Rusty Logic

by Robin Alexander

  “You take my hand and step on the seat,” Kirsten said.

  Rusty grabbed Kirsten’s hand, climbed into the boat, and continued to rant. “A job half done, that’s how she sees it. You know what? I’m happy with my progress. It’s supposed to be sunny today, but it’s going to rain this afternoon.”

  “O…kay, thanks for the weather report. How much coffee have you had?”

  “One cup.” Rusty’s hands shook as she pulled a packet of gum from her pocket and stuck a piece into her mouth.

  “Just sit down and try to relax,” Kirsten said as she threw off the lines. “I’ll take you for a nice ride, and you’ll see some pretty sights. We might even see some deer.”

  “You see cute furry creatures, I see bait. I don’t want to be wherever they are because something is probably hiding in the shadows ready to make them breakfast. If the deer get away, guess what? We’re the next best thing.”

  Kirsten sat in the driver’s seat. “I’ve been coming out here for ages, and I’ve never been eaten.”

  “Of course not, you’re here driving the boat, so what you just said makes no sense. Just because that hasn’t happened yet doesn’t mean it won’t, so stay away from the bank.”

  “Okay,” Kirsten agreed with a nod as she pulled away from the dock. “Would you remind me about the leaves?”

  “I think I’ve figured out how to make them. The first time I ‘opened’ up to you about the heart attack and the dream, the next time I had it, there were some leaves on my tree. We talked last night, and I had more leaves and grass coming in. What pissed me off was Mom showed up and wouldn’t acknowledge my progress.”

  “What that sounds like to me is you’re still seeking her approval,” Kirsten said gently.

  “No, it means she pisses me off.”

  “Well, that too,” Kirsten conceded. “You had success nevertheless, so pat yourself on the back.”

  “You sound like Neil. He was in the dream too, sitting in the house Mom wants me to finish. What does the house represent?”

  Kirsten shook her head. “I’m clueless on that one.”

  “All right.” Rusty blew out a breath and said, “Let’s talk about something else. Are you a Cajun?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then why do you sound like one?”

  “Because I’ve lived here surrounded by them all my life,” Kirsten said with a laugh. “It’s gonna happen to you too. One day, you’ll say gazz instead of gas.”

  Rusty watched how the sky changed as the sun rose. Mist hung low on the water, large white birds perched in the trees along the bayou. “All right, this is pretty,” she admitted begrudgingly. She pointed at one of the birds. “You better stay up there because if you come down here, you’re gonna die.”

  “That was so nice of you to point out because I’m sure that never crossed that bird’s mind,” Kirsten said with a grin.

  Rusty ignored the quip and asked, “So you don’t work on the weekends?”

  “I’m supposed to work seven to four five days a week. I say that because sometimes I do get called out at night. Two of my officers work four twelve-hour shifts at night, then I have part-timers cover their shifts on the weekends. There’s supposed to be two officers working the same shift during the day, but I fill one of those slots to keep us under budget, so we can afford new equipment. Small town, small money. On Fridays, I have two of the part-time officers working, so that gives me time to work on the administrative stuff I hate. Yesterday, I spent a lot of time in the mayor’s office being lectured on how to deal with a peeping Tom.”

  “It’s creepy thinking that someone might be watching me through my windows, but why is such a big deal being made over this? I mean, you don’t often see people being arrested for that in the news…unless they raped someone in addition.”

  “Right,” Kirsten said with a nod. “I’ve been doing research on the behavior, and while some experts disagree, what I took from it was voyeuristic behavior is often the precursor to sexual assault. At the moment, I’m torn between what my gut tells me and the facts.”

  “What are the facts?” Rusty asked with concern.

  “I don’t have anything concrete to lead me in any direction. No one has actually seen anyone at their windows. They’ve just found indicators that someone was outside.”

  Rusty folded her arms and nodded. “And what is your gut saying?”

  “That this could’ve been going on longer than we realized, and we may have a peeper that could escalate to predator.”

  “That’s disconcerting.”

  “That’s why I told you that night not to exercise after dark, but don’t worry, Stella is watching your place very closely,” Kirsten said with a smile. “She’s been nocturnal since her husband died, so you can rest assured she’s on guard until dawn.”

  “And what is she going to do if the guy comes to my window—hit him with a bird?”

  Kirsten glanced at Rusty. “No, she’ll call 911 and me. I can guarantee you, I’ll get there faster than anyone else.”

  Rusty put on a brave act, even though what Kirsten had said made her squeamish. “Well, like I said, I grew up in a rough neighborhood, and you learn to stay on your toes.”

  “How’d you get your nickname, Janine?” Kirsten asked with a smile.

  “Wow, you really have been doing some reading,” Rusty said with a partial smile. “I wanted to be a blonde in my teens because they always seemed more popular. Mom said no, but I went out and bought a bleaching kit anyway while she was at work. Regardless of the penalties, I was determined to do what I was going to do. I left the bleach on my hair much longer than the directions said to, and it still wasn’t blond. I called a friend who told me to rinse it out or it would burn my hair off, so I did, and I was left with a head full of orange hair. When Mom saw it, she decided the perfect punishment was not to fix it.” Rusty shrugged. “I was going to dye it back brown anyway when she wasn’t home, but the same friend I called for help said she nearly went bald trying to fix a mess she made. She told me I had to let it rest for a little while. Mom started calling me Rusty, and I actually liked it, but I didn’t let on that I did. When people picked on me about it at school, I just grinned and told them to call me Rusty. It stuck. Everybody has a nickname, what’s yours?”

  Kirsten’s face flushed red. “I’ve been called a lot of things.”

  “I’m not going to be comfortable telling you things if you don’t share stuff with me. I need more leaves, so spill it.”

  Kirsten sighed loudly and smiled. “Poot.”

  “Is that the nickname, or are you really saying, ‘Shit, she’s right, I have to tell her’?”’

  “Stella helped Mom with me, and according to her, every time she changed my diaper, I did that.” Kirsten held up a hand. “I couldn’t help it, they crammed me full of pureed prunes, my poor little baby intestinal tract couldn’t handle the pressure. No one calls me that anymore because I carry a gun. If you make the mistake of calling me that, I will shoot you in the foot.”

  Rusty clamped her lips together tightly, then asked, “May I laugh?”

  “Oh, sure, have a chuckle on me.”

  Rusty’s cackle echoed over the bayou and ran the birds from the trees. “Poot, how cute,” she cried.

  “I said a chuckle, not a howl,” Kirsten ground out and laughed. She turned into a canal, and after a minute or so, they came out into a much larger bayou. She killed the motor and allowed the boat to drift. “This is where I like to just sit and stare.”

  “And what exactly does that do for you again?” Rusty asked as she looked around.

  “It just gives me a chance to clear my head. It’s very mentally refreshing, and it calms my nerves.”

  “All right, let’s do that.” Rusty propped her chin in her hand and scanned the banks for alligators, bears, and anything else capable of eating a human. She managed a whole five minutes of silence before she said, “Hey, there’s a pterodactyl staring at us.”

  “That
’s a blue heron,” Kirsten said patiently. “He’s not paying us any mind, he’s hunting for food.”

  “I see his eye, and it’s on us. We’re breakfast,” Rusty argued.

  “I’ve never been attacked by a heron, and I don’t know anyone who has.”

  Rusty fanned a hand at Kirsten. “I think we need to leave.”

  “Rusty, it’s just a bird.”

  “With a damn beak that looks like a sword. It could run me through.”

  “You have more of a chance of being stabbed by me than that bird.” Kirsten slapped the side of the boat and yelled. She sighed as she watched the heron fly away. “You’re safe now.”

  “Thank you.” Rusty propped her chin in her hand again, and for a moment, it seemed that she was going to be quiet. “If we sank right now, what would happen?”

  Kirsten’s eyelids fluttered. “We’d get wet, but that’s not gonna happen unless you knock me out, take control of the boat, and run us into something.”

  Rusty chuckled. “I have a mental picture of that. I’m driving, the wind is in my hair, and you’re lying on the floor out cold being jostled around.”

  “And this you find funny?”

  “Yeah, in a maniacal kind of way, you know, like a dark comedy.” Rusty shook her head. “All right, silence, clear my head.”

  Kirsten was expecting another round of commentary, so she didn’t try to go into her mental happy place. She watched as Rusty stared at the water, squirmed around, then pressed a button that made a compartment pop open. Rusty closed it and pressed the button again.

  “Oh, my God, you’re like Donkey in the Shrek movies,” Kirsten exclaimed. “Are you capable of sitting still?”

  Rusty jerked a thumb at herself. “I’m a high-performance machine. If I’m still, I’m asleep, and even then, I’m told I kind of jog in place…like a dog when it dreams.”

  “Do you ever allow yourself to get into a relaxed state when you’re not sleeping? It could be in front of the TV or while having a massage?”

  “Um…kind of. I don’t like strangers touching me, so I don’t go for massages. I usually go through my email when I’m watching TV, and frankly, I’d be doing that now, but Neil froze my mail account.” Rusty threw up a hand. “But I’m relaxed when I do that.”

  “Okay, I want you to try something. Look at the sky, focus on the puffy clouds, and try not to allow any thoughts to invade your mind. Do that now.”

  Rusty gazed up at the sky, and she remained still for about thirty seconds before she began drumming her fingers on her knees. A few minutes passed by, Rusty stared at the sky, Kirsten stared at her. Then she began to move her head from side to side, and after that, she popped the knuckle on her index finger. Kirsten couldn’t suppress the laugh that bubbled up within her, even though it ruined the silent moment.

  “I win,” Rusty said triumphantly.

  “It wasn’t a contest, you overgrown kid.” Kirsten picked up her thermos. “Coffee?”

  “You’re a lesbian, right?”

  Kirsten nodded. “Coffee?”

  “I knew it the minute we met. I wasn’t sure you knew, though.”

  “I wasn’t sure about you until I read that article.” Kirsten poured coffee into a cup and asked, “Do you want this?”

  “Yes, and I wasn’t talking about you knowing I was. I’m saying I wasn’t sure you knew you were gay. Some women don’t.” Rusty raised the cup when Kirsten handed it to her. “When I saw you, I knew for certain.”

  “Have you been drinking this morning?” Kirsten asked seriously.

  “No,” Rusty said as her face tensed. “I’m having a hard time adjusting to this new life. I haven’t set an alarm since I came here, but this morning, I did. I sprung out of bed half asleep, thinking I needed to get dressed and go to work, then…I realized I was coming out here.” She clamped her cup with both hands and squeezed it. “I feel like I’ve lost my sense of purpose, and I’m out of sorts.”

  “Ah,” Kirsten said with a nod. “You know what you need? Breakfast.”

  *******

  “This is probably the best omelet I’ve ever eaten in my life,” Rusty said before taking the last bite and looking around. “I seriously thought this was a bait shop, though.”

  The store did in fact sell bait, but after the struggle it took to get Rusty inside, Kirsten decided not to admit that. “I swear, the kitchen is very clean. I’ve been back there a few times, and I know Mark and Cindy Pace really well. They make the best omelets in town.”

  “I’ve just never eaten a meal in a convenience store before.”

  “Oh, but it’s so much more,” Kirsten said with a laugh. “If you need boots, they’ve got ’em. You can find knives, tools, and even cans of soup. It’s your one-stop shop.”

  “How do you have a love life in this town? Do you have to import lesbians?”

  Kirsten raised her cup to her lips and said, “There’s quite a few that live here,” before she took a drink. “They’re not all in the closet, either.”

  “I just kind of got the impression that our people don’t live in small Bible Belt towns. Safety in numbers, you know, and larger cities are more accepting.”

  “Times are changing. Like anywhere else, we do have our narrow minds who still feel they have the right to dictate how one lives, but for the most part, my sisters and I are judged on character, not our sexuality. With that said, it’s much harder for a man to be out in a small town, at least that’s what I’ve observed here. I think the good ol’ boys feel threatened by them.”

  “So why are you single?” Rusty asked, meeting Kirsten’s gaze.

  “I could ask you the same.”

  “No time.” Rusty shrugged. “It’s hard to maintain a relationship when you go to the office at seven a.m. and stay until eight in the evening. As Neil says, I’m a workaholic. It’s my first love. What’s your excuse?”

  “I date,” Kirsten said casually. “I just haven’t found anyone that inspires me to commit. I’m of the mind that the right one will come at the right time, and I’ll know when I meet her.”

  Rusty’s brow furrowed. “How will you know that?”

  “I think I’ll just know,” Kirsten said with a shrug. “When I saw the house that I live in, I knew it was the one for me, and I wasn’t even shopping for a place then. Something inside of me cried out ‘this is the one,’ so I bought it.”

  “What if it hadn’t been for sale then? Would you have still felt that way?”

  “I don’t know. It came at the right time,” Kirsten said with a laugh. “That’s all I can tell you. It was just meant to be.”

  Rusty still looked confused. “So…you think you’re going to find your life mate the same way.”

  “It could happen. Haven’t you ever met someone or saw something, and it or they just called to you?”

  “I researched everything I’ve ever bought, my car, my condo to make sure they’d suit my needs and wants.” Rusty picked up her coffee cup and took a sip, thinking she’d approached dating the same way.

  “Have you ever just gone with your gut?” Kirsten put her hand on her stomach. “It just hits you right here and you know.”

  “I’m…apparently missing the gut chip. That must be a cop thing.”

  “Maybe,” Kirsten said with a smile, but as she gazed at Rusty, she felt that subtle knowing. Unlike her house, though, Rusty didn’t appear to be on the market.

  *******

  “Hey, Chief, we have a situation,” Mitch said when Kirsten answered her phone. “The wife and I are visiting Joanie Sikes, and she lives a few houses down from Noah Whitehead. I just saw Andy and Greg arrest Noah, and I asked them what was going on. Noah broke into Chip Wale’s son’s car last night, Chip caught the theft on video. I thought you should know because you’re kind of protective of the boy.”

  “Let’s get something straight, I’m not protecting Noah. Everyone seems to want to hang him for this peeper shit, but you know we don’t have any evidence,” Kirsten said as
she guided the boat to her dock.

  “That’s why I’m calling you. They no sooner had the cuffs on Noah than Ben Hoskins started telling people that we have the peeper. Now if it was Chip’s son that did the theft, Ben would take care of him, but Noah is nobody. Guilty or not, he ain’t never gonna be able to come home because in everyone’s mind, he’s already been convicted and labeled a pervert. Somebody in Ben’s inner circle will break that boy to pieces if he comes back around, and we ain’t gonna be able to do shit about it. Now you know why I spend most of my time sleeping on shift. Let me ask you something. Ben goes up for re-election next year, you gonna run?”

  “Hell no,” Kirsten said with disgust.

  “Good, because I think my chances would be slim if I had to compete with you. Can I count on your vote?”

  Kirsten would’ve cast her ballot for a snail before she would’ve considered voting for Ben Hoskins. “Yeah, you got it.”

  “I’ve already got my slogan, ‘Time to switch, vote for Mitch.’ My personal favorite, though, is, ‘Don’t just sit and bitch, get off your ass and vote for Mitch.’”

  “I like that, and thanks for calling me.” When the call ended, Kirsten was red-faced as she tied her boat off. “I have to go. My time off has been cut short.”

  “Did something bad happen?” Rusty asked with concern as she climbed onto the pier.

  Kirsten followed close behind her. “Yeah, but I don’t have time to explain. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Kirsten walked into the station and went directly to the holding cell where Noah sat looking defiant. “Are you only rocking one-third of your frontal lobe?” she asked him.

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “Are you crazy? You broke into a councilman’s car?” Kirsten asked angrily.

  “I saw on TV that I don’t have to answer questions without a lawyer. You’re gonna have to wait till he gets here.”

  “Noah, this isn’t where you’re gonna stay. You’ll be transferred to the parish prison. I hope your court-appointed attorney is a good one.” Kirsten turned and walked out of the station to the mayor’s office next door.