by Sharon Sala
Jake grimaced. “Not a who, it was a what…an IED…a bomb buried on the road. Our transport ran over it. All but three of us died. Some guys in the transport behind us pulled us out before we got burned. It was bad, and now it’s over.”
Ruby picked up her scissors and began again with more purpose. She was over the shock and had moved on to furious. “I am sorry. I am so sorry,” she said, snip, snip, snip. “If women were running the countries of the world, this stuff wouldn’t be happening.” Snip, snip, snip.
Jake grinned. “I have no doubt that you are right. If you want to run for president, you have my vote.”
“We’d vote for you, too,” the twins said.
Mabel Jean, the manicurist, came in the back door with an empty deposit bag. “Receipt is in the bag,” she said, and laid it on Ruby’s station, then gave Jake a big smile. “Hi, Jake. Good to see you back.”
Jake winked. “Thank you, Mabel Jean.”
Ruby muttered and huffed and snipped and snipped until she was done. She handed him a mirror and turned him around so he could see the back. “Looks great, Ruby. I can’t see even a hint of one scar.”
Ruby exhaled on a big sigh. “Good, because that was certainly my intent.”
Jake stood up and hugged her. “I’m sorry I upset you.”
Ruby poked a finger against his chest. “You didn’t cause it. I cried because you suffered it. There is a big difference. And don’t start pulling out money because this is on the house. I’ll take your money next time, when you don’t have to sit and listen to me bawling. Okay?”
“Okay,” he said, and waved at the twins and Mabel Jean as he left.
As soon as he was gone, Ruby went up front and locked the door, then turned the Open sign to Closed.
“I’m calling it a day,” Ruby said, and began gathering up wet towels and sweeping up the hair around her station. “I couldn’t listen to another woman sit in my chair and complain about the sale on shoes that she missed or the fact that someone in Ladies Aide told a lie about her. Not after witnessing the suffering Jake Lorde must have endured to be with us today.”
The twins gave her a hug. “Go home. We’ll finish cleaning and lock up.”
Ruby sighed. “Thank you. I believe I will. My heart hurts tonight even more than it did when I found out my no-good husband was cheating on me.”
She grabbed her purse and went out the back door without looking back.
Chapter 7
A fox paused near the back porch of Truman Slade’s rental house, sniffing around the trash barrel, then caught the scent of a rabbit on the air and trotted past it without investigating.
Truman had gone to bed hours ago for lack of anything better to do and was sound asleep beneath the covers, oblivious to the activity going on in the attic. It went on for some time until the scratching and scurrying about became loud enough in the ceiling above his bed that it woke him. He rolled over on his back, naked as the day he was born, then sat up and listened, trying to figure out why he was awake.
When the scratching sounded again, he groaned. “Damn squirrels! Get the hell out of my attic!” he yelled, then got out of bed, picked up one of his tennis shoes, and threw it at the ceiling. It hit with a solid thump and then dropped back to the floor with another thump.
Silence!
Truman listened until all was quiet again, then he crawled back into bed, punched his pillow a couple of times, turned it to the cool side, and stretched out. He was almost asleep when the scratching resumed, and Truman took it as a personal affront.
“Well, son of a bitch,” he yelled, and flew out of bed in a rage. He stomped through the house on his way to the kitchen to get the broom, turning on lights as he went. He grabbed the broom and stomped back through the house, poking the ceiling with the broom handle as he went. When he got to his room, he leaped up onto his bed and began thrusting the broom at the ceiling like a knight doing battle with a sword.
Thump went the broom handle against the Sheetrock—thump, thump, thump, over and over. Bam went the headboard against the wall as he used the bed to catapult him higher. Bam, bam, bam, bouncing the headboard against the wall as he came down.
After several minutes of that, he paused to listen and thought he could hear the hasty exit of tiny feet, so he repeated the move one last time to make sure whatever it was didn’t stop running. Thump, thump, thump.
Bam, bam…crack and boom!
All of a sudden, Truman was flat on his back. The bed frame was broken and the bed was on the floor. Truman still held the broom in an upward thrust but in a less-than-heroic state. Being naked had its drawbacks and this was one of them. Because of a squirrel, he had broken his damn bed. He laid the broom on the floor, pulled the jumble of covers back over his shoulders, and rolled over.
Beds were overrated anyway. He’d slept on the floor half his life, and he’d do it again. If he’d turned the lights on in the bedroom, he would have seen what he’d done to the ceiling. More than once the broom handle had pierced the Sheetrock, and when it had, he’d yanked downward with some force to pull it free. Now there were nearly a dozen holes in the Sheetrock and a noticeable sag in the ceiling.
And Truman was, once again, sound asleep. He was dreaming about squirrel hunting with his brother, Hoover, who was in the state penitentiary doing twelve to twenty for armed robbery.
In the dream, Hoover had just taken aim at a big, fat squirrel. Truman was already imagining how good squirrel and dumplings would taste when Hoover shot. The crack of the rifle was loud, but in the dream the squirrel hadn’t moved.
He punched at his brother’s shoulder.
What the hell, Hoover? Did you miss?
Then he heard the crack again, only Hoover wasn’t holding his rifle, and they were no longer at the creek. He thought he heard Hoover yell, run, Truman, run, then the ceiling above his head fell in.
When a large portion of the Sheetrock landed on top of him, along with what had passed as the squirrel’s nest, Truman screamed. All the while he was trying to get out from under the debris, he could hear the squirrel’s angry chatter for having been displaced. Just as he pushed the Sheetrock aside, the squirrel that had been on top of it dropped onto his bare belly, then spun out so fast trying to get away that Truman wound up with a dozen angry scratches in his skin.
He got up cursing. His belly was burning, his bed was dirty, not that it had been all that clean before, but there was now that huge hole in the ceiling. His landlord was gonna have himself a fit, and then most likely kick him out, which meant Truman just needed to keep his mouth shut and his rent paid up, and the landlord might never know.
In the meantime, Truman put on some pants and then tossed the Sheetrock on the back porch, dragged his mattress into the empty bedroom across the hall, then shook out the sheets and remade the bed. He was looking for something to doctor the wounds on his belly when he heard the scratch of the squirrel’s claws on the floor in the hall.
“You just wait until I get me some ammunition for my gun,” he yelled. “I’ll blast your furry ass to kingdom come.”
The squirrel didn’t seem worried, and Truman was hurting too much to give chase. Like it or not, until he could get to town to get a live trap, it appeared he was going to have to put up with a roommate.
* * *
Ruby Dye was at the lumber and hardware store shopping in the display aisle for towel rods. The one in the bathroom at The Curl Up and Dye was loose and kept falling to the floor. She was debating with herself between a wooden rod and a metal one when she realized the two men in the next aisle over were talking about Jake Lorde. She heard the words “payback,” “make him sorry,” and “get rid of him for good” and she gasped. Those sounded like threats against his life!
Desperate to find out who was talking, she hurried down the aisle and then peeked around the end cap to see who was on the other side. She recog
nized Truman Slade immediately and remembered years earlier it was Jake’s testimony that had sent him to prison, but she didn’t know the other man. She pretended to be looking for something on the bottom shelf and, instead, snapped a picture of the two men with her phone.
They walked away, unaware they’d been overhead and photographed, while Ruby hightailed it back around the aisle, grabbed the wooden towel rod, and made a run for the front to check out.
She got to her car and then didn’t immediately get in. She didn’t know what to do. She guessed the police wouldn’t do anything because all she did was overhear a threat. Unless something actually happened to Jake, the police couldn’t do a thing. She was trying to decide the best way to handle this when Peanut Butterman drove up beside her and parked.
As she watched him get out, she thought to herself what a good-looking man he was. Reminded her a little bit of a young Clint Eastwood.
Then he saw her and smiled. “Well hello, Miss Ruby. How are you this fine day? I must say I like that hair shade you’re sporting. Are those turquoise highlights in your pretty auburn hair?”
For a moment, Ruby forgot what she was bothered about and unconsciously touched her hair to make sure everything was in place. “Yes, they’re highlights. They aren’t permanent, you understand, but I feel it’s my duty to advertise my skills in every way I can, and the young girls these days are all about wearing crayon colors in their hair.”
Peanut nodded while eyeing her trim figure and earnest face. He liked Ruby Dye, and he couldn’t say that about a whole lot of other people.
“Well, I better let you be on your way,” he said.
Then she remembered her dilemma. “Peanut, may I ask you something?”
“Sure thing. Ask away.”
“I was inside the store just now when I overheard two men talking about Jake Lorde. One was making some threatening comments that sounded like Jake’s life could be in danger. I snuck around and snapped a picture of them. I recognized Truman Slade, but don’t know the other man. How do I report this? Is there anything I can do?”
Peanut’s eyes widened as he tried to picture Ruby Dye sneaking anywhere. She stood out in a crowd no matter where she was.
“May I see the photos?” he asked.
She quickly pulled them up on her phone. “Yes, that’s Truman alright. Even if you showed these to the law right now, there’s not anything they can do. It’s just hearsay until something happens.”
“Then what can I do?” Ruby asked.
“I don’t want you to do anything, because if people find out what you heard and start talking, it could put you in danger down the road.”
Ruby shuddered. She hadn’t thought of it in that way.
Peanut patted her arm. “Why don’t you send the picture to my phone? I’ll talk to Deputy Pittman and see what he says.”
He gave Ruby his cell number. She attached the photo, and moments later the picture popped up in a message. Now it was saved to his phone.
“Okay, got it,” he said. “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure the proper people find out about this. Even if they can’t do anything about it now, they’ll know it happened. If Lon needs to talk to you about it, he’ll call you.”
Ruby breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Peanut. You have taken a load off my shoulders. Thank you so much.”
“You are most welcome,” Peanut said, and then opened the car door for her so she could get in.
Ruby drove off with a wave.
Peanut watched until she was gone.
“Yes, she is a fine figure of a woman,” he said, and then thought of what she’d told him and got back in the car and headed for the police station instead.
He knew the police chief was in the hospital getting his gall bladder out, and Deputy Lon Pittman was, for the time being, acting chief. It occurred to him that Lon might be out of the office so he called the precinct, confirmed Lon was in, and told the dispatcher to let him know he was on his way.
* * *
Lon was standing in the front office talking to the dispatcher, Avery James, when Peanut walked in. “Hello, Peanut. Give me a second,” Lon said, and finished giving Avery needed information, then turned to Peanut. “Avery said you wanted to see me?”
“Yes.”
“We can talk in the office.” He led the way back. “Have a seat,” he said, and dropped into the chief’s chair. “So, what’s up?”
Peanut related what Ruby had told him, then ended by showing him the picture on his phone.
Lon frowned. “Truman Slade is a blight on Blessings,” he muttered. “However, unless he takes action, there isn’t anything we can legally do.”
Peanut nodded. “That’s pretty much what I told Ruby. I also told her not to talk about this to anyone. If Truman got wind of it, I wouldn’t put it past him to try and intimidate her just to keep her quiet.”
“What I can do is take this report,” Lon said. “Also, if you’ll email that picture to me, I’ll include it in the report. Then if he does try something, it will be on record.”
“What’s the email address here?” Peanut asked.
Lon wrote it down and shoved the pad across the desk so Peanut could see it. Peanut emailed the picture while he was sitting there and then dropped his phone back in his pocket.
“So, that’s done, and I have an appointment in about fifteen minutes, so I guess I’d better get back to the office. Thank you for hearing me out. I’ll let Ruby know.”
“I hope this all comes to nothing,” Lon said.
Peanut nodded. “So do I. Jake Lorde has been through enough.”
* * *
Jake pulled up to the gas pumps at Ralph’s on the edge of town and killed the engine. He pulled a credit card out of his wallet, then got out and moved to the pumps. He swiped the card, waited for approval, and then began refueling. While he was standing there, Laurel Payne drove by.
He waved.
She waved back and kept driving.
It made him wonder how the trip to the doctor had gone, and then he frowned. He was letting himself get too involved in someone else’s life, and there was no future in it. He already liked Laurel Payne. He’d even spent time letting himself imagine what being in a relationship with her would be like. He already had more than he could handle. He didn’t want to fall in love with a woman he couldn’t have. And then the pump kicked off, and he hung up the hose and drove away.
He stopped at the mailbox to pick up his mail, and to his dismay, the postman had accidentally left two letters in his box that belonged to Laurel. If they’d just been circulars or some kind of ads, he would have set them aside and given them to her at another time, but damn it, they were probably bills—that needed to be paid on time.
He sighed, backed up the truck, and drove toward her house.
* * *
Laurel was unloading her truck when Bonnie came bouncing out of the house. She’d already changed out of her school clothes and fed and watered Lavonne and was looking for something else to do when she glanced up at the mailbox. Only recently had she grown tall enough to reach it and be trusted not to let important mail blow away.
“Mommy, can I go get the mail?”
“May I, not can I, and yes, you may. Hang on tight to everything, okay?”
“I will!” Bonnie shrieked and off she flew.
Laurel started to tell her to slow down and then stopped and smiled. She watched her running with such abandon. It was how every child should live—with total joy. If she fell, she would get up because that’s how she would learn.
“Ah, God, help me do this right,” she said, and then saw a pickup coming over the hill and frowned. It was Jake Lorde, and he was slowing down.
She saw him stop and get out, and she started walking toward the mailbox. Bonnie was getting too attached to a man who would be nothing but a friend. She
walked faster, wanting to know why he’d come again so soon. Maybe it had to do with the bear, maybe not, but she wanted to know.
* * *
Bonnie broke into a big grin when she saw Jake’s truck, and when she saw him stop and get out, she waved. “Hi, Jake! I’m getting the mail!”
He smiled. “Good job, and I brought some more. The mailman accidentally left them in my box. Here, take these to your mommy.”
“Okay!” she said, and headed back to the house.
Jake saw Laurel coming, and short of being rude, he had to wait.
“I got the mail,” Bonnie said.
“Put it on the table,” Laurel said.
“I will, Mama,” Bonnie said, and kept going.
Laurel didn’t ask Bonnie what Jake said. It didn’t matter. It’s how Jake answered her that was going to count.
Jake didn’t know what was going on, but he didn’t like the expression on her face. He suddenly felt like she was a stranger. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and leaned against his truck. When she stopped in front of him, he took a deep breath.
“Postman left some of your mail in my box.”
She blinked. “Oh. Well then, thank you.”
“No problem,” he said.
Now she felt awkward. She’d come at him with attitude, and he’d seen it.
“Bonnie really liked Brave Bear. It made all the difference when Dr. Quick took out her stitches.”
“Then he’s doing what he was meant to do. Sorry if I startled you.”
“No, it was nothing like that. I just—”
“You don’t have to explain yourself to me, Laurel. She’s your daughter. It is your job to make sure she’s safe at all times. I would think less of you if you didn’t. I know you’re busy, so I’ll be on my way.”
Laurel felt like she’d just broken a new toy. Whatever trust and relationship they’d been working on was gone, and it was her fault.
“Thank you again. You’ve been nothing but kind, and I guess I’m a little raw about people thinking I can’t take care of myself. You know?”