“Someone’s bowling in my head,” Kelly whined and went down weeping again.
“I’ll get you some water.”
I hurried back to the bar, sprayed water from the soda gun into a beer mug and brought it to her. She sat up, took the mug and handed it back to me after a few sips.
Then she collapsed into me and started crying again. I put my arm around her.
“Stokes was having an affair,” she croaked.
“Oh God,” I gasped, doing my best to act shocked. “I’m so sorry,” I said, which was genuine.
“I came here to sleep last night. I couldn’t stay in the house with him another second.”
She continued to cry softly while I stroked her greasy hair and shushed her gently. I knew firsthand how betrayed and awful she felt.
“I’m so sorry,” I repeated. “So, so sorry.”
Kelly finally sat up and rubbed her eyes. I pinched a bunch of paper napkins from the dispenser on the table and handed them to her. She honked into one loudly and then wiped her eyes with another.
“He was sleeping with Helene. Helene Walker.”
This was confirmation of Eric Warschuk’s story from another source. An unimpeachable one. Gubbins could use this.
“No way,” I said in a higher-than-usual pitch. My guilt was kicking in for all this dissembling.
She nodded, and her ponytail fell apart completely. Now her black hair covered her face like a troll doll. I brushed some of it aside for her.
“She’s the gift that keeps on giving, isn’t she. How did you find out?”
“Stokes told me. He said he wanted me to know before he confessed to the police. They interviewed us yesterday. He didn’t say anything about the affair then, and now he’s scared they’ll uncover it. That not telling them will look, you know, suspicious.”
A preemptive move. Smart of Stokes. I wished I could ask her if he was home on the night of the murders. Not the right time. She’d begun weeping again.
“I never thought he’d do this to me. To us.”
I handed her another napkin, and she sniffled. I gave her a hug.
“I feel like I’ve lost my best friend.”
I remembered that feeling. Utterly alone and abandoned after I found out about Helene. The unbearable realization that I was replaceable for Hugh. But hearing Kelly speak the words provided a new perspective. Hugh and I were never best friends. Hugh set the terms of our relationship. Terms that allowed him affairs. I could accept them or leave him. Or use a more insidious option: pretend they weren’t occurring, which worked until he did something impossible to deny—he made a baby.
“I’ve been such an idiot,” Kelly moaned. “I was actually teaching her how to tone her flabby abs and tighten her saggy butt. Trying to make her sexy while I turned into a blimp.”
“Stop it. Your body is gorgeous. You’re a beautiful, voluptuous woman.”
A few years ago, I was desperate to have a fertile, round-bellied body like hers. But now I understood that if I had gotten pregnant, I would have been dealing with Hugh’s infidelity, coping with a toxic level of stress at the height of my vulnerability. That’s what Kelly was facing. My life would have gone one of two ways: either I would have divorced Hugh and become a single mom, or stayed and raised a child in a marriage filled with mistrust and resentment. I did not envy Kelly. For the first time, I entertained the idea that I’d gotten off easy with Hugh.
“Believe me, if I’d known what Helene had done to your marriage when she came to Pilates, I never would have let her join the class.” Kelly sniffed. “I let the fox into the henhouse. No, that’s wrong, I let the . . . no. Anyway, none of this would have happened. Or maybe he’d have cheated with some other woman. I don’t know. I feel so confused. I don’t know who Stokes is anymore.”
I took Kelly’s hand. What was the point in telling her that Helene had been with Stokes since September, well before she showed up in class? More important was to soften the impact of the devastating possibility I was about to present her with.
“Sometimes there’s a side to people we love that we don’t want to see because it’s too painful. We can sleepwalk . . .” I squirmed. “We can sleepwalk through a relationship, Kelly. But there’s a time to wake up.”
Kelly blinked at me and widened her eyes.
“What I’m trying to say is, on the surface Stokes seems one way, but underneath he might be a very destructive person.”
She burst into tears and flopped down on the banquette again. “You’re right. He’s killed everything we had together. I don’t think I can ever forgive him.”
“No. I mean . . .”
I heard the outside door open.
“Nora?” Grace called.
“In here.”
Grace walked into the bar wearing her orange parka and carrying her mat. She looked at me questioningly.
“I thought I was early,” she said, heading toward the table but stopping midway. “Oh my God. We’re in Oz!” She stood there gawking at my chest as if I’d sprouted a third breast.
“What are you talking about?”
“You’re finally wearing a color!”
I looked down at my torso. A few hours earlier, while refilling some of the drawers that the police had emptied, I’d come across the cherry-red hoodie that I’d bought myself as a present last year at Massamat Mall’s Valentine’s Day sale. Surprisingly, I felt like wearing it.
“What’s going on?” Grace asked, concerned. She’d seen Kelly, who was curled up on the banquette rubbing her head.
“I don’t feel so good,” Kelly muttered.
Grace furrowed her brow. “There’s a twenty-four-hour virus going around. Otis had it. Two kids in Leon’s kindergarten, too.” She turned to me. “We should get her home.”
“It isn’t a virus,” I said.
“Are you sure?”
Kelly rolled over. “What time is it? I have to set up for class.”
Grace took one look at her tear-streaked face and moved to sit next to her on the side opposite mine.
“What’s got you so upset?”
Was Kelly going to tell her?
“Nothing.” Kelly began searching under the table. “Where’s my mat?”
Should I tell her?
“Forget that. Tell me what’s wrong. And if you’re not feeling well, let’s get you home. We have to take good care of you and the baby. Right, Nora?”
She shouldn’t go home. Stokes might be very angry with Kelly for leaving him. I was afraid for her and the baby, even though he would be taking an enormous risk if he harmed one hair on her head once the police knew about his affair.
“She doesn’t want to go home,” I countered.
Grace examined me curiously and then turned to Kelly. “Kelly?”
“I’m not going home to a liar and a cheat,” Kelly said.
“Stokes was cheating?”
“He was sleeping with Helene,” I blurted.
Grace stared at me, stunned for a moment. Then she pounded her fist on the table, making the salt and pepper shakers jump. “Un-fucking-believable. That woman was a man-eater.”
“I never want to see him again,” Kelly whimpered.
“Of course you don’t. I can respect that,” Grace said, putting her arm around Kelly’s shoulders. “But in these situations, you can’t be the one to give ground.” She shot me a look. “Let him find somewhere else to stay,” she said, firmly. “You’re pregnant. You can’t be living in a bowling alley.”
“But I can’t see Stokes. I’m not ready.”
“You can come to my house,” I said. I instantly pictured the wreckage the police left and regretted the offer.
Kelly nodded a little uncertainly.
“Hold on,” Grace said. “The Coop can get pretty cold, Nor. She needs creature comforts in her condition. We have a guest room and hey, who better to have watching over you than an EMT? I’ll call Mac and tell him you’re coming, Kelly. I’ll be home after my show later.”
&nb
sp; “I think Grace is right,” I said. “I’ll make a sign that says class is canceled. You should go to Grace’s and let them baby you.”
“You guys are great. Thanks,” Kelly murmured.
“Think you can drive?” Grace asked her.
“Uh-huh.”
“Good. I’ll help you get cleaned up,” Grace said, taking her hand. “Come on, honey.”
While Grace steered Kelly to the restroom, I went behind the bar to scavenge for sign material. In a moment, the outer door squeaked again.
“Who’s there?”
No answer.
“I said who’s there?”
Still no reply. My shoulders tensed. Was it Stokes? Had he come for Kelly? Instinctively, I reached for a bottle and grabbed it by the neck. I relaxed my grip when Sinead’s husky form appeared in the doorway. Dressed in sweats, she was carrying her usual hanger of work clothes to wear to the bank, along with her exercise mat and a small brown-paper bag. Under her blunt-cut bangs, her eyes had bags, too.
“What is everyone doing here at the crack?” she asked.
“I could ask the same of you,” I said, putting the bottle down nonchalantly. “Kelly’s sick. I’m making a sign to say class is canceled.”
Sinead came over and set her burdens on the bar. I thought of Tidy Pool Al and their four jobs, and I regretted raising my voice to her at the Tea Cozy.
“Sinead, I’m sorry about the other night. The way I spoke to you. I was a first-class bitch.”
“Forget it. I handled it arseways. You were in a state. That Detective Roche who interviewed us yesterday? He asked how I thought you were taking it, and that’s what I said. ‘Even if Hugh Walker was a shite bastard, she shared the same bed with the man for years. She’d have to have ice water in her veins not to be devastated by what happened to him.’”
I rocked slightly, holding on to the bar to keep steady. This meant Roche was asking around about my emotional state, building his case. Would he even look into Stokes as a possibility?
“What else did Detective Roche ask?”
“If I’d noticed anything that might help the police, which I had not. What I thought of Helene. There, I gave him a piece.”
I tried to quell my anxiety and concentrate on Sinead.
“I guess things haven’t been easy for you, either. I saw Al leaving here this morning in the Dirt Busters van.”
Sinead lowered her eyes.
“He didn’t want people to know.” She looked up and lifted her chin toward the Jameson bottle. “I’ll take a wee one.”
I picked up a shot glass from the bar, then hesitated and picked up a second one. I poured whiskey into both. We picked up our glasses, clinked them together and took our sips. I saw Sinead’s tears welling up.
“Oh, Sinead. Is it that bad?”
She nodded.
“Cleaning pools and digging irrigation ditches was one thing,” she said. “But toilets . . . He lost so much business this year that he had to take on this night job, and we’re still short. What with the high prices in town and the taxes going up on our house . . .”
“I had no idea.”
“Things went from bad to worse after he lost Pequod Point. It was his biggest account. The owner used to be a Tidy Pools client before he sold to the Walkers. Apparently, they replaced him with some bloody fella from Massamat their realtor recommended.”
“The Walkers fired Al?”
She nodded. “He hates being a janitor. It’s turning him mean. He’s mad all the time. He’s mad as hell. That’s what he’s been saying ever since he started this night shift.”
I stepped back. He’d been saying what?
“He used to be so good-natured. But now it’s: I’m mad as hell that I’m cleaning other people’s piss and shit; I’m mad as hell that your mum’s coming for Thanksgiving; I’m mad as hell it costs half a day’s pay to fill my gas tank. He’s so knackered he barely eats. He’s always running from one job to another.”
Sinead knocked back the rest of her whiskey while I gaped at her.
“I wanted to surprise him and bring him breakfast before he left,” she said, tapping the brown bag. “I brought his favorite: sausage-and-egg sandwich. But I guess I missed him.” She wiped her eyes. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be such a whinger. Hey . . .” She pointed at my chest.
“What?” I said, finally jolted out of my amazement.
“Look at you. You’re wearing a color.”
I had thought of Stokes as a hater, capable of killing Hugh and Helene. Now there was also Al with an ax to grind against the Walkers. No, the idea was ludicrous. Shy, nervous Al Rudinsky, a guy who worried about tracking mud on the floor? He couldn’t kill anyone, let alone do it over the loss of an account. Or could he? The only thing I felt certain of as the four of us emerged from the dark Thunder Bar into the bright, brisk morning was that Mad as Hell had to be him. He’d used the phrase repeatedly, and he drove like a madman. But why couldn’t he come to me directly and say he was offended? Why did he have to express his anger under a nom de plume?
When I thought about it for a second, the answer was obvious. Shame. Humiliation. What Eric Warschuk said was probably true: “It’s the thing men fear most.”
“Women don’t exactly love it, either,” I mumbled.
“What did you say?” Grace asked.
Grace, Kelly and Sinead stood by the entrance door in the sun, squinting like moles.
“Nothing.”
Kelly shivered in her shorts as she held on to Grace. The skin on her gorgeous calves was covered in goose bumps. Grace bundled her into the Mini and gave her directions and a house key while I tacked the CLASS CANCELED sign to the door. I’d written it on the blank back of a coaster that said, “Due to cutbacks, the light at the end of the tunnel has been turned off.”
Grace returned, shaking her head. “What a thing to go through when you’re pregnant. I’m surprised she didn’t miscarry. I didn’t think Stokes was Helene’s type.”
“You don’t know the half of it, Grace. I have a million things to tell you.”
Grace dropped her chin to her chest and began picking invisible lint off her parka. “I have stuff to tell you, too. Detective Roche came by last night.”
I nodded as my belly turned over. “He was asking about me, right? They searched my house. They commandeered my phone and computer.”
Grace jerked her head up. “Shit!”
“Gubbins is working on getting them back. What did Roche ask you?”
“He asked if I thought you were emotionally stable. I said you were a rock. That you’d gone through hell in the past because of Hugh and you’d kept it together. But lately you’d been depressed.”
“And you felt you had to share that,” I said, recoiling.
Grace was quick to defend herself. “I didn’t want him to hear it from someone else and think I was hiding it.”
“How did he react?”
“He wanted details. ‘How is she behaving differently?’ ‘Is she spending more time alone? Becoming more secretive?’ I told him you were a little colorless, that’s all. I also set him straight. ‘I’ve known her for twenty-three years,’ I said. ‘She’s a good person and godmother to my kids. Don’t waste your time investigating Nora Glasser. There’s a dangerous killer running around out there. Go find him.’”
Loyal as Lassie, like I said.
“Nor, there’s another thing. About my program today—”
“Wait. Stokes might show up here soon. Let’s talk at the station.”
Grace broadcast Talk of the Townies live at 10:30 a.m., and her station manager usually stocked the fridge. I couldn’t remember when I’d last eaten.
As I drove along the commercial stretch between Pequod and Massamat, my mind jumped from worry to worry like a grasshopper dodging a lawn mower. I worried about getting arrested, about Stokes roaming free, about my sleepwalking and what it meant. I even worried about Al working all night scrubbing toilet bowls. The more I thought about it, I knew
Al wasn’t a killer. I knew it in my bones. My money was on Stokes. Stokes was the one. No matter how mad Al was about my column, his threats were idle. He was a frustrated victim of the changing economy. My heart went out to him.
It was a good thing I didn’t have a phone, because I had the urge to call Ben and tell him Tidy Pool Al wrote the letters. I probably shouldn’t talk to Ben until he had time to absorb the note I’d left. I hoped he’d understand. My reticence wasn’t about him. It was all me.
Grace disappeared through the station’s door as I pulled into a visitor parking spot at WPQD. My measly hour of sleep was beginning to take its toll. I climbed out of the car and stomped my feet to shake off the drowsiness before hustling into the warehouse-size brick building—a former party goods store. With their economic challenges, the Piqued hadn’t been throwing as many parties. Celebration had gone belly-up.
WPQD was suffering, too—federal grants decimated, ad revenues down. Half the time, some dejected host was chanting the phone number during a fund-raiser and offering hemp tote bags or Bruce Springsteen CDs in return for donations. As I entered, “Uptown Funk” was playing on the air. On the far side of the lobby, Grace’s boss, Monty Beers, sang along in his glass studio. He pulled a serious face when he spotted me, gave a big thumbs-up and mouthed, “You go, girl!” before fading the music out and starting the news.
“Good morning. This is Monty Beers with WPQD Weekly News in Review. The town of Pequod is still on edge as the police hunt for Hugh and Helene Walker’s killer. Apple-picking season is in its final week. And an economic report released yesterday is forecasting the 2018 economy will be ‘okayish.’ This and more. Stay tuned.” He flipped on a public service announcement and gave me two thumbs-up this time.
What was Monty’s big rah-rah for me about? He’d seen me on the news, I supposed. It looked like he believed my statement and was trying to show emotional support—praising me for managing to hold it together given the traumatic events of the week. I was grateful for a little encouragement. I proceeded to the kitchen to snatch two mugs and a peach Yoplait from the minifridge.
Tips for Living Page 19