Never Trust a Stranger

by Mary Monroe

  “I know. But the dude next door recorded it, so I’ll still get to watch it. Baby, um, I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch lately. In addition to work issues, I had to deal with another nasty family situation about the house.”

  Sylvia let out a loud sigh of disgust. “Damn those people! I wish they would get off your back and stop trying to make you sell your house and split the money with them. And that’s a damn shame. That’s your house. Your grandmother left it to you in her will, and they should respect that.”

  “You know what they say about relatives. They can be your best friends or your worst enemies.”

  “Tell me about it. Me and my used-to-be favorite cousin Pam, we haven’t spoken in ten years. All on account of me dating her ex.” Sylvia suddenly began to speak in a meek tone of voice. “Um, if you don’t . . . um . . . mind telling me, exactly where were you when I tried to reach you at seven this morning? I figured that with today being a Sunday, you’d still be in bed. I called your cell phone and your home phone. I even sent a text message.” Sylvia paused and sucked in some air. I could hear the pain in her voice, and it made me feel like shit. “I was so concerned, I even called your boss this morning to make sure you hadn’t been in an accident. A couple of days ago, there was a TV news report about a driver who was hauling some produce up from Mexico, fell asleep at the wheel, and drove over a cliff. He died on impact.”

  “In the first place, I always stop and check into a motel as soon as I get drowsy. And in the second place, I wasn’t scheduled to work this weekend, baby, and wouldn’t have been able to do so if I had.” I decided to tell Sylvia part of the truth. “I’ve been drinking a lot these past couple of weeks, and missing a lot of work that I’ll have to make up. I was blacking out left and right. I blacked out again four days ago and I didn’t wake up until the next morning—on my living-room floor.”

  “What made you go off the deep end?”

  “My cousin Willis and that battle-axe he’s married to stormed my house again the day before the game. They had been doing cocaine for days, so they got all up in my face about how they needed the money from the sale of the house so they could get a new roof put on theirs. After I chased them off, I went for a drive to clear my head, sweetheart.”

  “Calvin, you never drink and drive—”

  “I didn’t do any really heavy drinking until about five days ago, and I did it in my own home,” I said quickly.

  “You poor thing, you. I feel so sorry for you having to deal with those obnoxious relatives of yours. No wonder you don’t have much to do with most of the folks in your family.”

  There was a good reason why I didn’t associate with some of my family members. They didn’t associate with me was a more accurate way of putting it, though. I had embarrassed and upset them by marrying the town slut. Shortly after my discharge from the military almost five years ago, Glinda left me for another man and then she mysteriously “disappeared.” A lot of folks, including her family, thought she was dead. Most of my relatives were still angry with me for marrying her in the first place and had little or nothing to do with me now. Glinda had had a fling with my older sister Vickie’s philandering husband, so she avoided me. Other than my older brother Ronald, my uncle Ed in Chicago, my coworkers, a few buddies I’d served with in the Marines, and Sylvia, I didn’t socialize with a lot of people.

  “Before my drinking got out of control yesterday, I drove around for a while. While I was sitting at a red light, I saw that driver from Berkeley that I filled in for a couple of months ago. You remember Joe Lurie, don’t you? I took you to a Juneteenth cookout at his house last summer.” I didn’t give Sylvia time to respond. “His wife had told him that morning that she wanted a divorce, so he was in pretty bad shape. He had me follow him back to his house. We talked, drank, and played cards for hours. I didn’t feel like driving, so I spent last night at his place. That’s where I was when you called this morning.” It was such a blatant lie. Last night I’d spent two hours drinking in my living room while I stared off and on at Lola’s picture on my computer monitor again. I was trying to come up with more ways to make her suffer. I got so creative; I considered pouring sulfuric acid over her entire body—while she was still alive—to obliterate her completely. I didn’t stay on that notion for long. I had been saving a spot in my freezer for her too long to change that part of my plan.

  “You spent last night at Joe’s house? Hmmm. Isn’t he one of the men you suspected your ex was fooling around with while you were in Afghanistan?”

  “Huh? Oh, uh, yeah. That was one of the rumors going around. I don’t know if it was true or not. I confronted Glinda about Joe, and she denied being involved with him. I asked him about it, and he denied it too.”

  “Honey, I hate to say this, but I truly believe that Glinda really is dead. I know they never found her body, and they don’t have any evidence that she’s dead, but I have a gut feeling that she’s gone. From the rumors I’ve heard, she was heavy into cocaine, and everybody knows there is no happy ending to a story when drugs are involved. Maybe she overdosed in somebody’s house and they didn’t want to get in trouble so they disposed of her body in some remote place where it’ll never be found.”

  “Yes, she was into drugs. And she was hanging out with some very dangerous people, so there is no telling what happened to her. . . .”

  “I ran into her cousin Nita the other day. She’s nothing like Glinda, but she’s still kind of strange.”

  “Strange in what way?”

  “She lives with some guy from Haiti who calls himself a psychic. I don’t believe in that baloney but she told me that he told her somebody murdered Glinda. He claims her body is in a very strange, very cold place.”

  “Hmmm. Well, I don’t believe in any mumbo jumbo coming from a witch doctor, but I have a very strong feeling that Glinda is dead too. They found the body of the dude she’d been fooling around with in one of the most dangerous areas in Mexico. Dead bodies are dumped there on a regular basis. She’s probably down there somewhere too. What’s left of her, that is. She probably pissed off one of those drug-dealing pig farmers and he used her for fertilizer.”

  “I can certainly believe that,” Sylvia said in a low voice. “Just talking about that woman gives me a chill. Well, I hope they find her remains someday so you can give her a proper burial.”

  “I sure hope so too. No matter what Glinda did, she was still a human being and my wife, and I still loved her. I’d hate to spend the rest of my life wondering what happened to her,” I responded with my voice cracking.

  “Baby, I can hear the pain in your voice. I am so sorry for bringing up painful memories.”

  “Don’t worry about it, honey. I’m fine.” I sniffed. I decided it was time to toss Sylvia a very big bone. “Sweetheart, I’d like to take you to Brazil for your birthday in June.”

  “You would?” she gasped. “Oh, Calvin! That would be my dream come true. I’ve always wanted to visit the country my mother’s family came from.”

  “June is a long way off, but in the meantime, I’m going to work overtime on our relationship. I even bought a new suit to wear to your supervisor’s wedding next month.”

  “You didn’t forget about that? I was so afraid I was going to have to go to Felice’s wedding with my cross-eyed cousin, Alonzo. I . . . I’m so happy, I think I’m going to cry.”

  “So am I,” I said.

  We both laughed.

  “When will I see you again, Calvin?”

  “I still have a slight headache from all the drinking and the mess with my cousin, so I’d really like to get some rest tonight. If it’s not too inconvenient, can I come over tomorrow evening around six?”

  “You can come over at any time you want!”

  “Then six it is.”

  After my conversation with Sylvia, I took a hot shower, slid into my pajamas, and mixed myself a large glass of rum and Coke. It was seven p.m. when I stretched out on my living-room couch to watch an episode of Law and
Order that I had recorded.

  As soon as I got a good buzz, my mind began to wander. I wondered how many other criminals enjoyed watching crime shows on TV as much as I did. I also wondered if they learned how to be better criminals by doing so. I sure had. Even though cops were generally dumb as hell, they had gradually come up with all kinds of ways to solve crimes over the years. Had I not known about DNA, forensics, and all the rest of that shit I’d learned from TV, I’d have been caught a long time ago.

  When Law and Order ended, I decided to do some chores that I had been putting off. I did my laundry and ran the vacuum over my living-room and bedroom carpets. Then I checked the online schedule for my next run. I was glad to see that I had two back-to-back runs from Portland, Oregon, to the San Fernando Valley next week. I was ready for a fresh kill. It had been too long since the last one. I had a mission to continue, and I was not about to let anything get in my way. Meeting Lola had been the shot in the arm I’d needed to get myself back on track.

  My plan was to let another week or two go by before I communicated with her again, unless she contacted me first. That was just what happened.

  Chapter 11

  Joan

  DESPITE THE FACT THAT REED AND I HAD BEEN TOGETHER FOR almost fifteen years, there were times when it felt as if I was married to a stranger. He was not the man I thought he was when we first met. Had I known what he was really like before I married him, I would have dropped him like a bad habit. He was a neat freak of epic proportions. A single crumb on the kitchen counter could set him off. Everything in our home had to be arranged to please him. One time he actually took a ruler and measured the distance between the framed photographs I had hung on the walls. He was insecure and paranoid, and he whined and pouted like a baby almost every single day. He was an only child, and his stuffy parents were a major thorn in my side. I cringed every time they visited us. They had their own keys, and sometimes they even dropped in when Reed and I were out. I was horrified the first time I came home from a shopping trip and found my mother-in-law wallowing in my bathtub with bubble bath up to her three chins like she was Queen of England. My father-in-law didn’t come around that often, but when he did he was as annoying as his wife. If all that was not enough to drive a woman like me crazy, Reed was a major flop in the bedroom. I spent a fortune on batteries for the vibrators I owned, which I used to finish the jobs he started.

  Leaving him was not an option. At least not yet. In addition to his threats to commit suicide, my family made it clear to me that no woman in her right mind would leave a man who had as much to offer as Reed. Especially a black woman from the hood. Besides, he was a cash cow to most of my relatives. Reed’s parents didn’t offer much support or sympathy either. Even though he had attempted suicide once, they still refused to believe he was serious. No matter how many times I tried to get them to be more proactive in this situation, each time they told me that I was “overreacting” and that as long as I treated Reed the way I was supposed to, everything would be fine. Once I even offered to contact intervention professionals I’d heard about, and it only made him angry. “Woman, if you even think that I’d be willing to sit down face-to-face and talk to a bunch of meddling strangers about my problem, you’re crazier than I thought! Putting my business out there like that would really push me over the edge!” he warned.

  Two days after our latest confrontation, he drove to San Francisco to attend a conference and would be gone most of the day. I called up Mama and told her to set a plate at the dinner table for me.

  It was always a treat to be with my family. Every time I visited, I got so much attention, you would have thought that I’d just come home from an extended leave. But that was not the case. I went to my mother’s house at least once a week.

  Five minutes after everybody in the house had sat down to feast on the oxtails and rice that Mama had prepared, I kicked off the conversation. As soon as I spoke the first sentence, all eyes were on me. “I wish I’d never met Reed Riley. It’s getting harder and harder to live under the same roof with him.” I was not surprised to hear gasps and see stunned looks on every face at the table. I knew I was going to get a tongue-lashing from them, but I didn’t care. I had been keeping my feelings from them long enough.

  Mama was horrified. Her mouth dropped open so wide, I could see the fillings in her molars. “What’s wrong with you, girl? Your home is a palace compared to this dump we live in. Y’all got a swimming pool, a fitness center, and doctors and lawyers and businessmen for neighbors.”

  “That’s not all I care about. It’s still not enough for me, anyway,” I insisted.

  “Not enough? Are you crazy? What else do you want, Joan—gold?” my stepfather Elmo hollered with an incredulous look on his face. “You can eat steak and lobster and drink champagne every day if you want to. This is the third time this week we’ve had oxtails and rice and Kool-Aid,” he added as he made a sweeping gesture over the table. “And your poor, sweet mama uses coupons every time she goes to the market. I bet Reed ain’t never even set foot in the Food-4-Less or the grocery store outlets like us regular folks do.”

  Reed had never set foot in a discount store. Last week when he went to an auto supply store to purchase new seat covers for his Lexus, he refused to park in any of the vacant parking spaces in the strip mall because they were too close to Walmart. He had personalized license plates—DRRRDDS—so a lot of people recognized his vehicle. He didn’t want any of them to see his car and assume he was shopping in a Walmart! He parked three blocks away.

  “Reed didn’t grow up the way I did,” I defended. “And if he can afford to shop in high-end stores, why not?”

  “That’s all the more reason why you shouldn’t still be shopping in no discount store,” Mama pointed out.

  “I shop in the expensive stores too,” I declared, holding up my arm so they could see the diamond bracelet on my wrist. I was sure that it had cost more than every piece of jewelry Mama owned put together. The beige suede dress I had on had set me back nine hundred dollars. “But I still like to take advantage of a good bargain.” I was wearing a bra I had purchased at Target for eight dollars.

  “Well, you know what they say. You can take a person out of the hood, but you can’t take the hood out of the person,” my stepfather snickered. His comment made all of us laugh. Then Elmo suddenly got quiet. With his eyes squinted, he gave me a critical look. “Joan, you got it made in the shade. Most rich black men are as old as Methuselah and they look like baboons. They’re probably stingy as hell too. And they marry white or Asian women. Not only do you have a youngish, rich black man, Reed’s generous with his money and he’s good-looking!”

  “I’m still not happy,” I insisted, looking across the dinner table at my forty-two-year-old sister, Elaine. Since she had divorced her husband when I was still in high school and had her share of problems with other men now, I expected some sympathy from her.

  Instead of showing me some support, Elaine stared at me with a blank expression on her face and started talking in a low, detached voice. “I curse the day I left my husband. I hear he just bought a house, furniture, and a new car for his wife. And they just had their third baby. If I had had more sense and patience, all of that would be mine. Here I am almost forty-three years old, still living with my mama, and I don’t have a new husband or any kids of my own in sight.”

  I turned to Too Sweet. She had never been married and had not had sex in over twenty years. The only thing left on her bucket list was a husband. She was the family fool, so she was flighty, irresponsible, and unpredictable. A person never knew what to expect from her. She owed me a few favors, so I thought she’d be in my corner. “Too Sweet, you saw how Reed complained about a few specks of dust on the furniture last month when you came over to have dinner with us. And you heard how he was complaining about the roast beef I’d cooked that day.”

  Too Sweet reared back in her seat and tilted her head to the side. She still had a wad of food in her jaw, but she start
ed talking anyway. “Well, I ain’t taking sides, but there was a lot of dust on the furniture and you did burn the roast beef. I had to take some Pepto-Bismol to settle my stomach and get that nasty taste out of my mouth.” I didn’t like what my cousin said in her husky voice, but she did display a hint of sympathy by touching my shoulder and giving me a warm smile. “I pray for you every night, Joan. To you, Reed Riley might not be the best husband in the world, but I bet a dollar to a donut you wouldn’t want to trade places with me.” Too Sweet swallowed the food in her mouth and reached for another piece of corn bread. Then she added, “Get yourself together, girl. If you was to lose Reed and end up back in the hood, then you’d have something to be bitching and moaning about.”

  “Amen, amen, amen,” Mama chanted, glancing at my stepfather. Elmo made fairly good money as a mechanic but not enough to please Mama. She complained almost every day about still having to work as a security guard at the local women’s detention facility. I never bothered to remind her that if she’d stop trying to live a champagne lifestyle on a beer budget, she’d be okay. Even though she purchased groceries at the outlets, she had to have a high-definition TV in her bedroom, the living room, and the den. She had to shop in the high-end stores at least once a month, and she had to spend money on lavish parties to entertain our whole family—which was very large—and half of the neighborhood on a regular basis.

  “You should have stayed single like your girl Lola,” Elaine said with a dry chuckle. “She don’t have a husband and she’s happy as can be.”

  “For your information, Lola is anxious to get married. Lately, that’s all she talks about,” I said.

  “Well, if Lola wants to get married, get a house of her own, and have kids, she’d better hurry up. She ain’t getting no younger. And you can tell her I said so,” Too Sweet said with a smirk. “Is she even dating anybody right now?”

  “Uh, yeah. She’s going out with a few guys, but there’s one I think she’s really got a thing for,” I announced. “He’s a real good-looking truck driver who lives in San Jose.”