Carbs & Cadavers (19 page)

“Ah, who would like some coffee?” James asked, jumping out of his chair so quickly that it scraped the wooden floor. “Decaf all around?”

His friends nodded mutely as James hustled off into the kitchen. His father sat at the table, chewing on a pile of green beans and a slice of buttered bread. He was reading the paper with an air of utmost absorption and didn’t give his son the slightest glance as James gathered the coffee pot and five dessert plates.

“Don’t forget the Reddi-wip!” Bennett called from the dining room and James could hear the sound of his friends indulging in some low laughter at his expense. Irritated, he made one trip with the coffee and plates, and then returned for forks, the mangled pie, and a can of Reddi-wip. Jackson never moved a muscle.

“Is that a pumpkin pie?” Lindy asked. “Or should I say,
was
that a pumpkin pie?” She giggled.

“Aw, it’s not that bad. The old guy just took a taste,” Bennett said.

“Yeah, right from the center!” Lucy pointed out.

“So this is low carb?” Gillian asked Bennett as James served the pie.

“Sure is. Made the recipe up all by myself. Trust me, it’s good stuff. ’Course, it helps to have a nice, healthy dose of Reddi-wip on top. I always put a big ‘B’ on all my desserts.” He sprayed the can of whipped cream on his pie slice to demonstrate.

“Bennett!” Gillian exclaimed, licking her fork. “I don’t know how you’re still on the single’s market when you can come up with something as delicious as this. I’m going to march right down to the First Baptist Church and put a notice on their bulletin board announcing that there is a single, hard-working, trivia-loving postman who enjoys experimenting with food looking for love.”

“Do that and I will save everyone’s junk mail for a month and deliver it to you over the next two years,” Bennett quipped.

“Hey,” Gillian shrugged. “If my bills can’t fit in the mailbox then I won’t have to pay them. Let’s see the recipe for this pie, Chef Postman.”

Bennett handed out copies of the recipe to his four friends.

The Flab Five’s Guiltless, Crustless Pumpkin Pie

Ingredients

2 eggs slightly beaten

1 can (16 ounces) Libby’s solid pack pumpkin

½ cup (or less) Splenda© or other sugar substitute made for baking

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

1 teaspoon vanilla

1½ cups (12-ounce can) undiluted Carnation© evaporated milk (or, even better, evaporated skim milk)

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Combine the filling ingredients in the order given. Pour into a glass pie dish. Bake 15 minutes at 425 degrees. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees. Bake an additional 40–50 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool.

After devouring their slices of pie, the supper club members planned their next meeting at Gillian’s house. When she handed out directions, James immediately recognized that the street she lived on was known for its historical homes.

“Are you in one of the houses on the National Register?” James asked.

“Not yet,” Gillian said. “I’d like to be, but I need to finish some more renovations to qualify. I think the business I am starting with Beau Livingstone might just be my ticket to coming up with a little extra cash.”

“That’s great,” Lindy enthused. “What are your plans?”

“First, we’re looking to hire someone to build us a website. Beau has a bunch of photos of sample pet palaces to put on the site—stuff he built to take to the Veteran’s Day parade in Harrisonburg next week. I’m then going to advertise in some of the smaller pet magazines. We can’t afford to place ads in the big ones.” She threw up her hands merrily. “After that, we’ll just sit back and let the orders come in. I’m going to handle marketing, billing, and freight issues, and Beau is going to handle, well, the building and design side.”

“You know, I think the Fitzgerald brothers could make you a website,” James suggested. “They’d certainly be cheaper than hiring one of those IT guys and they’d love the experience. We’re thinking about offering some computer courses at the library.”

“I
will
call them. First thing tomorrow, before the library gets too busy.”

James couldn’t tell whether Gillian was being facetious, but decided to take her comment at face value.

“And just like that, Pet Palaces, Inc., is born!” Lucy declared and held her coffee cup aloft in a salute.

As the group of friends raised their empty cups, the back door slammed once again.

“Out to the shed he goes,” James said mockingly.

“We should probably get going.” Bennett glanced at James. “It’s hardly fair to keep him out of his own house.”

“It’s by his own choice,” James argued.

Lindy rose. “I’m going to try to talk to him. When was the last time someone did?” She looked at James accusingly.

Gillian answered before James could even open his mouth. “That man is grieving. He may be acting like some kind of crazed hermit, but that’s just how he’s coping. That might seem like an odd way of showing grief to
us
, but people all over this world have
different
ways of dealing with death. For example, in China—”

“Personally,” Bennett cheerfully interrupted, “I like the way they make it into a party in New Orleans. That’s what I’d want.” He chuckled. “Jazz band, bright umbrellas, tons of food and booze. Yeah.”

“See?” Gillian gave Bennett a smug look. “Who are we to judge?”

“Well, I’m
still
going out there.” Lindy headed toward the back door.

“He probably won’t unlock it for you!” James called after her. “And if he does, enter at your own risk!”

The remaining four brought their plates to the sink and began to wash up. They all waited with baited breath for Lindy to be driven from the shed, but apparently she had gained entrance and had not yet been verbally eviscerated by Jackson Henry.

“I guess I’ll head for home,” Gillian said as she dried off her bean dish.

“Me too.” Bennett and Lucy also bid James goodbye. A few minutes later, Lindy exited the shed and pranced into the kitchen to retrieve her salad bowl.

“Well?” James was dying to know how Lindy fared with his father.

“I’m sorry, James, but I promised your daddy that our conversation would remain a secret.”

“What? Why?” James spluttered in annoyance.

“I can’t say anything more. That’s the nature of a secret. Thanks for a great dinner. Bye!”

James watched Lindy get in her car in bewilderment.

The lights in the shed stayed on. There wasn’t the slightest indication that someone had entered the lion’s den and had lived to tell the tale. As James blew out the candles in the dining room, there was a light tap on the front door.

“I . . . I forgot my casserole dish,” Lucy stammered, avoiding James’s eyes.

“Oh. Sure. Let me get it.”

When James returned with the dish, Lucy was holding a framed picture of him wearing a Batman costume.

“How old were you here?”

James looked down at the photo. “Seven or eight.”

“Cute.” Lucy returned the frame to the hall table and accepted her glass dish. “Thanks.” She turned to go, hesitated, and then swung around to face James again. “Actually, I left it here on purpose.”

James could feel his heart attempting to squeeze out of his rib cage. As if from a great distance, he saw himself reaching out to caress her thick hair, brushing it tenderly from her soft cheek. Lucy took a step toward him. He could smell her fruity perfume and the coconut scent of her shampoo. Sliding his arm behind her back, he gently brought her body close enough to his so that their lips could meet as she tilted her head upwards. He tried not to focus on how his protruding stomach rubbed up against hers or that her large breasts had closed the distance between them before any other part of her body.

Lucy tasted of coffee. James kissed her once, cautiously, and then again, with more force. Just as he was about to tell her how much he cared about her the unmistakable sounds of Jackson entering the house through the kitchen reverberated into the hall. James and Lucy jumped apart guiltily, wiping their wet lips and straightening their tousled hair.

“Good night,” Lucy whispered, flashed a crooked grin, and dashed out the front door.

James stared after her, wearing a goofy smile and waving goodbye until her Jeep’s taillights grew smaller and smaller, like two red stars winking through the dense row of trees, and then they disappeared.

“Christ! Are they finally gone?” Jackson demanded, sneaking up behind James.

“Yes, Pop. We won’t be meeting back here until December.”

Jackson closed and locked the front door. “Guess I should say a prayer for small favors,” he replied with heavy sarcasm.

“So what did you talk about with Lindy?” James asked, his curiosity temporarily overcoming his desire to dwell on his romantic moment with Lucy, replaying it over and over like a movie being constantly rewound.

Jackson raised his caterpillar eyebrows and smirked. “Oh, was
that
her name?”

“Come on, Pop,” James prompted gently, thinking about what Gillian had said about Jackson still working through his grief. “It’s okay to talk to people again. Mom would have wanted you to.”

For a second, James thought his father would erupt like a boiling teakettle, but Jackson seemed to be digesting the words his son had spoken without spitting out the first flippant reply that came into his mind.

“The best parts of me, and I know there weren’t too many, died with your mother,” Jackson said in a low voice and then turned away.

James held him back by placing a hand on his shoulder. “No, Pop.” He reached over from behind Jackson’s back and tapped in the center of his father’s chest, above his heart. “The best parts of mom are living right here, in us.”

Jackson pulled away, slowly, as if he were uncomfortable with being touched. Halfway up the stairs he turned and looked fully at James, as if seeing him for the first time since he had moved back home. “Well, goodnight . . . son.”

The next day,
James woke up with a start. He had tossed and turned the night before, wondering how to begin a casual conversation with a man he had never laid eyes on before.

The Cabin Creek Amoco station was completely out of the way for James during his short commute home, so he drove there during his lunch hour as it had only taken him five minutes to gulp down the inside of two tacos and a beef and cheese burrito from the Quickie Mart. He threw the tortilla shells in the trash and went back inside to buy two hot dogs without buns. Draining a bottle of water, which cost $1.50 and was merely filtered tap water with a crisp, blue label, James resigned himself to his fate. It was time to put his investigative skills to the test.

Wishing for Lucy’s guidance, James pulled next to one of the pumps and began to fill up the Bronco with gas. He noticed that the gas prices were five cents lower than they were in town. No wonder the station was busy. The other three pumps were all occupied and two cars were up on lifts inside the garage bays. James filled his tank and went inside to pay. A short line of customers waited to settle up for gas and sundries, and it quickly became clear to James that the cashier was not Darryl, but a woman in her mid-fifties sucking on a lollipop while she cheerfully zipped credit cards through a machine.

James peered through the glass door connecting the Food Mart to the garage. He could see the shiny dome of a bald head sticking out from the undercarriage of a Honda Accord, but he couldn’t tell who was working on the classic Camaro coming down off the lift in the far bay. James paid for his gas and then walked around the front of the garage and approached the broad back of a man wearing a denim jacket who was operating the lift.

“Excuse me,” James began hesitantly.

The man turned slowly around and James knew that he had found Darryl Jeffries. Though not as captivatingly handsome as Brinkley had been, Darryl had narrow, almond-colored eyes, straight brown hair, and a childish peppering of freckles across the bridge of his nose. His upper body was wide and muscular and his hands were covered with grease and oil. Like Brinkley, he showed the beginnings of a beer belly. Darryl’s cheek was filled like a squirrel’s and when he turned aside to spit into a cup, James realized the twentysomething was sucking on a wad of tobacco large enough to put a professional baseball player to shame.

“Can I help you, mister?” Darryl asked, his face a mixture of impatience at being interrupted and the need to exhibit professional courtesy.

“Uh, my Bronco has this strange habit. Sometimes it keeps on running
after
I take the key out of the ignition.” James answered lamely. No one in the car industry ever fully believed him when he mentioned the Bronco’s odd quirk.

Darryl swung his head around to look at the cars near the gas pumps. “That yours?” He pointed at the Bronco, a spark of interest lighting in his eyes.

“Um, it’s a 1985.”

“Oldie but a goodie.” Darryl walked over to the truck and patted the white hood as if he was greeting an old friend. “I’ve got a real classic at home that I’m fixin’ up in my spare time. It’s a ’68. Even got a bikini top for her.”

James had a vague mental image of a Bronco from that era. It was a true outdoorsman’s truck—exposed steel frames and giant wheels crying out to be driven through the mud. He decided to act supremely impressed. “That’ll be some truck when you’ve got it done. You can tear all over these mountains with a machine like that. What else do you need to do to it?”

Darryl chortled. “Just a little engine overhaul! Now, how long has your girl been makin’ this trouble for you?”

“Ever since I bought it.” The irritating habit had existed since James owned the truck. It had happened to him several times, but never in the presence of any mechanic. Even after James explained the problem to the guys at the dealership, they had examined the Bronco and then had thrown up their hands in defeat after having tried to fix it a half a dozen times. James finally gave up trying to solve the problem as the engine would eventually cut off if he jiggled the keys frantically enough.

Darryl looked thoughtful. “Might be your battery leads. Do you want me to take a look?”

“I’d sure appreciate that, if you’ve got the time,” James answered, pretending to be extremely grateful.

“Let me pull her into the bay. Just take me a second to park that Camaro. Be right back.”

James watched Darryl hustle off and tried to picture him as a killer. He seemed like a helpful and hardworking young man. True, he hadn’t become a nuclear physicist after graduating from Blue Ridge High, but he was clearly a competent mechanic. Judging from the cars parked alongside the garage, Darryl seemed to have plenty of work lined up for the day and, unlike many folks, he actually appeared to enjoy his job. As James watched him park the Camaro, a convertible Beetle zipped up to the pump next to James and a leggy brunette stepped out, wearing jeans that could have been airbrushed on her gazelle-like legs and a short leather jacket that cinched tightly around her waist. She shook out her long hair and then applied some ruby-red lipstick using the car’s passenger mirror.

This is my segue,
James thought as Darryl walked over to the Bronco, staring openly at the comely brunette. “You get customers like that all the time?” James whispered, jerking his head toward the woman.

“Not as often as I wish!” Darryl exclaimed, eyeing the woman’s legs. He got into the Bronco and drove it expertly into the bay. As he popped the hood, he cast one more glance at the brunette as she walked back to her car from the Food Mart. “Man, I love a chick in cowboy boots.”

“I hope your girlfriend knows that,” James joked.

“Tsss,” Darryl made a sound through the mound of tobacco. “She doesn’t wear boots, but she’s pretty hot, too.”

“Like model hot?” James prodded, feeling idiotically transparent.

“Yep,” Darryl replied offhandedly, absorbed in his examination of the Bronco.

“Lucky man.” James looked around the garage. Behind him was a cluttered desk bearing a half-empty liter bottle of Mountain Dew and a soiled Atlanta Braves baseball cap. Above the desk was a bulletin board covered with phone numbers, parts diagrams, and a poster of a blonde in a bikini draped over the hood of a black Ferrari.

Darryl raised his face from his inspection and laughed. “
That’s
not my girlfriend!” He gestured at the poster and laughed. “She did one modeling job, but it wasn’t her thing. You’ve probably seen her around. Her ma owns the Sweet Tooth and she works over there.” Darryl sounded proud that his girlfriend held a steady job that required hard work but not a college education.

“I love that place,” James said truthfully. “Sure, I think your girlfriend has helped me there before. She’s great. Her name’s Amelia, right?”

“That’s her.” Darryl climbed inside the Bronco and began tinkering within the steering column.

“I bet Amelia’s had a rough time lately, huh? With that ex-football player dying in her shop. She doing okay?”

“Yeah, she’s a tough nut.” Darryl scowled at the steering wheel, and then turned the engine over. He removed the key and to James’s astonishment, the engine kept running. Other than the frown he wore over the mechanical puzzle before him, Darryl seemed completely unfazed by much of anything, including the mention of Brinkley’s death.

“You look like you might have played some ball yourself.” James filled his voice with admiration.

“I was on defense. Not the same kind of glory as guys like Brinkley get.” He paused. “Got,” he added apologetically.

“Were you two friends?” James winced, hoping he wasn’t pushing it too hard.

“We hung out now and then after we graduated, but he started acting funny a few months ago, and I started hanging out more and more with my girl. You know how it goes. Once a woman’s got her hooks in you . . . look out! There goes your free time.” Darryl sounded delighted to be able to complain about having a relationship.

James was stumped. Not only did it appear that Darryl felt no animosity toward his one-time friend, but he gave no indication that he knew about Brinkley and his blackmail scheme.

“It must be tough to come up with the extra dough to work on your Bronco,” James commiserated. “All the long hours here and then you need spending money for your girlfriend. I don’t know how guys like you work so hard.” James fidgeted as he prepared to lie. “The only times I saw Brinkley he was eating at the diner or lazing about the video store, checking out three or four movies. Guess he had no girlfriend to spend cash on, huh?”

Darryl shrugged. “He always claimed to have more than one. Who knows? Girls thought he was the bomb.” He paused, adjusting something out of James’s view behind the dashboard. “I don’t know where he got his extra jack from, either. He didn’t mow
that
many lawns.” He grunted in exertion and then jumped out of the car and disappeared under the hood again. “I think I know what’s going on here!” he announced, pulling open a drawer near the desk and fishing out a tool. James froze. His gig was up and Darryl was calling his bluff. But to James’s surprise, the young man pointed excitedly to the Bronco and asked, “You leave your car outside at night?” as he slipped back inside the car.

James leaned into the driver’s-side door. “Yes.”

“Does it keep running like this in the summer or only in the colder months?”

James thought about the question and then exclaimed, “Only when it’s cold! I never noticed that before.”

“Yep, you’ve got a bad battery lead. It makes your battery drain in cold weather. I can fix that. I also think we should make a copy of your key. I think the original, this one that the dealer gave you, is messed up.” He pointed at the ignition. “The tumblers connect to the ignition switch and I think this key pushes the tumblers on its way
out
. It’s only supposed to hit them on the way in. I can file your new key down a bit and then your problem should be solved. Can you leave it here today?”

James stared at Darryl in amazement. “Man, you’re a magician. I can’t, because I’ve got to get back to work, but I can drop it off first thing in the morning and catch a ride from a friend.”

“Sounds like a plan. I’ll put you down for tomorrow.” Darryl jotted a note in his appointment book. As he wrote, the sound of police sirens cresting the hill near the gas station broke the midday stillness.

Two brown Sheriff’s Department cars pulled erratically in front of the garage and came to a grinding halt, inches behind James’s truck.

“What the hell?” Darryl dropped his pencil in shock.

Sheriff Huckabee and Deputy Donovan leapt from their cars and hustled over to the young mechanic. Their faces reflected a grim determination that immediately set James on edge.

“Darryl Jeffries?” Sheriff Huckabee asked. “We’ve got some questions to ask you. You want to answer them here or down at the station?”

James stood frozen in shock as Donovan turned a disdainful gaze on him. “Now just what are you—?”

“What the hell is going on here?” the bald man who was working on the Honda suddenly demanded. “This boy committed a crime?”

“That’s what we’re tryin’ to find out, Tom. We just need to ask him a few questions.” Sheriff Huckabee stepped closer to Darryl.

“Well, shit! You don’t need to drive in here like the place is filled with terrorists! You’re scarin’ all my customers. Turn off the damned sirens and sit down like civilized human beings. Does he need a lawyer?”