still here.” Barely, I added to myself, placing the empty glass back on the table. He could cozy up to me all he wanted to now, I knew what he wanted.
“Well, I’m glad of that.” Rick reached across the table. “I can’t tell you how glad.” I looked down at the bitten nails, felt the smooth guitar callouses as his two hands closed over mine. They fit, as they always had. And my fingers had a few bitemarks on them as well. Were we really that different?
“We feral animals have to stick together, Theda.” He always could read my silences. “Nobody else will ever totally understand us.”
***
“You need that man back in your life like Musetta needs fleas.” Bunny pulled no punches when I called her a little later, and the force in her voice tossed my head back. I’d called to finalize plans to carpool to Rose’s funeral and meant to tell her about Cool, what I could anyway. But once she checked in about my physical status—headache more or less gone, no blurred vision—she honed right in on my romantic woes. “He’s bad for you, Theda, and I don’t care if you both have the same job problems right now. That’s the only thing you’ve got in common. You’ve moved on, girl. And if I know him, he’ll manage to come out all right even if he has to climb over you to do it.” Bunny had never forgiven Rick for keeping any news of the Phoenix job opening from me, even as she swore she’d never let me leave town. It was the principle, she said.
“Don’t worry, Bunny.” I held the receiver back up to my ear. “I’m not going to get involved with him again.” Well, I had told Rick about Violet’s gig on Saturday. He’d never heard her band and it wasn’t the kind of thing Bill would enjoy anyway. “And I certainly didn’t tell him about working for City .” He would’ve scoffed.
“Well, that’s a blessing. How did lunch with Cool go?” Bunny let me get back on track. With a moment’s thought, I decided not to tell her about the blackmail—it wasn’t my secret, and once it was out, I couldn’t pull it back—but I did give her some of the news, sharing everything our mutual friend had told me in the hour-long “official” interview we’d done after our real heart-to-heart. Most of what Cool had been willing to go on the record with wasn’t really breaking news—her last album had been out for nearly two years—but she had given me enough to update the original City story. There were some new song ideas, a couple of potential collaborators, hip names who might interest younger listeners, and we’d agreed that my story would be a great way to announce Cool’s return to the East Coast.
“Well, I’m glad she’s out of Tinsel Town. There’s no there there,” said Bunny, speaking from all of about a week’s experience with the West Coast. “I wonder what the real story is behind her silence, though. You think she’s in some kind of trouble, Theda?”
Bunny had a nose for trouble. Also for gossip, and I was glad I’d held my tongue.
“She did look tired, like she needed a break.” That much I could share. “But when we chatted, she was the same old Cool. Did I tell you she’s got a personal trainer now?”
“That’s so LA!” Back on safe ground, we rambled on for another forty minutes. Musetta came into the room and, finding me extended on the sofa, jumped onto my belly. As the subject turned to plans for Bunny’s upcoming nuptials, I found my mind wandering, but by then Musetta had quit kneading and was sleeping peacefully tucked between me and the sofa back.
“So, you don’t want to do it on Halloween?”
“Samhain,” Bunny corrected me, using the Gaelic pronunciation, “SOW-in.” “No, we’ve got enough going on then. Besides, that’s just next Sunday, Theda. Way too soon for the big shindig I’m planning.”
As Bunny returned in detail to the kind of wedding plans that only interest the primaries, I sighed, and Musetta did, too. The doorbell startled—and saved—us both.
“That must be Bill.” I interrupted some account of a vegetarian caterer who could do wonders with walnuts. (“My family will freak,” Bunny was saying. “But a lot of our Wiccan circle don’t believe in killing anything.”) Musetta hit the floor with a thump and ran to the door. “Love to Cal.”
“And to Bill, too, Theda.” She sighed. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at ten. Blessed be.”
“Back at you, Bunny. Blessed be.” We could all use the goodwill the Wiccan greeting called for. I signed off and turned to Musetta, who was already stretched out to her full length, reaching for the knob.
***
Three hours later, I was closing it behind me again. Somehow, I had done it once again, turned an interesting situation into something worse.
The evening had begun well enough. “Hey, darling, how’s your head?” Bill had greeted me with a kiss and a mixed red-and-purple bouquet, which I’d managed to place in water and out of Musetta’s reach before we went in search of food. We’d been halfway to Anna’s, the local pizza place, before I’d gotten him to believe that I was healed enough to share a carafe of the house red along with the large pepperoni and mushroom that had become our regular. But I had convinced him and once we’d ordered, had even managed to tune down his solicitous questions long enough to hear a little about his day. Being a homicide detective, Bill was always somewhat reluctant to talk about his job. Partly, I knew, he was often working on cases in progress and he had to be careful about what he said. Partly, I suspected, he didn’t want to gross me out. But I’d seen enough of violence and crime recently to believe myself inured. Besides, if we were going to progress as a couple, he was going to have to let me in. Once our pizza arrived and we’d each torn off a slice, my campaign began in earnest.
“So, open cases?” I’d asked.
“Let me leave that at work,” he sighed and wiped his free hand over his face.
“C’mon, Bill, don’t shut me out.” Subtlety wasn’t my forte.
“Did you hear about that abandoned baby? The one they found in a pile of leaves on the Common?” I nodded. “Well, she died. Now that’s my case. You sure you want to hear more?”
What could I tell him but the truth? “I do if it’s what’s on your mind.” We’d gotten our wine by then, and maybe I’d downed a glass too quickly while the pizza cooled. “I mean, I’ve got to, if we’re going to continue.”
“So that’s what this is about: Bunny and Cal’s wedding.”
“Handfasting.” I corrected, pulling a string of cheese into my mouth. “It’s a Wiccan thing. And no, not exactly.”
“Theda, your friends are tying the knot, whatever you want to call it, and you want to know what’s up with us. If I’m serious.”
Oh, he was infuriating. “No, Bill. I’m not worried about you. You’ve been a rock.” I meant it sarcastically, but it came out like a compliment. Damn. “I’m trying to figure out how I feel. What I want to do.”
“Pre-handfasting jitters?” He was smiling now, as much as a man can while maneuvering molten cheese.
“Damn it, Bill, listen to yourself. You’re treating me like a child. And, well, maybe you are too old for me. I mean, do you know what I really care about? Music. The scene, the clubs, the bands. Yeah, you’ll go out with me, but it’s like you’re suffering through it all for my sake. But for me, that’s what’s important. Music unleashes something in me, and that’s where I’ve always connected with my friends, my best friends.” He winced. “It’s not just going to see some band, hear the tunes, and go home. It’s a community, my community. Until I started seeing you, it was my life!”
“Great, so you want to cruise into your forties hanging out in smoky dives.”
“They’re all smoke-free in the city now, Bill. And I’ve got quite a few years before my forties, thank you very much.” I was getting off track. “But, yeah, maybe I do want to spend my time hanging in the clubs. Maybe that’s what I’m really about and you’re just an aberration.”
“An aberration from boys in bands who can’t remember your name.” He paused, put his pizza down, and shot me a look. “Or devil-may-care rock critics who treat you like another cut-rate freela
nce assignment. Good enough when nothing better is around?”
Had Bunny told him about Rick? “What are you getting at?”
“I know about Rick.” The wine and pizza in my belly threatened to revolt. “You told me all about that relationship and how he treated you.” I relaxed. He’d not heard that my ex was back in town. Still, this was not the road I wanted to pursue.
“It’s not that, Bill, not just that anyway.” Putting my own slice back on the plate, I began to list the ways we were different: age, interests, history. Even friends: “You don’t have any, and I live for mine.”
“I have a few good friends, that’s not fair.” He pushed back from the table. “Besides, some of that’s a gender thing. Women bond.”
“Oh great, so now you’re going to pull a sexist stereotype on me. My friends aren’t some ‘girl thing.’ They’re serious women who I share quality parts of my life with.”
“And about whom you know nothing.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Like your friend , Rose? Well, because she was such a close friend of yours, I asked around.” He leaned closer and I could see that his eyes had grown cold. I wasn’t liking his tone, but I couldn’t interrupt him now. “Your friend, the upstanding breeder, may have been involved in those cattery thefts you were so up in arms about.”
“No way.”
“Way, Theda.” His mouth was set in a tight-lipped grin, but there didn’t seem to be any happiness behind it. “Not my bailiwick, but I made some inquiries. Believe it or not, I worry about you—and with all this female bonding you can be just too trusting sometimes. Seems your ‘good buddy’ Rose was hard up for cash, was putting out feelers for selling a lot of cats, quickly and with no fuss. In fact, the undercovers who are investigating this say they would’ve had her, too, if she didn’t keep backing out of meets, changing her mind about sales. They think that’s what got her killed. She dallied when the muscle wanted her to move.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“Evidence, Theda.”
“Of course she needed money. She was being hit up for protection. Someone was threatening her. I told you, and I told the Watertown cops.” Damn, I wished I’d pushed her to go to the police back when she’d first told me. “She was probably looking to sell some of her own cats, to save the others, poor woman. No wonder she kept backing out.”
“That dog won’t hunt, Theda. Sorry.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Don’t you think the Watertown cops have any brains? They’ve gone through her phone records for that Monday, the day she told you she was threatened. And the weekend before and several days later. There are no incoming calls that don’t have a good explanation. No strangers phoned Rose. None at all, so there were no threats. No threats, no crime. The only thing off in the whole equation was your ‘friend.’”
“No.” I shook my head. A mistake, especially after the wine. “No.”
“Maybe, Theda. Maybe. But think about it: what if the attack outside Violet’s was planned, and the break-in just cover for someone who was really trying to hurt you? Slow you down, scare you off, or worse? That was after you had talked to Rose, right?”
“Yeah, but no.” I couldn’t believe it. I wouldn’t, and just kept shaking him off despite the growing pain in my head. “No.”
The pizza had gotten cold by this time and I certainly didn’t want any more wine. Somehow we made it back to civil conversation long enough to pay the bill. But when I told Bill my headache was back, he didn’t offer to take care of me again. Instead, he walked me home and we parted with stiff, formal words—and no mention of seeing each other again. I walked in to a hairball and a cat who was nowhere to be seen.
Chapter Ten
Sleep eluded me, as did the cat, and I found myself eyeing dawn over a cup of coffee already gone bitter and cold. Was I being a fool? Was I really in danger? I knew I needed time to think, and the week had just been too full. But these questions echoed through my head, as did one even closer: Was pushing Bill away what I really wanted?
“Be careful what you ask for,” I said aloud, to no one but myself. That was another of Bunny’s favorites, and it rang true. Of course, I was too tired to be thinking clearly, now that I had the peace and relative quiet in which to mull over my life.
“Kitty?” I was feeling deserted, and would’ve started worrying about my chubby little companion’s well being if she hadn’t chosen that moment to appear, body-checking my ankle with her soft, warm bulk. “You still love me, don’t you?” She was silent, but at this point that was consent enough and I hugged her to me.
“Eh,” she pushed away, cool pink paw pads pressing against my face. Chastened, I went instead to open a can. The kitchen clock told me I had hours before the funeral. Dumping my coffee, I walked back to my computer and booted it up. Might as well type in my interview notes.
“You’ve got mail!” Finally, a friendly voice. Better still, I saw as I opened the note, a profitable one. Carrie, my editor from the bridal mag I Do , had finally gotten back to me, ending the months-long drought.
“T - Can you do 800 on new trends in bouquets? We have art already—so one trend must be all-white. Need by Nov. 8.”
I Do had an annoying habit of telling me what conclusions to find before I’d begun my research. However, eight hundred words meant four hundred dollars. For that, I would find a florist who swore that the hot new bridal bouquets all had polka-dots. I fired off a cheery assent, and started sifting through the barrage of sales pitches and pornography offers that had filled my in box since I last logged on. Why was everyone so interested in farm animals?
Ten minutes later, I’d deleted most of it, but a few items caught my eye. One was from an old club acquaintance. A wedding announcement. Great, but the woman sending it hadn’t contacted me in three years and the name of her fiancé didn’t look familiar. If she was hoping for a gift, she was out of luck. More promising was another with the subject line: “Big Cats are Huge.” It proved to be a short wire story, forwarded by my old college roommate in California, talking about the growing international popularity of large cat breeds. My former roommate had known James, my last cat, back when he was a hefty eighteen pounder, and I assumed this latest story was prompted by photos I’d sent her showing off Musetta’s rather pear-shaped profile. The cats in this story, though, were bred to be big, from the docile Ragdolls to the newer Pixie-bobs, a hefty feline supposedly produced by crossing some poor domestic tabbies with bobcats. The attached photo, of a moon-faced Ragdoll, looked somewhat familiar, and I remembered the Newton cattery theft.
Were these cats becoming too popular for their own good? Maybe I was just cranky from lack of sleep, but it seemed a possibility. Hadn’t that crime been reported as one of a series? Earlier in the week, I’d been too busy to follow up, but this morning loomed like an early winter storm. I started typing. Within minutes, the Internet and my trusty iMac had coughed up competing newspapers’ write-ups of a few similar crimes: A breeder of Maine coons, also large, long-haired cats, had been hit less than a month before, as had a cattery known for its Norwegian forest cats, an athletic, densely furred animal that reminded me a bit of James. In each case, only a couple of animals had been stolen, but each time the purloined pusses had fit the pattern: big, cuddly cats.
Which made me wonder about Rose’s cattery and the crime that had ended her life. Angoras have great fur: silky, long, and soft to the touch. But they’re tiny, compared to those other animals. Small-boned and delicate, with a build that always reminded me of Siamese. Maybe the thieves were branching out. If, in fact, the threats Rose had received and the cattery thefts were all the work of the same criminals. Maybe we were just entering a new age, I thought as I powered down my computer. Maybe animal security was going to be the next hot profession. Once I got the flower story done, I should look into it, I thought, as I went to brew more coffee.
***
Maybe it was the extra gig that gave
me a sense of security. Maybe it was Musetta, finally purring by my side. Despite the caffeine refill, something lulled me back to sleep and I woke with a start on the sofa, under the newspaper, the phone ringing by my ear.
“Theda?” It was Violet. “Are you going to Rose’s funeral?”
“Mmm.” I wasn’t quite awake yet. Then I saw the wall clock and bolted up. “Yeah, Bunny’s picking me up in thirty minutes. Why, do you need a lift?”
“Yeah, I think I’d like to go. I was thinking, with classes and all, I’d take a pass. But I’m all set for the Econ midterm, and I wouldn’t feel right missing it.” Since I’d introduced them over the summer, Rose had done a lot to break down Violet’s antipathy toward pedigreed cats and the people who breed them. My punk buddy still thought the industry was a waste—“bogus” was her word—since so many perfectly fine and healthy beasts had to be euthanized each year. But Rose had made her case, explaining the pedigreed animals can raise public interest. Any animal that commands a high price is seen as having value, she pointed out, as screwed up as that may be. Besides, Rose genuinely loved animals, and Violet could see that when the diminutive older woman in her crazy wigs started coming round, using her rare spare hours to help out at the shelter. Rose knew how to “pill” a cat with the best of them, and she wasn’t above getting down on the floor to coax a timid kitten out to play either.
“Well, we can swing by. Bunny knows how to get there. And Violet?” I didn’t want to offend my friend, but as I rooted through my own closet I figured a word to the wise couldn’t hurt. “This is all happening at a conservative synagogue. Rose’s sister is older and, I gather, distinctly suburban.”
“No sneakers, gotcha.”
“Ciao.”
***
Violet was wearing black Doc Martens when we picked her up, but she’d paired the heavy workboots with a long black dress made of sweatshirt material. Despite some fevered brushing before Bunny had arrived, I seemed to have more cat hair on me than either of my friends. Somehow, Musetta’s white belly fur, rather than the black hair that covered the majority of her round form, had found its way onto my one good navy suit. Next to my disarray, Violet’s goth get-up, and Bunny’s inability to completely subdue her natural exuberance (her eggplant outfit had embroidery, but no beads), I worried that we’d stand out. I needn’t have been concerned. Rose’s friends were cat people, and despite the somber occasion, the folks who filled the big, underheated synagogue were dressed more casually than I’d expected. They all showed various signs of grief, as well, from open weeping to the kind of grim facial expression that told of sleepless nights. They were a family unto themselves, largely a sisterhood, marked uniformly by the signs of fur. Although there must have been other breeders among them, maybe even some who were suspects in the cattery thefts, I couldn’t imagine any of them had wished Rose ill.