Seventeen
Soaking, sopping spring rains blew in. They made for muddy boots, wet dog, and some dramatic photos.
Naomi worked in the unfinished bedroom with the ugly blue bathroom and learned to block out the scream of tile cutters.
She spent the rainy Monday and started the rainy Tuesday refining the weekend’s work. She’d added the Wreckers to her playlist, used their music while she worked on the band shots.
She switched off to blues when refining the shots of Xander on her deck, went random on the book-in-hand.
If she put off working on what she thought of as Storyland, she’d get to it. Inside, she knew she had to get past the upset of seeing that damn book tucked in with all the others on Xander’s book wall. And right now, she was experiencing something new and different.
She was happy. Not just satisfied, content, or engaged. Happy in a way that stuck with her right through the day—rainy or not. The house, the progress on it, the work—because, God, she did good work here. Even the dog gave her a sense of happiness.
And still, this was more. However it had happened, however it ran contrary to ingrained habit and what she considered good, sensible judgment, she was in a relationship. And in one, she had to admit, with an interesting man. One who engaged her, mind and body, who worked as hard as she did, and enjoyed it as she did.
Who could blame her for wanting to hold on to it as long as it lasted?
She matted the manipulated shot of him on the deck. Toned black-and-white, his eyes boldly blue, the dog’s crystal. Bright white mug, and the red-gold streak of sun an arrow over the horizon where sky met water. She’d debated between white mat or gray, and saw now she’d been right to go with the gray. It popped the colors out, didn’t distract as the white might have. Pewter frame, she decided, not black. Keep those edges soft.
She propped the matted print against the wall, stepped back to study it.
The start of a good day, she thought, remembering. She only had to eliminate the visit from the chief of police, and it had been the start to a most excellent day—that ended as it began, with Xander in her bed.
She hooked her thumbs in her pockets, giving the prints ranged against the wall a critical study, called out a come in at the knock on the door.
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she told Kevin. “Perfect time to break.”
“Good, because Lelo’s downstairs.”
“He is?”
“Yeah, he wanted to . . . Wow.” He came all the way in, leaving the door open so the sounds of hammers and saws echoed from downstairs, and the tile cutter screamed down the hall. “Those are great. That’s Cecil’s barn—and Cecil. And Xander. Mind?” he asked, and crouched down before she answered. Tag padded over to nose under Kevin’s arm for a hug.
“This one? Man, you can smell morning. That minute before it bangs open and it’s day.”
“You make me wish you were an art critic.”
“It’s how it hits. The black-and-white with the bits of color, that’s dramatic, right? And seriously cool. But this one, it’s the quiet and the . . . possibilities?”
“Definitely wish you were an art critic.”
“I’m not, but I’ve got to say Cecil’s barn never looked so good. Where are you going to hang them?”
“I’m not. They’re going to the gallery in New York. In fact, I need to do a second print of what seems to be your favorite. The gallery owner wants one for his personal collection.”
“Hah.” Visibly tickled, Kevin pushed up to stand. “Xander’s going to New York. You know, the shop where Jenny works would go nuts for those smaller ones there—the flowers and the barn door, the old tree.”
She’d matted them for herself, but . . . maybe. The commission, if they sold, could carve nicely into the cost of the old cedar chest she had her eye on at Cecil’s.
“I might take some of them in, see about that. Did you say Lelo’s downstairs?”
“Hell, got off track. Yeah, he said he’d look at the yard, work up some ideas. But he’s poking around with the guys downstairs—or was when I came up.”
“We talked about him looking at the yard, but it’s pouring rain.”
“It’s Lelo.” Kevin’s shrug said it all. “If you’re going to break for a bit, I’ve got some things to talk to you about downstairs. The laundry room deal, and up here, the studio.”
“Okay. Let me talk to Lelo, then I’ll find you.”
“We appreciate you don’t breathe down our necks when we’re working. I mean that. But you might want to take a look at the work on the master bath before you close off again.”
“All right.”
Kevin peeled off in the direction of the master, and the dog started down with her. Tag paused on the stairs, sniffed the air. If a single bark could signify utter delight, his did before he all but flew down the stairs.
She heard Lelo laugh. “Hey, there he is! How’s it going, big guy!”
She found them, already wrestling over the painter’s tarp. Lelo wore a wet cowboy hat and a yellow rain slicker.
“Hi. Figured it was a good day to take a look around since we’re rained out on this patio job.”
“So you want to slosh around outside here instead?”
“Rain’s gotta rain. I didn’t want to go poking around without letting you know.”
“Let me get a jacket.”
“I can just make some notes and all if you don’t wanna get wet.”
“Rain’s gotta rain.”
He grinned. “There you go. Meet you out there. Okay if Tag tags with me?”
“I’d have a hard time stopping him. I’ll be right out.”
She grabbed her rain jacket, a ball cap, and took the time to change her sneakers for boots.
When she got out front, Lelo wandered in the steady rain, tossed a sodden tennis ball for the delirious dog.
“Got a good start on the cleanup,” he called out.
“Xander did. I’d barely started on it.”
“He likes the work. My dad’s always saying he’d hire Xander in a heartbeat, but then who’d fix his truck? I want to say right off, I hope you’re not in love with those old arborvitaes because they gotta go.”
“I’m not in love.”
“Excellent. Anything you especially want?”
“I thought an ornamental weeper, like a cherry. Over there.”
“Uh-huh.” He stood, rain dripping off the brim of his hat, studied. “That’d work. Have you ever seen a weeping redbud?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s not red. It’s lavender.”
“Lavender.”
“Awesome color, and just a little less usual. And it’s got heart-shaped leaves.”
“Heart-shaped.”
“You maybe want to look it up.”
“I’m going to.”
“You could maybe do some pavers, you know? Kind of winding, not straight-arrow-like. And set off the house with native shrubs and plants. You like birds and butterflies? Like that?”
“Sure.”
“You gotta have a mock orange. It smells good, looks pretty, and it’ll draw the birds and butterflies. And Juneberry. It’s got white starry flowers, and it fruits. Purple fruit about this big.” He circled his thumb and finger. “You’ll get the songbirds with that. You can eat it—it’s pretty good. And you want some rhodos.”
He walked, gesturing, tossing the ball, rattling off names, descriptions. And painted a picture of something fanciful and lovely.
“I was going to plug in a tree, a couple of shrubs, do some bedding plants and bulbs.”
“You could do that. It’d look fine.”
“Maybe it would, but now you’ve got me thinking about plants I’ve never heard of and trees with heart-shaped leaves.”
“I could draw it up for you, give you a better picture.”
“Okay, let’s do that.”
“Can I see around back?”
“We’re already wet.”
As they started around the side, he reached into the pocket of his slicker. “Want?”
She glanced down, saw the classic yellow pack, caught just the drift of that comforting scent as he drew out a stick of Juicy Fruit.
Though she shook her head, deemed herself foolish, the simple pack of gum cemented her initial impression of him.
Kind, sweet, loyal. No wonder the dog adored him.
“You get afternoon shade here,” Lelo continued as he folded a stick of gum into his mouth. “It’s a nice spot for a hammock or a bench, some shade lovers. You wind those pavers around, you’d be able to walk clear around the house barefoot.”
“You’re killing me, Lelo.”
They circled to the back, where he set his hands on his skinny hips and looked up the deck steps, out to the narrow ribbon of scrubby lawn to the stone wall.
“You’ve got a basement, right?”
“A big one. Storage and utility. It’s not finished. I don’t need the room.”
“Might want it when you have kids. And you’d want to build up that wall more when you do. For now, you might want to put some hemlock over there, naturalize some daffodils, give you a foresty feel on that far side. And some shrubs fronting the wall. Keep them low ’cause you don’t want anything blocking the view. When you ever decide to finish the basement, you do yourself a walk-out, and you’ve got a nice shady patio area under the decks, then a sunny little backyard.”
“I wanted to put some herbs, some vegetables in. Not a huge space, but enough for a kitchen garden.”
“You could do that.” Nodding, he walked up the short steps to the first-floor deck. “It’s a ways from your kitchen, but you could do that. Or you could have yourself a container garden up here. You got the sun, you got the room on a deck this size. Build them out of the same wood as the house, make them look built-in, you know? Do yourself herbs, some cherry tomatoes, maybe some Romas, some peppers, whatever. Containers are easy to maintain.”
“And steps away from the kitchen.” More practical, she thought, more efficient. And pretty. “You know what you’re doing, Lelo.”
“Well, I’ve been working the business since I was about six.”
“It’s a lot of work.”
“Whatever you do, you can do some here, some there, some down the road.”
“But you can draw it up, give me an estimate—on each section?”
“Sure. And there’s this other thing.”
“Am I going to have to sell the family jewels?”
He grinned, shook his head, and shot out raindrops. “Maybe you could take pictures of the work—you know, before, during, after. We could use them in the business. Like a trade.”
Bartering again, she thought. The popular commerce of Sunrise Cove.
“That’s a smart idea.”
“I can’t claim it. It’s my dad’s. I haven’t seen what-all you sent to Dave yesterday. I’m swinging by his place after he gets off work—may be able to mooch dinner, too. But my dad took a look at your website, and he came up with it.”
She’d want pictures in any case, she thought. She’d been documenting the progress on the house, for herself, for Mason and her uncles and grandparents.
“We’ll work that deal.”
“Solid.” They fist-bumped on it. “I’ll get you some drawings and some figures. You’re really pretty.”
“Ah . . . thank you.”
“I’m not hitting on you or anything. Xander’s like my brother. It’s just you’re really pretty. And I like what you’re doing with the house. Like I said, I used to hang up here sometimes with Dikes. Even though I used to think working in the business was bogus, I’d end up planting stuff in my head.”
“Now you’ll plant it for real.”
“That’s something, isn’t it? I should book. Xander’s on my ass about the muffler. I guess I’ll take it in, let him fix the damn thing. I’ll come by when I’ve got everything worked up.”
“Thanks, Lelo.”
“Sure thing. You be good.” He rubbed the wet dog. “Later,” he said, and jogged down and away.
—
Xander stood under an aging Camry, replacing brake pads that should’ve been replaced ten thousand miles earlier. Some people just didn’t maintain. It needed an oil change and an all-around tune-up, but its owner—his ninth-grade American history teacher—still didn’t believe he knew what he was doing. About any damn thing.
And never let him forget he’d been suspended for hooking school.
Something that made no sense to him then or now. Suspension for hooking was like a damn reward.
Speaking of suspension, her shocks were about shot—but she wouldn’t listen there either. She’d wait, drive the car into the ground until he ended up towing it in.
He had a transmission job after this and had given a clutch replacement to one of his crew, a simple tire rotation to another.
He had two cars out in the lot, towed in from a wreck on rain-slick roads the night before—a call that had pulled him out of Naomi’s bed at two in the morning.
The drivers got off with mostly bumps, bruises, some cuts—though one of them ended up being taken in by the deputy when he didn’t pass the Breathalyzer.
Once the insurance companies finished wrangling, he’d have plenty of bodywork to deal with.
But he’d missed waking up with Naomi and the dog, having breakfast.
He’d gotten used to those sunrises. Funny how fast he’d gotten used to them, and unused to sleeping and waking alone in his own space.
Even now he had a low-grade urge to see her, to hear her voice—to catch a drift of her scent. That wasn’t like him. He just wasn’t the sort who needed constant contact—calling, texting, checking in, dropping by. But he’d caught himself thinking up excuses to do any of that, and had to order himself to knock it off.
He had work—and later in the afternoon a quick meeting with Loo about the bar. He had books to read, sports to watch, friends to hang with.
And the paperwork he should’ve done Sunday night to clear up.
Xander shook his head when he heard the unmistakable cough and rattle of Lelo’s shitty muffler.
“Get that thing out of here!” Xander shouted. “It’s bad for business.”
“I’m bringing you business, man. And half a jumbo Diablo sub.”
Xander paused long enough to glance over as Lelo, dripping rain, walked in. “Diablo?”
“I went by, saw your chick, and she is hot. She is smoking hot. Made me want some hot.”
“You went up to Naomi’s?”
“Still think of it as the old Parkerson place. Not for long if she hires us. Trade you the sub for a Mountain Dew.”
“Two minutes.” Xander went back to the brake pads. “So you went up, took a look at the yard?”
“I’ve been dreaming about that place since I sat up there smoking dope with Dikes. Now I find your smoking-hot chick’s pretty open and flexible about landscaping. She listens. She’s got the vision, man, just like with the photos.”
Lelo boosted himself up to sit on a workbench, unwrapped the sub. “We get a job like that? That place is a landmark—sad one these last few years, but still. Showing how we can turn it around’s got my parents doing the bebopping boogie. Going to try to work a deal for pictures we can use for promotion, keep her outlay down some. How come you let Denny play that country shit in here?”
“It’s all right, and it keeps him happy.” Finished, Xander walked over to the soda machine, plugged in coins for a Mountain Dew and a ginger ale.
He grabbed paper napkins—Diablos were hot, and messy—then joined Lelo on the bench.
“Is that Mrs. Wobaugh’s Camry?”
“Yeah, she’s driving it into the ground.”
“I had her for American history.”
“Me, too.”
“About bored me brainless.”
“Me, too.”
“Who said that shit about history repeating itself?”
“There are a lot of people who said that shit,” Xander told him. “A favorite is: ‘History, with all her volumes vast, hath but one page.’ That’s Byron.”
“Cool. So, why do we have to study it, be bored brainless, if it’s got one page?”
“We keep thinking if we do, we’ll change the next page. Not so much,” Xander decided. “But as somebody else said, hope springs. So high school kids get bored brainless.”
“Guess that’s it.”
They ate in the easy, companionable silence of old friends.
“Saw you got a couple banged up good in the lot.”
“Wreck last night on 119. Driver of the Honda blew a one-point-one.”
“D-W-fricking-I. Hurt bad?”
“Busted up some, and the other driver, too. Didn’t sound major. Cars have it worse.”
“Cha-ching for you.”
“Should be.” As he ate, Xander studied Lelo’s truck. “Are you bringing that piece of shit in here for me to fix?”
“Yeah. I can leave it if you can’t get to it, hitch a ride home.”
“I can get to it. I bought the damn muffler a month ago, figuring you’d come to your senses eventually. I can shuffle you in next.”
“Dude. Gratitude. The chief stopped me this morning on my way out of town—let me off when I told him I was coming back here after some business, and you were taking care of it.”
Unsurprised, Xander washed down fire-hot Diablo with ice-cold ginger ale. An excellent combo. “That’s one way to come to your senses.”
“I’m going to kind of miss the noise.”
“Only you, Lelo.”
“The chief told me they haven’t found Marla.”
Xander paused with the can of ginger ale halfway to his mouth. “She’s not back?”
“Nope, not back, nobody’s seen or heard from her. Since he had me pulled over, he asked if I had, if I noticed her with anybody Friday night. Saw anybody go out after her. It’s gotten serious, Xan. It’s like she poofed.”
“People don’t poof.”
“They run off—I tried that when I was pissed at my mother over something. Packed up my backpack and set off to walk to my grandparents’. I figured it only took about five minutes to get there—by car—and being eight I didn’t calculate the difference on foot so well. I got halfway there when my mother drove up. I figured I was in for it big-time, but she got out and cried all over me.”
He took a hefty bite of his sub. “Not the same, though, I guess.”
“We can hope it is. She took off on a mad, and she’s sitting somewhere sulking.” But the odds of that now, Xander thought, weren’t good. “It’s too long for that. Too damn long for that.”
“People are thinking she got taken by somebody.”
“People?”
“They were talking about it in Rinaldo’s when I got the sub. Local cops are talking to everybody now, from what I can see. Seems she hasn’t used her credit card since Friday either. And she didn’t take her car, any clothes. They had Chip and Patti look at that, to see if they could tell if she grabbed up some clothes. Everybody there saw her walk out of the bar, and that’s it.
“I can’t say I like her. I know I had sex with her a couple times, but Jesus, she has a mean streak. But it’s scary, man, thinking something really happened to her. A lot of people are fucked-up, you know? And do fucked-up things. I don’t like thinking about it.”
Neither did Xander.
But he couldn’t put it away. By the time he had Lelo’s truck on the lift—and Lelo, with a yen for ice cream, had wandered off to get some—he had a twist in his belly.
He got a clear picture of the look she’d tossed him when she’d come out of the bathroom—where Patti had dragged her on Friday night. The look she’d shot him, full of hot fury, before she shot up her middle finger and stormed out.
That was his last image of her—a girl he’d known since high school. One he’d had sex with because she was available. One he’d blown off countless times since because, like Lelo, he didn’t really like her.
She could have walked home in under five minutes, he calculated. And at the pace she’d stormed out, more like three. A dark road, he considered, even with some streetlights. A quiet road that time of night with nearly anybody out and about in the bar for the music and the company.
He tried to see the houses on the route she’d have taken, the shops if she’d cut across Water Street. Shops closed. People would have been awake—or some of them—but those at home most likely sitting and watching TV, playing on the computer. Not looking out the window after eleven at night.
Had somebody come along, offered her a ride? Would she have been stupid enough to get in the car?
Three-to-five-minute walk, why get into a stranger’s car?
Didn’t have to be a stranger, he admitted, which tightened the twist in his belly. And there, she’d have hopped right in, glad to have an ear to vent her temper to.
Nearly two thousand people made their home in the Cove, in town and around it. Small town by any measure, but no one knew everyone.
And a pissed-off, drunk woman made an easy target.
Had someone followed her out? He hadn’t seen anyone, but he’d shrugged and looked away after she’d shot him the look and the finger.
He couldn’t be sure.
Even people you knew had secrets.
Hadn’t he found black lace panties in the Honda of the very married Rick Graft—whose wife wouldn’t have been able to wish herself into panties that small—when he’d detailed the interior?
Graft came off as a happily married father of three, who coached basketball for nine- and ten-year-olds and managed the local hardware store.
Xander had tossed the panties, figuring it was better all around that way. But he couldn’t toss away the knowledge.
Or how Mrs. Ensen had smelled of weed and cheap wine, and the mints and spray cologne she’d used to try to mask it, when he’d answered the breakdown call and gone out to change her tire.
And she a grandmother, for Christ’s sake.
No, you couldn’t know everyone, and even when you did, you didn’t.
But he knew Marla wouldn’t sulk alone for going on four days.
He was very much afraid that when they found her, it would be too late.