Fish Nets: The Second Guppy Anthology

by Ramona DeFelice Long

  After the last service, I straightened up the library once more and left. But I didn’t go home. Sometimes people took books and set them down somewhere else in the building. It was a long shot since so many were missing, but it couldn’t hurt to walk around the church and look.

  The church wasn’t a building so much as a complex of buildings. There was the main building, which held the sanctuary, expanded three times over the two decades; a smaller pair of buildings for staff offices; and across the street, the building that housed ministry activities like kids’ Sunday School classes, the ear-numbingly loud Teen Worship service, the After School program, and the library. Each had little waiting areas, with two or three corporate-looking chairs, the kind that look like they’d be comfy but aren’t, and a small table beside them.

  That’s where I found the missing books. Not all in one place, but sown among the waiting areas. I collected them until my arms were full—figuring I was on a fool’s errand, I hadn’t brought a bag—took them back to the library, and returned for another pass. It took three trips to get them home. It was awkward, carrying armloads of books while wearing a skirt. I still wasn’t used to wearing skirts all the time, but Doug preferred women not wear pants so I hadn’t since we starting dating seriously.

  Whew. That was weird. But I had them back. When Brenda saw the well-stocked shelf, would she apologize for getting snippy? Probably not.

  * * * *

  Next Sunday, I checked the evangelism shelf first thing, and was relieved to see the books still in place. Which was more than I could say for the children’s books. Someone, or more likely someone’s assistant, had “cleaned up,” rearranging books by size and color. It made a striking image on the shelf but was useless for finding anything. It took me an hour to re-alphabetize them.

  After that the morning ran on rails. As usual, the time between the first and second services was brisk but not busy. During second service, people began trickling in, making a beeline for the coffee. True to form, towards the end of second service, Lisa the Left Behind Lady checked out Book 9, her heavy bag perched this time on her hip. Clara dropped by when fifteen people were in line, but it was a perfunctory visit, her flicking gaze making clear she was really there to see what I’d done about the children’s books, nostrils flaring when she saw it already fixed. Oh well. Just another round of survival of the fittest.

  I was basking in the post-rush glow when Facilities Pastor Clark came to the counter. “Why is there an empty shelf in the Coffee and Conversation area?”

  “What?” I was out of my chair in a tick.

  He frowned. “If you’re not able to make good use of the space…”

  I made a beeline for the shining pots. There was my evangelism shelf, buck naked. I bit down on an unchurchly word.

  Pastor Clark had followed. “This area…”

  “Again?”

  I found Brenda at my elbow. Another unholy thought burst through my brain.

  “She’s not doing her job,” she hissed at Pastor Clark.

  “I know—”

  “I’m head of the Fish Nets—”

  “This is prime real estate—”

  “My committee donated those books—”

  “Right by the coffee pots—”

  “Out of our own budget—”

  “I knew a bookstore was a better—”

  “Incompetent—”

  “Ought to be replaced—”

  “Ought to be fired!” Brenda wagged a finger under my nose. She was gone before I could blink at the too-close manicured nail.

  “So this shelf’s been empty for a while?” Pastor Clark nodded to himself. “Very poor use of space.” He tsked. “Room is too tight to give any over to inefficacy. Just like Toyota.”

  I kept my teeth together until he was gone.

  * * * *

  Someone was out to get me.

  This time I brought a bag, and it was full to groaning by the time I collected the evangelism books, scattered once more around the campus like grass seed.

  Someone was removing the books and distributing them hither and yon. A person who borrowed without checking out only took a few books, and took them home, intending to bring them back. The rare outright thief took some, but not so many. A prankster bent on random destruction would drop them into trash cans, not end tables.

  Somebody was trying to make me look bad.

  It was disheartening how many prospects there were.

  Maybe I could set up a webcam and catch the culprit. But did I really want to stay when someone was trying so hard to get rid of me? It’d be creepy, like watching over my shoulder at a haunted house, waiting for the next ragged creature to jump out. And what if it didn’t work, but they found out I’d tried? Much better to go quietly and with some dignity intact.

  How long before my Ministry Supervisor asked me to resign?

  At least Doug would be back soon. Just a week left. I made dinner reservations. I’d tell him about grad school, and we could celebrate his homecoming, my new career, and me getting fired all at once.

  * * * *

  Next Sunday the evangelism books were still there when I arrived. I wasn’t reassured. That’d been true last week and they disappeared before the last service. But the morning was butter-smooth.

  Just before the between-service rush, Pastor Clark went pointedly to the Coffee and Conversation section, then walked past with a stiff look on his face that told me the shelf wasn’t empty. Clara made a perfunctory complaint about the “messiness” of the DVD slat wall, which turned out to mean three cases were upside down.

  As I was reshelving during third service, Brenda flounced by. Just like Pastor Clark, the look on her face told me everything I needed to know. As third service ended, I checked the shelf again. All was well.

  The morning was nearly over. The books were still there. Thank goodness.

  Whatever had happened, it was over now. I felt a twinge of guilt at having suspected sabotage. Fortunately, guilt is a specialty of Catholics. I whistled softly as I headed back to the counter and began entering new materials into the catalog.

  Left Behind #10 slapped down right by my nose.

  “Oh!”

  “Sorry!” Lisa panted. “I wasn’t sure you’d still be here. I really wanted to get the next one.” She hiked her monstrous bag further up on her hip.

  “No rush,” I said. “I’m always here for about half an hour after the last service.”

  “Ooo,” she breathed. “That’s good to know. I usually go to second service but I slept in this morning and had to come to third.”

  I swiped the book and handed it back to her.

  “Thanks!”

  “No problem. Have a good day.”

  “You, too!”

  In a few minutes the library was empty. Once everyone was gone, I gave in and whistled openly while I typed. Sometime later the custodian stopped by. “You gonna be much longer? I’m turning lights off.”

  “Would another ten minutes be okay? I’d like to finish these last two books.”

  “Sure. I’ll lock up the other buildings and come back.” He paused. “Is that empty shelf an extra? I could get rid of it for you.”

  I froze. “Empty shelf?”

  He pointed towards the coffee area, his ring of keys jangling.

  I was wheeling around the counter, skirt flapping, before his goodbye faded.

  The evangelism shelf was empty again.

  I thought something so vile I’d never heard a real person say it, just characters in movies.

  How had this happened? All the suspects were at the library that morning but the shelf had been full when they left. Could one have slipped back without me noticing? But I’d been watching. I hadn’t seen any of them.

  And—why had the books disappeared so much later this week? Brenda, Clark, and Clara came through at their usual times. If one of them took the books…why the change?

  Understanding rang in my head like Eucharist bells.

&nb
sp; It wasn’t any of them.

  It was Lisa.

  There wasn’t a plot to discredit me. Just a woman’s Left Behind-inspired attempt to save souls before the Rapture. I could picture it as clearly as if I’d seen it. Lisa’s enthusiasm, the bulging bag when she only checked out one book at a time. Scattering the books around the church’s public areas, trying to encourage the faithful to go forth and convert the lost before it was too late. Honest, earnest Lisa, wanting to save the world.

  I blew out a breath, wrestling my irritation. No doubt she hadn’t meant to cause me problems. Next week I’d explain how her well-intentioned attempts to goad her fellow congregants were making me seem disorganized. I could suggest she join the Fish Nets as an outlet for her evangelistic fervor.

  The door opened. I turned, hoping it might be Lisa coming back but expecting the custodian.

  It was Doug.

  I wasn’t expecting him until evening. He must have caught an earlier flight. I beamed. I wanted to run to him and hug him but he disliked public displays of affection, so stayed where I was.

  He gave a thin smile, grave as always. “Hello.”

  “How was India?”

  “As expected.”

  Now I did come to him and, unable to resist, touched his hand. “I have good news!”

  “Your acceptance to graduate school? I heard.”

  I took a step back. “You heard?”

  “Clara emailed me.”

  “Clara?” I shook my head. “But you said you don’t like to be contacted on a business trip.”

  His hand flicked impatiently. “Not for trivia, of course, but it is acceptable in an emergency.”

  “Emergency?” I took another step back. Grad school was an emergency?

  He gestured to the table. “Please sit. We need to talk.”

  I sat.

  His face fell into deeper lines. “You can’t.”

  “Yes, I can. I got a fellowship.” Giddy relief swamped me. “Is that what you’re worried about, the money?”

  “No…I have a Bachelor’s degree.”

  “Um…okay…?”

  “God doesn’t want the woman to be more educated than the man.”

  I resisted the urge to dig at my ear with my little finger. “What?”

  He said it again.

  It still didn’t make any sense. “Where in the Bible did you get that?”

  He coughed. “It’s not in the Bible, per se. It’s my interpretation of the writings of John Calvin.”

  I stared. Was he joking? A little welcome-back ridiculousness?

  Doug never joked.

  “You mean,” I said slowly, “I either give up grad school or you’ll break up with me?”

  He nodded as if pleased with my quick understanding.

  My eyes flooded. I blinked, trying to keep wetness from spilling out. He hated emotional displays of any sort.

  Something snapped.

  Why did I care what he liked or disliked?

  I’d given up Mass and jeans for him. The centuries-old splendor of the Liturgy, prayers etched in memory since childhood, the dignified plainchant of the priest.

  Jeans were insignificant in comparison. Except they weren’t, when you realized, as I saw now, what they represented. Ease of movement. Freedom. Men and women dressing the same.

  I shivered, as if I’d suddenly noticed a pit I’d almost tumbled into.

  “Doug,” I began softly, then stopped.

  It wasn’t his fault. Not entirely. If he’d tried to put me into a box, make me into his idea of a nice little Protestant girl, I’d let him. Most of my friends from college were already married. A few even had kids. Desperate for a boyfriend, I’d gone along.

  “Doug,” I said again quietly.

  Quietly.

  No. Not quietly. I’d been ready to walk away from the library quietly.

  That was the coward’s way. And I was a coward. Not only was I too afraid of being single to challenge Doug’s controlling ways, I sniggered at people in my head who I was patently afraid to confront. Like Clara. Who clearly wasn’t at all afraid of me. I was even too much of a wuss to say a swear word out loud. I liked to think of myself as bold, even edgy, but that’s exactly where my courage began and ended—in my head.

  I’d obeyed when he told me to sit, like a well-trained puppy. Now I stood. “You can bite me.”

  He blinked.

  “And John Calvin can bite me. I quit.”

  “Quit…?” Surprise shivered across his face, more emotion than I’d ever seen there. Anger followed. “You’re breaking up with me? You’re breaking up with me?” His face reddened. “I should have known. Ungrateful papist. I tried to save you.”

  Ten minutes earlier, learning that Doug shared his congregation’s all-too-common view about Catholics would have upset me. Now it stoked my resolve. His arrogance had wanted to mold a girl into his ideal wife. A Catholic girl was even better—what a spiritual coup. But it’d been helped along by my craven unwillingness to stand up for myself or anything else. No more. Not ever again.

  I started for the door.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Mass.” I pulled the door open. “Then grad school. In jeans.”

  FISHING FOR MURDER, by Teresa Hewitt Inge

  Detective Dexter McKane watched from the Rudee Inlet Bridge as the crane operator lowered a silver pick-up truck onto a barge in the Virginia Beach inlet. Two crewmen the size of small mountains stood on the barge deck, guiding the operator.

  “Any sign of the driver?” Detective Katie Whitaker asked Dexter as they stood near a team of accident reconstructionists gathering readings and measurements of impact, skid marks, and speed calculations on the bridge.

  “No.” Dexter turned toward the Virginia Beach dive team onboard a police boat floating near the barge. The team had finished an underwater search and rescue for Mac Seagraves, driver of the pick-up truck who was nowhere to be found. However, his fishing partner, Bobby Harrison, had been riding shotgun and was found safe and sound after swimming to shore. Dexter and Katie exited the bridge and made their way down a slippery, wet embankment and onto a dirt path under the bridge. They walked past a group of rubberneckers eager to find out about the truck that had tumbled off the bridge. The detectives stopped to talk with an officer posted at the beach for crowd control.

  “Well, well, look what the sand drug in. I see the brass called in the experts,” the officer teased.

  Dexter grinned, sporting a new set of veneers that covered teeth discolored from years of smoking. The veneers were part of his self-induced makeover to help him look and feel better alongside the young, fit detectives in the unit. He’d already given up cigarettes, the hardest part of his journey. “Detective Whitaker and I will be working with the crash team.”

  The officer nodded toward the attractive brunette detective.

  “Whatcha got?” Dexter asked.

  “What I’ve got is an open and shut.”

  Dexter’s eyebrows arched, heavier and darker than the thinning gray hair on his head. “How so?”

  “The passenger, Bobby Harrison, stated Mac Seagraves lost control of the vehicle in the rainstorm while on the bridge. They hit the jersey wall and took a nosedive into the water. Simple as that.”

  “Where’s the passenger?” Dexter asked the officer.

  “Over at the fishing pier near the ambulance. He’s wrapped in a dark-green blanket.” The officer pointed toward a sandy haired man.

  “Any other vehicles involved?” Dexter said.

  “Nope.”

  “What about witnesses?”

  “Two fishermen were packing up their gear on the north bank when the crash occurred but they didn’t see anything due to the downpour,” the officer said.

  “What about relatives?”

  “There’s a daughter. Name’s Abbey Seagraves. She’s the pretty young blonde in the red parka. She’s sitting on a bench at the fishing pier with her boyfriend, Tyler Logan, an al
l-star wrestler at Virginia Beach High.”

  “Any other relatives?” Dexter said.

  “No. The mother died a few years back. The father was raising the daughter by himself in a cottage on 9th Street.”

  Dexter waved. “Thanks for the info.”

  “Hey, McKane. Rumor has it you’re on your way out. Is that the reason for your new sidekick?”

  “Don’t believe everything you hear and only half of what you see.” Dexter was not pleased he had a young female partner assigned to him. Her gender had nothing to do with his frustration. From what he’d seen she didn’t know which end was up.

  “What was that about?” Katie asked.

  “Smart-ass cop. Thinks he knows everything. Just follow my lead so you don’t get yourself in trouble.”

  Katie snorted. “I’ll have you know that I am quite capable of assisting you with this investigation.”

  Dexter turned toward her. “That’s right. The operative word here is assist. And don’t forget it.”

  He made his way toward the fishing pier with Katie trailing behind. He tried to button his coat to shield himself from the chilly, mid-March air, but the twenty pounds he packed on last year when he quit smoking made it difficult. Losing weight was also a part of his makeover.

  “I’ll talk to the passenger first, then the daughter,” Dexter said to Katie as they walked toward Bobby Harrison.

  “Mr. Harrison, I’m Detective McKane and this is Detective Whitaker.” Dexter put his hands in his pockets and jingled some loose change around, a habit he’d picked up since quitting smoking.

  Bobby nodded.

  “I’m sorry to hear about your friend,” Dexter said to the grim faced man with bloodshot eyes. “I understand you swam in frigid water?”

  “Rough is more like it.”

  “Have you been checked out by the paramedics?”

  “Yes.”

  “The accident must have been pretty frightening for you?”

  “I feared for my life,” Bobby said.

  “What did you and Mac do today?”