The Battered Body (5 page)

Lucy laughed. “Enough to make me wanna run out to the street and see what the convicts are tossing from that bus!”

The white bus in question was crammed with jail inmates. The group of men, who wore orange jumpsuits and red Santa hats, waved and blew kisses to the crowd as they threw penguin finger puppets from the windows and into the hands of eager children.

“You’re probably responsible for several of those incarcerations,” James cautioned Lucy. “They might throw something at you besides a penguin.”

“They got
themselves
into those jumpsuits,” Lucy retorted firmly. “And only those who committed minor offenses get to ride in the parade bus. All the same, I think I’ll wait for the firemen. They’re a lot better looking than those jailbirds, and I hear they’ve made frosted gingerbread cookies shaped like dalmatians. One of those would go nicely with my hot buttered rum.” She grabbed Lindy’s hand. “Come on, Gillian. Let’s go ogle some of the men in yellow.”

The three women joined the crowd in order to whistle and coo at the burly, handsome men poised on top of their newly washed fire truck. On the roof were two wooden cutouts. One was of Santa. His rear end was on fire and his mouth formed a pink
o
of surprise and dismay. Standing alongside Santa’s burning bum was Rudolph the Reindeer, who held a bright red fire extinguisher between his two front hooves but seemed unable to use the device. The Quincy’s Gap Volunteer Fire & Rescue had used the same cutouts for years, yet they never failed to make the children laugh.

In addition to Santa and Rudolph, the fire truck was decorated with blinking chili pepper lights and was towing a small trailer bearing a burning Christmas tree and a pile of smoking presents. A lone fireman sat on the edge of the trailer and held up a sign reading
Don’t Forget to Unplug Your Tree!

The fire truck was followed by the county’s only street cleaner. It moved at a snail’s pace while the driver tossed out small bags of coal (which were really black gumdrops) and cheerfully admonished the throng to clean up after themselves. “I’m goin’ on vacation!” He yelled over the roar of his machine. “And I don’t wanna be cleanin’ up after y’all at five in the mornin’!” He punctuated his message by stepping on the street cleaner’s accelerator, creating a puff of foul-smelling black smoke.

The children were delighted. They begged for a repeat performance while simultaneously stuffing their mouths with black gumdrops. When the voter registration vehicle came along, sending out voter application registrations in the form of paper airplanes, the children stuck out their black tongues until the woman in the passenger seat, who appeared harried by the entire experience, frantically flung out a large portion of her supply of candy canes in lieu of voting paraphernalia.

“Too much candy will rot your teeth!” she shouted as she hurled candy canes at a row of preteens.

“They’re too young to vote anyhow!” Bennett shouted in the children’s defense.

After three glasses of hot buttered rum, James found himself laughing at everything the cavalcade had to offer. He even managed to choke down one of the three cookies left on Gillian’s platter—a feat so impressive that Bennett offered to eat the remaining two. He had just swallowed the second when the snow began to fall. What began as a few flakes blown lazily around the porch by the wind quickly morphed into a genuine snowfall. Within minutes, the flakes seemed to grow smaller and multiply in a steady march toward the ground.

“Oh!” Lindy clapped her mittened hands. “It’s beautiful!”

Everyone agreed. The first snow of the season, illuminated by the twinkling colored lights entwined around Gillian’s railings, seemed magical. For the spectators gathered on the sidewalk, however, the precipitation became unpleasant in a hurry. The wind whipped cold snowflakes against their cheeks and noses, making them red and chapped. Moist bits of snow sneaked under scarves and wriggled down the front of jackets and planted wet kisses on exposed wrists.

“Good thing we’ve almost reached the finale,” Gillian said as she pointed at the crowd. “I believe those children by my front gate are turning blue.”

“Nah,” Bennett argued. “They’ve just got cotton candy all over their faces.”

“I feel sorry for their parents. How are they ever going to get those kids to sleep? They’re totally hopped up on sugar,” Lindy remarked with ill-disguised glee.

“Speaking of sweet,” Lucy gestured across the street, where a minivan had come to a stop in a parking spot reserved for event volunteers. “Isn’t that Milla?”

Beneath the sheen of a streetlamp, it was easy to recognize the lavender hue of Milla’s van as well as her vanity plate, which read
LV2COOK
. James groaned. “Oh no. She’s brought her sister, the harpy, with her. Brace yourselves, my friends. This woman is as fork-tongued as a serpent.”

“Oh come on.” Lindy swatted James with the end of her crimson scarf. “How can anyone related to Milla be mean? You must be exaggerating.”

“Trust me. Paulette Martine is Queen of the Shrews,” James answered nervously as Milla, Paulette, and Willow crossed the street and headed toward Gillian’s house.

Lucy, who had been watching the newcomers’ arrival with interest, gripped James by the hand when he mentioned Paulette’s name. “You didn’t tell us Milla’s sister was the Diva of Dough! Oh, James! Do you think she’ll be baking cakes while she’s here? I watch her TV show all the time. Man, oh man …” She paused to lick her lips. “You know frosted cakes are my big weakness, and this woman makes them like nobody’s business. How lucky for you that she’s related to your daddy’s future wife!”

“Yes, I’m feeling
really
lucky about having her join the family,” James mumbled caustically as Milla stepped onto the porch.

“Hello, my dears!” she shouted merrily, but James sensed that her smile was partially forced. “I’m so sorry to barge in on your fun like this. Normally, I’d be all snuggled in my nightgown with my darling Sir Charles the Corgi at my feet and a Nora Roberts novel in my hand, but my sister was just dying to witness our little event, so here we are. Did we miss the whole thing?” she asked anxiously.

“It’s just about done,” Lindy answered regretfully. “That’s the Department of Finance limo,” she explained to Paulette and Willow, who had yet to speak. “They toss chocolate coins to the kids along with little slips of paper telling them that it’s never to early to open a bank account.”

“How quaint,” Paulette responded flatly, and then pursed her lips. “And this ‘assemblage’ is what passes for entertainment around here? You voluntarily stand out in the frigid cold while vehicles decorated with as much
kitsch
as can be found in your ‘dollar’ stores pass by distributing stale, tasteless confections.”

Bennett leaned over to Lucy and whispered, “Does she talk like that on her show? All highfalutin and frostier than a snowman?”

Lucy nodded, surprisingly unruffled by Paulette’s criticism of their holiday event. “The Christmas Cavalcade is pretty creative,” she explained to their guest and gestured at the street. “Here comes the Sanitation Department. They’re one of the crowd pleasers because they throw out these little rubber frogs called
Mistle Toads
. They’re stuffed with gooey chocolate and when you squeeze their bellies, it oozes out of a tiny hole in their mouths. No one knows how the garbage men manage to get the chocolate inside the frogs.”

“How fascinatingly repulsive,” Paulette replied with a frown. “All I really wanted was a cup of hot tea with my sister, but the establishment masquerading as my hotel is only stocked with Lipton. No Ashby, no Mariage Frères, no Tazo—not even a packet of humble Twinings. There’s simply nothing suitable for me to drink in that hovel and I didn’t even
ask
for coffee.” Paulette indicated Willow with a nod of her chin. “And my assistant was incapable of procuring us a suitable rental car for this evening so that she could track down some essentials, so Milla agreed to pick us up in her uniquely colored van and take us to the home of someone who purportedly had good taste in tea.” She scanned her audience. “Is it possible that one of you has a sophisticated palate?”

Gillian perked up immediately. “That must certainly be me! I have an entire
spectrum
of organic herbal teas. Would you care to come inside and peruse my pantry?”

Paulette nodded. “You can stay out here, Willow. Perhaps one of the rubber frogs from the garbage truck will turn into your prince if you kiss it with enough desperation. Come along, Milla. No sense you catching a cold with your ‘big day’ coming up.”

As soon as the Diva of Dough, followed by a subdued Milla, entered Gillian’s house, Willow breathed a sigh of relief. James quickly introduced her to his friends and then offered her the last of the hot buttered rum. “I think you may need this more than anyone here.”

“Thanks.” Willow accepted the tumbler. “I used to carry a flask of vodka with me everywhere. Paulette likes freshly squeezed orange juice in the morning before her five or six daily lattes from Starbucks, so I’d just make myself an OJ and add a little splash of survival vodka. It got me through ’til lunchtime, anyway.”

“I’d need more than a flask if I were workin’ with that she-devil.” Bennett pulled on his mustache.

“Well, I don’t even have
that
now.” Willow looked at the floor, shamefaced. “Paulette smelled the vodka on my breath one day and that was that. I guess it was good because only alcoholics drink at work like I was doing. So now I smoke instead.” She dug a pack of cigarettes out of her coat pocket and grinned abashedly. “I’ll just go out to the street for a minute.” She eyed Gillian’s front door nervously. “If
she
comes out, just tell her I went to catch one of those frogs. She’d love to think I was obeying her orders to the letter.”

The four friends watched the young woman scuttle down to the sidewalk, where she bent her head down and cupped her cigarette with her left hand, clearly determined to get it lit despite the swirling wind and snow.

“Poor thing,” Lindy said, and then she clucked her tongue. “No one should be treated like that.”

“I told you what Paulette was like.” James lowered his voice. “And I tried to talk to her about being nice because this was her sister’s community and people are kind to strangers in these parts, but I guess she’s not called a diva for nothing.”

“Well, the
Diva’s
going to miss the finale.” Lucy looked pleased by the idea. “Here comes Santa!”

An old yellow school bus corroded by rust lumbered down the street. The spectators in front of Gillian’s house gave their heartiest cheers and the children began to shriek at the top of their vocal ranges as they hopped up and down in excitement. The bus, which was driven by a very authentic-looking Santa Claus in denim overalls and a red flannel shirt, was occupied by the mayor and her staff. Each adult wore a green elf hat, pointy ears, and a red clown nose. The elves hung out the open bus windows, jingling hand bells and smiling widely in order to display their fake “redneck” teeth, which protruded from their mouths in crooked rows of brown and yellow.

Just below the line of windows, the bus had been spray-painted with the words
Hillbilly School Bus
. A chicken coop had been erected on the roof and several agitated chickens, ducks, and white geese strutted about on a pile of straw. A shotgun rack had been built behind Santa’s back and he waved at the crowd with a hand brandishing an empty whiskey bottle. Plush raccoons, squirrels, and rabbits hung from hooks inside the open passenger door while the mayor’s four basset hounds occupied the rear bucket seat. Every inch of the bus’s exterior was covered in a mismatched hodgepodge of Christmas lights.

Santa and the elves sang “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth,” paying no mind to pitch, tempo, or any other musical element that might produce a harmonious sound. In fact, each time the group hit a high note, the mayor’s dogs began to howl, which the bystanders found incredibly funny.

“What’s the big prize this year?” Lindy asked.

James laughed as the elves began to shower the crowd with red, green, and silver Hershey’s kisses.

“The kid’s prize is a new mountain bike, complete with helmet and knee pads,” Lucy answered. “And boy, would I love to win the adult prize. It’s a thousand-dollar Christmas shopping spree. Vendors from all over the county donated gift certificates good in their stores for the next two weeks only. How much fun would it be to spend all that much money at once?” She rubbed her hands together excitedly.

“But you’re a county employee, just like the rest of us.” Bennett gave Lucy a perplexed look. “We’re excluded from winning the shoppin’ spree, so why get all worked up?”

“A girl can dream, can’t she?” Lucy demanded crossly. “Anyway, if Gillian gets out to the street in time, she might catch the Hershey’s Kiss with the winning message on its tag.” She glanced through Gillian’s living room window. “How long can it take to make a pot of tea anyway?”

“That crazy redhead’s probably whispering some Buddhist chant as the water boils,” Bennett said with a snort.

The hillbilly bus slugged past Gillian’s house. Its exhaust issued a series of loud reports that caused the youngest children to scream in mock fear and the mayor’s bloodhounds to increase their frenzied keening. Amid the raucousness, Willow made her way back onto the porch. Her pale face was illuminated by Gillian’s lights and her white-blonde hair was nearly obscured by snow. She seemed immune to the cold, and James thought that she looked quite pretty with her cheeks tinged pink by the chilly air.