by Tonya Kappes
Then there were the times she’d say she’d had a feeling about someone being hurt or worse. . .killed, liked she’d had the morning Richard was killed. She called me, adamant that she had a feeling, and told me to call him, which I didn’t because he was in meetings all day. Turned out, Iris’s feeling was right.
“Let’s just say I need a coffee,” Iris said. Her brows knitted with worry. “I’ll be right back.”
Iris helped herself into the house and came back out with her cup, then she sat down in the rocking chair next to me. She glanced over her shoulder at Courtney Gaines’s home she rented from Mac.
“Do you know your new neighbor is Florence Gaines’s niece?” Iris had some information, and she was about to spill her guts.
“Yes. Of course I did. Nice girl. She’s the new gym teacher and cheerleading coach. . .”
“I knew it!” Iris yelled and smacked the arm of the rocking chair with her free hand. “High school. Teacher. Grady.” She sighed with relief.
“What?” I asked. “I may not be awake fully, but I’m not even following you whatsoever. Or do I want to know?”
“I’m not sure.” She took a drink of her coffee and used her fingernail to lightly tap the side of the cup. “I had a feeling about Grady, and I honestly think it’s just about the new girl moving in and you living here, which in turn leads to Grady. Now that I know your neighbor is a teacher with Grady. . .” She trailed off. “Oh. How are Grady and Julia?”
“They are fine.” At least I thought they were fine. I hadn’t heard otherwise, but I didn’t ask either.
“Okay.” Iris shrugged and stood up. “Just checking.”
“Sit. Down.” I made my words very clear and deliberate. “What do you know that you’re not telling me?”
“So now you want to know when I have a feeling, when usually you just want to not even acknowledge that they do have some merit? I mean, this house.” She gestured behind her. “I told you I had a feeling about Lee, and here you are.”
“Fine. I do want to know if you feel like something is going to happen to Grady.” I could see satisfaction written all over her face. My brow rose, my jaw set.
“I have a feeling something isn’t right with him and Julia. I mean. . . I’m feeling they aren’t happy right now, and something with your neighbor.” There was a seriousness to Iris that made me sit up straighter and take notice. “I don’t know what, but something is off. I got an idea in the middle of the night for you.”
“For me?” I questioned. “You know I never butt into Grady or Julia’s business.”
“No, but you’ve proven to be a middle-aged Nancy Drew, so why not just snoop around and see if there’s something or not before it gets bigger?” Iris had a point and a way of making me agree to things.
“What’s your idea?” As soon as the words left my mouth, there was a pit in my stomach that told me I was going to regret asking.
“I’m going to make Julia’s favorite dessert, and I’m going to make some “welcome to Sugar Creek Gap” cookies. You can deliver Julia’s dessert to the farm tomorrow for the family Sunday supper.”
Every Sunday since I was a child, our family had Sunday supper, and when I got married, Mom continued it with me and Richard. After Richard and I moved into the farmhouse with Grady, we hosted the Sunday supper for my parents. Now that Grady and Julia were living in the farmhouse, they had taken over the hosting, even though I did most of the cooking.
“Dessert would be great.” I agreed with Iris. She always had good ideas and plans.
“Tonight after work, you can walk over the welcome cookies to your neighbor. Have chitchat. You’re good at that.” She started to leave then stopped at the porch steps and lifted her mug in the air. “When you stop by the bakery to get the goodies, I’ll give you your mug back.”
“Clean it too,” I called after her and went back into the house to get ready for work, thinking I was going to need work today much more than usual because walking always cleared my head.
Iris made my mind one big jumbled-up mess. Not even my hot shower and extra coffee helped sort out Iris’s crazy feeling.
On my way out the door to go to work, I glanced over at Courtney’s yard. At least she’d gotten the mulch from the back of her small pickup to a pile in the front yard.
I told myself when I delivered her mail today along with the cookies, I’d offer to help her tonight to scatter the mulch. I’d bring up Grady to see what she had to say in hopes I’d be able to put Iris’s feelings aside.
“There is no time to dillydally and stare,” I said to myself and headed across the street. I walked over the little creek via the small wooden bridge that led to Main Street.
Even though it was much too early for anyone to be out, I still looked both ways before I crossed Main Street, where the post office was located next to the doctor’s building and the bank.
Sugar Creek Gap was a small town, but Main Street was where the local businesses were located. The old mill was on the right side of Main Street, along with the post office, courthouse, library, and funeral home. On the left side were the small shops like Social Knitwork, Tranquility Wellness, Wallflower Diner, Pie in the Face, the community center, the Roasted Bean, Tabor Architects, the general store, and the local radio station.
Of course we had bigger-box stores that were located on the outskirts of Main Street, but everything I needed was right here in this one block. Being close to work was a plus too.
I had three mail loops every day. The first loop Monica would have ready for me in my mailbag was the nursing home. The second loop consisted of all the shops located on Main Street. It also included Little Creek Road residences because there were only a few houses on the dead-end street. Then I finished my day with the neighborhood located behind the old mill downtown, which was where I lived.
Since my route was downtown and the houses were located around there, it was easier for me to walk back to the post office between loops than to drive an LLV, a lifelong vehicle—or mail truck as common language would say.
The LLV mail carriers were busy going over their trucks with Monica, so I didn’t get to ask how her subbing for me yesterday had gone, though I knew it was fine or she’d have called me.
When I went to grab my bag, I noticed that for the third loop, my neighborhood, I had a small cart, like I’d had a couple of times since Courtney had moved in a week ago. It made me think back to the knitting class yesterday when one of the Front Porch Ladies had commented on how many packages Courtney was getting.
Now that I knew she was a teacher and it was summer break, I too wondered what on earth those various packages sent from different parts of the United States were about. Clearly, being a mail carrier, I got a good glimpse into the personal lives of the folks in my town. I knew who ordered what and from where. Sometimes handing a package to my clients made me blush more than chitchat, especially when it dealt with personal matters. I could tell you what men were on Viagra and what women were shopaholics and keeping the secret from their husbands.
Take Kate Pitts. She was a little woman who lived with her husband in the assisted living part of the nursing home. Today there was a package for her from the home shopping network. This told me she would be waiting for me by her mailbox so she could intercept it from Willie, her husband. Today appeared to be one of those early mornings when I would see Kate, because there was a small package with the HSN logo on it.
The birds were chirping before the sun was even up, putting a skip in my step. It was going to be a good day. At least I told myself that and put Iris’s little feeling in the very back of my head.
I always made the Sugar Creek nursing home my first loop because it was directly behind the post office. The mailboxes for the facility were in one central location and all I had to do was use the master key to get all the silver doors to open, then fill their tiny mailboxes. If I was being completely honest, most of them were still asleep at five a.m., so I didn’t have to stop and chitchat lik
e I did the other loops I delivered too. Plus being near the post office was easy. I liked easy. Easy day. Easy customers. Easy. Easy. Easy.
“Good morning, Bernie.” My good friend, and retired FBI agent, Vince Caldwell was an exception to my theory about everyone in the nursing home being asleep.
He always greeted me from the long front porch swing located at the main building, though he lived in one of the senior independent living condominiums, where my parents also lived.
“Hey, Vince.” I popped a squat next to him, tugging my mailbag off my shoulder and onto the concrete patio between my feet. “Any big news?” I gestured toward his newspaper.
“Not a thing.” He shook his head. “That’s a lie.”
“Really?” I questioned.
“Yep. Vivian has scheduled a bingo game today in place of the outside yoga in anticipation of the thunderstorm rolling through this afternoon.” He looked at me under knitted gray and bushy brows. “It appears that I’m going to have to cancel my afternoon appointment with Matlock.”
“You’re giving up Matlock for bingo?” I joked, pretending to be shocked because I knew he loved watching the MeTv channel.
“Heck yeah. I don’t want to miss out on the opportunity to win a pair of swim earplugs since water aerobics will be starting up soon.” He folded his hand, creasing his paper in the middle and resting it in his lap.
“You do have to keep fit.” I winked and bent down to get his mail. “Looks like you got more reading to do.” I handed him his stack of magazines.
“Oh. I might have to miss bingo,” he teased and put the mail next to him. “No big news on the street?”
“Not a thing.” I shook my head.
“No crimes for us to snoop around in?” He had used his retired FBI credentials to help me once. It was fun and exhilarating.
“No, but I do have a new neighbor. Courtney Gaines, Florence Gaines’s niece.” Not that it was a crime, but it was news. “Did you know Zeke Grey is dating Florence?”
“He’s been looking for a woman.” He drew a long shuddering breath. “I told him he was too old for a woman and to play the field.”
“When did he tell you that?” I wondered since it was odd how Zeke had sent Harriette Pearl the scented thank-you note.
“It was during that whole wedding shower gig he gave a couple months ago. He said all the single women came out of the woodwork when he decided to host. Then he realized how much he missed female companionship.” Vince obviously didn’t approve, and it made me smile to think that men their age still wanted to have a companion around. “We were at our weekly poker game. He’d just won all the pretzel rods and thought he was on cloud nine.”
“You play for pretzel rods?” I laughed.
“Vivian is a stickler for gambling around here.” He rolled his eyes. “But I figured Zeke was hitting on Florence because they danced all night at the senior grab-a-date.”
“Senior, who, what?” My jaw dropped since this was the first I’d ever heard of such a thing.
“The Elks Club has what we call grab-a-dates. It’s announced the morning of, and we rush around asking anyone to come.” He leaned to the side to look at me. “Your parents never miss. I’m surprised you didn’t know.”
“They do so many things without telling me.” It was nice to hear they were getting out from behind the diner counter to have some fun. I always worried about them and socialization, not to mention keeping their minds alert. “Where is the dance?”
“It’s always at the community center. Zeke brought Florence, and boy, he brought it.” Vince shook the swing. “He must’ve dusted off his moves that day because he was wiggling and shaking, dancing all around Florence.”
“That’s so funny.” I couldn’t wait to go to the diner and ask my parents about the dance. “So Florence is Zeke’s choice, huh?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if he played the field a little, but right now she’s got that money. He lost a lot in the stock market, so I’m wondering if he’s looking for a sugar mama in his old age.” Vince shook his hands in front of him in a shooing motion. “I’d say forget it. I wouldn’t want the headache.”
“Headache?” I asked.
“Yeah, of some woman telling me how to dress, what to eat, who I can see, and what I can do.” The more Vince talked, the more it sounded like Zeke and Florence had been an item for quite some time. “He’s been a changed man. She told him he couldn’t play pretzel poker no more because it wasn’t fittin’ in the Lord’s eye.”
“Oh.” I drew back, kind of shocked Zeke Grey would even compromise. He never seemed like the guy to do that. “That seems out of his character.”
“You’re telling me.” Vince crossed his arms. “Like I told you, he lost almost everything in the stock market over the last couple of years. Instead of aggressively playing when he was younger, he decided he’d try his own hand at it, taking his portfolio out of the hands of his broker, and started to do the online thing with his money. Even took out a second mortgage on his already-paid-off home. Now he owes the bank. Man is piss-poor broke.”
My eyes grew big, and my jaw dropped.
“What?” Vince questioned.
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you curse.” I smiled and picked up the mailbag. “I’d love to stay and chat, but I’ve got mail to deliver.”
I didn’t tell him how he reminded me that Florence’s big scholarship winner was picked today. It was always nice to see a young person get the scholarship so they could afford to go to college. It was always a needy kid too. Most times Grady knew the family, and it was something for us to discuss. I needed something to discuss with him since I would be calling to feel him out about what Iris had said, even though Iris thought I should go straight to Julia with the bribery treats.
Vince and I said our goodbyes. I quickly went inside the main building to the mail room, where I did find a very eager Kate Pitts.
“I was ’bout to go out there and tell Vince Caldwell to shut up.” She had her fists planted on her thin hips. “It’s ’bout time for Willie to get up, and I’d be in a pickle if he caught me with another package.” She put her hand out.
“Here you go. It looks like a good one.” I took it out of the bag and handed it to her.
“It’s for a friend.” She wiggled her drawn-on eyebrows, which were lopsided. “Gonna be a wedding, but I can’t spill the beans.”
“I wouldn’t dare ask you to tell me who is getting married.” I put the key in the master lock and twisted it, popping all the silver mailbox doors open.
“If you insist, Bernadette.” Kate Pitts was dying to tell me. “My friend, Florence Gaines, I think she’s gonna tie the knot.” She winked. “I got her the perfect gift too. One of them Christmas ornaments with this year’s date on it so she and Zeke…” She curled her lips together and put her hand on her mouth. “Oh dear, I’ve said too much.”
I gulped, knowing if what she just let slip out of her mouth was true, the gossip would be hurling around like one of the seasonal tornadoes.
“Your secret is safe with me.” I busied myself with filling the mailboxes. There was no way I was going to say a word. Especially to the Front Porch Ladies. They’d all go into mourning since they all thought they had a shot of a relationship with Zeke Grey, when in reality, if they’d played their cards right, one of them might’ve been the new Mrs. Zeke Grey.
Chapter 4
The second loop was definitely going to be the most interesting of the day. Like the Front Porch Ladies had noted, Courtney Gaines was getting another round of packages which were stamped from various parts of the United States. Maybe somehow when I tried to help her with her mulch, I could slip in some questions about her mail.
Regardless, the second loop was the shops on Main Street, Little Creek Road, the courthouse, library, funeral home, and the church. I checked my cell phone time to make sure I was on target to get to the church to hear the announcement of the scholarship winner.
Most of the
shops were just opening by the time I got around to delivering their mail. Pulling a cart full of Courtney’s packages slowed me down, but the fresh air was doing me some good.
Every time I thought about Grady or even the whole Florence-and-Zeke situation, I would suck in a deep breath and remind myself it was all going to work out. I wasn’t sure if I was lying to myself, but there was a niggling feeling that there was something not right in Sugar Creek Gap.
Luckily, Leotta was already teaching a class, which let me drop the mail in the basket next to her register. Tranquility Wellness was in their usual yoga class. I took some outgoing mail and replaced it with their incoming mail.
The Wallflower Diner was next to Tranquility Wellness, and it was exactly what I needed. A few carbs to give me a burst of energy and a refill on my coffee.
There was nothing special about the diner. It was a typical southern diner. When you walked in, there was a dingy bell above the door that made every single person turn to look, and they waved, even if they didn’t know you. The front of the diner had various size tables for the eat-in crowd. Then in the far back was the diner counter, where all the locals were holding what I liked to call their daily meeting, where they all gave their opinions and felt like they could solve all the world’s problems. My dad included. He was generally the loudest one, and his boisterous laughter filled the restaurant.
Behind the counter was the kitchen, where my mom could be found at any time of the day even though she had several short-order cooks. She was still good at barking those orders. And today was no different.
“I said, country ham and biscuits. Country ham!” Her scream echoed out of the open kitchen window. “Who wants city ham on a biscuit? No one!”
“I see Mom is in a good mood.” I gave my dad a hug around his neck when I made it back to the counter where he was sitting with his buddies.