Assignment Austin

by Lucey Phillips

  “I’m kind of sore, too,” he said, rubbing his neck. “Oh hey! You have a kitchen!”

  I looked toward the tiny kitchenette. “I guess.”

  “Do you like to cook?”

  I shrugged. “If I’m really hungry and there’s directions on the box, then yeah, I’ll make something.”

  For me and my mom, meals were mostly fast food and frozen pizza. A lot of the time, we didn’t sit down together for actual meals. I learned at a young age to make a sandwich or bowl of cereal—if we had groceries in the house—when I was hungry.

  The year we lived around the corner from a convenience store, I pretty much lived on their 99-cent hot dogs.

  But there were times when Mom seemed to be doing better—still drinking, but not as heavily. She could make spaghetti or bacon and eggs. I should have asked her to show me how to make eggs.

  In college I did learn the art of preparing boxed macaroni and cheese.

  “I’m a decent cook,” Colin said. “Maybe I’ll make us something one night?”

  I smiled. “Yeah. Okay.”

  He held the door for me as we left the cottage. My stomach knotted as I walked past him, close enough to catch the light but masculine aroma of his cologne. I knew we would probably kiss again—I wanted that, anyway. But thinking about the logistics of more romance between us, wondering when and how it might happen, was starting to make me nervous.

  At least I had work to distract me. I always had my work.

  “You’re kind of isolated over here,” he said while we followed the path back to the main house of the Bluestem Inn. “Is this lit at night?”

  “I think so,” I said. “I could get used to the isolation. Maybe I’ll live in the country someday. I can have a garden and stuff.”

  “I can’t see you enjoying the quiet life. You’re, like, the opposite of a homebody.”

  He was right about that. I’d worked really hard to get myself into a lifestyle that didn’t require me to even have a home.

  “I guess so,” I said. “I like this—traveling. I think I could do it forever.”

  Colin and I were going back to the River Lane Rec Center to meet Kara and Mia. The plan was for me to try skating and learn some of the rules for derby.

  The parking lot was nearly full when we arrived. There was a group of women gathered around a station wagon, talking and laughing. Some of them wore Violent Crown T-shirts, the backs of which were splashed with the SoCo Athletics logo.

  Colin stopped in the parking lot to wait for a pickup truck to back out, then parked in that space. A few more women, with large equipment bags over their shoulders, were leaving the side entrance while we walked toward that door. They seemed to be talking about meeting for drinks that night.

  None of them said hello, or even looked at us.

  The gymnasium was as hot as it had been the last time we were there. And now it smelled like stale sweat. Mia was already there, skating backwards laps. She grinned and waved when she saw Colin and me.

  Kara was there too. She rolled up to us and said hello, managing only a tiny smile. Her skin was pale.

  “Thanks for coming, guys. I think you’ll like this, Jae. Maybe you’ll even want to join a team when you get home,” Kara said.

  I smiled, without telling her that I don’t have an actual home. Or that I avoid visiting my hometown whenever possible.

  “The world is our home,” Colin said with a chuckle.

  Kara’s eyes widened. “Oh, you mean you just travel all the time? You don’t go home in between doing your different articles?”

  I smiled.

  “No, not really. It’s fun though. This is kind of my dream job. I love to travel.”

  “You too, Colin?” Kara asked. “You don’t go home either?”

  “I’m new at this,” Colin said. “I’ve only been on the road with Jae for a few weeks. But I guess I’ll go home sometimes, to visit my family.”

  Kara nodded. “My family’s in California. I usually just see them during the holidays. But I would really miss my friends, especially my team, if I traveled for work like you guys do.”

  I found a chair and put on the pair of skates Kara had given me. I hadn’t been on roller skates since I was a little kid. But in middle school, I spent quite a few weekend afternoons at the local ice rink in the wintertime.

  I pulled the laces so tight that the skates and my feet felt like one solid, numb body part. I stood gingerly, expecting to feel unsteady. But this time, unlike on the paddle board, balancing was easy. It was intuitive. I made a lap around the gymnasium, enjoying the smooth rolling sounds of the ball bearings in my skates and the plastic wheels against the wooden floor.

  It felt completely foreign, when I rolled up to Colin, to be standing eye to eye with him. The skates gave me at least three inches in height.

  “I could get used to this,” I said, folding my arms across my chest.

  Colin looked up from the controls he was adjusting on his camera. He smiled and raised his eyebrows.

  “Yeah? You look good, natural,” he said.

  “Hey, Jae!” Mia called out to me from across the track. She was skating fast toward Kara and grinning. “Did anyone ever explain to you why we roller girls wear our jerseys so tight?”

  I shook my head, expecting an off-color joke.

  “Don’t you dare!” Kara yelled and laughed.

  Kara tried to skate away from Mia, but Mia had too much momentum and she easily caught her. Both women were shrieking with laughter.

  In one wild move, Mia grabbed the hem of Kara’s T-shirt, pulled it halfway over Kara’s head, and gave Kara a hard shove.

  Kara stumbled, but was able to stay upright. She was smiling and shaking her head while she straightened her shirt. Luckily, she was wearing a full-coverage sports bra underneath.

  “We wear tight jerseys so the other team can’t do that to you, if you get in a fight,” Mia said, still grinning.

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said.

  Kara waved at me to come over to the track. She had Mia and me stand side-by-side as she started explaining a blocking technique. She was halfway through a sentence when she stopped talking abruptly, looked over my shoulder, and frowned.

  I turned to see what she was looking at.

  Lacey, the niece of the murder victim Harris Myer, was stomping toward us.

  “You’ve got some nerve showing your face here,” Lacey said. Her round, acne-scarred face was becoming a dark shade of red. “You don’t think I know about Neil?”

  Mia skated slowly toward Lacey, holding out both palms in a “slow down” motion.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Calm down.”

  “Lacey, I’m so sorry about your uncle…” Kara said. Her tone was sincere.

  She was interrupted by Lacey, whose voice was growing louder.

  “Yeah right! You and your whole team hated him,” she said. “I can’t believe you were all here when it happened, but supposedly nobody saw anything?”

  Colin jogged toward us.

  “The team stayed here for hours that day, talking to police,” Kara said. “We’re all trying to help.”

  “Maybe help cover up what your boyfriend did,” Lacey said. Her hands were clenched in trembling fists. “It’s so obvious, they probably got into an argument again and Neil went crazy or something.

  “When I got the call that my uncle had been killed, I knew your team had something to do with it. You were always so jealous of us,” Lacey said.

  “We’re not murderers!” Mia shouted.

  “Neil’s a thug. He has a record,” Lacey hissed.

  She lunged toward Kara, but Colin stepped between, causing her to bounce off of his chest and stumble. Mia skated next to Kara, folded her arms across her chest, and glared at Lacey, seeming to dare her to try again.

  “Lace!” a man’s voice shouted from behind us. “We’re leaving.”

  Lacey looked over her shoulder, but didn’t say anything to the man. She turned back to Kara.


  “You and Neil can’t hide behind your team forever,” Lacey said. “My aunt is going to use her life insurance money to hire a private investigator. You tell Neil to enjoy his freedom while it lasts—he’ll be in prison soon.”

  She turned and stomped away before anyone could respond.

  “I’d like to kick her ass,” Mia muttered when Lacey was out of earshot.

  “Friendly gal,” Colin said.

  Kara’s face was now completely drained of color. Mia threw an arm around her neck.

  “It’ll be fine, Kar. They just questioned Neil for a couple hours—that doesn’t mean anything,” she said. “Everyone knows he’s innocent.”

  “Not everyone,” Kara said. She was still watching the doorway where Lacey had made her exit. “Innocent people get convicted all the time… and in Texas…”

  Colin and I exchanged grim glances.

  “No,” Mia said emphatically. “Don’t jump to conclusions. You’ll drive yourself nuts if you think like that.”

  I knew this wasn’t the right time to ask Kara questions, but I just couldn’t stop myself. There were too many missing pieces.

  “What did Lacey mean about Neil’s record?” I asked.

  “He… he assaulted his dad, put him in the hospital,” Kara said. Her voice was monotone. “He was just defending his mom—the guy was an abusive monster. But they said the injuries were more than self-defense. Neil was eighteen. He only had to serve probation, but yeah, Lacey’s right. Neil does have a criminal record.”

  And he threatened Harris. And he doesn’t have an alibi.

  My face probably revealed too much of what I was thinking, because when Kara looked at me, her expression went from grim to desperate.

  “They have all this money now. What if they do get an investigator, and a shark lawyer, and they railroad Neil? We don’t have the money to fight all that.” Kara’s voice broke. She covered her face with her hands.

  Colin and I exchanged another look. I guessed he was thinking the same thing I was.

  So I told her, “We’ll help you.”

  | Six

  “Are you sure this guy is innocent?” Quinn asked me.

  “Um. Not really.”

  She was always my first step when I was doing a hard news investigation. Quinn was a stealthy hacker. Even most government databases couldn’t keep her out.

  “But Kara was crying and the murder victim, well, he doesn’t seem very victim-y. I think plenty of people are probably glad he’s gone.”

  “Okay,” Quinn said. “If the murderer wasn’t this Neil guy, who are we looking at?”

  I opened my mouth to answer her, then closed it.

  “Hello? Suspects?” she asked again.

  “I, I don’t know,” I said. “Harris Myer owned a gym and there are some steroid rumors. We could start with that, I guess. He did seem to spend a lot of money sponsoring this roller derby team, so maybe he’s selling, or running rackets, or something else shady.”

  Quinn sighed. “Did he have a girlfriend or boyfriend?”

  “There’s a wife. No kids. And his niece Lacey is captain of the roller derby team he sponsored—the Violent Crown.”

  “The Violent Crown?”

  My phone beeped. I looked at the screen. It was a number I didn’t recognize, so I went back to my conversation with Quinn.

  “It’s an Austin thing. They say the sky out here looks like a violet crown. So the derby ladies, you know, made it sound tough, I guess.”

  “Huh. Okay. So I’ll start with the business. You said it’s called SoCo Athletics? It shouldn’t be too hard to see their tax filings, payroll, stuff like that. I’ll check his credit report, too. This is starting to smell like a money thing.”

  “Thanks. Colin and I can go and check out the gym—maybe some people there will talk to us.”

  “Is it a big news story down there?”

  “Meh. There was a press conference yesterday, but I think it might fizzle pretty fast,” I said. “Unless the niece starts making some more noise. Then it could blow up.”

  “I guess I should look up Neil, too,” Quinn said. “Anything special I should know?”

  “He’s a phlebotomist. And he has an assault record. And he doesn’t have an alibi.”

  “Jeez, Jae. No wonder the police questioned him,” Quinn said. “How is he allowed to work in health care with that in his past?”

  “Maybe he pleaded down and it wasn’t a felony,” I sighed. “I know he looks kind of bad. But I told Kara I’d help.”

  “Okay, I’ll try to get back to you later today or tomorrow with whatever I find.”

  She started to say goodbye, but I interrupted her.

  “Did you look into your frequent flyer miles? You should come visit. I’m in this little cottage and there’s plenty of room for you,” I said. The pitch of my voice seemed to rise the longer I talked.

  “Uh, I don’t think I can get away right now. Plus I don’t want to be in the way of your new romance.” Quinn giggled.

  “Oh. Okay.”

  I knew I sounded deflated. I didn’t like revealing how disappointed I was, but I just couldn’t control the tone of my voice.

  “I’ll call you as soon as I find something, okay?” she asked.

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  We said goodbye.

  I took my key, my phone, and some cash, and stepped outside. I started walking. I didn’t have a destination in mind, but I knew I didn’t want to sit inside, alone.

  I needed to stop inviting Quinn to visit me. She always had a reason, or maybe excuse, for not coming. I believed her—she wasn’t just making stuff up. But I also knew that, if she really wanted to come, she could make it happen.

  I walked toward the inn’s main building. There was a refreshment area where they served iced tea and fruit. Maybe I would get a snack. Or maybe I could go see what Colin was up to.

  My phone started vibrating. It was that same unknown number that had called while I was talking to Quinn. I pressed “ignore” and slipped the phone back into my pocket.

  Inside the main building, I got myself an apple, a package of crackers, and a glass of iced tea. Then I found my way to the front porch, where I was relieved to see I had the place to myself.

  I sat in a wooden rocking chair and looked at my food, but I didn’t feel like eating. I was still thinking about Quinn. She had always been a good friend. And even though I wanted to be angry at her for flaking out on vague promises to visit me, I really couldn’t blame her.

  Most people are entrenched in work and family and social lives at home. Most normal people, anyway. If I wanted that, I told myself, I would have to stay in one place. I’d decided that’s not the lifestyle for me a long time ago—even before I took this travel writing job. Sometimes it felt like my whole life was leading up to this planned escape.

  My phone vibrated with the same number for a third time.

  I grumbled to myself and hit the “accept” button. I held the phone to my ear without saying hello. I was listening for the telltale beat of silence and the click of a robo-dialer.

  But instead, I heard a sniffle. An exaggerated, self-indulgent sniffle that made my skin crawl.

  “Mom?”

  “Oh, Jae, honey, finally!” my mother, Angela, said with her typical flare of urgency.

  “Hi, Mom. Where are you calling me from?” The number on my phone was a different area code than her rehab facility.

  “Oh, this is my friend Roger’s phone.”

  I sighed. Another “friend,” of course.

  “Why aren’t you at Briar Valley?”

  “Oh, they discharged me. The Medicaid insurance ran out and I was doing better, so…”

  Her speech sounded a little off—too bright in some places, fuzzy around the edges in others. She was probably already drinking again. There was a slight chance she was on an anti-withdrawal medication that was affecting the way she talked, but probably not.

  “Yeah. Who’s Roger?”
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br />   “Oh, I guess you never met him. We were friends before I went to the hospital. He’s really nice. I’m staying with him for a while, until I get on my feet.”

  “What? What about your apartment? I just paid your rent last week,” I said. My voice was shrill and my heart was starting to pound in my ears.

  “Well, yeah, honey, but the utilities got cut off. I can’t stay there in the dark, you know?”

  I held the phone away from my face and looked at the screen. It shook in my trembling hand. I fantasized about hurling my phone into the lawn in front of me. Then I imagined myself telling my mom to lose my number.

  “Jae? Are you there?” My mom’s voice sounded small, lost.

  I brought the phone to my ear again.

  “Don’t ask me to pay your utilities, Mom. You need to get your own stuff figured out.”

  “You’re right, sweetie. I will.”

  “I’m done being an enabler, Mom.”

  “Okay,” she said. “I know you shouldn’t have to worry about me all the time.”

  The next moments of silence made it clear that my mom had no other reason for calling me than to ask for money.

  “So. Where are you now?” she said finally.

  “Texas.”

  “Oh, nice. You’re doing well? I wanted to read your story from Las Vegas, but they didn’t let us get on the Internet at rehab and there’s no computer at Roger’s house.”

  “That’s okay. It’s nothing exciting. Fluff,” I said.

  “Don’t be down on yourself, Jae. You’re an amazing writer.”

  “I’m not down on myself, Mom,” I said. “I’m fine.”

  “Okay, well, Roger’s going to give me a ride to the unemployment office. I better get going.”

  “Okay. Bye.”

  “Bye, honey.”

  I set my phone on the table beside me and rocked in the chair, absently popping crackers into my mouth.

  Every now and then, my mom can show a little flicker of nurturing—of the mom she could be if her personality wasn’t buried under so many muddy layers of addiction. Those rare moments always catch me off guard. And, for some reason, they’re harder to stomach than the moments when she was doing her predictable, screw-up behavior.