by J. L. Salter
"One minute please." When I turned to get the money orders from the drawer behind me, the creep raised up on his toes to look over the counter. Aynette had first called my attention to this and I realized he was either checking out my butt or my legs, or both. And it always freaked me out.
We went through the regular tiresome ritual. I took his five dollars, all in crumpled ones which I suspected he'd kept down in his skivvies somewhere. Then I handed him the money order with instructions to keep the carbon copy, et cetera.
He had almost certainly memorized my spiel but seemed to crave it anyway. I just wanted to vomit. He never said "thanks" and after departure, he always went toward the long hallway where the restrooms were. I could only imagine.
Normally, I could cope, but that day I was too frazzled. Not enough sleep, too much stress over the weekend, and all that running around on Monday. Plus, I still didn't know what I'd face in court the next day. So, naturally, I started crying.
Aynette reached over and put the "Next window" sign in front of my space and I turned away so no customers could see my tears.
Miss Z watched intently. She had her typical expression, with obvious disapproval in her pursed lips. She must have witnessed the entire encounter. But even if not that particular episode, then one of the many previous occasions almost precisely like it. So I assumed she didn't care how much abuse her tellers had to endure.
In any case, Miss Z did not come over and make me re-open my window. After a few minutes, I wiped my eyes and slowly turned to face the banking world again. Miss Z looked up at the closed circuit camera which recorded the goings-on of my drawer and window, then she checked her watch and resumed whatever she did when she wasn't scowling. I figured she planned to dock me for those six minutes.
I never did get to talk to Aynette.
****
After work all I wanted was to go home, dump my medium heels, and take a nap. Then soak in the tub with a homemade marguerita. Or slit my wrists. Whatever.
But when I reached the end of my cul-de-sac on Fleming Lane, I saw my brother's truck in the driveway. Eric also had a copy of my house key, so he was probably inside watching TV and snacking. I didn't usually mind him dropping in, but I sure had my heart set on that nap.
Eric lived in the small community of Marrowbone in the western part of Greene County, approximately half way between Verdeville and Nashville. He worked in a large auto parts store close to where the east Nashville loop intersected I-40. He didn't come to our fair city all that often, even though he lived less than ten miles away.
I found him asleep on my sofa with Elvis curled up in the crook of Eric's legs. Good. I'd still get my own nap.
It was about 6:30 when I woke, feeling quite groggy, and put on my slippers. Usually Elvis was the one to terminate my naps, but this interruption came from noises in my kitchen — Eric was scratching around for something to eat. I hustled in that direction and hoped I could derail his usual chaotic messes.
Too late. Eric had cracked five eggs and only four of them made it to the mixing bowl. His meaty hand was completely inside a bag of shredded cheese when I walked in.
"Eric, what on earth are you doing?"
He smiled. That younger brother grin used to have a lot more charm than it did on Tuesday evenings in early November. "I was in town. Thought I'd stop by and make you some supper." His fork whipped those eggs so badly I thought they might scream. Eric's only true capability with food was to stir it or grill it.
I sighed heavily. "So what brings you into Verdeville?"
"Hadda pay the tax bill at the courthouse. Pay it early and they knock off some." When he put down the bowl, egg juice splashed on my counter and Eric began his search for a frying pan.
His tax could be for vehicle or house, or maybe both. I didn't ask, just pointed to the cabinet with the small pans. "Look, it's nice to see you and thanks for making supper and all, but my friend Ellen's coming over this evening." I checked the wall clock. "In about an hour." And now I have a kitchen to clean.
"Ellen. That good-looking black girl who works at the school?"
I nodded, though I doubted Ellen considered herself a girl.
"She's cu-u-ute." He paused to savor the image. "Okay. No problemo. After we eat, I'm gone. Velma's waiting anyhow."
I'd heard Velma's name before, but didn't know which sequential woman she was in his life. I didn't ask questions about the love life Eric had… and he didn't ask about the love life I didn't have.
Eric was very protective. Four years ago, when he'd learned what Wally did to me, Eric had offered — quite sincerely — to beat Wally within an inch of his life and get my money back. Though his phrasing had been much more colorful. "Where's he hiding?" Eric had demanded, his fists clenched.
"Probably went to Kentucky," I'd replied. "There's lots of stupid women up there he can sucker-punch."
Even though my brother never got the opportunity to lay a finger on Wally, it gratified me that Eric was so eager to tear him apart. The only thing more gratifying would have been if I could have watched.
"So, how'd the big Halloween thing go?"
I was half-way surprised Eric even knew I'd worked on it. "Wore me out. It went okay 'til the end when I got locked in and had to get a pirate to rescue me."
Eric asked a few questions and I explained with the short version, unembellished. I wanted to take over his egg scrambling, but he seemed intent on stirring our meal into unrecognizable dry yellow crumbs.
"So, Eric, have you ever heard of a new guy in town named Ryan Hazzard? Works at the courthouse. Maybe you saw him today."
Eric shook his head. "Doubt it. Mostly women in the tax office." He looked around for plates and I pointed to the correct cabinet. "Hazzard? Nope. No bells."
I wouldn't ask him for further info on Hazzard, but I wondered if Eric knew anything about Vanessa, since he kept track of most women — within a certain age range — in the entire county. "The tax office is on the same floor with the D.A. Do you know Vanessa Karlov? She's one of their attorneys."
"What's she look like?"
As I described her, Eric began smiling. "Oh, yeah, I've seen her. A buddy and me delivered a bunch of golf cart parts to the Verdeville Country Club one time and that Vanessa lawyer girl was out at the pool putting her tan juice on." His smile kept going.
I felt the need to wipe away Little Brother's grin. "Eric, you do know those are fakes, don't you?"
Another big grin. "Don't care. A nice rack's a nice rack. End of story. Her buns are too skinny though."
Most men probably never looked lower than her ribcage. I had to confess I hadn't checked out Vanessa's rear either. "You know much else about her?"
"Vanessa the lawyer?" Eric screwed up his eyes — bright blue like mine. "I don't know why you're askin', but you don't want to tangle with her. She's like a horror movie slasher meets a radio-active monster shark."
Vivid image. "Explain."
He continued but didn't actually explain. "She's been dating this big galoot who lives in Nashville somewhere. Matter of fact, he was at the pool with her that day. He's got arms like this." Eric demonstrated that estimated girth with both hands. "He comes in to our store and buys parts for a big diesel dualie, as I recall. Couple of times, this tall blonde lawyer comes in with him. She's the kind that looks around and goes, 'Eww' and decides to go wait in the truck, but she wishes it was a fancy sedan."
I could see why that bothered Eric. All of his women could change spark plugs and drain their own oil.
Eric was an uncomplicated good ole boy. He only dated one woman at a time and always broke up with them face-to-face. He never dated married females unless they were legally separated. Eric would never bed you, steal you blind, and then sneak away — like the Weasel did me.
I loved Eric as my brother but I could never share romantic love with anybody so superficial. For a man to ever attract my heart again, he'd have to have depth and breadth, insight and perception. He'd need emotional warmth,
of course, but also the dashing virility of a corsair. Huh? Where did that word come from? Aarrgghh!
When I remembered, I asked Eric if he'd gotten a call from my friend Karla on Saturday night. "It would've been about coming to the festival to pay my bail."
"Nope, no calls. Least not while I was awake." He whipped out his phone. "Hold on, let me check messages." He had one of the old phones which played a lengthy recording of all the un-erased communications. "Uh, there's eleven new messages. I guess Karla coulda been one of those."
Coulda. Thanks for nothing, brother dear.
Eric never did explain why he thought Vanessa was slasher-meets-shark. And before I could ask again, he'd shifted. "You still got my stuff?"
I knew some of his belongings were up in the attic somewhere. "Yeah. What's in that big old box anyhow?"
"Don't remember. But every time I can't find something, Velma says it's probably with my stuff. Meaning what I keep over here."
"Well, if you'd take it back to your place, you and Velma could sort through it all and integrate those items with your resident junk."
"Yeah, but now I got all of Velma's stuff around."
"She's moved in with you?" What a hound dog!
Big smile. "Yeah. You should meet this one. She figures we're about eighty percent married."
Eric made a relationship seem simple, straightforward, and even loving… albeit in a very casual way. I wondered if I'd ever have a connection like that. But I had to chuckle. Not every female connection was uncomplicated. There was one psycho who'd tried to cut him with an electric carving knife, but Eric stayed just far enough away that the cord's plug kept popping out of the wall's power receptacle. That wacko was so ignorant she thought when the device had no reciprocating action, that its sharp blade wouldn't cause any damage. So she'd just thrown it down and stormed off.
"What are you smiling about, Sis?"
"Nothing." Nothing but the memory of how good fortune continually smiled on my sibling. I checked the clock. There wasn't time to hound Eric into climbing up to my attic and taking his possessions with him, so we just hugged tightly and I ran him out the door.
Ellen drove up just as Eric was leaving.
"Hi, Ellen. You look real nice tonight." Eric jumped in his truck and drove off.
Ellen approached me looking puzzled, but she smiled. "What's that all about? I didn't think your brother hardly knew me."
"He apparently knows all the good-looking women of legal age in Greene County."
"Oh, hush."
Chapter Eleven
I'd asked Ellen over mainly to help me with the Pyewacket puzzle, but I had also come to lean on her for deeper needs.
Ever the counselor and a dear friend eager to help, she always told me what was on her mind when she knew I was troubled. "This new man in town has thrown you, hasn't he?" She peered into my face as we walked inside the house. I scooted Elvis away and we both settled on the couch.
"It's only because of the note. If he'd just driven away after conquering that evil spider, I could have forgotten him as easily as Sunday's football scores." I looked down at my semi-fluffy house shoes. "We were just corny 'strangers in the night' and it would've ended with that single pass."
"Except for his one-word note."
I nodded solemnly.
"Kris, I want to come back to the note, but let me ask something." She leaned forward slightly, her palms resting on polyester-covered thighs. "If you weren't out to catch a man, why on earth did you wear such a sexy Halloween costume?"
My face probably looked like I'd stepped in something. "Uh, I don't know."
"I mean, if you were intent on witching, you could've gone with warts and a shapeless black shift." Ellen cleared her throat. "Why a sexy witch?"
I felt slightly ashamed. "I guess sexy was the only, uh, direction that occurred to me."
"Kris, have you wondered why? If you really don't want a man in your life again — why would you wear something showing lots of leg and bocoodles of…?"
Tears formed in my eyes, but they didn't pool enough to fall… yet. It probably meant I was still conflicted. Deep inside, maybe I actually did want to re-establish contact with the male species. Well, not the entire species. I didn't reply to my friend.
Ellen took a deep breath. "Look, you were burned badly but you've survived. You're climbing your way out financially and you have normal relationships with individual men."
I nodded slowly. "But friends, landlords, and former supervisors aren't the kind of relationships you wear high hems and low-cut blouses for. Or a bustier." I gulped.
"No. Those, uh, trappings are designed to make a statement."
"What statement did I make that night at the armory?"
"Well, for some women I know, the statement would have been, 'Have a good look and if you're interested, meet me in the storeroom in ten minutes'."
I gasped and pressed a small pillow to my face.
Ellen hurried to reassure me. "But I think your statement was more along the lines of, 'Hey, somebody let me know if I'm still attractive, because I haven't felt sexy for nearly four years'."
Not since that scumbag screwed up my life. Those pooling tears fell, followed by others. "But that makes me sound so desperate. What did all those people think?"
Ellen sandwiched my hand between hers. "You need to remind yourself that you did not deserve this, Kris. Wally was looking for an easy victim and you opened up to him because you believed his words and trusted his touch. But after Wally everything changed." She peered into my face. "I know you're crushed and bitter — completely understandable. But you have to grow past all that, just like you've steadily paid down all those bills."
I sniffled loudly. "Yeah. One day, about fourteen months from now, I'll be free from that financial jail."
"Jail is a good image, Kris, and I worry that your heart is still confined." Ellen patted my hand. "That pirate let you out of those wooden bars…"
I didn't let her finish. "But there's no way he can rescue me any further, even if I'd let him." Which I won't.
Ellen, who had begun this conversation looking counselor-hopeful, seemed crushed. I hated to disappoint her, but I couldn't just flip a switch and suddenly emanate a golden glow from my formerly shriveled heart. That's just in movies and paperbacks. So, I stood quickly and headed to the kitchen to get the universal tonic for Greene County blues — iced tea.
I held up the plastic pitcher. "Or would you rather something stronger?"
Ellen chuckled in spite of the glum mood in the room. "No, tea's fine."
I poured two glasses and returned to the couch. "I appreciate everything you do to help. Everything you've done, Ellen. Truly. But I don't think I can fix my heart until I get my finances back in operating order. You know, one thing at a time."
"Kris, life doesn't always give you the privilege of handling one thing at a time. Sometimes, you have to tackle whatever's thrown at you. And if one of those happens to be really good — or appears to show some promise — you owe it to yourself to at least stop and take a look."
I mulled that notion. "Or poke it with a stick to see what it does."
Ellen looked puzzled at my image. "Well you sleep on it a bit. It'll come to you… if it's for the good." She took a sip of tea and then stole a peek at her watch. "So what did you find out about that word?"
I was relieved to depart the psychoanalysis. "Pyewacket." I quickly summarized what I'd learned on the Internet search and segued into the movie I'd watched. "That was the name of the witch's cat. Doesn't mean anything to me."
Ellen studied the slipcase for the VHS cassette. "The real question is 'What does that word mean to Ryan?' See the difference?" Ellen seemed always either in the mode of counselor or amateur writer.
"So you haven't seen it?"
Evidently not, from her shrug.
"It's an old movie — late fifties…"
"Oh, back then script writers could put anything on the screen and we were supposed to buy
into it." Ellen rolled her eyes. "Give me the low-down."
"It's on the Internet, uh, on a movie database."
"I can't blast my DH off the computer long enough to even check my e-mail. Just list the high points."
"Okay, Jimmy Stewart is a publisher about to marry some icy socialite. Kim Novak knows the Ice Queen from a betrayal during their college days. For revenge, Kim puts a spell on Jimmy so he'll fall out of love with his fiancé. In the meantime, Jimmy falls in love with Kim! But Kim is a witch so her heart cannot even feel love. Yada yada yada. Then Jimmy drinks a potion to counteract the spell and Kim gives up her witch powers so she can finally feel her heart. So, they both lose and it's basically back to square one — an impasse."
"Sounds pretty lame. Nobody could publish that nowadays."
"It plays better than it tells." I was never very good at movie summaries or book synopses. "Well, after some time passes, they happen to meet again and start over with a clean slate, so to speak. No spells, she's completely human by then, and he's over his hurt pride, or whatever."
Ellen placed the slipcase on the coffee table. "Okay, so what part did the cat play in all this?"
The Internet summary hadn't spelled this out, so I had to go back to memory. "Hmm. The cat left Kim after she gave up her mojo, but Pyewacket was instrumental in getting them together. Don't remember exactly because I fast-forwarded part of it, but I think the cat went up to Jimmy's office and sort of reminded him of his connection to Kim. It's a bit fuzzy now."
"Well, forget the cat. Ryan's allusion was the movie itself." Ellen the writer. "Obviously, you're his Kim Novak."
"I don't look anything like Kim." Though it would be quite nice to resemble the sultry Ms. Novak in her prime. "But I'm back on the cat. If it was just a reference to the film, he could've used the title."
"Men don't always utilize the most direct route." Ellen sometimes closed her eyes when she thought especially hard.
"Okay, I'll play it again and you watch it with me."
Ellen reached for her phone to call Mack and then grinned. "Can we bake cookies during half-time?"