Chasing Shadows (6 page)

“You, girl!” Carlotta kind of yelled, her usual way of getting my attention. “You need job to do; you bring up boxes from basement. Put away.”

Her English wasn't great, but it was never a problem for her to make her orders understood! I could hardly believe that she expected me to do that all by myself.

“Uh, Ben said he and I would do that together on his next shift,” I said, knowing full well it wasn't going to change her mind. I'd seen the delivery guy strain when he was carrying some of the boxes, though, and dreaded the thought of having to wrestle them upstairs all by myself.

“What? You want paid to do nothing? You want maybe we should just give you money to stay home?”

“That's not what I meant.”

“Go then! Do like I tell you!”

I trudged downstairs and surveyed the piles of boxes lined up along the far wall. There must have been fifty of them, and I knew a big percentage held canned goods like tomatoes and stuff.

Well, there was no sense in standing there feeling discouraged. I went over and scanned the labels that were exposed, looking for the lighter things like pasta and paper products. Maybe by the time I'd hauled the things that weren't too heavy upstairs and put them away, we'd get busy with customers and I wouldn't have time for the rest.

No such luck. It remained quiet in the place, and there was no way I could work slowly when I was unpacking stuff. Not with the dictator standing over me.

By the time I'd brought up everything that wasn't too hard to carry, I was dreading what remained downstairs. I began to wish I'd staggered them so there'd at least be a break in hauling up the weighty things. Besides, I was already getting tired from the trips up and down the stairs, and I realized I'd probably made a big mistake leaving the worst for last. It wasn't the only mistake I made either, as was pointed out in a hurry.

“Stupid girl,” Carlotta said, as though it was perfectly normal to call someone you're working with names. “Why we want this in kitchen?”

I looked at the box she was referring to. Citrus air freshener.

“Where does it go?” I asked wearily.

“Is for keep place smelling nice. Not food to eat!” she snapped, as though I were a complete moron who needed that explained. “Put back.”

I was angry that she'd expected me to know where it was stored without being told, but at least now I knew why I could often smell oranges around the side door. It was air freshener. I lugged it back downstairs and started bringing up the canned goods.

What really annoyed me about the whole thing wasn't even the hard work. It was the fact that Carlotta just sat back on her chair and issued orders. She never so much as lifted a finger to help. She could at least have helped me put a few things away, but no, that would be lowering herself to her assistant's level, which would never do.

It felt as though my back was breaking by the time I'd dragged the last box up and unpacked it. My arms were so sore I could hardly move them.

The only good thing was that my shift at work flew by that night. I've noticed that the busier I am doing something, the faster the time goes by. I hoped that it had dragged horribly for Carlotta!

I'd been so busy that I hadn't had time to chat with Nadine at all through the evening. It had been my intention to talk to her a bit more about the breakup
with Leo, especially after I'd noticed partway through the evening that her mood had changed. I wondered if he'd dropped by and said something to her. Earlier, she'd been in perfectly good cheer, but later she looked kind of upset and almost frightened.

My shift ended an hour before hers that night. If it hadn't, when Dad arrived to take me home after work we'd have given her a ride too, and I could have asked her if there was a problem. Instead, I just said good-night to her, aching and tired and looking forward to showering and collapsing into my bed.

Well
, I thought as I climbed into the car,
I can always ask her what happened when I see her at work on Monday
. I was scheduled for a day shift and she didn't come in until four in the afternoon, but we should still have a few minutes to talk. Mondays aren't normally that busy.

It didn't work out that way, though. On Monday, when four o'clock came, one of the other waitresses showed up instead.

“Is Nadine sick?” I asked Ben. “She was supposed to work tonight.”

“Nadine? No, she quit.”

“Quit?” I asked, stunned. “That's impossible!”

He smiled. “This may shock you, but waitresses quit their jobs all the time. It's really not that uncommon.”

“But she just moved into a new place.”

“So?” His eyebrows arched with amusement as he spoke. It was obvious that he thought I was making a big deal out of nothing, and I started to feel a bit foolish.

“Well, she has to pay the rent and stuff. Why would she quit her job?”

“Maybe she found another job.” He shrugged. “How do I know
why
? I just know she called Lisa yesterday and said she quit.”

I went to Lisa and asked her what, exactly, Nadine had said.

“How would I remember?” She seemed as uninterested in the subject as Ben had been. “All I know is she didn't give notice. Very thoughtless. Now I have no one to fill her shifts and I have to find someone else right away.”

“Did her voice sound funny or anything when she called?” I asked, concern growing in me.

Lisa seemed to have run out of patience. “The girl quit, that's all I know. I can't stand here all day talking about it. And I would think that
you
might have work to do.”

Discouraged, I went back to work, glad that my shift would be over at six. I decided to stop by Nadine's place later, to find out what was going on, but when I got home I was met with some unexpected news.

“Shelby,” Mom said, putting her arms around me, “I'm afraid I have something sad to tell you. Your Great-Aunt Isabel passed away this evening.”

You can hardly blame me for forgetting about Nadine for the next two days. My great-aunt's death pretty much took over centre stage as far as my family was concerned. There was the wake and the funeral, besides which we had relatives from out of town at our place for most of the meals during the whole thing.

My mom cried a lot, which made me sad. Well, actually, the truth is I felt pretty sad anyway. That was a surprise because I'd never been overly fond of Great-Aunt Isabel.

She'd had a lot of habits and mannerisms that I'd found silly and annoying, but they suddenly didn't appear to me in the same light at all. Instead, I could picture things that she might have said or done, and instead of bothersome, they seemed sad and pathetic.

In a room full of people, Great-Aunt Isabel had liked to be the one who was talking. More accurately, she'd liked to be the one being listened to. She often put me in mind of Lady Catherine de Bourgh — a character from
Pride and Prejudice
— except Great-Aunt Isabel, unlike that other rather self-centred lady, had neither power nor wealth.

It was like she'd longed to be important somehow, as though her whole worth was tied up in what other people thought of her. In the end, none of that mattered, and the only thing that seemed to be left was memories of an old woman who'd had a great need to hold the interest and attention of those around her. In fact, there'd been little about her that would command much notice from anyone.

So it was totally unexpected that standing there, looking at her lying all still and silent in that coffin, a huge flood of belated affection came rushing over me. It made me feel just awful, thinking of how I'd disliked going to her place for visits and how I'd secretly made fun of her, even if it was just to myself.

I'd never stopped, not once, to wonder about her life — what it was like and whether or not she might be lonely or sad. Strangely, as soon as her life was over, that seemed to be the only thing I could think for the next few days. Finally, I couldn't stand it anymore.

“Do you think your Great-Aunt Isabel was happy?” I asked Mom when we were on our way home from the last wake session. I don't know what I expected her to say. I think I was really looking for something to soothe my feelings of guilt. Like, if Isabel had been happy all her life, it didn't matter if my attitude toward her had been less than loving.

“Happy?” Mom pondered before answering. When she did, she spoke slowly and thoughtfully, like she was telling the answer to herself at the same time. “Why, I suppose she had happy
and
sad moments, like the rest of us.”

Her reply didn't exactly satisfy me, but I couldn't seem to find the words to ask anything else that would tell me what I wanted to know. Or maybe, right then, I realized I didn't actually want to know how Isabel had lived and what her life had been like. It might be best to put such thoughts out of my head altogether.

The funeral was the next morning, and once that was over with and she'd disappeared into the ground, it seemed as though Isabel's whole existence had been pointless. She and her husband, who'd died years and years earlier, hadn't had any children, so there was no one to carry on in her place, if that's even what kids do when their parents are gone.

Greg and his dad, Dr. Taylor, were parked in front of our house when we got home from the graveyard.
They'd been at both the funeral and the short burial ceremony, but had left before we did.

Greg took my hand and squeezed it. We walked silently into the house, behind my folks and his dad, who were talking quietly.

They'd brought lunch, a big container of homemade soup, along with rolls and raspberry pie. I set the table while the soup warmed on the stove, the smell of it making my stomach growl, though I hadn't known I was hungry. Dr. Taylor is a psychologist, but he's also a fantastic cook.

He and Greg moved here to Little River last summer after Mrs. Taylor died in a fire. Since then, Dr. Taylor has been working on a book, which my mom says is helping him heal from his grief. As I put the last few things on the table I wondered if this whole funeral thing today had brought back a lot of sad memories for him and Greg.

I didn't like to ask Greg that, but as we ate, it struck me that the conversation around the table seemed perfectly normal. In fact, you'd never have guessed that we were all gathered after someone's death, or that anyone there was grieving.

Afterward, Greg and I cleaned up while our folks visited in the living room. I was wiping off the counter when he asked a question that stopped me in mid-swipe.

“How'd your friend Nadine make out with the rest of her painting? Did she get the bathroom done?”

I whirled around, startling him.

“Greg! I'd forgotten all about her,” I exclaimed. “Just before all this happened, Nadine quit her job at The Steak Place.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“It's very strange, though. We worked together on Saturday night, you know, the same day we painted her place, and then all of a sudden the very next day she quit.”

“Maybe she found a better job.”

“That's what Ben said, but I don't know. It doesn't
feel
right. Besides, don't you think she'd have mentioned it if she was looking for work somewhere else? She and I have talked quite a lot since I started working at The Steak Place. Why, she told me about her family and growing up without a dad and her mom's new husband and all kinds of things. I feel sure if she was looking for another job she'd have said something about it. But she didn't. Not a word. I have a bad feeling about the whole thing.”

“You sure you're not dreaming this up — inventing something that needs detecting?” Greg leaned forward and kissed my cheek. “I think you're getting addicted to chasing clues.”

“C'mon, Greg. I'm serious about this. I'm kind of worried.”

“Well, why don't you just give her a call and see what's up?” Greg didn't seem any more concerned than
Ben or Lisa had been, and it made me wonder if I was overreacting. I've been known to do that.

“I can't call her,” I said. “She has no phone.”

“So then, drop by.” He slid an arm around me. That Greg can sure be distracting sometimes! “If it's bothering you, and it seems that it is, then you should check it out and put your mind at rest.”

“Yeah, that's what I'll do.” Just deciding on a course of action made me feel a bit better. No doubt I'd get to her place and she'd laugh at me for being a big worrier for nothing.

I was scheduled to work at noon the next day, so first thing in the morning I took Greg's advice and walked over to Nadine's apartment. When I got to her door, a strange shiver ran up my back and I had to talk to myself about not being so dramatic and paranoid.

Except, maybe I wasn't. Maybe what I'd felt was some sort of premonition. Because when I knocked, the door swung open on its own, the slow creak of the tired old hinge almost making me scream.

I called out Nadine's name a few times, but the only reply was an ominous silence.

I hesitated in the doorway for a few seconds and then stepped into Nadine's apartment. It probably wasn't right, just walking in like that, but it was obvious something was amiss. She'd once told me how careful she was about keeping her place bolted, and here it was with the door not even properly closed, never mind locked.

“Nadine?” I called again, moving slowly through the kitchen. I knew, deep inside, that she wasn't going to answer. My instincts had been right — something was dreadfully wrong. I looked around carefully, as though there might be some evidence that would explain why Nadine had gone off and left her place open.

On the kitchen counter sat a bowl with a half-eaten orange resting on top of peelings. Beside it were an empty coffee mug and a plate with toast crumbs. It
seemed to be the remains of breakfast, but there was no way of knowing when it had been left there.