Murder Most Mellow (A Kate Jasper Mystery) (2 page)

“Of course, it’s all right,” murmured Tony, squeezing my shoulder. “You need to do things at your own pace.”

“What you really ought to ask yourself,” advised Sarah enthusiastically, “is why you created this separation with Wayne.”

I turned to her, my pulse suddenly pounding furiously. “I did not ‘create’ this separation! Wayne’s the one who won’t see me—”

“Kate, Kate,” sighed Sarah, shaking her head. “Of course you created this separation. You have to be honest with yourself.”

“I did not—” I began again.

Sarah blithely ran me over. “Everyone creates their own reality. Everyone, Kate! And then they complain.” She shook her head again, her smile sad but tolerant. “When that gardener of ours, Jerry, complains that he’s not making the bucks he was when he was an attorney, I ask him, ‘If you really want to be a lawyer, why did you quit?’ “

Sarah tilted her head at me, as if to ask if I got the point.

“Listen, Sarah—” I started.

“What Jerry does or doesn’t do is irrelevant to this discussion,” Peter interrupted. “The real issue is one of commitment—”

“The real issue,” Sarah corrected him, “is acknowledging our own karma. We can’t learn what the universe has to teach us unless we’re honest with ourselves. Take my cleaning lady, for instance. She fancies herself a computer programmer, but she’s still a cleaning lady. She blames others for her failures—”

“Your cleaning lady’s problems are irrelevant!” Peter asserted loudly. The water in the tub shivered nervously. We all knew Peter wanted to be a judge some day. He was already good at rulings.

“The issue here is Kate’s commitment to Wayne,” he finished, his volume lowered but his tone still righteous.

Sarah wasn’t impressed. “Kate has to meditate on what she really wants,” she insisted. “We all have freedom of choice in our actions, in our reactions. I got a weird phone call last night on my answering machine. The voice said I was an ‘arrogant, unfeeling hag.’ And that my money wouldn’t do me any good when I was dead. Huh!” she snorted. “I could have let it upset me, but I didn’t—”

“You ought to take that kind of call more seriously,” Peter told her, shaking his Perrier bottle sternly. “As an attorney, I receive my share of abusive calls, and let me assure you, I take them very seriously. Right now, I’m dealing with one disgruntled client—”

“You missed the point, Peter,” interrupted Sarah. “My intuition told me it was a wrong number. If I’d believed the call was for me, I would’ve flipped. But I take a positive world-view. You see, you really can create your own reality.”

Peter twisted his thumbs around the neck of his Perrier bottle. “Sarah,” he threatened. “If you say ‘you create your own reality’ one more time, I’m going to strangle you!”

“Kate,” Tony interjected softly. “Relationships can feel—”

“You can strangle me, but you can’t kill me,” Sarah teased Peter. She stuck out her tongue, then leaned back against the tub’s wall, grinning. “I’m immortal, remember?”

I turned to Tony. “Go on,” I prompted. Tony opened his mouth again, but Peter was faster.

“First of all, you are not going to live forever any more than I am,” he told Sarah. “Secondly…”

Tony shrugged. There was no way either of us was going to get a word in edgewise, now that Peter and Sarah were off and running. I rolled my eyes for Tony’s benefit, patted his knee, then slid down in the hot water again. At least Linda wasn’t watching me anymore. Her head was turned toward Peter again. I let my eyelids drop and resumed brooding. Peter’s words came breaking into my thoughts a few minutes later.

“Kate, I’m talking to you,” he scolded. I opened my eyes reluctantly and focused on Peter’s pinched, frowning face.

“I’m concerned about you,” he told me.

“Thank you, Peter,” I replied cautiously. But he wasn’t finished.

“Your attitude towards marriage indicates a profound lack of commitment. And commitment and responsibility are what make us human.”

“And love,” added Tony. “But don’t worry, Kate. This kind of mix-up happens in relationships, even in caring ones. Lovers always test each other. But if it’s the right relationship, it’ll weather the storm.” He smiled warmly at me.

I returned his smile. Cliched or not, his words had the ring of truth. And more importantly, it was a truth that I wanted to believe.

“But marriage—” began Peter.

“Can we talk about something else?” I requested hastily. I had received enough advice for the day.

“Dammit, Kate, you brought the subject up!” Peter objected.

“I did,” I agreed quickly. “And I appreciate everyone’s suggestions,” I assured him, with the silent amendment that sometimes I actually appreciated Linda’s silence more than his suggestions. “But I need some time to think about what everyone’s said.”

Sarah nodded and gave my arm a friendly pat. “You know what they say,” she prodded me.

“No, what do they say?” I asked impatiently. I wasn’t in the mood for jokes.

“When you ask for free advice,” she replied, “you get exactly what you pay for.”

I had to laugh. Even Peter’s face relaxed momentarily into a rueful smile. As Tony chuckled, I felt a warm moment of companionship with the others in the tub. I glanced at Linda’s face, wanting to include her. She stared back, her grey eyes cold and dead. The moment ended.

“Anyway, I’ll be glad to change the subject,” Sarah went on. “I’m working on this far-out new computer program. It models the genius of the very best stockbrokers. And I’m almost done. All I have to do now is come up with a name for it.”

“Broker In A Box,” I suggested.

Sarah giggled appreciatively.

“Does it go in a robot?” asked Tony slowly, his face reflecting his confusion. Sarah mostly programmed personal robots for robotics firms.

“No, no,” she said. “I’m branching out in a whole new direction…”

I leaned back, relieved, as the conversation went on to business. We were all small-business owners, with the possible exception of Linda Zatara. I had no idea what she did for a living. Peter Stromberg had his law practice. Tony Olberti owned and cooked for his own vegetarian restaurant, The Elegant Vegetable. His cooking was inspired, so good that even the major San Francisco reviewers had praised him unanimously. Sarah Quinn made big money designing software for computer games, personal robots and whatever else caught her attention. And I was the sole proprietor of Jest Gifts, a mail-order gag-gift company.

My cat, C.C., came skulking around the tub just as Peter launched into a tirade about that rarest of commodities, ethics in the legal profession.

I dangled a wet hand over the edge of the tub to keep C.C. company. She sniffed it, then yowled her objection to the chlorinated water that dripped from my fingers. Peter stopped mid-sentence to glare at her. Was he going to overrule her objection?

Before he had a chance to, Sarah began to serenade the cat. “Sing the blues, honey,” she caroled, blissfully off-key.

C.C. obliged with a long, mournful meow. C.C. was hungry. C.C. was always hungry.

I was hungry, too. I hadn’t had any breakfast. I was saving room for one of Tony’s spectacular meals.

“Isn’t it about time for lunch?” I asked him hopefully.

Tony nodded and stood carefully, barely disturbing the surface of the water. “I’ve got medallions of tofu, shitake mushrooms and greens in a lemon-herb sauce…” he began.

I hustled recklessly out of the tub into the cold air, leaving a small tidal wave behind me.

“And avocado-stuffed zucchini,” he continued as he stepped out onto the deck. Peter and Sarah scrambled out after him.

“And spiced oatmeal-raisin bread…”

Even Linda was out of the tub and drying off by the time Tony got to the apricot-and-currant crepes with whipped tofu-carob topping. We all threw on dry clothes as fast as we could, mostly sweat suits except for Sarah’s orange and purple caftan. Tony’s meals were worth hurrying for.

Once inside, I set the kitchen table as Tony pulled the elements of our lunch from my refrigerator. He even had something for C.C., a cooked corncob, the only vegetarian dish she would eat. He squatted down and held it out to her. She inspected it suspiciously, then clamped her teeth around it and pulled it rudely from his hand. Tony was smiling dreamily as he straightened up.

Sarah sidled up to him with a mischievous grin on her face and sniffed. “I know your secret,” she stage-whispered.

The dreamy smile left Tony’s face. A pink tide rose slowly up his neck and into his cheeks.

“But I won’t tell,” promised Sarah, winking. “I like your cooking too much.”

Tony made no verbal response to her words. He turned back to the refrigerator and pulled out the rest of his covered dishes in silence. Sarah giggled as she walked to the kitchen table.

Peter and I looked at each other and shrugged simultaneously. What was Sarah teasing Tony about? We all knew he was gay. That was no secret.

I watched Tony as he put the finishing touches on the zucchini. His skin color had returned from pink, passed through normal and settled into pale. So what was the big secret?

“Tony—?” I started to ask.

He turned and handed me a fragrant loaf of bread. I could smell cinnamon for sure, maybe nutmeg. “Kate, will you slice this for me?” he asked quietly.

I opened my mouth to pry.

“Please?” he said.

I sighed, shut my mouth and sliced the bread.

We devoured Tony’s feast with the quiet focus of gluttony, only speaking to one another to claim more food. Once the last dollop of whipped tofu-carob topping had been licked from the serving bowl, we waddled into the living room, past the pinball machines—relics of a defunct business as well as a defunct marriage—to sit in comfort. C.C. claimed Tony’s lap as he flopped into one of the swinging chairs suspended from the redwood beam ceiling. Sarah grabbed the other swinging chair, and Peter and Linda sat down on the homemade wood-and-denim couch. I lowered myself carefully onto a large pillow on the floor, one hand on my too full stomach.

“If no one else has anything pressing,” Peter began, “I’d like to discuss a potential client—”

“Excuse me for a moment,” Sarah interrupted, rising from her chair. Ignoring Peter’s scowl, she promised, “I’ll be right back,” and walked out the front door.

Peter sighed, but continued with his story. “A man came in yesterday who wanted to sue his therapist for unlawful touching because the poor woman hugged him. Do you believe it?”

Tony shook his head in commiseration. Linda merely stared as usual.

“So what did you do?” I asked.

Peter opened his mouth to answer, but the ring of the doorbell cut him off.

Sarah? Or another visitor? I pulled my overfed body from my pillow with an effort, walked back past the pinball machines and opened the front door. A four-foot-tall aluminum robot wearing a curly red wig and padded bra stood on my doorstep.

- Two -

“I have gone beyond bodily limitations,” the robot announced in a choppy, metallic voice. Then it laughed. “Ha-ha-ha.” Each “ha” was a distinct syllable.

I couldn’t help smiling. For all its metallic mannerisms, the robot was clearly Sarah’s child. Peter, Linda and Tony joined me at the door. Tony was chuckling softly.

“Watch,” commanded the robot. It executed a neat quarter turn on its fat tires, rolled across the front porch to an electrical outlet, pried it open with clicking metal pincers, and plugged itself in for a battery recharge.

“Ahhh,” it sighed. “I needed that.”

Tony burst out laughing. But Peter just glared. Linda watched without expression, as usual.

Sarah walked up the stairs and took a bow.

“Pretty neat, huh?” she asked, once Tony and I had finished applauding.

“Pretty neat,” I agreed. It was a lot better than some of the robot jokes we had endured at
her
house. Robots popping out of closets like jack-in-the-boxes, giving you the Bronx cheer or joining you in the bathroom. Sarah was big on practical jokes. Luckily, we didn’t go to her house that often.

Peter wasn’t amused. “I was talking, Sarah,” he said through clenched teeth.

“About a client whose case you didn’t want?” she asked, turning toward him.

“Right,” he snapped.

“Well, did you take the case?” she demanded.

“No, but somebody will,” he shot back. “And then I look picky because I didn’t.”

“Well, aren’t you picky?” she asked cheerfully.

“Yes, but—”

“If you are picky, look picky, and sound picky, then you must be creating your own reality most effectively.” Her mouth stretched into a wide Howdy Doody grin.

“Sarah!” Peter yelped, his voice rising from misunderstood to outraged in one word.

Sarah jumped forward and hugged him violently. Then she kissed Tony and me on our respective cheeks, nodded at Linda, shouted “The universe doth provide,” and was on her way down the porch stairs before you could say “transpolitical ecological awareness.”

Sarah’s robot whirred and clacked dutifully down the stairs behind her on its hydraulic lifters, then joined her in her new BMW.