Stay At Home Dead

by Jeffrey Allen

  My mother gathered her up and hugged her. “That is a very pretty van.”

  “Vans aren’t pretty,” my father grumbled.

  “And there’s no man in the back,” Carly added.

  “Well, we are glad about that,” my mother said, grinning at me.

  “That another Japanese car?” my father asked, squinting, even though his eyesight was better than mine.

  Carly wiggled out of my mother’s arms and shot inside the house.

  “Doesn’t Ford make a minivan?” my father asked.

  “They do but it sucks,” I said.

  “Watch your mouth,” my mother warned.

  “Yeah,” my dad said. “Chevys suck. Not Fords.”

  She swatted him in the ear. “Knock it off, Eldrick.” She looked at me. “Had quite a day yesterday, we hear.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Does anyone not know?”

  “Hard to keep a dead body quiet in this town,” my father said, still staring at the Toyota. “Especially when it’s a toad like Benny Barnes.”

  “You know anything about him trying to open a new business?” I asked.

  For all the noise he made about leaving Rose Petal, my father was just as entrenched in the town as my mother. For twenty-five years, he had managed Rose Petal Regional Bank and had been one of the town’s movers and shakers. Though he’d retired from the bank two years ago, he still held his seat on the town council, and rarely did anything go on in Rose Petal without his having gotten a whiff of it.

  He shifted his weight in the chair. “The kids thing?”

  “Grammy!” Carly yelled from inside the house.

  “Don’t give him horrific advice,” my mother said to him as she crossed between us. She cut her eyes to me. “Like visiting an old girlfriend right after her husband died.”

  “She called me,” I said.

  “Honestly, Deuce,” she said, frowning. “Do more things like that and people will think you’re dumber than your father.” She disappeared into the house.

  My father made a face at her.

  “I saw that,” she called back.

  He shrugged and motioned for me to sit down in the rocker she’d vacated. “What’d you hear?”

  I explained what Shayna had told me.

  “Sounds about right,” he said, nodding his head. “It hadn’t gone very far. That guy Barnabas had made some inquiries about land and zoning but hadn’t gone much further than that. Don’t know what his finances looked like, but I would assume a retarded monkey at the zoo has better credit.”

  “What’s Barnabas like? Shayna said he was fired from the rug store, too.”

  “Sounds about right.” My dad took his index finger and spun it in a circle near his temple. “Nuttier than the retarded monkey. You ever seen him?”

  “Nope.”

  He chuckled. “Well, I won’t spoil that surprise for you. But trust me. If I was gonna go into business with anyone, Odell Barnabas would be in line right behind the last guy I’d want as a partner.”

  Carly’s giggle wafted out from inside the house.

  “What were you doing over at Shayna’s?” my father asked.

  “Being stupid, I guess.”

  “I’d say so. Thank God your taste in women improved once you got outta high school.” He chuckled to himself. “Julianne will like that one.”

  “She won’t care. You know that.”

  “Don’t be upsetting my Julianne. Might disown you.”

  I was lucky. Julianne and my parents got along better than I did with my parents. I think they were shocked that someone who had so much going for her would choose to marry me. Not that I hadn’t shared those same thoughts, but they liked to voice it every so often, more to goose me than anything else. But I think even they were still a little uneasy with Julianne being the breadwinner in the family while I took care of Carly. Not that they didn’t approve. Just that they thought I might lose Carly at Target or something some afternoon. Which was always a possibility.

  “Leave it all alone, son,” my father said.

  “What?”

  “They found Benny in your car. So what?” He shook his head, frowned. “The bozos around here will try to make something of it, but the couple of right-thinking folks in Rose Petal will figure out. Shoot, I wish they’d give you more credit.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Some kid of mine knocks somebody off, I hope he’s got the smarts to drop the body off somewhere other than the back of his rice-burning minivan.”

  I laughed. I never recalled my father being a funny guy when I was a kid. He was a little stern, a disciplinarian. Supportive, but tough. It wasn’t until I’d finished at A&M that I started to get a taste of his humor.

  “Stay out of it, Deuce,” he said, tilting his head back, closing his eyes. “It’ll sort itself out, and you can go back to sponging off your wife again.”

  Maybe he wasn’t that funny.

  14

  Julianne loves lists. Grocery lists, to-do lists, Christmas lists, and Deuce lists.

  When we laid out the ground rules for my staying home, we both agreed that leaving me a list of chores every morning would be a terrific way of driving me insane.

  “I don’t wanna see a list every day of things to do,” I said. “I’ll go crazy.”

  “I understand,” she replied.

  “I understand” was apparently code for “I don’t care, and I am going to leave you a list of things to do every day for the rest of your natural life, and if you go crazy, our insurance covers mental health” in wife talk. I had trouble recalling a morning during the previous three years in which she did not leave me a short note, reminding me to go to the grocery store, gas up the car, call the doctor, or solve the Lindbergh kidnapping. When I complained, she said I was exaggerating, but that she would try and ease off.

  She would then write that down on a sticky note to remind me she would try to ease off and to pick up the dry cleaning.

  Someday, I am positive, someone is going to sue 3M on the grounds that their little convenient invention led to relationship failure.

  Amid the chaos at Cooper’s the previous day, I’d left our groceries behind, and Julianne left me a note that morning, reminding me we still needed groceries. I didn’t dare head back to the market, knowing that everyone there would be well aware of Benny having been found in the back of our car. Instead, I headed over to the Wal-Mart in Lewisville, where I knew I could get my shopping done in anonymity.

  After filling the new van with the groceries, I sat at the light and the strip mall across the street caught my eye. Actually, it was one store in particular.

  Land O’ Rugs. Benny’s former employer.

  The smart thing to do would have been to take my father’s advice and just let it all go. Take the green light, turn right, head home, and put the groceries away and pick up the house before my parents brought Carly home in time for dinner. And then make dinner, too.

  As I went straight through the light and pulled into the parking lot in front of the rug store, I wondered if my father was wrong.

  Maybe I was dumb enough to put a dead body in the back of my own minivan.

  Land O’ Rugs was sandwiched between a school supply store and a doughnut shop. The entire strip mall had the appearance of barely hanging on, as if a bulldozer could come by at any moment and wipe it from the face of the earth and no one would be the wiser. In all my years in Rose Petal, it was the first time I could ever recall noticing the occupants.

  A distant doorbell chimed somewhere in the back of the store as I stepped through the door. A scrawny cat looked up at me from its perch on a pile of rugs. Short hair, orange and white striped, with one ear significantly shorter than the other, as if it had been clipped. The cat stood up, arched its back at me, and hissed.

  “Boo,” I said.

  The cat scrambled off the rugs and sprinted for the open door at the back of the store.

  I looked around. It was indeed a land of rugs. Piled in the
middle, piled on the side, hung from huge racks that lined each wall, rugs were everywhere. The entire store smelled like new carpeting. An unoccupied desk and computer at the front were about the only things not rug related that I could see.

  A college-aged kid ambled out from the back of the store, licking powdered sugar off his fingers. He reminded me of those young guys on reality TV shows—tall, well built, with bronze skin and a walk that indicated he was aware of his good looks. Short dark hair, strong cheekbones, and aquamarine eyes. He wore old jeans and a polo shirt that looked a size too small for him, like he’d just stepped out of the Abercrombie & Fitch catalog.

  The cat trotted out behind him and retook its perch on the rugs, eyeing me suspiciously.

  The guy finished cleaning his fingers. “Help you?”

  “Manager around?”

  “You’re looking at him.” He offered the licked hand. “Reggie Hamlin.”

  I kept my hands in my pockets. “You’re the manager ?”

  He withdrew his unshook hand and shrugged. “Yup.” His eyes scanned the interior of the store, looking for something. “Jake wasn’t in here when you came in?”

  “Jake? All I saw was the cat.”

  Reggie frowned, shook his head. “My supposed part-time employee. When he shows up, that is. Probably out chasing high school girls. Or moms at Wal-Mart. Dude can’t get enough.” He shrugged. “Anyway. You need a rug?”

  “No. I just, ah, had a question for you.”

  The tiny flicker of optimism he’d shown when he thought I might be interested in buying a rug died, and he shrugged again.

  “Benny Barnes used to work here?” I asked. He nodded, nonplussed. “Yup. Until about two weeks ago.”

  “How come he left?”

  “He didn’t leave.” A sly grin formed inside the tan cheekbones. “I fired him, man. That dude wasn’t getting it done.”

  I glanced around the store. “Couldn’t handle the heavy workload?”

  The cat made a weird growling sound and hunched down like it was about to attack me.

  Reggie laughed. “Exactly, right? How could you get fired from a place where all you have to do is, like, show up?”

  I nodded.

  “Look, my dad asks two things of me,” Reggie said, holding up two fingers. “Show up on time and make sure we’re all doing what we’re supposed to be doing.”

  “Your dad?”

  “He owns the store. I go to UNT, and he’s making me earn my tuition.” He smirked. “Teaching me lessons about life and things, I guess.”

  It wasn’t a bad gig, really. Pretty sure he had plenty of time to get his studying done.

  “But Benny was doing other stuff,” Reggie said.

  “Like?”

  The cat stood up again and hissed. I resisted the urge to scare it a second time.

  Reggie started to say something, then closed his mouth, oblivious to the cat. He ran his hand over his chin. “Hold up. Who are you?”

  I was waiting for that question. “I knew Benny.”

  A confused look crossed his face. “Knew?”

  “You didn’t hear?”

  Reggie shook his head, now taking genuine interest in our conversation.

  “He’s dead,” I said.

  Reggie’s eyes went wide. “Shut up.”

  “Nope. Yesterday.”

  The cat hissed a little louder and stomped its feet. Almost terrifying.

  The kid looked shaken and went back to rubbing the goatee. “Wow. Didn’t expect that.” He stopped moving and looked at me. “Wait. He didn’t, like ... kill himself? Man, come on. Over this job? No way. If ...”

  “No, no,” I said, feeling guilty for even giving him that impression. “Nothing like that.”

  Relief swept through his face. “Good. I mean, not good. But I’m just glad it wasn’t getting fired that caused it.”

  I nodded and kept quiet. The cat stopped hissing and sat down, keeping a watchful eye on me.

  Reggie thought about it for a moment, then glanced at me and remembered my question. “I caught him using our computers for other stuff.”

  “That’s not allowed?”

  Reggie shook his head. “No. Not even for me. I can’t do school stuff or nothing, okay? My dad, he pays us to be here, and he expects us to work here. We don’t get a lot of customers, but there’s stuff to do. Vacuum, organize, paperwork. Work.” He frowned. “I didn’t wanna fire Benny, but if I hadn’t and my dad found out, I woulda been fired. His store, his rules. At least when Jake shows up, he follows the rules.”

  “That’s fair,” I said, thinking he’d actually done a pretty mature thing. It would’ve been much easier to avoid the confrontation. “What was he doing on the computer?”

  Reggie laughed, then stopped himself, as if he thought laughing was disrespectful to Benny. “He was trying to do this business thing. He wanted to build a school or something.”

  I didn’t correct him. “I heard he was working with someone on that.”

  He made a derisive snort. “Yeah. With Odell. Now, that guy I was happy to fire. He was a jerk.”

  “He worked here, too?”

  “Yeah, for about two months,” Reggie said. “He was worthless.”

  “Why’d you fire him?”

  “He tried to steal Bob.”

  “Bob?”

  He pointed to the cat. “That’s Bob.”

  “He tried to steal the cat?”

  “Tried to put him under that stupid leather jacket he wears all the time and walk out with him.” Reggie smiled at the cat. “But Bob fought back. Shredded his T-shirt and bloodied him pretty good. I heard Odell screaming and cussing, and I came out of the back. I still don’t know why he did it.” Reggie shook his head. “I seriously used to hate Bob. But I have new respect for him now.”

  I swore the cat sat up straighter.

  “Thanks for your time, Reggie,” I said, backing toward the door. “Appreciate it.”

  Reggie nodded and looked at me. “Hey. What exactly happened to Benny?”

  I pushed opened the door. “Still trying to figure that out.”

  15

  I took my groceries home and spent the next hour picking up the house. Between the previous day and that day, I’d spent very little time at home, and it showed. Carly’s toys were spread throughout the house, the sink was filled with dishes, and the laundry was spilling out of the closets. I got things squared away and took some chicken out of the freezer to throw on the barbecue for dinner.

  Not the most enjoyable stuff, but better than sitting in faculty meetings or Julianne’s depositions.

  I lay down on the sofa and dialed Julianne’s office.

  “Julianne Winters’s office,” a cheerful, female voice said.

  “Hi, Melissa. It’s Deuce.”

  The line buzzed for a moment. “Actually, this is Kathy.”

  By all accounts, Julianne is an excellent attorney. Professional, well thought of and, most importantly, almost always victorious. She is, however, quite possibly the world’s worst boss. Overly demanding, forgetful and, as one former assistant described her, loony tunes. Her assistants rarely made it six months before slinking away. I wanted to have a turnstile delivered to her office, but I hadn’t been able to find one on the Internet yet.

  “Oh. Hi, Kathy,” I said. “This is Julianne’s husband.”

  “Oh, hello!” she said, mustering up the enthusiasm I heard from every one of Julianne’s assistants when they were first starting out. “Ms. Winters was just telling me about you.”

  “Lies. She lies compulsively.”

  Awkward silence.

  “Kathy, I’m kidding.”

  “Oh. Oh. Right,” she said. I pictured her holding the phone away from her head and staring at it like it had just spit in her ear. “Let me see if she’s available.”

  “Thanks.”

  It was just a guess on my part, but if she didn’t get my lame humor, she would not be long for the job as Ms. Winters’s assistant.


  “Hey, babe,” Julianne said.

  “Hey. Breaking in a new one today?”

  “She’s been here for two days, and she’s doing a nice job.”

  “So she’s got what? Maybe just a couple more days left?”

  “For someone who doesn’t have a job, I’d expect you’d have more time to work on your stand-up routine,” she said. “What’s going on? How was your morning?”

  “Fine. Quiet,” I lied.

  “Really? How did Shayna look?”

  I sat down on the sofa again.

  “Your mother called a while ago,” she said, sounding pleased. “Spill it.”

  I ran down my visit to Shayna’s and, just so I wouldn’t feel guilty, told her about going to Land O’ Rugs.

  The line buzzed for a moment when I finished.

  “Hold on,” Julianne finally said.

  I was getting the distinct impression I was busted.

  “Had to shut my door,” Julianne said when she came back on the line. “I didn’t want anyone to hear me call you an idiot.”

  Yes. Definitely busted.

  “I want you to think about a couple of things,” she said, her tone measured. “They found Benny in our van yesterday. Automatically makes you a person of interest. Whatever. That’s fine. But you’re making it worse.”

  I felt the donkey ears sprouting out of my skull. “But then you go see Shayna, the dead guy’s widow—and, uh, your ex-girlfriend... .”

  “That was twenty years ago, Jules.”

  “And then you show up at the guy’s place of employment ?” She cleared her throat. “I’m neither a detective nor a criminal defense attorney, but I don’t need to be to see the guy they’re going to peg as suspect number one. What exactly are you doing, Deuce?”

  “Glad I didn’t tell you about school,” I mumbled, thinking of my confrontation with Sharon Ann.

  “What happened there? Did you pull the fire alarm or something?”

  “No, nothing. It’s nothing.” I sighed, properly chastised. “I’m just curious, Jules. And it seems like everyone is pointing the finger at me. But I didn’t do anything.”

  “Exactly,” she said. “So don’t give them a reason to point the finger. But running around, shoving your nose into Benny’s life. How do you think that looks?”