by Elise Sax
Chris looked down at his lap but didn’t say anything. It must’ve been torture for him not to give her a piece of his mind, but I figured he was experienced at not saying what he meant in order to maintain his brand.
“We looked for Kim, but we couldn’t find her. Then, she found me,” I said, rubbing the back of my head. “It was more than obvious that Kim Barry was batshit crazy, but I don’t think she wrote those letters.”
“I’m not crazy!” Kim yelled.
“Oh, I think you’re crazy, Kim,” I said. “Loony Tunes. Gaga. Wackadoo. Loco. Your elevator doesn’t go to the top floor. One box short of a full load. And on top of that, you’re a bitch. Just want to put that out there,” I said, rubbing my head, again. “To prove my point, we found the weapons in your room.”
“You did?” John asked, surprised. I waved him off. I didn’t want to lose my flow.
“There was something about the weapons that confused me,” I said. “They were all guns. Pistols, rifles, and ammunition. There was no bow and arrow, no old-fashioned weapons, and no newfangled technology like a remote control for the tripod. It didn’t make sense to me. Right there, I doubted that Kim was the killer, or in fact if she ever even wrote those letters.
“So, then I got to thinking, who else would want Chris dead? His manager, Rick, said something about Chris refusing to do a superhero movie. And that got me thinking. Why would a superstar refuse a superhero movie? Isn’t that the best way to get filthy rich and to become even more famous? And it also made me wonder just how mad Rick would be if his client refused a superhero movie. That was a big financial hit for Rick. When two men came into town wearing pinstriped suits,” I said, pointing at the two gangsters. “Cub reporter Miguel Sanchez found out that they were in town looking for Rick. Rick had gambling debts up the wazoo, and the gangsters were after him. And that made me think. Was Rick enough angry at Chris to kill him because he blamed him for not having the money to pay off his gambling debts? Or maybe the gangsters tried to kill Chris because they blamed him for not making the movie so that their debts could be paid off? As you can see, the suspects were piling up.”
“You go, girl,” Amy said. “You’re doing great.”
I smiled. She was right: I was doing great. And they didn’t even know where I was going with this. I couldn’t wait to see their faces when I told them who the killer was. I tried to wipe the smile off my face and remain serious. Everyone was looking at me, waiting eagerly for the next part of my story.
“And then there was the dispensary,” I continued. “The dispensary, it turned out, was illegal. Augustus was illegally dumping his toxic weed into the ocean, which was causing havoc. At first, I thought the mobsters were here for Augustus. That would’ve made sense. Augustus was doing a lot of shady business, and it would’ve been logical to have mobsters after him. But it wasn’t mobsters after him. It was the government.”
“That’s why I’m becoming a Libertarian,” Augustus announced.
“You can have my copy of Atlas Shrugged if you want,” Eddie offered him.
“And this is just a guess, because I really don’t know, but don’t you have a connection to Chris, Augustus? You two look a lot alike.” I asked.
“Chris is my cousin and was one of my shareholders,” Augustus said.
“Not shareholder. He put up money, right?” John said. You have an illegal establishment.”
“I didn’t know a thing about it being illegal,” Chris said. “I’m constantly being asked to invest my money in places. I thought Augustus’s place was on the up and up.”
“I believe you,” I told him. “But in retrospect, it made Augustus a suspect. Because if you had found out it was illegal, you probably would’ve pulled out your money, and that would give Augustus a motive for murder.”
“Absolutely I would’ve pulled out my money,” Chris insisted. “I don’t do anything illegal.”
“Of course you don’t,” Amy and Kim said in unison.
“Let’s go back to the superhero movie,” I said. Why didn’t Chris do the movie?”
“Because he’s an artist,” Amy supplied. “He doesn’t sell out to do movies in tights.”
“Is that true, Chris? I asked. “Are you an artist?”
He shrugged. “Everyone’s a critic.”
“I don’t think it was a matter of artistic differences,” I said. “I think it was timing. Two years ago, Chris’s fiancée Bebe got drunk and drove her car, which resulted in a terrible accident. She died in that accident. It’s my guess that Chris was too upset to do a superhero movie. He’s been in mourning for the past two years.”
“He’s totally over her,” Kim announced. “She was nothing. A drunk! She didn’t deserve him.”
“Shut up!” Chris shouted at her. “Shut your mouth!”
“That’s why Chris didn’t do the movie,” I said. “For the past two years, he’s been in mourning, but he’s also been planning. Two years of strategic planning. And here’s where the surprise comes in. Danny Avocado was one of the best competitive eaters in the world. He was also a bartender. In fact, he made drinks for all of us here in the soup shop right before the taco-eating contest. It doesn’t take a mathematician to figure out that two plus two is four. And it doesn’t take Raymond Chandler to figure out that a murdered bartender was killed because he let a drunk girl drive away to her death.”
I watched as ten mouths dropped open in surprise. “What’re you talking about?” Irving asked. “I’m lost. The bartender killed the movie star’s girlfriend?”
“What was it?” I asked Chris. “Was it just simply that Danny didn’t recognize that she was drunk? He didn’t take her keys? He didn’t call her cab? He just let her drive away? Is that why you’ve been seeking revenge for two years, planning his murder?”
“I get it,” Doris said. “Danny was the real target. At first, we thought Danny was the target. Then, we thought Chris was the target. And now we’re back to Danny. This is great. I wish I had some popcorn.”
“Keep going, girl,” Irving urged. “Next, you’ll find Jimmy Hoffa and figure out who killed JR.”
“Danny Avocado was a miserable bastard,” Chris said. Gone was the charismatic, amiable movie star that I had grown to know since he arrived in town. In his place was a furious, rage-filled man, who was more than capable of murder. “The law is that a bartender has to take the keys. He’s not allowed to let someone get in their car and drive to their death. Danny Avocado, that miserable son of a bitch, bastard murderer, filled the love of my life with booze, and then showed her to the door and let her drive to her death. Danny deserved to die. I’m the first to admit that he deserved to die. But I didn’t kill him. Why would I have waited two years to kill him?”
Everyone turned from him to me, expecting me to answer. I didn’t disappoint them.
“It’s simple,” I said. “You needed to figure out a way to kill him without getting caught. Because as much as you loved Bebe, you loved your career more. You’re a giant superstar, and you didn’t want to let that go. You didn’t want to rot in jail. You wanted to keep going with your movies, even if you lost the superhero movie. So, you planned it out for two years. You figured out everything about crossbows. You learned the remote-control technology. You followed Danny’s movements. When the taco-eating contest was announced here in Sea Breeze, you jumped for it.”
“Holy crap. I did wonder how we got Chris here,” Eddie said. “I never thought we could bag such a big star for our little event.”
“Exactly,” I said. “But he was thrilled to come. He said it was his manager’s idea and he just went where he was told, but this was studiously planned out.”
Chris applauded. “Very good. Very good scene, soup girl. But you have no proof. No proof at all. This is just the ravings of a woman who works in foodservice.”
I took three steps toward him and slammed my hand down on his lap. He jumped back in surprise, but I wouldn’t let him go. I crammed my hand down his pocket.
“I knew she was after him!” Kim said.
My hand was down Chris’s front pocket. Finding what I was looking for, I pulled it out and held it up high for everyone to see.
“When you all did the group selfie in the shop before the taco-eating contest, Chris emptied his pockets,” I explained. “I thought this was a pager, and I remember thinking how odd it was to have a pager in this day and age. But it’s not a pager. Is it, Chris? This is the remote control that you used while on the grandstand to kill Danny Avocado the moment he stood up in triumph.
“Chris Trist, you killed Danny Avocado. You’re the murderer. You’re guilty.”
Chris jumped up and threw his table in the air, crashing it into a few people, including John. There was a scuffle, as John’s prisoners tried to escape. At the same time, Chris was really escaping. He ran as fast as he could, past the diners and out of the soup shop. I ran after him, without a plan if I caught up to him.
Outside, he ran towards the Sea Breeze Inn, and he was much faster than I was. He probably had a fancy Hollywood personal trainer, whereas I had never done any organized exercise in my long life. But just as I thought I was going to lose him, Frances drove up in her deluxe scooter. I waved at her and she stopped.
“Follow that killer!” I yelled, and jumped onto her scooter behind her.
“We’ll get him!” she announced, excited. “Nobody gets past my Deluxe Super Warrior Power Scooter Model EXL!”
Chapter 15
“Tis now the very witching time of night, when churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out contagion to this world.”
– William Shakespeare
Two mornings later, I walked to the soup shop. The town was blissfully quiet. After Frances had run over Chris with her Deluxe Super Warrior Power Scooter Model EXL, he was taken to the hospital, and from there he was arrested while he was still in a full body cast. They said that he would make a full recovery, but that his perfect bone structure would never be quite as perfect again.
Bone structure didn’t matter in jail, though, and that’s where Chris was staying without bail. The other prisoners, including Augustus and Kim, were in jail, too. There were no more planned town events for a long time, and as far as I knew there were no more suspicious deaths. It was a relief to have a quiet town, again.
I turned onto Sea Breeze Avenue. Auntie Ida had given me two large baskets full of baked goods for the soup shop, which was twice as much as normal. I lugged them down the street, and was happy to see that Doris and Irving were waiting for me at the front door.
Irving gallantly took one of the baskets from me. I looked across the street, as I fished the key out of my pocket. Over the pier, I could make out the large sign with We love our seagulls! written on it. It had been put up by the locals a little after the seagulls had saved the town from the giant snake. Quint had been upset that the credit for the snake wrangling had gone to the birds instead of him, and he moved out of town the next day to “somewhere where they’ll appreciate me.”
Either way, the town had been cleared of snakes, and the seagulls had quit attacking people and seemed to have settled down to enjoying their life in Sea Breeze with the occasional gift of doughnut crumbs and fish guts.
“Isn’t this nice?” Irving asked. “None of those potheads anymore. Just us soup fans.”
He was right. The dispensary had shuttered, and nothing had opened in its place next door. Gone were the long lines of people searching for a high. Business in the soup shop had slowed down, and I was no longer getting paid in change. It was a definite improvement in my quality of life.
“Not potheads, Irving,” Doris corrected. “They’re called weedheads.”
The scooters had also left town, and it was finally safe to walk on the sidewalks without the threat of getting run over. The owner of the scooter company had decided there wasn’t enough profit in Sea Breeze, and so he moved them to Albuquerque.
I opened the door, and we walked inside the shop. Irving turned on the gas lights, and he and Doris sat at their regular table in the center of the shop.
I put my apron on, but I decided not to take the recipe book out of the safe today. I had so much success lately, that I decided to try to make the soups on my own without my Auntie Prudence’s help. I sighed, and I felt a wave of melancholy, as I realized how much I missed my Auntie Prudence. I wanted to tell her about all the goings-on in my life, and I wondered what she would make of it. Auntie Tilly and Auntie Ida weren’t as worldly as Auntie Prudence, who had been famous in town for giving out good advice with a hot bowl of soup.
But Auntie Prudence had died under mysterious circumstances, and I would never get her advice again. An icy feeling crept up my spine, at the thought of Auntie Prudence’s death. We had never investigated it, never gone down that path because it was too scary to think that if her death really wasn’t natural, what on earth could have killed her?
Or more like it, what not of this earth could have killed her?
I shook the feeling off, deciding to focus on the good instead of the bad. And there was lots of good happening. John and I were together, and life was going pretty smoothly.
I filled the coffee pot with coffee and water and let it brew. The door opened, and I was surprised to see a large group come in for coffee and breakfast. They sat, and I served them muffins and scones. When the coffee was done, I poured it into everyone’s cups. The door opened again, and Frances walked in. She plopped down on a chair, and I poured her a cup of coffee. I decided to sit with her and chat. It wasn’t like Frances to be up this early, and I was worried about her.
“I’m fed up,” she said throwing up her hands. “I’m never going to make money as a delivery person. Screw the gig economy. It sure screwed me.”
“I’m so sorry. What’re you going to do? Have you decided?”
Frances’s face brightened, and she smiled wide. “Yes! I have the best idea ever. I’m going to be the richest person in Sea Breeze. I’m selling my scooter and buying a new business.”
I was kind of sorry to see the Deluxe Super Warrior Power Scooter Model EXL go. I really liked to ride it. It was much better than a car.
“What business?” I asked.
“I’m going to be an entrepreneur. I’m going into a business that everyone needs. I’m going into the poop business.”
Wow, I didn’t see that coming. “What’s the poop business?” I asked.
The door opened, and Eddie Acid walked in. He yawned, and forgot to pose for a change. He took a seat and called me over, so I didn’t have time to find out more about the poop business.
I poured him a cup of coffee because he looked like he really needed it. “I’m fed up,” he said. It seemed to be the theme of the day. “You got a copy of The Handmaid’s Tale? I need to read that. I can’t be an Ayn Randian anymore. That shit’s too dark for a punk rocker.”
I gave him a scone, and I fetched The Handmaid’s Tale from the stacks.
When I returned with his book, the door opened again and Mouse and Bud walked in. Bud looked happy as a clam, but Mouse looked terrible. Her eyes were puffy, as if she had been crying.
Without saying hello, Mouse marched up to the counter and ripped a delivery app tablet off the wall. “I’m fed up!” she exclaimed. “I’m sick and tired of these deliveries. My fingers are rubbed raw from kneading dough. My boyfriend is sick and tired of me never being around. I can’t handle it one second longer!” As she ripped each tablet from the wall, she threw them on the floor, and they broke into pieces.
Bud gnawed on a fingernail. “I guess this means you don’t need me, anymore,” he said, sadly. “I really like it here. It’s much better than writing reviews. My carpal tunnel’s totally gone, and it turns out that I like soup a lot.”
I could’ve jumped for joy at the thought that the deliveries were over and done. Living with the twenty-first century technology had been a nightmare, but f
inally the soup shop would be back to normal. Just my regulars and my semi-regulars would come in. The soup shop would return to being my sanctuary, a quiet and sedate place, full of wonderful scents and good books.
I patted Bud on his back. “You don’t have to go, Bud. I want you to stay. You’re a good worker, and you can help Mouse hold down the fort whenever I need to leave.”
“That’s a good idea,” Mouse said. “You never know when there’ll be another murder, and you’ll have to solve it.”
Bud clapped his hands together and bounced up on his heels open. “Oh, good. There’s gotta be a murder again soon. I’ll definitely hold down the fort for you.”
The day went fast after that. Nobody else was murdered, and no other attack animals came to town. At closing, John surprised me at the door.
“I thought I would walk you home, if that’s okay with you,” he said, as I locked the door.
We held hands while we walked toward home. There’d been no more word from the coven, and Bob Hayashi turned out to be just a normal guy who liked to take walks. All of our fears had gone, and now we were left with each other and the decision of where we were to go from here.
We walked very slowly, enjoying the time alone together before we would be at home with my aunts. Just as we reached the cobblestone road to the house, John turned me to face him.
“I know what I want is wrong,” he said, softly. “I know what I want is greedy and too much to hope for. But the truth is, Agatha, I am madly in love with you. I dream of you at night, and I think of you during the day. You fill my thoughts and every breath I take with the hope that you can be in my life. Because I am alive now, Agatha. I’m flesh and blood and bone, and very much a man who is very much in love with you. Please tell me that we can try to make this work, even if it’s not forever, and even with all of the complications.”
Tears filled my eyes and flowed down my cheeks. I would never have thought his words could be true, but his hands holding mine proved to me that they were. He was here, alive and real and wanting me. And oh, how I wanted him, too. I wanted him more than I had ever wanted anything in my life. In fact, he was the only thing I wanted in my life. With him I was deliriously happy. Without him I was only a shell of a person.