Mean Woman Blues

by Smith, Julie

  “At least I could work on it some. That’s all I ask.”

  The sergeant’s eyes went shifty on her. “Langdon, you’re not the person to work on this. You know that. Anyway, I can’t spare you.”

  She ignored his last sentence. “Oh, come on. I wouldn’t be working the shooting, just the cold case.”

  “Did you hear me? I can’t do it. I’ve got to have you for the cemetery thefts. I want you to head the task force.”

  Here in the Third District where Skip had been sent when the department was “decentralized” and the Homicide Division disbanded, things were usually pretty quiet. But the cemetery thefts were big, about as high profile as a case that wasn’t a triple murder could get in New Orleans.

  Somebody— probably a ring of professional thieves— was removing cemetery statues and selling them through the lucrative antiques market. In a city that took its saints and angels as seriously as it did its pre-Lent festivities, this was big, bad crime. A department that stopped it was going to be a popular department. Heading the task force was a handsome plum.

  Still, to Skip’s mind, it was trivial compared to getting Jacomine. She said, “A.A., I’m flattered, but…”

  “The superintendent asked for you. Says it’s the mayor’s idea. Two city councilmen have also called— at the mayor’s request, probably.”

  “Oh, shit.”

  He could have made a crack about the price of fame, but Abasolo looked as downcast as she probably did. “Yeah. I’m sorry, Skip. Wrap it up fast, and we’ll see about the transfer.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Terri Whittaker stared at herself in the bathroom mirror, wondering how she was going to get through the day without Isaac. And with blue hair.

  She had gone ahead with the hair, anticipating that her boyfriend would act as a buffer between herself and her parents, particularly her mother. Now, with no Isaac for the evening, it was a beacon inviting her mother’s attack. She would just have to hope the barbed-wire-looking thing around her neck and the thorn bracelet tattooed on her upper arm would look so scary no one would comment.

  Now there was a pipe dream.

  Mother’s Day would be Judgment Day, as usual. Her parents were Christians of a sort: the sort who seemed to think they were channeling God with a bug up his butt. She toyed with the idea of saying she was sick.

  But she knew she would go. She always went; to this and all family gatherings, no matter that she felt less kinship with her kin than she did with gibbons and lemurs. She didn’t exactly hate her parents; she merely disliked their company. In fact, she was perfectly aware that they were decent people who’d done the best they could for her and her sisters, both of whom had had the gall to move out of state. That left her to cope, and it would have been a lot easier with her new boyfriend.

  Her parents wouldn’t be rude in front of a stranger, in fact they’d go out of their way to be friendly. And Isaac, truth to tell, would be quite a prize to show off. The man was handsome, and he was talented, and he was polite and well spoken. Best of all, he was just eccentric enough to intimidate them— and she got along with them best when they were intimidated.

  Yet she didn’t know how to pull it off by herself. In fact, she’d cover up the tattoo with sleeves, and she’d leave the barbed-wire thing at home. She was aware that, for all her blue hair and bravado, there was still some piece of her that was deeply timid and submissive. And frightened.

  She sighed, hoping this time would be better. She had baked a lemon chess pie, her mother’s favorite. It was something, anyway.

  Her parents lived in a small, depressing house in one of the few neighborhoods she could name that actually had no charm. This was a hard thing to pull off in New Orleans, but the house was in Kenner, out in the burbs. It might have been the sort of thing you’d hide from a new boyfriend— and so might her parents be— but Isaac was so perfectly sweet and tolerant, he probably wouldn’t even be offended when they questioned him about whether he was Jewish or not, on account of his first name.

  It was still light when she arrived for dinner, and when her mother saw the pie, she said, “Oh. I thought you liked chocolate. I got a cake.”

  “Mom, the pie’s for you. Happy Mother’s Day.” Her mother looked as if she didn’t know how to respond. Neither of them made a move to kiss the other. Her dad was in the den watching television.

  “What’d you do to your hair?”

  “Dyed it. What’s for dinner?”

  Terri stayed in the kitchen while her mother finished cooking: ham, sweet potatoes whipped with orange juice, frozen green beans, and Waldorf salad— her mother’s idea of festive food. She hadn’t started the salad yet. This way she could keep Terri in the kitchen with her while she complained about her husband.

  He never talked to her, she said. Their marriage wasn’t close; it never had been. Sometimes she was so depressed she didn’t know what to do.

  “Pray?” Terri suggested.

  And her mother snapped, “A lot you know about it,” as if Terri were being deliberately insolent.

  When they were at the table, in the small dining room papered with a stiff brown and yellow floral pattern, her mother said, “You’re welcome to bring your boyfriend. We hope you know that.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “You got a boyfriend?” Her dad seemed suddenly interested. “Who’d want a blue-haired gal?”

  “A very nice man. An artist.”

  “You meet him in some bar?”

  “At school. He went back for his degree.”

  Her dad pointed a fork at her, speared with a great hunk of pink meat. His face was perennially red, and his neck was thick and always had been, even before his middle matched. Though he’d never hit her— it was her mother who had— she’d always found him frightening. “He older than you?”

  “A little bit. He’s very mature.” She wasn’t sure that he was, but at least he made money, which was more than she could say for herself.

  Her dad made his voice low and somehow seductive. “You gonna marry him?”

  She felt the hot rush of blood to her face. “I don’t know. We’ve just been dating a couple of months.”

  She didn’t even know if she wanted to marry him, but she sure wished he’d ask her to move in with him. Sharing rent and groceries would take a huge financial burden off her.

  “Just so you don’t go living in sin.”

  Terri lost it then; sometimes it didn’t take much. “I wouldn’t consider it a sin to live with somebody you love.”

  It was like throwing a mouse to a cat. Her mother sat up straight as a pole and narrowed her eyes. She was in territory she loved. “It is in the sight of God,” she said.

  “Who decided that? The male chauvinists of the Roman Catholic church?”

  “Thou shalt not commit adultery.”

  “If you aren’t married, it isn’t adultery.”

  “Why, it certainly is.”

  “You know, if you’re not a Christian, it just doesn’t matter. You don’t have to listen to what anyone says. You get to make your own rules.”

  “You don’t believe there’s such a thing as God’s truth?”

  “Will y’all stop!” Her father was furious. “My stomach’s churnin’ and churnin’.” That was his unvarying reaction to conflict, which was inevitable in all Whittaker family visits. When there was silence, he said, “Now tell us about school, Terri.”

  The rest of the evening continued that way: a pocket of peace followed by an eruption of aimless, unfocused anger. And when it was over, her parents thanked her for coming and said how much they’d enjoyed the evening and how they didn’t see her enough and wished they could see her more and when could they do it again. This happened every time and never failed to make her feel sad. They clearly didn’t have a clue how to communicate with her, didn’t approve of her, and didn’t enjoy her company, yet they wanted to. Actually, she wasn’t sure of that; in some dim corner of her soul, she knew that she wanted
to. She thought that perhaps they just wanted to think they did.

  Her mother had given her half the bought chocolate cake, which Terri took because she thought Isaac might enjoy it. (She herself avoided sweets and fats lest she turn into a balloon.) Why not take it to him now? she thought.

  She was desperate for someone to talk to. Being with her parents always made her feel desperate, as if she were alone in the world and there was no hope.

  She could simply go over to Isaac’s house and surprise him— have a second evening after the first fiasco. Actually, they hadn’t seen each other all weekend. Isaac had gone to visit his mother— in Atlanta, she thought— but he was coming back tonight. He’d said he’d call her; that meant he’d be home.

  He might be too tired to see her. Well, in that case, she could just drop off the cake and kiss him good night. What could be wrong with that? Who wouldn’t be glad to see half a chocolate cake?

  If she’d really thought about it, she’d have known she had expectations beyond cake delivery. Isaac lived in the Bywater, and Terri lived in Carrollton, two neighborhoods about as far from each other as you can get.

  She felt a little rush of happiness as she got out of her beat-up Toyota and saw that the lights were on in his living room. She was nearly up the front porch steps when she noticed the curtains weren’t completely closed. What was he doing? she wondered, and peeked.

  He was sitting in a chair, and someone was with him. A woman about Terri’s age, maybe even younger, was packing a suitcase lying open on his sofa. Terri got it instantly: The woman was about to go home after spending the weekend with him.

  He had lied to her. He hadn’t gone away to see his mother at all. The serious little talk she’d had with him about whether he could possibly join her at her parents’ house now seemed a sham. He’d said he really cared about her, but he didn’t think they were at the stage yet of meeting each other’s parents.

  She stopped dead in her tracks and watched a moment. But only a moment. Before she knew she was doing it, she threw the cake at the door. The plate her mother had left it on banged satisfactorily and maybe broke. She couldn’t be sure, she didn’t look back.

  She only heard the door open suddenly and then voices, laughing, she thought.

  Yes. She was almost sure she heard them laughing at her.

  He had to know who it was, even from the back; who else had blue hair and a beat-up, dented, rusty old Toyota? He didn’t even call to her. That was how much she meant to him.

  She drove back to her shabby little place in Carrollton, tears nearly blinding her, the tension of the evening giving way to despair. She flopped on her bed and stared up at the ceiling, wishing like hell for a cigarette, though she no longer smoked, not, for one thing, being able to afford it.

  That— and everything— was so damned expensive. She did tutoring, errands, and intermittent clerical work for a few off-campus clients, but she never had two nickels, as her father would say, to rub together.

  Almost not realizing she was doing it she got up, slipped into her shoes, picked up her keys, stuffed five dollars in her pocket and went back out to get cigarettes.

  She was nearly home, a fat unopened pack on the seat beside her, when she saw the blue lights of a police car. Its driver was signaling her. Her? Terri? Thank God, she thought, she hadn’t been drinking.

  Wondering what on earth was up, she pulled over and got out of the car, as she’d once read you were supposed to do— it made the cops feel more comfortable or something. Too late, she recalled she had blue hair; that may not have been so reassuring.

  Oh, well, she thought. Good thing I resisted a nose ring.

  The cop looked okay: mid-thirties, maybe, slightly heavy; but not a redneck. That was good.

  “What’s going on?” she said.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Terri Whittaker. Have I done something wrong?”

  “I noticed you don’t have a brake tag.” He pointed to her windshield. Louisiana law required a brake check every year; if you passed, you got a tag that said so. If you didn’t you got a ticket.

  “I’m really embarrassed. I just… uh… well, I work two jobs and go to school…”

  He smiled, showing he understood. “See your driver’s license?”

  “My… uh… omigod. I came out without it I just went to… She turned around and reached through the windshield, meaning to show him the cigarettes. His hand closed around her arm, hard, and she screamed, it was so unexpected.

  “Stay where you are, please.”

  “I just… I mean I was going to…”

  “Just stay where you are.” She saw him glance in at the seat and, apparently having reassured himself there was no gun there, he said to her, “Insurance?”

  “I, uh, keep everything together. Someone broke into my car once and took everything, registration and all, so I…”

  “You keep everything together.” He smiled at her.

  She decided to flirt a little. “Now, how’d you know that?”

  “Oh, just a lucky guess.” Thank God. He was being nice. “So you don’t have your registration, either.”

  “I’m sorry. I can’t believe I was so dumb. I was upset and I just came tearing out without even thinking about it.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To get cigarettes. I’ve already gotten them. I’m on my way home now, just a couple of blocks away.”

  “Terri, have you been drinking?”

  She shouldn’t have been shocked by the question, but she was. “No. Why would you think that?”

  “Say the alphabet for me.”

  Impatiently, she raced through it.

  “You messed up, Terri.”

  “I did? How?”

  “You know what I want to know? How come every time I ask you a question you answer me with another one?”

  “Am I doing that?”

  “There you go again, Terri.”

  This was getting out of hand. She tried to head it off. “Listen, Officer, I meant no disrespect. I really didn’t know I was doing it.”

  “Let’s try it again. Say the alphabet.”

  This time she went through it more slowly.

  “Okay,” he said. “Close your eyes and touch your nose with your index finger.”

  She did it easily.

  “All right. I’m going to write you up. Get back in the car, please.”

  He asked her her date of birth and a few other questions, and then he got back in his car and scribbled for a long time, so long she was pretty sure he was playing some passive-aggressive game with her, making her wait for no reason, and then he picked up his radio mike.

  He talked awhile and returned.

  “Everything okay?” she said.

  “You need to step out of the car again.”

  She opened the door and got out, quickly stubbing out the cigarette she’d finally gotten to have.

  “Now step away.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re answering me with a question.”

  She obeyed him, feeling nervous.

  “Now put your hands behind your back.”

  Once again she obeyed, and before she had a chance to think about it, he’d handcuffed her. She stared at him, utterly bewildered. She wanted to ask him why he did it, but it seemed questions were suddenly against the law.

  He said, “Terri, you got any warrants out against you?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Have you done anything?”

  “Well, no. I haven’t.”

  “Yes, you have.”

  She remembered her parking tickets. There were so many they’d threatened to boot her car, so she had a tittle stash at home meant to take care of them at the end of the month. “It must be my parking tickets.”

  “I’m going to have to take you down to the police station. Maybe you can call somebody to come pay your tickets.”

  He wouldn’t let her move her car, but it hardly mattered; she’d be out
in an hour or two.

  But he didn’t take her to the station. He took her somewhere with doors like an elevator that opened automatically and then you were standing in a space with more of those doors. Once you got in, there was a large room with lots of hard plastic chairs, like a bus station. The room was like a hub: opening off it were other rooms— cells. One, way at the back, was a holding tank for women.

  “Where are we?” she asked.

  “Central Lockup.” He took her handcuffs off and left her. When he came back, he said, “You know what you did, Terri? You committed a felony. This isn’t about parking tickets. This is forgery. Why didn’t you tell me about it?”

  “Forgery? That’s ridiculous! Whose name would I sign?”

  “There you go again. With that question thing.”

  * * *

  Before he opened his door to find it smeared with chocolate, Isaac James had been enjoying the last moments of a near perfect weekend, a weekend spent with his niece, Lovelace, who, because Isaac had a much older brother, was only a few years younger than he.

  On seeing blue hair and a trim behind flying down the walk, he had taken in the hopelessness of the situation as quickly as a breath and laughed outright, there being little else to do. Lovelace, apparently simultaneously horrified at the chocolate, the hair, the retreat, and the laugh, looked as shocked as if someone had just opened fire. “What’s happening?” she said, and, knowing she had plenty to fear, he wanted to reassure her immediately. But he couldn’t. He thought later that it must have been the phenomenon called hysterical laughter.

  “That’s Terri. It’s Terri,” he sputtered finally, knowing Lovelace would know who he meant. He’d talked about his girlfriend all weekend.

  “Why is that funny?”

  “I can’t say you’re my niece— who’d believe that?”

  She looked so completely unbelieving that it sobered him up. He cared deeply what Lovelace thought about him; except for his mother, who was some kind of missionary and was never in the country, his niece was all he had— by no means his only relative but all he had nonetheless. And since she was almost a contemporary, she was more like a cousin or a sister than a niece.