“I, well, uhm, I guess that will be okay.” I tried hard not to sound pissed, but I must not have been successful.
She puckered up like she was about to start bawling. “I just hate that I’m causing you so much trouble. I’ll go now. It’s okay. I’ve been out on the streets before. I’m sure I can find a bench somewhere safe. It’s supposed to get a little cold tonight, though. Do you have a sleeping bag and a jacket I can borrow?”
For a split second, I actually considered getting my sleeping bag and tossing her out, but, honestly, what choice did I have? She didn’t have anywhere to go and, even if she did, she didn’t have any money.
I couldn’t have her out on the street. My luck, something would happen to her. I could just see the headlines in one of those stupid gossip magazines: “Unemployed DJ Responsible for Death of Major Movie Star”.
Even worse, Mom would kill me if she found out I’d made another woman sleep on the streets, even if I had provided a down-filled sleeping bag advertised as being good in temperatures as low as the 20s.
“No, no. It’s fine. It’s just that, well, I’m tired and I’ve had a really crappy day.” I didn’t feel like baring my soul and spilling my guts to her, so I planned to just leave it at that.
“Is this about you losing your job?” she asked. “I heard. It was on the news. That skanky reporter, the one Vivi’s sister beat down, reported it. Dude! That must have been one whacked out fight!”
Great. Now the news I’d been fired was all over town and I hadn’t told my mom or Tim yet. I pulled my phone out of my tote bag and checked. It had died, of course. When I plugged it in to charge it, it buzzed and jiggled up a storm, letting me know I had six messages from Mom. I ignored Beau’s comment about the fight and the text messages and went to get my bomber jacket out of the closet.
“I’m going to meet my boyfriend for dinner,” I said. “I’ll be back in about an hour. Do you need anything?”
I wished I hadn’t asked. She needed six things, including, of course some sort of vegan food, maybe some vegan sushi?
“I doubt they have that, but I’ll see. If not, I can get you another salad, maybe some soup or something.”
“Only if it’s fresh made. I never eat canned goods. Those chemicals they use to preserve things are like super dangerous.”
I blinked and did an imaginary eye roll. “Got it: cans bad, vaping good. I’ll see what I can do.”
When I left, she had sprawled on the sofa, giggling over another stupid video on my laptop, while Delbert perched on top of my entertainment center, probably begging me not to go. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I sort of hoped that he’d come on down and actually bite Beau. A girl can hope, can’t she?
Tim leaned against the bar chatting with Bette, Pilazzo’s head waitress. Four guys and a gal, all wearing black and purple bowling league shirts, surrounded one of the scuffed up tables, laughing and joking about how badly their match had sucked. I said hey to a friend of Charli’s who was just leaving, then stopped at the bentwood coat rack to take off my jacket, but mainly to ogle Tim for a few seconds before joining them.
“So, for once, Marty wasn’t involved,” I overheard Tim tell Bette over the cackles and juke-box music, which, thankfully, was not playing one of the eight zillion Ricky Ray songs it housed.
I snuck over, wrapped my arms around his shoulders, and covered his eyes. “Boo. And what do you mean, for once?”
He pushed my hands down and kept talking, raising his voice just a bit to tease me. “Yes, for once, she managed to stay out of trouble. So, we’re making progress. Oh, speak of the devil.”
He playfully chucked me under my chin. “I was just telling Bette about May Lynda and Giselle’s cage match down in Skunk’s Bottom.”
“Wish I’d been there,” Bette said. “I always miss the excitement.”
“It was something, all right. You should have seen Giselle’s face when May Lynda hopped on her back,” I said. “I wish I’d had my camera out.”
“I’d have paid good money to see that,” Bette said. She clinked ice into a tall glass, drew a root beer from the soda fountain, and plopped it on the bar in front of me. “Heard about your bad luck, hon. If you need extra cash, Dave said to give him a call. Lord knows we can always use another hand around here on the weekends.”
Tim looked puzzled. “What bad luck?” he asked. “Why would you need extra cash? Is Charli getting rid of the shop or something?”
So he hadn’t heard yet. I let out a big sigh. “Herb and Georgina decided that since Giselle took a job back at the television station, they are going to take the morning show in a different direction. They gave me two months severance and canceled my non-compete, so at least there’s that. It’s fine. I’ll be fine.”
I knew I didn’t sound fine, but I’d decided to go with the “fake-it-’til-you-make-it” routine in the hopes that it would finally stick.
“Oh, babe, I’m sorry,” Tim said. “Don’t worry, okay? I have faith that you’ll land another gig before you know it. You’re good. The best. Herb’s an idiot for letting you get away.”
I patted him on the arm. “Thanks, babe. You’re earning yourself some major boyfriend points, but you can stop now.”
A bell rang and “Order up!” came from the back. Bette hustled through the swinging doors into the kitchen to get our food. I picked up my root beer and followed Tim to the back room, which was empty.
“I miss you,” I said. “Do you have to go in early again tomorrow?”
“No. They’re basically calling off the search now that they’ve got the car up. There’s nothing else really we can do. Like I told you earlier, Winger thinks Ricky’s being missing and Vivi’s murder are connected. Only thing new is they found lethal amounts of cyanide in both the water and in her vape juice.”
The image of Vivi vaping just before she drank the coconut water popped into my head. “Someone really wanted her dead.” Or, her and me. I shuddered.
“That’s what Winger said. She would have probably died from either one, but the combination of the two killed her almost instantly.”
Bette brought us our Stromboli and refills for our sodas. My mouth watered.
“Otey’s out front,” she said. “I didn’t tell him y’all were back here yet in case you didn’t want company.”
“Tell him to come on back,” Tim told her.
“Hope that’s okay,” he said to me. “I need to ask him about using the playground and shop next month. We’re going to do a platoon challenge, mainly for bragging rights.”
“No, it’s fine,” I said. “As long as he doesn’t swipe my fries. I’m going to the rest room. Guard them with your life.”
When I got back, my fries were almost gone and Otey and Tim were jawing about the fight between May Lynda and Giselle.
I shot Otey a pretend dirty look. “Officer, I’d like to report a theft. Dang it, Otey. I was really looking forward to those. You owe me another order.”
He winked.”I was just playing with you. I already told Bette to bring you another basket. So, anyway, May Lynda’s mortified. We didn’t even go out to dinner like I’d planned. Giselle played it up on the news, of course. Made out like she was some sort of saint.”
“Did you charge them both or just May Lynda?” I asked Tim.
“Only May Lynda since she started it, but just with disturbing the peace. Giselle pushed for May Lynda to get assault 1, but Jason talked her out of it. Told her to consider what May Lynda was going through, what with losing her job and her sister getting murdered. Giselle refused at first. You know how hard-headed she is, but Jason took her aside and whispered something to her and all of the sudden, she agreed to drop it.
“Jason who?” I asked.
“Winger. He and Giselle are sort of dealing with each other.”
“Detective Winger? And Giselle?” I tried to process this new piece of gossip, but it grossed me out. “I would have thought he’d have better sense than that,” I said. Then I remembered
something from the first time I’d met him. “I thought he was married. I remember Charli saying that his wife was Kevin’s teacher last year.”
“He was. Well, is, I guess. He’s been separated since July or August, I think. So, anyway, truth is, I was glad he got Giselle to back off. Assault usually brings much more punishment.”
“May Lynda’s stressed about it enough as it is,” Otey said. “She’s never been in trouble before and she thinks it’s going to hurt her job search. I tried to reassure her, but she’s pretty distraught.”
“Tell her not to worry about it,” Tim told him. “It’s a misdemeanor. She’ll probably just get community service and a fine. It’s possible, if she gets a good lawyer and the right judge, it might even get dismissed.”
“I sure hope so,” I said. “Good thing you guys were there already.”
“That’s for sure,” Tim said. “Let me tell you, if we hadn’t pulled her off when we did, no telling what damage she’d have done to Giselle. I didn’t realize she had it in her.”
“I guess all that training May Lynda’s been doing at the playground is paying off,” Otey said.
“Yep!” Tim finished the last of his Stromboli and drained his soda. “She’s definitely scrappier than Marty.”
“No she’s not!” I said. “I’m plenty scrappy. I’ve been...” In my annoyance, I almost gave away my secret. I caught myself just in time. “I’ve been the winner of lots of fights.” Okay, so mainly imaginary ones, but still...
Tim and Otey laughed and Otey patronizingly patted my head.
“No, you haven’t,” Otey said. “Heck, that Sugar chick would probably kick your butt and she’s old.”
“She would not. Not that I’m going to try and find out or anything,” I assured Tim, knowing that he was going to bring up the ridiculous number of fights I’d been forced into over the past couple of years since the tricky trio had decided to wreak havoc with my life. “I’ve turned over a new leaf. I’ve got this system now where, whenever anyone messes with me or tries to get me riled up, I go all “what would mom do” and then I do that. It’s working, too.”
Tim stood up and pulled a wad of cash out of his wallet. “Well good. You keep doing that.” He kissed me on top of my head and plopped down two tens. “I’d hate for anything to happen to you. Oats, my man, I gotta scoot. I’ll shoot you an email and we can firm up the details for the challenge.”
Otey yawned. “Later, bud. Be careful out there, you hear?”
“You want me to walk out with you?” I asked Tim.
“Nope. I can manage.” He kissed the top of my head again. “Since you don’t have to go in at the crack of dawn tomorrow, you want me to come over after I get off tonight?”
I almost said yes, but then remembered Beau. No way I wanted Tim to know about her. He’d insist I tell Winger and then he’d tell Giselle and it would be all over town that I was harboring a major movie star.
“How about I come to your place instead? Your apartment’s probably way cleaner than mine,” I said, knowing it was true. Tim’s place is neater than mine even when I don’t have a slob staying with me.
“Sounds good. Can you pick up a six pack and maybe some chips or something to snack on? I’m out.”
I agreed and looked around to make sure that no one other than Otey was around, then gave him a big, sloppy kiss. “Don’t forget about those handcuffs,” I whispered.
Tim blinked, went neon, and did his guppy impression. “I, I, uh, I was only kidding, Marty,” he said.
I lifted my eyebrows and tried to fake a sultry tone. “Really? Too bad.”
He was still standing by the table staring at me, opening and closing his mouth, when I sat back down and started chatting nonchalantly with Otey. Finally, he waved bye and left, looking back over his shoulder at me three times before he got out of the back room.
Otey chuckled. “I don’t know what you said to him, but from the looks of it, he ain’t gonna be thinking clearly the rest of the night. You ought to be ashamed.”
“Who me?” I said, pretending to be little Miss Innocent. “He’ll be fine. He’s just heading back to the station to do paperwork. I wouldn’t have teased him if he’d been going back on patrol.”
Bette brought out a big basket of fries and onion rings. “Fresh out of the fryer. Y’all need anything else?”
After assurances that we were fine, she left, and I asked Otey how Miss Guydie was handling May Lynda’s fight.
“I don’t think it really registered. She’s pretty focused on making the arrangements for Vivi. They’re going to hold off on the memorial service and do it next Friday. A lot more of the family can come then since it’s the day after Thanksgiving and they thought maybe some of her friends out in L.A. might want to come. Izzy’s not happy about it, though. She wants to go ahead and get it over with, says she needs to move on. That they need to all get on with their lives and the sooner the better.”
“Move on? It’s not even been two days. That’s pretty cold. I mean, I know they had a lot of sibling rivalry, but still, that’s her twin sister, not some acquaintance.” I dumped a glob of ketchup on the side of my plate and another glob of mustard for the onion rings on the other side.
“I know. I was pretty shocked when she said it. Izzy’s always been jealous and angry about Vivi’s success, but once she got that job running Ricky’s fan club, May Lynda said she seemed happier and less bitter. Then, about a month or so ago, she said something changed and things between Izzy and Vivi got a lot worse, even worse than before. She said she didn’t know what it was, but that Izzy was particularly furious when Vivi showed up Sunday.”
I looked up at my friend. “It probably didn’t help that Vivi was inside the house, getting to cozy up to the Riley’s and she was stuck outside with those nutty fans.”
“Exactly. Plus you saw how Izz acted when I brought that coconut water over for Vivi. She heard why I was there, she acted like she’d been slapped.”
“Yeah, you know, at the time, I thought it was because she was just jealous. But now that I think about it, maybe it wasn’t so much about you as it was the fact that Vivi was there in the first place.”
“You saying I’m not the center of the world? Harsh, Marty.” He pretended to pout. “Naw, you’re probably right. May Lynda told me Izzy tried to get Vivi to come outside and talk to them Sunday night, but Vivi refused.”
“Probably because she knew that whatever it was Izzy wanted to talk about was going to cause a fight. When I went over to the Riley’s on Monday, they were going at each other.” I told him about the argument I’d witnessed. “Izzy was clearly way more angry than Vivi. The thing is, I only caught the tail-end of it, so I don’t know what it was about. May Lynda broke it up when she saw me. She doesn’t know what it’s about?”
“Some of it, but she didn’t want to talk about it. She said it was private, just between the three of them, but it sounded like at least some of it had to do with money. Vivi supposedly had a lot of it and Izzy was always broke. She had a pile of college loans and, even with the fan club job, she was barely scraping by. Maybe she asked Viv if she could borrow some money and Vivi said no.”
That made sense. “May Lynda told me the other night that Vivi promised to pay off their student loans when she got her next promotion. You think maybe she told Izzy she’d changed her mind?”
“That’s actually a good guess. Good as any. We’ll probably never know.” He checked his phone for the time. “Welp, I gotta run. Gotta get my beauty sleep. It ain’t easy being this purty.”
“We still on for in the morning?”
“Yep. Meet you there.” He walked me out to my car and hugged me goodbye. “Thanks for the company. You’re a good gal, Marty. That Timbo, he’s a lucky guy. Hope he knows it.”
“Thanks for the compliment, Otey, but you’re wrong. I’m the lucky one. It just took me a long dang time to realize it. And I’m bound and determined to not do anything to mess it up.”
Looking b
ack, I sure wish I’d have listened to myself. Maybe things wouldn’t have turned out so badly if I had.
17
When I got home, the bedroom door was closed, so I figured Beau was asleep. Shoes, clothes, and food containers, including a bowl with crusted over oatmeal, littered my living room and kitchen. I finally located Delbert, who was trapped once again in my linen closet, by following his pitiful mewling.
“You need to stop going in there, buddy!” I told him. “I know it’s all cozy and warm, but people don’t know you’re in there and you get locked in.”
I fed him, rubbed his tummy, then did a quick straighten of the apartment, all the while fussing and fuming at my inconsiderate house guest. I left her a note telling her I was going over to Tim’s and letting her know she owed me another $57.84 for the things I’d picked up for her at the store.
I tried not to think too hard about my rapidly dwindling bank account, preferring instead to more fully embrace my flirtation with Delusion and Denial, those handsome cousins to the tricky trio.
The next morning, after parking in the driveway of the only house on Skillet Road, an old log cabin with a sagging porch that had been abandoned for a couple of years, I got out and started warming up. The bridge to the main road had been closed for about eight to ten years, and since no one lived on the road and it was a bit off the beaten track, it was the perfect place to work out, especially if, like me, you didn’t want to be seen. In all the time Otey and I had been running out there, I’d never seen another soul.
I half-heartedly stretched while I waited around for Otey, but when he still hadn’t appeared or responded to my text at ten after eight, I decided to go ahead and get started without him. I took a last slug of water, then jogged slowly down the road toward the bridge.
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