Gone in a Flash (2 page)

‘She’s just jealous because I can wear her clothes and she can’t wear mine!’ Alicia, three sizes smaller than Megan, shouted back.

‘I can’t help if it you don’t have boobs! I do!’ Megan said, sticking said boobs out. ‘And wearing your clothes would just make me look cheap.’

Alicia: ‘Well, wearing your own clothes so tight already makes you look cheap!’

Megan: ‘Oh no! You didn’t just say that!’

Alicia: ‘Uh huh! I did! And I’ll say it again!’

Megan: ‘Do and I’ll slap your face!’

Alicia: ‘Yeah? You and what army?’

New voice: ‘What the hell’s going on here?’

Both girls in unison: ‘Daddy!’

‘Well, you see,’ I said, turning to Willis. ‘It seems that Megan has big breasts—’

Turning red in the ears, Willis, who still held our bags, said, ‘I don’t need to hear this!’ and headed to our room beyond the kitchen.

‘Mom!’ Megan said, hands on hips.

The family room and my beautifully large kitchen are connected with an open bar area separating the two, and a larger open space. I glanced to my right. The cabinet under the sink was pushed open by trash accumulation spilling out of the can inside.

‘What’s this mess?’ I said, or yelled, or whatever, pointing to the trash.

Alicia said, ‘We divvied up chores and guess whose chore that was?’ The look she sent Megan was – only one word for it – smug.

I sighed. ‘Megan, deal with that now, please.’

‘What about my sweater?’ she yelled, pointing at the too-big cotton-knit blue-and-gray-striped sweater that fell to Alicia’s knees. She appeared to be wearing nothing else. I prayed for panties.

‘I think Alicia’s idea is a good one. And it goes for all three of you. You leave something – anything, not just clothes – in the common rooms, whoever finds it can use it.’

‘Mom!’ Megan wailed.

‘Trash! Now!’ I said, pointing.

‘I can’t believe this shit—’ Megan mumbled under her breath as she headed for the kitchen. I didn’t get on at her about language. With Willis and me as role models, it’s just a miracle they didn’t start cussing while they were potty training.

We have satellite TV, and get most of our local stations from Austin, although we do get a couple from Houston. Black Cat Ridge on the north of the Colorado River and Codderville on the south are sort of in the middle, between the two cities, although slightly closer to Austin. I was in the kitchen fixing dinner and the girls and Willis were in the family room arguing over the remote.

‘There’s something on MTV I want to watch!’ Megan said, grabbing for the remote in Willis’s hand.

‘I’m watching the news!’ her father said, and I saw him swing the remote out of Megan’s reach, this way and that, while trying to watch the news around her body.

‘Daddy!’ she wailed.

‘Go watch it upstairs!’ he said.

‘This TV gets better reception!’

‘Bullshit! It’s just bigger!’

‘Well, yeah, duh!’

‘Stop!’ Willis shouted. ‘Get out of the way! E.J.! Come here!’

By the sound of his voice, I didn’t think it had anything to do with my daughter’s hijinks. I went into the family room, my hands dripping water.

Willis turned up the sound as a reporter appeared on screen. ‘The man appears to have jumped, or possibly fallen from the top of the parking garage. His identity is being withheld pending the notification of his family. Again, the body of an unidentified man was found just moments ago outside the kitchen entrance of the Driscoll Hotel in downtown Austin. The APD and hotel security are looking into the matter, but at this time they will not say whether or not the man was a guest of the prestigious and historical Driscoll Hotel.’

‘Oh my God!’ Alicia said. ‘Isn’t that the hotel y’all stayed in last night?’

‘Yeah,’ Willis said.

‘God, how awful,’ I said, setting a hip down on the arm of the sofa next to my husband.

‘Mom, you think it was murder?’ Bess asked.

‘They didn’t say a word about murder, missy!’ Willis said. ‘They said fell or jumped. Nobody said a word about him being pushed.’

‘Well, if they found him just now, then no one really knows, do they?’ Bess said.

Willis shot her a look. This was all we needed – one of the girls trying to start sleuthing. Willis and I had separated briefly during the summer over my involvement in too many murders. I can’t help it. I feel like I need to help people in these situations, and that I can, so I do. And, yeah, sure, I like the puzzle. I admitted that to Willis. And he admitted that he was scared I was going to get myself or the kids killed. We got back together because we love each other, and we’re trying for a ceasefire, which has been fine since the summer’s puzzle was solved. And now here was Bess trying to build a puzzle out of nothing.

I stood up and headed back into the kitchen. Over my shoulder I said, ‘Bess, honey, the guy fell, or he jumped. Don’t try to make a mountain out of a molehill. The only point of interest here, other than for his wife and family, of course, is that your father and I were in that very parking garage only this morning.’

Bess jumped up. ‘Then you might have seen something!’

‘They only found him a little while ago, honey,’ Willis said. ‘We left the parking garage at around eleven this morning.’

‘So how often do the kitchen people go out that door? Hum? How long could he have lain there?’ Bess all but shouted.

‘I’m sure the police will look into that,’ Willis said.

I decided to ignore them and went back into the kitchen. Since losing thirty-five pounds, I’ve been learning to cook in a more healthy fashion. Tonight we were having broiled salmon with corn on the cob and a green salad. I knew my husband would go to the pantry and pile his plate with a couple of pieces of bread – wheat not white, there’s no white bread in the house! – but it was still better than having mashed potatoes or pasta. I know, I know, corn is a carb, but it’s still better than the alternatives.

‘It wasn’t on him,’ the smaller of the two men, Mr Smith, said into the phone.

‘Then where is it?’ the man on the other end of the phone, Mr Brown, demanded.

‘Mr Jones saw him throw a satchel into the back of a pickup truck. He got the license plate number.’

‘Give it to me!’ Mr Brown demanded.

Mr Smith grabbed Mr Jones’ arm and read the numbers off the palm of his hand to Mr Brown.

‘Stay put,’ Mr Brown said. ‘I’ll call you back with a location.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Mr Smith said and hung up.

‘What’s this?’ I asked Willis that night as we got ready for bed. He had finally brought our bags up from where he’d deposited them right next to the back door when we first came home. I was pointing at a black satchel that wasn’t mine and wasn’t his.

‘Isn’t that yours?’ he asked.

‘No, I only had the one bag,’ I said.

I sat down on the edge of the bed, bringing the satchel to my lap. ‘There’s no ID tag on the bag. Should we look inside?’

‘Cool!’ Willis said, always waiting for that pot of gold to show up. He sat down beside me. ‘Open it!’

I did. No form of ID inside either. Nothing but men’s clothes – a couple of T-shirts, a pair of jeans, and some underwear. And a Dopp kit. Opening the kit still didn’t give us an ID, or a pot of gold, just some Aqua Velva aftershave, an old electric razor, a can of Right Guard, some nail clippers, and all the stuff the Driscoll puts out in the bathroom for their patrons to use – little bars of soap, little bottles of shampoo, conditioner, body lotion, and hand lotion, all shoved in the corner.

‘OK, so this guy’s a thief, but that’s all I see,’ Willis said.

I could feel my face heating up as I defended him. ‘They put that stuff out there for you to use! So what if you use it at home or at the hotel? They
want
you to use it, for God’s sake!’

‘How much of that shit did you steal?’ my husband asked me with a grin.

‘That’s not the point,’ I said, and deflected further questioning with a question of my own. ‘You think any of this stuff will fit you? Anything in the Dopp kit you want?’

He pulled out one of the T-shirts. ‘If I weighed a hundred and fifty pounds maybe,’ he said, looking at the clothes. ‘Which I haven’t since I was in eighth grade.’

‘What about the Dopp kit?’

‘That razor’s older than I am, and you won’t let me wear Aqua Velva.’ He took out the can of Right Guard and shook it. He frowned. ‘I’m not so sure about using another man’s deodorant.’

‘Jeez, Willis, it’s not a roll-on.’

‘Naw.’ He stood up and took both the Aqua Velva and the Right Guard and put them in the bathroom trash can.

‘This Dopp kit is older than mine, but it’s real leather. It’s in pretty good shape,’ he said.

‘Are you going to keep it?’ I asked.

‘Should I?’ he asked.

‘Why not?’

‘Is it stealing?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘Somehow this got in our truck and possession is nine-tenths of the law, right?’

‘Actually, that’s wrong,’ he said. ‘But we have no idea who to give it back to, so I guess we’re in the clear. And I like this leather. Really soft and aged. Classy.’

‘Did you just say “classy”?’ I said, raising my eyebrows.

‘No,’ he said, going back in the bathroom.

I put the clothes back in the satchel, zipped it up, and set it by the bed.

Willis came out of the bathroom. ‘What are going to do with that?’ he asked.

‘Take it to Goodwill in the morning,’ I said, turning off my bedside light.

‘Yeah, that’s best,’ he said. ‘I’m going to read for a while. That OK with you?’

‘No problem,’ I said, turning over and shutting my eyes. I may have been asleep before my eyes were actually shut, I was that tired.

The phone rang in Mr Smith’s hand. ‘Hello?’ he said.

‘There’s a place called Black Cat Ridge, right outside a town called Codderville, either side of the Colorado River, on the way to Houston. The truck is registered to a guy named Willis Pugh, lives at 4210 Sagebrush Trail in Black Cat Ridge. Get that satchel, find what I want and do it now.’

Before Mr Smith could say, ‘Yes, sir,’ Mr Brown had hung up. Mr Smith turned to Mr Jones. ‘Road trip,’ he said.

It was six-thirty on Monday morning and I was standing around the parking lot of my church, waiting for the bus and my friend Gladys Cook to show up. She was to be my roommate. At least it wasn’t cold, I said to the woman standing next to me, who nodded her agreement.

Now, I’ve been a God-fearing, twice-on-Sunday Southern Baptist for most of my life, and I believe a preacher, especially a Baptist preacher, should be spouting fire and brimstone if his mouth is open. Scare those sinners half to death, I always say. Only way to get their attention.

But then our long-time preacher, Brother George, ups and retires and we wind up with Brother Joe Logan. I’m not sure if we’re being punished for something or not. Not only does he not preach fire and brimstone, he’s pretty damn close to being a liberal, if you ask me. And I’m sorta an authority on liberals in my church, seeing as how my son, Willis, married the queen of liberals, my daughter-in-law, E.J. That about says it all right there – won’t even go by her Christian name. She’d rather go by initials. I’ve tried calling her Eloise, her Christian name, but by the looks she gives me when I do that, I’ve always been afraid she’d keep my grandchildren away from me. Now that they’re all teenagers, I guess I don’t have to worry about that. Not that I see ’em much anymore.

But back to this new preacher. The most damning thing about him, of course, is that he’s a bachelor, which just isn’t right. I don’t think he’s one of them homosexuals you hear about all the time, but I do believe he’s got an evil eye for the ladies, and some of ’em aren’t quite old enough for him to be having even a good eye on, if you know what I mean.

Little Beth Simpson just about drools every time she looks at him, and she’s still in high school. And that Rachael Donley, that young,
separated
woman in choir, she’s all up in his business. And he don’t seem to mind it a bit. Did I mention she’s just
separated
? She’s not divorced. I think a Baptist preacher should be a married man, preferably with children – at least two. If we’re all for family values, then the preacher should be leading an example, right? Now, that’s just my opinion, but a bachelor Baptist preacher? Uh uh. That’s just wrong. And there’s a commandment against what him and Rachael Donley are thinking of doing – or have already done, but I’m not one to talk out of school.

At least that Donley woman is an alto, so I don’t have to stand near her in the choir loft because I’m a soprano. But myself and everybody else in the loft get to see the googly eyes the two share almost the entire service. I can hardly keep my mind on the sermon, thinking about the way the two of them were looking at each other. It’s downright disgusting.

Our former preacher, Brother George, was a good man, married with four children, and his wife was a perfect preacher’s wife. Not too pretty, not too thin, not too ugly either, and certainly not fat. Sister Edith was just a medium woman’s woman, who cooked and sewed, and did her own housework. And she started a quilting club while she was our church’s first lady. I belonged to that quilting club for nigh on twenty years, and then her and Brother George up and retired, and Brother Joe comes in and doesn’t even
have
a first lady. Well, it sure didn’t take long for the quilting club to disband. Heck, there were only three of us left, anyway. These younger women can’t get off their cell phones long enough to sit and have a chat without Tweeting or IM’ing, or texting, or whatever it is they’re doing!

We got a notice back in the summer, before Brother George and Sister Edith left for their retirement home in the Hill Country, that our choir had been chosen to perform at the Southern Baptist National Meeting in the fall in, of all places, Washington, D.C. I say of all places because, really, who could use a little Southern Baptist influence more than those politicians up there?

So here we were in the parking lot of the church, ready to board the bus for the trip to D.C., when we get word that my would-be roommate, Gladys, and Sister Sharon, our choir director, both got the flu, and that Brother Joe, our bachelor preacher, was gonna go in Sister Sharon’s stead, having directed the choir in his old church. Well, I can tell you one person who was happy about this chain of events, and that would be, of course, Rachael Donley. And a couple of the other younger women – all of them married. Let me just say that in thirty-three years of marriage, I never looked at another man. Ever. And that’s the gospel truth! These younger women, I swear to God, are all depraved! Even my own daughter-in-law likes to say how she’d do this or that with this or that actor, just because he looks good without his shirt on! I only know this because I occasionally stumble across her Facebook page – purely by accident.