Never Smile at Strangers (5 page)

AROUND TWO-THIRTY, Sheriff Hebert walked into Luke’s clutching his campaign hat between his thick hands. “’afternoon,” he said, nodding to the group. Slightly bowlegged, the 60’ish man sauntered to the counter, set his hat down, and took a seat next to the attendant. Purple circles, the shade of Easter egg dye, framed his crinkled lower lids.

“Sheriff,” the attendant said in greeting.

“Sheriff,” the others said.

“How’s the search going?” Chris asked.

The sheriff cleared his throat. “I suspect it’s goin’ just fine.”

“I’ll head out there around four if there’s no news before then. Join the late shift,” Chris volunteered. “If there still is one.”

Hebert nodded. He reached into his shirt pocket, took out a pack of unfiltered Camels, and then returned them. His laugh was gravelly. “Tryin’ to quit, but don’t believe in goin’ cold turkey.”

Erica set a cup of coffee in front of him and picked up Rachel’s still full cup. She’d left minutes ago, her face pale.

“You care for a sandwich? Some soup? Gotta mean cream of mushroom back there,” Chris said.

Hebert shook his head. He surveyed the room. His blue eyes were as cool as lake water, but more stern than any eyes Erica had ever seen. He was a quiet man, preferring to talk very little, but when he did, he easily took command. “There’s goin’ to be a young fella from Chester comin’ by to speak to a few of ya’ll about the Perron girl sometime tomorrow. Will you be around, Chris?”

“Absolutely.”

“Haley Landry on the schedule?” he asked, his thick, stained fingers returning to the cigarette pack. Before they got there, he lowered his arm.

“Mornin’ shift.” Chris said.

“I’ll tell the detective she’ll be here in the mornin’ then. Name’s Eddie Guitreaux. Seems like a decent young man from what I’ve seen. Bright, somewhat hungry. Ex-football hero. Used to be a real big shot in Baton Rouge. He’ll be comin’ around to ask folks some questions. Since I’m short a deputy, I need all the assistance I can git. I trust everyone will be as helpful as possible.”

He took a long slug of his coffee. “It’s also been brought to my attention that there’s been a peepin’ Tom in town for the last couple of months. Not sure if it’s related. And it’s never smart to jump to conclusions. Besides, there are no signs of foul play here. Hard facts, that’s what the detective will be lookin’ for. I expect that's what he’ll git.”

Kim’s eyes lit up. “Peeping Tom?”

There was nothing Kim liked better than a juicy piece of gossip. Her mouth served as the town’s FOX News.

The Sheriff set his coffee cup down. “Yes ma’am, someone peekin’ into folks’ windows. He’s been doin’ it in Chester for as long as I can remember. In Weston, too. We can’t seem to find the bugger and seems as though he’s becomin’ more active. Scarin’ more locals. Same folks been gittin’ prank calls, too. They think it’s the same fella.” He paused. “But I reckon I shouldn’t say anymore about that right now. I just ask that ya’ll keep yore eyes peeled. Call the station if you see anythin’ out of the ordinary. In the meantime, I’m sure Guitreaux will be keepin’ everyone fine company.”

ERICA RIPPED A page out of her notebook and crumbled it up. She tossed it to the floor and scowled at the next blank page. Tears stained her cheeks.

The scenes still weren’t working, and when she tried to write them anyway, they sounded contrived. She would have to start all over. Write something completely different.

She eyed the oversized plastic Heineken bottle that served as a bank for her New York City fund, the money that would take her to the East coast so that she could find her mother. It was four feet tall and three-quarters filled with dollar bills and coins. Her goal was to have it completely filled by the end of the summer. Now realizing that she might have the money, but no novel, panic seized her.

She kicked the gray top sheet to the foot of her bed in a futile effort to release some of the nasty anxiety, then reached for her wine glass only to find it empty. “Un-freakin-believable,” she groaned.

Slipping out of bed, she pulled on a pair of sweatpants, then shuffled down the hallway, toward the kitchen. The air conditioner was set low and the house was chilly.

“Hello.” A soft voice behind her.

Erica stiffened.

“Oh sorry, dahlin’. Did I frighten you?”

It was Pamela. She was sitting on Erica’s mother’s leather couch, a romance novel in her hands. A sheer pink nightgown barely covered her body.

Erica folded her arms across her chest. “Did my father give you a key?”

Pamela laid the book down and cocked her head. Erica could see that the woman’s breasts were barely contained inside the lacy material. “If he had,
cher
,” she replied slowly, “would that be a problem?”

Erica stormed from the room and into the kitchen. She threw open the refrigerator door and looked inside. Two tomatoes and a cucumber she’d taken from a garden on the way home the night before, a case of Diet Coke, a jar of olives, and three Miller Lites.

She pulled out two Miller Lites and was balancing the beers, a box of tea candles, and some matches when Pamela walked into the kitchen.

“If you don’t want me here when yore daddy’s not home, I won’t come over,” she said softly. “Is that what you want?”

The woman looked even younger than before with her hair pulled back and no makeup. She was actually much prettier without it. As pretty as a cheap-looking bimbo could possibly be.

“Do whatever you want. It’s
his
house.”

“But it’s your house, too, dahlin’.”

Erica moved past her.

The woman’s voice followed. “I haven’t decided. Either yore into witchcraft or yore thinking about it. You into witchcraft,
cher
?”

Erica felt like someone had kicked her in the stomach. She whirled around, nearly losing a bottle to the hardwood floor. “What?”

“Just somethin’ I noticed.”

Erica thought of the deck of tarot cards on her dresser. The valerian root, a relaxant that she used when she was messing around with simple spells that her mother used to cast. “You’ve been in my room?”

“I wasn’t prowlin’ or anything. I was lookin’ to borrow some cold cream is all and noticed some things. Yore incense. The book of invocations.”

“Don’t
ever
go into my room again! You hear me?”

Pamela’s face fell. “I just wanted to talk to you about maybe castin’ me a little spell. Don’t worry, I won’t go tellin’ yore daddy or nothin’. It’s a girl thing anyway. Business that should be left between us women.”

Erica shot the woman a dirty look.
Us women? She and this woman were nothing alike.
“Tell him what you want. But you’d better stay out of my room,” she said, “or I’ll make sure my father puts a leash on you.”

HE SHIFTED HIS gaze from the television to the wall. The phone was ringing. It hardly rang. But when it did, it was always a sales call.

“Hello?”

“Hi, sir. My name is Andrea and I’m calling from Total Decks,” a squeaky, hopeful voice began. “How are you today?”

He didn’t answer.

“Great, I hope,” she continued, cheerfully. “May I ask if you currently own a deck?”

“No.”

“No, you don’t? Fantastic. Then we would like to send someone out to your home to give you a free estimate. When would be a good time?”

“Not interested,” he replied, glancing at his watch. Nine P.M. It seemed too late to be getting a sales call. Weren’t small children in bed by now?

“You sure, sir? It’s complimentary. That means it’s free.”

“Yes,” he said, not concealing his annoyance.

The screen door opened and his sister, Allie, appeared. She glanced at him and shook her head, disapprovingly. Her long hair was down again and she smelled strongly of liquor and lotion. She stumbled past him, then slammed her bedroom door.

“Are you sure?” the voice on the phone continued. “We can just come out and give you that estimate. I promise it’s free. And Grady’s Custom Decks are rated the. . . ”

Music erupted from inside Allie’s room. He could feel the vibration in his hands, his skull. He hung up the phone and sat back down. Grabbing his beer, he picked up the remote. Alarming images of female flesh flashed across the screen as he flipped through the channels.

When she was home, he couldn’t relax. Since their mother had passed, Allie had become even more frightening.

Ian, the mangy cat, shrieked outside.

Allie’s door flew open and music spilled out from her room. She tottered to the kitchen and flipped on the fluorescent light, bathing the room blue-white.

“Staying in again?” she asked.

His eyes went back to the television. A Seinfeld re-run filled the screen and his eyes moved blindly over the characters. He’d never gotten into television. It was impossible for him to concentrate on one thing for even half an hour while he was inside the house. There was too much going on inside his head. Plus, it disturbed him. Aside from the black and white sitcoms and dramas that were taped in the ‘50s through the early ‘70s, the rest of the programming was nothing but filth, pure debauchery.

Out the corner of his eye, he watched her at the refrigerator. She opened it and looked in, her hands on her narrow hips. “Don’t you have two jobs? You know, if I had two jobs I’d buy groceries every once in a while.”

“What do you need?”

“Uh, let’s see,” she answered. “Two, or even one of the four food groups? Something besides a can of tobacco and cheap beer? You’re supposed to be the adult, you know. You should really start acting like one.”

She slammed the refrigerator door and twisted the cap off a beer bottle.

He hadn’t asked for this job and he knew he wasn’t any good at it. “Five,” he said.

“What?” she asked, tugging at her gauzy top.

“Five. There are five food groups.”

“Whatever.”

“I leave you money.”

“I
spend
the money. And not on food. On other stuff. Like condoms and blow.”

He stole a quick glance at her. She was smirking. He loathed her attitude and her outfit. He didn’t like any of her outfits. All the girls her age were dressing like tramps. Didn’t they realize how unsafe that was? What it did to certain men? Men. . . like him.

His eyes settled on the beer. “You’re too young for that.”

She snorted. “Too young? What, now you think you’re my father? Oh please, you’re not even an adult. You never will be.”

He turned back to the television screen. It had grown fuzzy. He cracked his neck and looked at the coffee table, where a cereal bowl sat, half filled with congealed milk.

A cockroach scuttled across the floor behind the television, then slipped through a crack in the wall. He shuddered. He’d always been afraid of roaches, even as a kid when Allie would chase them and laugh as she crushed them between her small palms. But she was older now, and had moved on to more dangerous things.

She tossed the bottle into the trashcan with the rest of the empty bottles and frozen food cartons and picked up her purse. “Don’t you wish you had a life?” Her eyes took in the room. He watched them flit from the old pulled-up carpeting to the large, gold-framed St. Bart’s print that hung lopsided on the wall.

He watched her, knowing this wasn’t where Allie wanted to be. But he didn't want to be here either. As soon as she turned eighteen, he’d be gone. He’d drive to Nevada and finally get a place of his own. He’d move far, far away from this place and the constant reminders of his late mother, of the torment. He’d be a different person. He’d begin a normal life.

If that was even possible.

Allie walked across the room, her chin upturned. She had been Mommy’s little angel. She was special, something he’d never been. He pressed the button on the remote harder.

“And one day, I’ll walk out this door, and I’ll be gone forever,” she said, her words slurred. “You’ll be lonely, won’t you?”

He thought about Tiffany. The fear in her eyes as she realized she was about to die. She’d wanted to leave, too. But she never had. Not in the way she imagined she would. He remembered her muffled screams, how rigid her body had grown.

“Are you drunk?” he asked.

Her steely eyes bore into him and he tried not to let his nervousness show. She could
never
know how uncomfortable he was around her, the power she had over him. She’d use it to her advantage. Women always did.

“No, I’m not drunk. Anyway, why should you care? You barely exist.”

He knew she was trying to get a rise out of him. He just sat, staring at the television.

He was aware he’d grown more attractive over the years, losing all the horrible baby fat. The changes had ended the name calling and the laughter from the kids at school. But to his sister he remained just as hideous and insignificant as always.

She smirked. “And for your info, I
know
you had a girl in here the other night. I saw her purse and there’s a lipstick stain on the couch,” she said, pointing, her eyes small. “Unless you started cross-dressing and wearing shitty shades of lipstick. Oh, not that I’d be surprised.” She snorted at her own joke.

Her face turned serious again. “So, who was she?”

He picked up his beer.

Her voice softened. “Was she pretty?”

He glanced at her face and realized his sister was jealous. Their family was demented.

“Did she have big tits?”

“Yes, and they were very nice,” he mumbled.

Her eyes grew even smaller. “You screw her?”

“I did.” He began to shake.

The room went still. A long moment later, her laughter cut the silence. “Whatever. I don’t believe it.” She smoothed her skirt and marched to the front of the house. “God, am I glad I’m not you!” she hooted, then let the screen door snap shut behind her and was gone.

He studied the place she’d been standing. She’d be gone until tomorrow. He always felt safer when she was gone. He pulled on his rubber boots and walked to the back door.

RACHEL ANDERSON OPENED the door to her son’s room and sighed. Clothes and magazines littered the floor and, despite the house’s “tidiness” rules, a ketchup-smeared plate and two crumpled Coke cans had been left on top of his dresser.

She was having a terrible year. A few months earlier, she’d discovered that her husband, Tom, had been having an affair with one of his teenage students: Tiffany Perron. Tom, a man she would have sworn just a year ago would never stray. Tom, someone she always thought of to be a fine man, a faithful man. To say her perception of him had been flawed would be a colossal understatement.

“Tommy!” she shouted.

Since she heard the news about Tiffany, her stomach wouldn't untwist. To think she stopped by Luke's to show the girl that she was still watching her. It had become a tradition. She had visited ever since she found out about Tom's affair, hoping to keep the younger girl away from her husband. To keep her family together. What had seemed like a clever plan before suddenly sounded horribly asinine. The girl was now missing. She probably just ran off but, nonetheless, she was missing. And somehow that made what Rachel had been doing seem highly juvenile. Pathetic, even.

“Tommy!” she yelled again. “I thought you told me you cleaned your room!”

She began to collect the dirty clothes. Then thinking better of it, she dropped what she’d picked up and shuffled into the living room. Was this what her life had become? The jaded wife of a philandering husband? An insecure thirty-six year old woman going out of her way to challenge teenage girls? A woman forced to
compete
with teenage girls?

Rachel thought of the unfinished manuscript she kept buried in her closet. She once had big dreams, then she became pregnant with Kelsey. She married Tom, ten years her senior, and in her progesterone bliss she thought there’d be nothing but positive things to come. A healthy marriage, a beautiful child, a successful career as a novelist. But money was tight and she had been forced to take up teaching. Not long after, little Tommy came along. Then Tom started taking his trips. Several of them. And in the last year, the trips nearly doubled in frequency.

In the living room, eleven-year-old Tommy lay on his stomach in front of the television with a bowl of Apple Jacks. Rachel picked up the remote by her son’s side and pressed the power button. The screen went black.

Tommy twisted, the spoon still in his hand, his big eyes confused.

“You told me your room was clean, Tommy.”

“It is,” he answered, his words slow and even, like his father’s often were.

She planted her hands on her hips. “Tommy?”

“God, Mom!”

“God, Mom, what?”

“Just. . . can’t you relax for once? You act like the sky is falling and guess what? It’s not.”

Rachel winced. Those were the words he’d heard his father, Tom senior, say many times. The words she despised. She had a reason not to be relaxed. It wasn’t as if she was the innately tense person they made her out to be. She had reasons. Good ones, dammit! “Don’t ever tell me to relax, Tommy.”

He sat up and scowled. “But you’re always getting on my case! I’m so sick of it. Is Kelsey’s room clean? Did you get on
her
case?”

Rachel regarded her son. He was becoming more like her husband every day. His wavy blond hair. His stubborn, defiant tone. The way he tilted his head when he watched television. The anger on his face. She took in the long, lean legs that were now sprouting more peach fuzz, the feet that had seemed to grow so large overnight.

“Tommy, we’re talking about
your
room,” she said, trying to keep her tone in check.

It had become difficult around the house in the last year. She was always on edge and she knew her children felt it. She wondered if they knew about the affair. The town was small, and she was sure that others knew. But who? And how many?

Was he still cheating despite his insistence that he wasn’t? Had he cheated before, or had this really been the first time? Rachel forced the wave of questions into the back of her mind. “This conversation is about
your
room, Tommy,” Rachel repeated. “You told me it was clean.”

“You see? You’re always on my case and not hers!” He snorted. “You know, she’s not as perfect as you think.”

Rachel raised an eyebrow. Her sixteen-year-old daughter Kelsey had changed a lot lately. She’d become rebellious even, and Rachel was beginning to worry if she was okay. “She’s not?” She looked out the living room window and watched the handsome young man who cut their grass ride the length of their back yard on the big John Deere lawnmower they’d inherited from Tom’s now-dead father.

She picked up a cushion from the floor and situated it on the couch, wondering what the best tactic would be to coax Tommy into giving her some information.

After a few seconds, she turned back to her angry son and said something she knew that a good mother wouldn’t say. “I think she’s pretty darn close to perfect, Tommy. Kelsey’s a good girl. You could stand being more like her.”

Tommy’s eyes smoldered. “Yeah, she’s a good girl, all right. If you call sneaking out your window in the middle of the night
good
, then, sure, Kelsey’s a
great
girl. If only I could be like her.”

Rachel’s breath caught in her throat.
Kelsey was sneaking out of her window? To do what? And. . . with whom?

She dropped to the couch. “How do you know this, Tommy?” she asked, nervously fingering her bracelet.

“I’ve seen her. She did it last night, too. She always does it.” Tommy shook his head. “And you think she’s so dang perfect.”

***

AN HOUR LATER, the phone rang. It was Myrna, one of Rachel’s colleagues at the college.

“I just wanted to let you know, Rachel,” Myrna said. “Oh, dear. How do I say this?”

Rachel tossed a stack of student essays on the kitchen table. “Say what? Just say it, Myrna.”

“There’s been. . . talk,” Myrna said. She said the word “talk” so softly Rachel could barely hear it. Having known Myrna for years, however, confirmed that that had indeed been the word she used. Rachel could imagine the woman right now, probably sitting in her bedroom, bubbling with anticipation, dying to tell her the juicy, hurtful news.

Rachel swallowed. “Talk?”
What about? Tom? About Tom and Tiffany?

“I’m not sure how to say this.”

Rachel headed to the liquor cabinet. “Just
say
it, Myrna,” she said, desperate to maintain her composure.

“It was about Tom’s. . . his affair.”

Rachel tried not to acknowledge the tears in her eyes as she filled a shot glass with whiskey. She downed it and winced. So Myrna knew about the affair. And if Myrna knew, then— “And now that the Perron girl has disappeared, people are. . . well, you know how they are. They think that maybe Tom. . .”

Rachel’s heart sank. She wrapped her free arm tightly around her middle and tried to hold herself together. She managed to keep her voice even.

“What are you saying? You think this is something more than just a young girl rebelling and running away from this small town? You’re saying that you think something went awry and that Tom had something to do with it? Because if that’s what you’re saying, I have to tell you that you couldn’t be further from the truth.”

There were footsteps behind her. Then a young voice. “Mom, I’m going to Stephanie’s.” Rachel turned to see her daughter, Kelsey, dressed in a black t-shirt and the black Texas A&M sweats Tom had bought her during a recent conference at the university.

Rachel suddenly wanted to speak to Kelsey. Since it now seemed the rest of Grand Trespass had learned of the affair, she wanted to find out just what her children knew. “Hold on, Myrna,” Rachel said into the phone, her voice just a croak. She covered the mouthpiece with a shaky hand. “No. I don’t want you to leave the house. Not now.”

Kelsey’s jaw dropped. “But Mom!”

“I said
no
, Kelsey.”

“Dammit, Mom!” the girl shouted, although the two stood only a few feet apart.

“Don’t curse in this house, young lady,” Rachel whispered, concentrating on not dropping the phone. She was sick from the news, the whiskey, the sudden shouting.

Rachel could hear Myrna’s voice, teeny in the phone. “Oh, dear. Do you want to call me back?”

“But why? Why
can’t
I go to Stephanie’s?” Kelsey asked.

“Because you and I need to talk,” Rachel whispered. “When I get off the phone—”

“Oooh! I can’t wait to turn eighteen!” Kelsey shouted even louder. “I hate your stupid rules. You don’t understand me. You don’t understand
anything!
” she exclaimed, then disappeared.

Rachel blinked, listening to the angry footsteps in the hallway, then a door banging shut.

“Myrna? You still there?”

“I’m sorry to have to bring up such a sore subject,” the woman replied.

Sure she was.

“No. No, I appreciate the call,” Rachel said. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

There was a brief silence, then “Sure. I’ll see you tomorrow, Rachel. Chin up.”

Chin up?
Rachel thought, slamming the phone down. What the hell was that supposed to mean? And how long had people known about the affair? Longer than
she
had? Without hesitating to think, she uprooted the phone and hurled it against the wall.

The house was silent as she poured her next drink. And the next. She’d probably been the laughing stock of the college all this time, and they were still gossiping about her during the summer term. And now this? Thinking Tom could be some sort of suspect in what was just a silly little girl’s rebellious tantrum? Which surely was all this was. At least the ladies at the diner seemed to think so.

She had the urge to do something awful to Tom, to really hurt him. Maybe put a knife to his throat while he slept. While he slept dreaming of young, beautiful girls.

What had changed? Wasn’t she still attractive? Why did she suddenly not make him happy? The thoughts infuriated her. She could have married many men. But Tom had been the one she loved most. And he seemed to be so taken with her. So loyal.

But now they couldn’t talk. He was distant. Hard, cold. But not to the kids, just her. Is this what happened to men when they entered their mid-forties?

And then there was the conversation about trading in the Pathfinder for a sports car. Some tiny, ridiculous, red thing. Had he always been like this? Had she just been oblivious?

She downed another shot of whiskey.