1 Margarita Nights (2 page)

Her stiff body relaxed and sank into my side for only a few seconds before she pulled back and began tucking in the starched blouse and smoothing down her skirt, putting her temporary weakness behind her. “You must think I’m being silly.” She brushed the tears off her cheeks with long white fingers, then searching through her bag for a tissue before dabbing at her nose and sniffing delicately.

From down the alley came the raucous laughter of a boisterous group leaving the Sunset. I glanced out to the mouth of the alley before shaking my head in denial and saying, “Being cheated on isn’t silly. I know. I’ve got the T-shirt. It must have been hard for you to come here tonight.”

She opened her bag and put away the tissue. “I don’t like scenes.”

I laughed. “Trust me, Cordelia, this is no scene. I’ve been at the center of too many of them to be fooled.”

“Don’t tell Evan,” she pleaded. “I don’t want him to know.”

That was something I wasn’t going to promise. I had rather a lot to say to Eva n. You see, I was the skirt that Evan hid behind, the woman he dragged along on those social occasions where he couldn’t go stag, the female he used to keep other women away I was the way he socialized with his lover so his lover’s wife didn’t suspect. It hadn’t bothered me before but now I felt dirty, conspiring in Noble’s betrayal of Cordelia.

Two hours after Cordelia left, the cop arrived to tell me that Jimmy, my godawful husband, was dead—blown up with his boat, the
Suncoaster
.

I looked at Detective Styles as if he’d told me it was raining outside. Actually, rain in southwest Florida in January is rarer than violent death, but the thing is, I’d always waited for this news, knew it was coming sooner or later. Jimmy was never meant to die easy . . . or old. He was probably dead drunk when his boat went up and thought it was fireworks. “Hee haw,” as Jimmy always said.

Detective Styles asked, “Would you like me to drive you home, Mrs. Travis?”

Did I need to go home? Was I going to fall apart? I didn’t know. There was just a great big void of nothing: no pain; no feelings; no nothing; just Peggy Lee singing in the background about the final disappointment.

Jeff said, “Go on home, Sherri. Leave me the keys. I’ll get someone to follow me with your car.” Middle-aged and chronically tired, Jeff was always the first one out the door and the last one in, so this was a sacrifice for him.

I nodded, relieved to have someone else make the decision.

In the car Styles said, “Fasten your seat belt, please.”

I asked, “Do Jimmy’s parents know?” This worry was running round and round in my head.

“We only notified you as the next of kin.” Next of kin was a strange way to hear myself described. “Would you take me out to Indian Mound Beach to tell them? I can’t do it alone.” I clicked the belt into place. “And even my shaky knowledge of deportment says this isn’t the kind of thing you announce over the phone.”

We stared at each other for a few seconds. His features were even, not remarkable or memorable, unlined and pale as if he spent too much time indoors, but it was a face I was never going to forget. Mercy, meek and mild, Grandma Jenkins would say. If I’d met him on the street, I’d bet he sold insurance.

He sighed, a dry exhausted sound. I guess he was hoping to ditch me quick and get home to bed. Or maybe he just hated the thought of delivering one more piece of bad news to more next of kin.

He put the car in drive. “Where are they?”

I gave him the number on Spyglass Court and asked, “How did it happen?”

“Best guess at the moment is he didn’t turn on the exhaust fan to clear out the fumes in the bilge. The boat exploded when he hit the ignition.” He glanced over at me before going on in that same dry, level voice. “We didn’t find much. The tide was going out. We’ll search the mangroves along the shore in the morning.”

“But that doesn’t make sense. Jimmy was always warning me to hit the exhaust fan before I turned the key. Even dead drunk it’s hard to believe he’d forget something as basic as that.”

Unmoved he asked, “When did you last see your husband, Mrs. Travis?”

Jimmy’s mom, the Wicked Witch of the South, was Mrs. Travis, I wasn’t—but it didn’t seem like a good time to complain.

“Sunday night,” I said.

“When officers Mackle and Reese were called to remove him from your apartment?”

“Yes.”

“And did you threaten to kill him, Mrs. Travis?”

“Jimmy just didn’t get it. Our marriage was over. I came home and found the idiot asleep on the old steel lounge on my balcony. He must have stood on the railing of the balcony underneath mine and pulled himself up,” proving that he was still fit and still out of control. That he was still stupid was proven by the fact he fell asleep on the bare metal lounge. I never left the cushion out because the guy living below me fed the scrub jays. They perched on my railing and shit all over the concrete of my balcony while they waited for their turn to dive down for dinner. It was just one damn big birdcage with dying plants, the hot afternoon sun and bird shit. Come to think of it, it was the perfect place for Jimmy.

“Tell me about your husband,” Styles said.

“I’m the wrong person to ask about Jimmy—too much history and I only remember the bad stuff.” If I started talking, it might all pour out. How could I explain to this neat bland man that Jimmy could make you want to do all kinds of crazy things, including kill him?

But he wouldn’t leave it alone. “How did you meet?” I searched for pitfalls before I answered. “I first saw Jimmy the summer I turned twelve. He did a pike off the high board at the public swimming pool and flowed out of the water right at my feet. He was blond and beautiful and shining like a god. I fell in love with him instantly. It was an illness that took a long time to run its course.” It felt good to be talking. Good and dangerous. “I’ve no idea what Jimmy was doing at the public pool that day, probably the one and only time he was ever there. Jimmy spent his summers playing golf and tennis at the Royal Palms Golf and Country Club, where he was club champion at eighteen, the same year he was the star of the high school track team and captain of the basketball team when Jacaranda High School won the state championship. High school sports are a real big deal around here, which made Jimmy a really big deal. After high school Jimmy went to Florida State on a golf scholarship, although his parents wanted him to go to Harvard or Yale . . . anything Ivy League with a good Northern address. His parents also didn’t want Jimmy to marry me. I mean, really, really, didn’t want him to marry me, which is probably why he did.” I told myself to shut up.

Styles drove in silence for a while and then asked, “What was he like?”

“He’s charming. My god, is he charming.” He could charm the birds out of the trees or his playing partner’s wife out of her underwear.

“Is that why you were having trouble?” His voice sounded almost bored.

I wasn’t fooled. I kept silent.

After a bit he asked, “What can you tell me about your husband’s death, Mrs. Travis?”

I searched the pocket of my black leather jacket for cigarettes. I already knew there weren’t any but I needed a cigarette bad and addiction, like hope, dies hard. “Are you sure he’s dead?”

He let out a big frustrated breath. “Your husband’s truck was in the parking lot. The
Suncoaster
went up in a huge ball of orange flames. It could be seen for miles. Plus we found clothing.”

“Jimmy was living on his boat. Of course, you’d find clothing.”

“Come daylight, we’ll search for his remains.” Remains, what a horrible word, like something leftover and unwanted. Like what was left between Jimmy and me. I rubbed my forehead to clear away the ugly thoughts. “It just doesn’t seem possible. Jimmy is the most alive person on earth.”

“What can you tell me about the explosion?”

“Nothing.”

“Did you have anything to do with your husband’s death?”

“No.” I shifted my body away from him and stared out the window into the blackness over the water. On this stretch of Beach Road only sand dunes and the odd clump of palm trees separate the road from the Gulf of Mexico. Come May, sea turtles lumber ashore and lay their eggs on the beach. The town removed all the street lights where Beach Road is exposed to the gulf, ensuring newly hatched turtles will head for the moon over the gulf instead of coming inland to the street lights and dying under the wheels of cars. But there was no moon now, only dark. Were there pieces of Jimmy floating out there in the blackness, being eaten by fishes and crabs and other unnamed creatures? I shivered and huddled deeper in the seat. Styles exhaled heavily, a sound of bone-weary frustration.

The lights were still on in the Travis mansion. No worry about nature there. Maybe they left them on all night because it looked so pretty all lit up. The mansion was a fairy-tale castle, with a steeply pitched roof and a round turret like the castle I saw Sunday nights on Walt Disney when I was a kid. Covered in pink stucco, it didn’t belong on a beach in Florida.

Just pulling into the pink concrete drive made my stomach contract into a hard knot. I didn’t even have to go in or see Jimmy’s parents to feel the panic.

The drive led to a curved flagstone path edged in tightly clipped geometric shrubs. Ground-hugging lanterns set among bushes to cast small puddles of brightness in front of us.

I rang the doorbell and we waited in silence while my courage melted like the ice cubes in some forgotten drink. “Maybe it would be better if you break the news,” I suggested.

“I’ll wait in the car.”

Before Styles could answer, more lights flicked on and a disembodied voice demanded, “Who is it?”

Detective Styles and I looked at each other, waiting for the other to respond.

“Who’s there?” the impatient voice demanded.

I leaned towards the grill set in the wall and said, “It’s Sherri. May I come in, please?” I hoped he’d say no, so I could run away and let him read about Jimmy in the morning paper. Instead the door swung open on an older version of Jimmy.

Dr. Travis was dressed in crisp chinos and a blue dress shirt, open at the neck with cuffs neatly turned back at the wrist. The gray hardly showed in Dr. Travis’s fair hair and his good looks surely made checking into his clinic for plastic surgery a whole lot easier.

He held the door open for us without speaking and extended an arm in the direction of his study off to our left, but before we could reach the safety of Dr. Travis’s lair, the wicked witch of the South flew out from the back of the house. Rings sparkled on each finger wrapped around the highball glass.

“What’s she doing here?” Jimmy’s mom hissed. Her given name was Bernice but I’d never been invited to call her that.

I hadn’t seen Mrs. Travis in a couple of years, but she was still blond and beautiful. Of course she would never have accepted anything less. The only imperfect thing in her life was me, and she didn’t like to be reminded of this temporary failure of the system. Tall, at least as tall as my five seven and a half, she was so skinny she looked like a prison-camp survivor. The close-fitting knit top and pants, in bands of hot pink and raspberry, clung to her and accentuated her thinness.

Bernice marched forward, intent on getting to me and doing some damage, but Dr. Travis shot an arm across her shoulders and held her back saying, “Bernice, please,” in a tone of voice that said he already knew his request was useless.

“This is Detective Styles,” I said quickly. “He has something to tell you.” Well, I’d done my part. Take it away Detectives Styles.

Styles frowned. “I’m afraid it’s bad news.”