SHIVER: 13 Sexy Tales of Humor and Horror (24 page)

My head felt woozy, and I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to catch my bearings.

“Sweetie, you don’t look so good up there,” Anne called as she held the ladder for me. I was a good ten feet off the ground, and the longer I hovered in the air, the more I realized that I should have blown the balloons up on the ground.

“I’m fine, I just feel lightheaded,” I assured her as I tied off the balloon and reached up on my tiptoes to tape it to the ceiling. You know what looks like crap? Balloons stuck to the ceiling in random spots. Once again, I thought of how strange it was that my nursing curriculum had failed to teach me party decorating considering it made up 50% of my job. The other 50% consisted of urine. So much urine.

“Grandma, they have you on ladder duty?” A deep voice asked from a few feet behind me. I twisted around with enough force to cause the ladder to twist out of Anne’s grip.

“Ahhhhhhhhh,” I screamed as I tried to grab onto anything around me, but I was only coming up with empty air. My life was flashing before my eyes as that ladder slowly toppled toward the ground.

“Byyyyeeee Annneeeeee,” I said in what felt like slow motion speech, just as I fell into strong arms.

“Whoa,” Sawyer said as he steadied the two of us. “Are you okay?”

AM I OKAY?!

I am in the arms of my lover. My unknowing lover. I’ve never been
more
okay.

“I fell,” I said lamely.

A smile broke out across his face, and I caught an up close view of straight, white teeth. “You did, and then I caught you.”

I nodded, connecting the dots.

“You’re really strong,” I pointed out, appreciating his physique. “Like the hulk.”

He laughed and then slowly set me back onto my own two feet. If I had thought faster, I would have feigned injury to stay in his arms.
Oh weird, my leg just fell off, so why don’t you just carry me around all day?
That would have worked like a charm.

“Sawyer! You made it!” Anne sang as she swooped in and gave him a big hug and a kiss on the cheek. I took the moment to take him in, appreciating his soccer jersey and jeans.

“Hey grandma,” he said before meeting my eye. “Hey Ruby. Cute ears.”

I instinctively reached up to feel the fuzzy, gray mouse ears. I’d forgotten I still had them on.

“Oh hi — thanks,” I said.

“What’s with the jersey?” Anne asked, eyeing his choice of clothing with an air of judgment.

Sawyer reached down to hold the loose material between his fingers. “It’s the only thing I had at my apartment that would work as a costume.”

“So — you’re a soccer player?” she asked, trying to connect the pieces.

He shrugged. “I guess. This is Liam Wilder’s jersey. He’s a forward for the LA Stars.”

Anne narrowed her eyes on him. “That doesn’t count as a costume!”

“I think it does,” I protested. The words were out before I could stop them. Anne shifted her gaze to me and raised her brow, shocked that I actually contributed to the conversation. Sawyer gave me a wide grin.

“There you have it. You’ve been outvoted, Grams,” he said, patting her shoulder.

It was always about this time in my encounters with Sawyer that I would excuse myself to get back to work, so I took a slow step backward, hoping Anne wouldn’t notice.

“No. No, don’t even think about,” Anne said, holding up her hand.

“What? I have to get back to my shift.”

“Bullshit.”

Sawyer’s eyebrows shot up. “Grandma! Let her get back to work.”

Anne shook her head, staring at me with narrowed eyes. “If Sawyer hadn’t just walked in here, you would have stayed and continued to decorate with me for another thirty minutes. You always just skiddadle as soon as he arrives.”

My mouth fell open in shock.
No she did
not
just call me out.

“Grandma,” Sawyer warned again.

I couldn’t even look his way at that point because the old ho-bag had essentially just spilled all the beans for me.

“Oh, what’s that?” I said, cupping my ear and pretending to hear something. “Yup, I think Mr. Jenkins is calling for me down the hall. Oh, yup, he just broke his hip. Oh wow, no,
both
hips. I better go check on him.”

“Ruby!” Anne called as walked to the door.

I stuck my tongue out at her when Sawyer turned around. She and I would have a major discussion later, and I’d be sure to stay at least a few feet away from her so she couldn’t put me in another choke-hold.

When I cleared the door to the dining hall, I stood there for a moment, wondering how long Anne had known about my crush on her grandson. I thought I’d been so sly; I’d never directly asked her about him. I’d wait for her to bring him up and then just piggy-back off of her discussion. I thought I’d covered my tracks flawlessly, but apparently not.

I leaned against the wall, trying to collect my thoughts.

Okay, Sawyer is here and you will have to talk to him
, I told myself.

Sure, most of my encounters with Sawyer had been terrible in the past, but I was going to change all of that. Today, we would have an actual conversation that didn’t consist of me slurring my words as I shuffled past him. I’d speak slowly and clearly and be the most charming version of myself. Which might only be about one-fourth as charming as anyone else, but it was the best I could do.

***

“Come in, take
a packet,” I said, standing at the door of the dining hall beside George as residents started to trickle in. “Come in and grab a packet.”

“Thank you,” Sandy said with a touch of attitude as she strolled in wearing her spandex costume.

Gertie walked in a second later, taking a packet and giving my work scrubs another tsk tsk. I groaned and tried to ignore her, continuing to pass out packets as people strolled in.

I’d done my best to transform the dining hall into a Murder Mystery set, but since I didn’t really know what that meant, I just went with orange and black streamers, balloons, and a bowl of punch with plastic spiders floating on top. As I finished up decorating (once I was sure Sawyer and Anne were gone), George was in a tizzy about how his script would play out. He paced around the dining hall while I set up, repeating the same concerns over and over again.

“What if no one is committed to their characters?” he asked as I dropped spiders in the punch bowl.

“They will be,” I’d replied, taking a step back and slipping on some of the punch that I’d spilled on the floor by accident. I landed flat on my back, staring up at the ceiling while I caught my breath. George didn’t even notice.

“I just want everyone to immerse themselves in the story. If they don’t, this will just be a train-wreck,” he said with a dramatic flare of his hand. All the while I was lying on the ground.

I’d been lucky to survive the afternoon, and I was still trying to console George as Anne and Sawyer walked through the doorway. Sawyer smiled at me as he walked by. Anne paused, watching him take a seat in the middle of the room, before turning to me.

“Are there enough packets left for everyone to participate?” she asked, glancing between me and George.

I looked down at the packets in my hand. There were still four left. Which meant out of the twenty people who’d already arrived, only two of them decided they wanted to participate in the game.

“Why yes, Anne, there
is
enough,” I said, holding her eye contact as I passed her a packet.

The edge of her mouth lifted in a smirk. “You aren’t mad at me, are you?” Her tone gave her away. She knew I was annoyed with her and she was playing the innocent old woman card. It wouldn’t work on me.

“Nooooo.” I exaggerated the o’s until I knew that she knew she was in deep shit.

She leaned in closer and whispered so that only I could hear. “I’ve lived on this earth for a very long time and I’ve learned that sometimes you just have to cut the shit. You’ve been eyeing my grandson for the past two years and both of you are too scared to do anything about it.”

I scoffed, even holding my hand over my heart for emphasis. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Mmhm,” she mumbled as she pulled away from me. “George, make sure Ruby gets a packet. She’s sure good at
acting
today.”

Had she not been my best friend and eighty-something years old, I would have flipped her off.
Damn that, Anne. I couldn’t ever stay mad at her
.

The rest of the attendees finally strolled into the dining hall, and by 7:30 P.M., George and I were standing in front of the room with two packets remaining.

“We need two more resident volunteers before we can start,” I said, waving the packets out in front of me like I was trying to auction them off.

The sea of residents stared at one another, waiting for someone else to volunteer. Out of twenty of them, there’d only been four volunteers so far: Anne, Sandy, Gertie, and Mr. Tennon. George would have volunteered, but he was out since he knew the plot.

“Seriously, someone has to volunteer or we’ll all just sit here,” I said, trying to get the ball rolling.

Sawyer glanced around the room before he finally shrugged and stood up.

“If it’s okay with everyone, I’ll play,” he said.

Anne clapped wildly, but no one else cared to comment as Sawyer stepped toward me.

“You should play, too,” he said with a devious smile as he slid the packet out of my hand.

I didn’t want to be a part of the murder mystery. I think I even specifically opted out of it on numerous occasions, but we were still down one player and if no one wanted to volunteer, I didn’t really have a choice.

I glanced around the room one more time, even holding eye contact with a few residents to make them squirm in their seats.

“Okay, fine, I’ll be the last person. Let’s do this,” I said, opening up my packet and peeking inside to find a script, a small description card, and a few props.

George clapped his hands and shouted, “Players, go read your cards and put on anything provided for you in your packet. We’ll meet back here in five minutes to start the game.”

As I made my way toward the bathroom, Sawyer caught up to me.

“Who are you?” he asked with a small smile.

“Detective Maverick,” I said, reading the front of the packet.

He nodded. “Apparently I’m Jim Fitzpatrick, the son of Gwyneth Fitzpatrick.”

I laughed at the silly expression he was making. “Thanks for volunteering by the way. I thought we were just going to sit there all night.”

“Yeah, no worries. I have a Halloween party to go to, but it doesn’t start until later,” he said with a shrug.

I thought about what I had planned for later. The options were: reading, watching a scary movie, and eating enough candy to go into a coma. I’d most likely do all of the above. Of course, I didn’t dare tell Sawyer that.

“Oh yeah, me too.” I nodded with what I hoped was a cool, nonchalant expression.

He smiled as we turned a corner toward the bathrooms near the dining hall. “Well then, let’s solve this mystery.”

Ten minutes later, the five of us were standing up at the front of the dining hall with our scripts in hand and our props attached to various parts of our bodies. George strolled across the stage in front of us, announcing the players to the crowd of on-lookers who would be helping us solve the mystery. I browsed over my script as he read aloud.

SETTING
: An old estate in the heart of Savannah, Georgia.

THE PLAYERS

Gwyneth Fitzpatrick
: An eighty-year-old woman who has oil money from generations past. She owns an estate in Savannah and has invited a few close friends over for a dinner party. She has two children, Jim and Hannah Fitzpatrick, who are both attending the party.

Gwyneth was played by Sandy in her latex Catwoman suit. Seemed appropriate.

Jim Fitzpatrick
: Gwyneth’s eldest child. He’s a prominent lawyer in downtown Savannah. He was married to a young debutante when he was younger, but she died in a horrible lipstick accident the year before.

Jim was played by Sawyer. He still had his soccer jersey on, but now he’d added a cane, pipe, and monocle as well. Jim Fitzpatrick was apparently very stylish.

Hannah Fitzpatrick
: Gwyneth’s youngest child. A struggling artist who doesn’t get along with her older brother. She has a lover named Antonio Ricardo.

Hannah was played by Anne, who was carrying a paint palette and a paint brush. She’d added a few streaks of paint to her hair which I thought was a cute touch.

Antonio Ricardo
: Hannah Fitzpatrick’s lover. He’s a Latin underwear model currently between jobs. He’s never gotten along with Hannah’s brother, Jim.

Antonio was played by Mr. Tennon, who I knew from experience was probably sporting some whitey-tighties beneath his suspendered pants.
Meow
.

Izzie Jenkins
: Gwyneth’s maid of ten years. She’s a young girl who grew up in a bad neighborhood in Savannah. Gwyneth took Izzie under her wing and provided her with a job when she had no other prospects.