Sintown Chronicles II: Through Bedroom Windows (3 page)

Tim's face turned red. Sandra patted Junior's head. “Daddy does a lot of reading and writing in his study. Haven't you seen him using his computer?"

“Oh, yeah,” Junior said. At last, he looked up. “I'm not sure, but I think it says, ‘Daddy loves you, too."

Tim lifted his son high in the air and swung him in a complete circle while Junior laughed with glee. “You're something else, son. I am so proud of you. Bobby told me that you helped him cut the grass this morning."

“Nah,” Junior said. “I just sat in his lap and pretended to steer. We weren't cutting grass either. We were grinding up the dead leaves that fell from the trees after the last time Bobby raked. Bobby was really driving the tractor, but it was fun anyway."

“Ready to learn some more words?” Sandra asked.

“Let's go fishing."

Tim and Sandra looked at each other. “Son,” Tim said. “Don't you think it's a little too cold to sit by the lake? Next month is April and then the weather will warm up enough for us to fish."

“I will put on my coat and cap and gloves,” Junior pleaded.

The parents again exchanged glances. “What the heck,” Tim said. “Mommy, you bundle Junior up and I'll go dig some worms."

Sandra stood up and hugged her two men. She whispered in Tim's ear, “And you say I spoil the boy."

“What the hell are you doing in here?” Dottie growled at George as he took his normal counter stool.

He looked surprised. “A man has to eat,” he said.

“Go eat in your own damn restaurant,” she spit back.

“Come on, Dottie. I came on a little strong yesterday. I'm sorry. Let me have one of your famous country style steak specials."

The usual din of the lunchtime crowd dropped a few decibels.

“Go get a tube steak at the golf course snack bar,” she hissed and started to walk off.

“Dottie, please,” he said.

She paused and looked at him over her shoulder.

“The words didn't come out right, but I was trying to do you a favor. I offered to buy you out at a fair price. I don't want your diner. If you change your mind and decide to sell, I'll close the place. I just didn't want you to be hurt by my new restaurant."

The only noise in the diner was now coming from the kitchen.

“Hey, everybody,” Dottie said as loud as possible without shouting, “Mr. Bennett is the one who is building a motel and restaurant across from the Dot Grocery. He says he is going to run me out of business. He claims that he will undersell me and all of my good friends and customers will desert me. Now he has the gall to come in here and try to order lunch as if nothing has happened. You, my former friend,” she said glaring at George, “can kiss my royal behind.” She stalked off to the kitchen.

George slipped off the stool and found every customer looking at him. “It's a misunderstanding,” he said meekly. “Because of the location, size, hours and variety of my new restaurant, I think Dottie will lose customers. I didn't want her to be hurt, so I offered to buy her out. I hope some of you can talk a little sense into her stubborn head. I give up.” He tried to walk out of the diner with dignity, but tripped over his own feet as he reached the door and left with the sound of snickering customers in his ears.

She wants to play hardball, he thought as he walked to his car. I love a good fight. He reversed himself and strode determinedly to the offices of the Holder Advertising Agency.

“Mrs. Holder,” he said when he was finally admitted to her office, “I want to plan an advertising strategy for my new restaurant that will wipe the Dot Diner off the face of the map.”

“How are you today, Mrs. Borders?” Mack McGee asked as he welcomed the elderly lady to his study.

“Mercy,” she laughed. “Please call me Leora. I can't get used to the name ‘Borders.’ I was a ‘Nickels’ too long, I guess."

“It was one of the prettiest wedding ceremonies I ever performed,” Mack said as he motioned her to have a seat on the sofa. “I never put much stock in the old saw about matches being made in heaven, but if there ever was one, you and Julius are surely it."

“Oh, my goodness,” she laughed. “Don't call him Julius. He hates that. Just call him Borders."

“How is the Detective getting along now that he is retired?"

“He's a pain in the butt,” she said, but her twinkling eyes belied her words. “Always underfoot. I finally convinced him to take up golf. That gets him out of the house a few hours a week anyway. I'm going to put him to work helping with my research. He needs something to keep him busy."

“I don't want to meddle, Leora, but have you given any thought to you and Borders getting a place of your own?"

“He wants to. He wants us to buy one of those fancy houses at the golf course, and maybe we will one day. However, Randy and Jo don't want us to move and right now I am having too much fun with the twins. Maybe we'll do something after they're potty trained."

“Your son and daughter-in-law went through hell and high water to have those babies. God rewarded them with healthy twins. What are their names again?"

“Leora and James,” the proud grandmother replied. “Jo insisted on naming the girl after me. We call her ‘Lee’ to avoid confusion."

Mack laughed. “I tried to talk Jo and Randy out of getting married. I thought they were rushing things. Boy, was I wrong. They are a wonderful couple, and if ever there was a daughter-in-law who loves her mother-in-law, it's Jo."

Leora's eyes twinkled again. “I wouldn't want it to get around, but the feeling is mutual. You know why she insisted on going to all that trouble and effort to get pregnant don't you?"

“Well, I assume it's because they very much wanted to have a family."

“Nope. Neither of them cared much about having children. Randy still wears a clothespin on his nose when he changes diapers, and Jo was so certain she didn't want children that she had a tubal ligation done. They went to all the trouble of in-vitro fertilization because Jo found out how much I wanted grandchildren. I tell you, preacher, if Randy had his pick of every woman ever born, he could not have chosen a better wife than Jo."

Leora slipped a pack of cigarettes out of her purse and then hastily replaced it.

“You may smoke if you wish,” Mack said as he looked around for something that would suffice as an ashtray.

“Thanks, but I'm trying to quit. I have to sneak a smoke once in a while. Randy won't allow smoking around the twins. Let's get on with it, Mack. Did you find those records?"

“Sure did,” Mack said as he got out of his overstuffed chair and headed towards his desk. “I surely do appreciate your willingness to tackle the project of writing a book on the history of the church. If we can get it published by next November it will be the perfect topping to the church's centennial celebration."

“I already have the hardest part done. I figure there must have been many uphill battles to win for the church to have endured for one hundred years. I'm going to call the book,
Upstream: The History of Dot Baptist Church
."

“Sounds great.” Mack lifted a large box from the floor to the top of his desk. “These are the minutes of the church, going back to the beginning. I glanced through them. Until recent years, they are all handwritten. Some of the handwriting is absolutely beautiful and some is barely legible. The ink has begun to fade in many cases, but I think you can still make it out."

Leora picked up the top leather bound volume and thumbed through its pages. “Funny,” she said. “I feel like I am holding a holy book."

“You are,” Mack replied as he placed a second large box on his desk. “These are the replies to our church newsletter request for photographs and memories from church members. Our secretary has marked the back of each document with the name of the contributor. We want to be sure we get these back to their rightful owners. She is also going through the names of former church members. Where we have a current address we are sending out letters asking for any information they may have."

Leora shook her head. “Looks like I have my work cut out for me. Mack, you don't know where we can find a strong young man to carry these boxes to my car, do you?"

He grinned as he picked up one of the boxes. “It's going to cost you,” he said. “I want to write either an introduction or an epilogue."

“Good idea,” she smiled as she held open the study door for him.

“What kind of name is Creasy Green?” Eddie Crow asked as he sat down beside the realtor's desk.

Creasy laughed and his whole obese body shook like a department store Santa Claus. “It's a moniker I picked up in grade school and it stuck."

“I don't understand."

“Creasy greens are something like turnip greens, only they grow wild."

“Do people eat them?"

“Old-timers used to. I guess some people still do."

“What do they taste like?"

“I can't describe it. My mama used to think them a delicacy, but they make me throw up,” he laughed.

“Do they grow around here?"

“I suppose they do. Why? You want to try it?"

“I'm a cook. I'll be working at the new restaurant Mr. Bennett is building when it opens. I thought if these creasy greens taste good, we might put them on the menu as a specialty."

“I don't think you'd make a living off of creasy greens,” Creasy Green joked with his belly shaking like a small explosion had gone off in his stomach. “What may I do for you, Mr. Crow? I doubt that you came here to talk about creasy greens."

“Like I said, I will be the cook at the new restaurant. My, uh, wife will be working in the motel. We need a furnished apartment to rent. I understand there are some units here in the Dollar Building."

“Damn nice ones too,” Green said as he pushed back in his desk chair. “Carl Elliott did a hell of a job remodeling the old hotel building for Tim Dollar. State of the art clinic on the first floor, a shopping mall and offices like this one on the second, and apartments on the third and fourth floors."

“What's on the top two floors?"

“Nothing yet. Tim's waiting to see how best to use them. I wish he'd go ahead and turn them into apartments, but he doesn't pay much attention to my advice."

“Who is Carl Elliott?"

“He's Tim's contractor. He has an office just down the hall."

“Is he related to Bobby Elliott?"

“Brother. You know Bobby?"

“Not really. I've just heard the name. I understand he is Sandra Dollar's bodyguard."

Green's belly rolled again. “That's a good one, but you may not be far off. Bobby is the Dollar's caretaker and close friend. I believe the Dollars think almost as much of Bobby as they do of their own son."

“How about the apartment, Mr. Green?"

Green's chair snapped to an upright position as he leaned his weight forward. “Ain't got a furnished apartment available right now. I'll put you on the list if you like."

“How about an unfurnished apartment. Maybe I can borrow enough money from Mr. Bennett to buy a bed and a chair or two."

“Nope. That's why I wish Tim would go ahead and convert the top two floors to apartments."

“Don't you have anything available?"

Green again leaned back in the chair, catching himself just in time to keep his weight from toppling the chair over backwards. He put his hands behind his head and looked at Eddie. “There's a little house behind the school on Schoolhouse Road. A lady who used to be a teacher owned it. She died before I moved to Dot, but they say she was a sweet old lady and at the same time a strong disciplinarian. The house has been unoccupied for three years so it will need a lot of cleaning up, but as far as I know, it's in good shape. The old lady didn't have any living relatives, so she left it to the Mecklenburg County School System. They don't know what to do with it. Eventually they'll probably put it up for sale, but just two years ago they remodeled the old schoolhouse and started using it again. I reckon they think that if Dot continues to grow, they may need the property for additional buildings."

“Is it furnished?"

Green nodded. “It still has the old lady's things in it—clothes and all. I think somebody from the school system looked over the contents and took anything of value. They just left the rest. You'll have to throw out anything you can't use."

“I'll take it."

“Don't you want to see it first?"

“You have anything else to offer me?"

“Nope."

“Then I have no choice."

“Guess I ought to tell you. Some folks say the place is haunted."

Eddie noticed that Creasy Green was no longer laughing. He signed a rental agreement and wrote a check for the deposit and first month's rent. He returned to his truck and smiled when the motor roared without the irritating knock. He drove up the Old Charlotte Road, turned left at the traffic light onto Highway 13 and left again onto Schoolhouse Road.

The little frame house was right where Creasy Green said, directly behind the school. As he drove up the gravel driveway, he looked with disgust at the briars, saplings and dead weeds that covered the front yard. Looks like a snake den, he thought, or a haven for rats.

He walked up the steps and glanced briefly at the old-fashioned front porch before inserting into the rusty lock the key Green gave him. The tumbler slipped effortlessly and Eddie entered his new home. He flipped the light switch, but nothing happened. Need to get the juice turned on, he added to his mental checklist.

“Hey, Ghost,” he shouted. “My name is Eddie Crow. I live here now. You mess with me and I'll burn your damn house down.” Eddie grinned and thought, That ought to take care of her.

He looked at the living room and moved to the bedroom. Place is filthy, he mused, and musty. Greta will work her fat ass off getting this place cleaned up, he thought. I think I'll make her work in the nude. That ought to spice things up a little.

He checked out the surprisingly large bathroom and headed for the kitchen. On the way, he opened the door to the second bedroom and wrinkled his nose against an offensive aroma that attacked his nostrils. He quickly shut the door. Must be a dead rat or something, he reasoned.