“What were you doing out at the Johnson farm anyway?” Yet another J, I realized as I said the name.
“Marjorie wanted a reading, and I obviously can’t drive, so your father brought me.”
“You offer a mobile service now? Uber Reads?”
“What’s that, dear?”
“Why didn’t she come to you?”
“Because she’s too timid to drive. Even as a little girl, Marjorie had no rambunction. Besides, I wanted to get out of the house. Not seeing all my lovely clients in my store is giving me cabin fever.”
“Speaking of your store, when are we going to pack it up and close shop?” I said as we reached the end of the private road and I waited for a lull in the traffic to turn onto the highway.
“We aren’t,” my mother replied.
“What? Since when?” I demanded, catching my dad’s eye in the rearview mirror.
“Your mother thinks that she’ll get depressed without the daily stimulation and social contact,” my father said.
“Really, dear, I tried my utmost best to retire, but sitting around all day twiddling my thumbs just isn’t for me. Besides, your father and I are beginning to get on each other’s nerves.”
“Are you?” I asked, surprised. I hadn’t noticed any friction — well, no more than usual.
“Oh, yes,” Dad said fervently, staring out of the window at the snowy forest of fir spires on either side of the road.
“For better or worse, but not for lunch — that’s what I always say,” Mom chirruped. “Just as soon as my cast comes off and the doctor gives me the all clear, I’ll reopen the shop.”
“Is there any point in trying to talk you out of this?”
“None at all,” Mom said, and Dad gave me such a pleading look in the mirror that I knew he couldn’t wait for her to be out of his hair either. What a family we were.
“Fine,” I said.
Although I knew reopening the store was a bad idea, a part of me was relieved. If I didn’t have to stay and help pack up, I could leave town earlier. Just as soon as I figured out Colby’s death. But in the meantime, I needed information to counteract my crazy intrusive thoughts.
“Dad, that emergency box of yours — what’s it for?”
“Emergencies,” he said in a puzzled tone. “Like today. If we’d been alone, we might have needed the food and water. Dang it, Crystal, we should have used the space blanket to keep out the cold!”
“Now he remembers,” Mom muttered.
“Yes, but what about the duct tape and things?”
“What things?” Dad asked.
“The rubber gloves, for a start.”
“Those are mine,” Mom said. “You never know, when you go visiting, if you might have to pitch in with washing the dishes, and I never, never, do that with my bare hands! Ruins the lines and dries the skin. So, I keep a pair in the box for emergencies.”
“And do you use a lot of duct tape?” I asked.
“Not really. I don’t think I’ve ever touched that roll in the emergency box,” Dad said, looking a little dejected at the realization. “But you never know when it might come in handy to tape up a loose exhaust, or something!”
Not wishing to point out that tape would be of little use in repairing a hot exhaust pipe, I asked, “And the cable ties — what are they for?”
“What’s with all the questions about my emergency box?” Dad asked.
“I– I’ve been thinking of putting together one for my own car.”
“Good idea! I found a list on the DMV site and packed according to their suggestions,” Dad said helpfully.
“So, the cable ties? And the box-cutter and the shovel?” I asked him.
“Those are all things you might need in a tight spot — to make emergency repairs or dig yourself out of the snow.”
“Or if you need to poop in the woods,” Mom added.
Well, that was entirely reasonable and plausible. But still… “You have a lot more of that sort of stuff in the basement.”
“When I sold the store, I kept aside whatever stock I thought we might be able to use, especially the non-expiring stuff, and brought it home,” Dad said.
“Soooo much stuff,” Mom murmured.
“It was much cheaper than having to buy more one day when we needed it, Crystal.”
“The entire basement was full to the brim with your father’s stuff that summer.”
“Nonsense. Besides, you’re one to talk — all that junk of yours stored down there.”
“People shouldn’t throw stones at glass houses,” Mom said sententiously, and Dad rolled his eyes.
“There was a can of pepper spray,” I said.
“I’d forgotten about that! I used to take that with me on walks because the Bernsteins’ dog was so vicious. Don’t you remember?”
I didn’t. “Why’ve you still got it?”
“Your father never throws anything away if he can keep it,” my mother said, and began rooting about in her handbag.
“A case of the pot calling the kettle black, if ever there was one,” Dad said.
Interrupting their bickering, I asked about the other question that had been niggling at me.
“When I visited Doc Armstrong yesterday, he—”
“How’s he doing, poor fellow?” Mom asked.
“Badly.” As I said the word, a cold, heavy dread settled in my stomach. “He said you’d asked him for a copy of Colby’s autopsy report, Dad. What was that about?”
My mother turned around in her seat to look at my father. He cleared his throat and said, “Well, we wanted to know how he died, didn’t we?”
“Why?”
“Why?” he echoed.
“Yes, why? I mean, the cause of death would have been released, was released, to the media, so why did you want all the details?”
“We wanted closure for you, dear,” my mother said, extracting a packet of pistachio nuts from her handbag and tearing it open.
“Then why didn’t you share it with me?”
“It was just too gruesome. It would’ve upset you and given you nightmares.”
“I was already upset. I was already having nightmares.” I met my father’s worried gaze in the mirror for a moment and asked, “You didn’t maybe get it for yourself?”
“For myself?” he said. “What do you mean?”
“You like that kind of stuff. Murder and court case records and autopsy reports. You’re kind of obsessed with it,” I said, my voice petering out as another glance in the mirror revealed the growing anger tightening his features.
“If you’re asking whether I got a copy of the report on your dead boyfriend’s autopsy to fuel my hobby, then no, Garnet, I did not,” he said sternly. “I’m deeply offended. I can’t believe you think that of me!”
I couldn’t either. Or that — briefly, unwillingly, irrationally — I’d thought even worse.
“If you must know, we got it at your mother’s insistence. It was for her.”
“For Mom?” I cut her a glance. “Why did you want it?”
She picked out a nut, prized the shell open and popped it in her mouth. Only once she’d chewed and swallowed did she reply. “I suppose I’d better come clean. I can’t have you thinking your father’s an unfeeling crime ghoul. Or would that be a vampire?”
“Mom!”
“Very well! I wanted to know if Colby had bled to death.”
Whatever I’d been expecting to hear, it hadn’t been that. Yet it rang a bell. “You asked about that before, at the police station when they questioned me. You asked whether he’d bled to death. Why?”
My mother squirmed uncomfortably in her seat and made a business of eating another nut.
“Why did you want to know about bleeding?” I insisted.
“I don’t know if you remember, but the day before his death, Colby popped in before work to visit. While we waited for you to get dressed and come down, we sat in the kitchen chatting and drinking tea. We had cookies, too. Lavender sho
rtbread, I’ll never forget. My goodness, I haven’t baked that for absolute ages! I must make—”
“Mo-om,” I said, my frustration stretching the word into two syllables.
“He seemed agitated. Very stressed about something, I thought. That’s why I gave him Rescue Remedy and some omega 3 oil capsules. Your omega 3s are very supportive to the nervous system.”
“Did he tell you what he was stressed about?”
“No,” she said. “He’d also injured his wrist somehow.”
“And?”
“And he was in pain.”
“And?”
“And I recommended he take arnica,” she said, in the tone of someone making a serious confession. “In fact, I gave him a whole bottle and told him to take it for a few days. It’s excellent for strains and sprains — speeds up the healing process. Even allopathic doctors acknowledge that.”
My mother was forever foisting her useless remedies on others — chamomile tea to a friend who wasn’t sleeping well, sliced onion steeped in honey to my father when he had a cough, feverfew leaves to me when I had a migraine. Back in my high school days, she’d insist that Jessica and I drank an infusion made from fresh rosemary, swearing it would stimulate our mental functioning during exam time. But what was so bad about giving Colby a homeopathic remedy — something traditional medicine considered a mere placebo?
“I’m missing something,” I said.
She sighed. “One of the side effects of arnica is that it increases bleeding. It slows the clotting or increases the blood pressure or something, I forget. Anyway, you’re not supposed to take it before surgery.”
“So, you worried that when Colby was beaten up, the arnica you gave him might have made him bleed excessively? You thought you might have been responsible for his death?” This was absolutely ridiculous.
“It was a serious dose,” she said. “D6 strength. Plus, with the omegas, you know …”
“No, I don’t know. What about them?”
“Well, they can also increase bleeding,” she admitted.
“Mom, you’ve got to stop giving people this shit! If it’s true that these supplements and remedies can have negative effects, then it could be dangerous.”
“It’s not dangerous.” The face she pulled at me indicated she thought I was being unreasonable. “It’s natural.”
“So’s arsenic. And mercury and lead. And rhubarb leaves. And azaleas and all-natural mistle-fucking-toe!” I yelled at her.
“I get the point, thank you. Now, will you kindly stop cursing and shouting.”
I groaned in frustration. “So, did he? Did Colby bleed out?”
“No, he did not. In fact, when I discussed it with Doc Armstrong — this was some months later — he told me I’d have needed to give Colby a wheelbarrow full of arnica to kill him,” she said, and resumed eating her nuts.
Was this what Doc Armstrong had been holding back from telling me? I’d been hoping for something more.
“Pinocchio?” Mom said, offering me the bag of nuts.
“Pistachio,” I corrected automatically.
“Yes, dear.”
The car fell silent. Dad was still sulking in the back seat, arms folded and lip protruding like a toddler’s. Mom was munching calmly on her nuts, making a mess of my car with their skins and shells. I stared through the windshield, eyes fixed on the road, thinking. I needed to speak to Doc Armstrong, to persuade him to open up about everything he knew. But he could wait an hour or two — I thought it might be a good idea to speak to Blunt first.
Beside me, my mother was using the shell of one pistachio to open another, wedging it into the slit between top and bottom shells, and twisting the halves apart. I’d do that with the Armstrong father and son. I’d imply to Blunt that his father had already spilled the beans (whatever they might be) on him, and hopefully that would get him to open up. And then I’d use whatever pieces of information I got from Blunt to crack the tough nut that was Doc Armstrong.
One way or another, I was going to find out what he was hiding.
39
NOW
Thursday December 21, 2017
Once I’d dropped my parents at home, I called Blunt to set up the meeting and get directions to his place. On the way, I swung by the pizzeria in town to grab a slice of double-pepperoni and jalapeno for myself, and popped into the donut shop next door to buy half a dozen of their best for Blunt. Junkies always have the munchies, right?
Ignoring the low, heavy feeling about Doc Armstrong that still poked at the edges of my attention, I ate my pizza as I bumped along the back routes that led to Blunt’s trailer. It was set in a small clearing well back in the trees, behind the perimeter of the golf estate. Two pot plants grew in trash cans placed on either side of the steps up to the trailer door, and a row of beer bottles stuck upside-down in the snow stretched toward the encroaching forest.
My knock was answered by an old man; it took me a moment to register that it was Blunt. Scraggly beard, greasy hair and missing teeth, he looked nothing like his old attractive self. Back when I was still at school, Blunt had been good-looking, the epitome of slouchy, careless cool. Now his thin face, pocked with sores, was crumpled and dragged down into deep lines. Above hollow cheeks, his sunken eyes were dull, even when he cracked a smile at the sight of me.
“Hey. Come in. S’cold out there.”
Good thing I had a strong stomach, because a person of a more delicate constitution would have tossed their cookies at the sight and smell of that trailer. It was rank with the sour stench of beer, sweat, unwashed clothes, pot and cigarette smoke. At one end of the interior, a bare mattress was piled high with dirty clothes and a couple of grubby pillows without cases. Did he actually sleep there? Dirty dishes, half-eaten microwave dinners, plastic cups and candy wrappers littered the counter tops. Mugs of half-drunk coffee with discs of green mold floating on their pallid liquid surfaces clustered on the small table top, amongst the paraphernalia of drug use — a stained teaspoon, candle and lighter, aluminum foil, syringes, a glass pipe and several bottles of pills.
“Here,” he said, sweeping an old pizza box onto the floor to expose a patch of cushioned seat by the table.
I checked for needles then perched on the cushion and handed him the box of donuts.
“For me? Thanks, man.” Sitting down on the other side of the table, he chose a chocolate-glazed donut with colored sprinkles and crammed half of it into his mouth.
“So, Blunt, how are you doing?” I asked.
He swept an arm around as though gesturing to palatial surroundings. “Living in the lap of luxury, as you see,” he said, his voice sharp with sarcasm.
I merely nodded.
“I was just about to shoot up. You want in?”
“Huh?” It took a moment to figure out what he meant. “Um, no, thanks. I mean, it’s very generous of you and all, but I really just wanted to ask you some questions.”
“Oh, yeah? What about?”
“Colby.”
“Colby?” His face was blank.
“Yeah, Colby Beaumont. He was my boyfriend in high school, remember?” No recognition. “He died. They found him drowned in Plover Pond?”
“Ohhhh. Yeah. Him.”
“Yeah, him.”
An image of Doc Armstrong flared behind my eyes.
Sleepy.
What the hell? Now I was having hallucinations about an old man falling asleep?
“He was on your case back then about your dealing,” I prompted Blunt.
“I remember. He had a bug up his butt about it. Had a plan to keep this town clean or something.” He shook his head and picked up a tiny baggie of brown powder. “Blowing against the wind, man.”
“I guess. Um, I remember he told Jessica that you’d been hanging out near the middle school classrooms. Near his sister.”
“Uh-huh.” Blunt tipped the powder into a teaspoon and then set it aside while he used a narrow syringe to draw up a few milliliters from a bottle of Beaumo
nt Brothers’ finest mountain spring water.
“He was pretty upset with you. And he’d hurt his wrist on the day he confronted you. Did you have a fight?”
Blunt’s face crinkled with the effort of trying to remember. “Maybe pushing and shoving. I don’t think more than that.”
“He thought you were dealing to the kids.”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s right.” Blunt rocked in his seat, nodding in recall, while he carefully squirted the water into the teaspoon. “That pissed me off. I would never have sold to kids, man, never.” He shrugged. “Didn’t need to. Teen market’s plenty big enough. Adults, too, these days.”
“Right.”
Listening to this, watching him invert the syringe and use the back of the plunger to stir the contents of the teaspoon, I wanted to grab all this crap and trash it. And drag Blunt by the ear to the nearest rehab — exactly as his father and sister had no doubt done on countless futile occasions. “So, if you weren’t selling to the kids, why were you there?”
He gave me a condescending look. “Kids aren’t the only ones at schools.”
I thought about that for a moment. “Teachers? There were teachers at Pitchford doing drugs?”
“More than one.” He pointed to the detritus of clothes and blankets beside me. “Hand me those pantyhose, will you?”
I lifted the gray nylon with two fingers and passed it over, watched as he expertly pushed up his sleeve and tied the makeshift tourniquet around his arm, just below the elbow, pulled it tight with his teeth, and slapped his forearm. The exposed skin was a painful-looking patchwork of scabs and spots of raw pink skin.
I averted my eyes. “Was Mr. Wallace one of them?”
“Can’t remember who they were. People came and went, y’know? That’s life.”
“How’d you wind up out here?”
“My father arranged it all. Did some kind of deal with the owners so I could stay so long as I don’t deal down there in rich man’s land.”
“How did he manage to swing that?”
Another shrug. “Paid them. Pressured them maybe. Doctors” — he pointed the syringe at me — “know things.”
“Your father’s real sick, Blunt. I think he misses you. Do you ever visit him?”
The First Time I Died Page 25