“Must be something in the air, ’cause I got one, too.”
He squeezed it through the denim, and his grin grew wider. Then he shook his erect penis at Cliff, who backed away in disgust.
“Fuck you, Merle. Get the hell away from me with that thing.”
“Come on, Cliff! Don’t you want some action?”
“Not from you. You’ve got so many diseases, your dick probably looks like a cheese pizza with everything on it.”
Merle playfully punched Cliff on the shoulder, and Cliff punched him back. The two of them started laughing, their erections forgotten. Dale still looked stunned, but he smiled along. I shook my head, wondering what in the world could have affected all five of us at the same time.
Before I could consider it any further, Tara pulled into the driveway. The guys all turned away from the car, trying to hide what was in their pants, but then the Legerski house caught their attention again.
“Hi, honey,” I hollered.
Big Steve ran around in an excited circle, jumping and panting, happy that his mommy was finally home.
Tara got out of the car, balancing her briefcase, pocketbook, and travel mug, took one look at us, and then followed our gazes to the activity in the Legerskis’ backyard.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
I gave her a kiss on the cheek and took her briefcase from her. “We don’t know. They showed up about five minutes ago.”
Still watching the police, Tara bent down and scratched Big Steve behind the ears.
Big Steve behind the ears.
“Did you miss me, baby boy?” she asked.
He licked her face in response.
“Bet you it’s a domestic dispute,” Merle said. “Either he hit her or she hit him. Something like that. You guys watch and see.”
I shook my head. “No way. Paul would never hit Shannon.” Merle snorted. “How well do you know him?”
“Well, not as well as I know you guys, but well enough. He reads my books. We like a lot of the same music. He’s a nice guy. He wouldn’t do something like that.”
Merle turned his attention back to the police activity. “You might be surprised what happens behind closed doors. You can live with somebody for years, and suddenly, without warning, they’ll fucking turn on you.”
I wondered if Merle was talking about Paul and Shannon or his own ex-wife, Peggy, but I knew better than to ask. Then I realized something else. Without really thinking about it, I’d been holding Tara’s briefcase in front of the bulge in my pants. But now my erection was gone. I cast a sidelong look at Dale and noticed his had vanished too. I was relieved. The last thing I wanted was my wife standing out there while three of our male neighbors were sporting unexpected wood.
Tara looked at me quizzically. “Are you okay, Adam?”
“Yeah. I’m just worried about Paul and Shannon.” She sniffed the air. “What’s burning?”
“Hmmm? What are you talking about? I don’t think it’s a fire.”
“Yeah,” Cliff said. “Ain’t no fire trucks over there, Tara. So far it’s just the cops and that ambulance.”
“Not that the fire trucks would have far to go,” Dale commented, nodding toward the Fire Hall.
“No, I’m not talking about the Legerskis’ house.” Tara pointed toward our grill. “Over there. Something is burning.”
“Shit!” I’d forgotten about the hamburger patties. “That would be our dinner.”
Tara rolled her eyes, and Cliff, Merle, and Dale all chuckled. I ran across the yard with Big Steve in tow and pulled the blackened burgers off the grill. They were charred all the way through.
“Shit.”
Tara hugged me from behind. “Looks like leftover meat loaf again, I guess?”
“I’m sorry, honey.” I tossed the burned hamburgers onto the ground, and Big Steve greedily gulped them down, not minding that they crunched.
Tara stood on her tiptoes and kissed my forehead. “That’s okay. At least you got the lawn mowed today.” I chuckled. “Yeah. And the laundry.”
She looked genuinely pleased. “Good. I was running out of nylons.”
“I started the book this morning, too.”
Her smile grew wider. “Really? Adam, that’s great!”
“Yep. Got about two thousand words written. I could have kept going, but there’s no sense in burning out early. This weekend I want to take a drive out to Gettysburg and do a little research.”
Tara took the empty plate from me, along with her briefcase. “Let’s celebrate. Maybe open a bottle of wine to go with our leftovers?”
I grinned. “Sure. Sounds good to me. What about dessert?”
She leaned close to me. I could smell her perfume, light after a long day’s work, but still there.
“After dinner,” she whispered in my ear, “we’ll take a bubble bath. You can scrub me and I’ll scrub you. And then we’ll see about dessert.”
I kissed the top of her head, breathing in her shampoo. “Promise?”
She sighed happily. “I promise.”
“It’s a date.” I had another erection, but this time I knew the reason why. Reluctantly I pulled away and turned off the grill.
“Good. I’m going to go get changed, and then I’ll heat up the leftovers.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll be right in.”
After Tara had gone inside, I rejoined the guys in the alley.
“Where’s Merle?” I asked.
Cliff nodded toward the Legerski home. “He went down to talk to the cops—see if he can find out what’s going on.”
“He said he knows one of the township officers,” Dale explained. “They drink at the same bar, apparently.”
We watched and waited. Merle stood off to one side, talking with an officer. Two men dressed in suits and ties, whom I assumed were detectives, were speaking to one of Paul’s neighbors (I didn’t know the old woman’s name). Then the paramedics carried Paul out of the house on a stretcher, flanked by two state policemen. It was hard to tell from our distance, but Paul looked pretty out of it.
Dale shuffled his feet. “Well, that’s not good.”
“No,” I agreed. “It isn’t.”
Cliff lit up another cigarette. “Wish Merle would get his fat ass back here and tell us what’s going on.”
We watched them load Paul into the ambulance. One of the cops got inside the vehicle with him, and then it pulled away. Gravel crunched under the tires. The lights and siren were both silent. After the ambulance had gone, the detectives went back into the house. Merle shook the police officer’s hand and walked down the alley toward us.
“What’s going on?” I asked him.
He panted, out of breath. “Shannon’s gone missing.”
Dale gasped. “What? When did this happen?”
Merle shrugged. “According to my buddy, Paul got home from work last night, and Shannon wasn’t there. No note, no message on the answering machine, nothing like that. He figured that maybe she’d gone to visit her mom, or to the mall or the grocery store, so he went on about his business like normal. Ended up having a few beers and fell asleep in front of the TV. When he woke up this morning she still wasn’t home. Paul got scared then, or says he did. He called the cops, and they told him he had to wait twenty-four hours to file a missing persons claim.”
Cliff grunted. “That’s bullshit. Fucking cops.”
“Well,” Merle continued, “they didn’t sit on their thumbs while the time frame passed. They checked with the Maryland state police to see if her car had been involved in an accident or anything. And they checked with the hospitals on both sides of the border. Nothing. This afternoon enough time had passed that they could treat it as a missing persons case. So they came over here and searched the house and talked with Paul.”
“How could they search the house without a warrant?” Dale asked. “And why?”
Merle shrugged. “Do I look like an attorney to you? Maybe they swore one out before they came over. Or maybe they can legally search as long as Paul invited themin.”
“Probable cause,” Cliff muttered around his cigarette.
“How’s Paul doing?” I asked. “Why are they taking him to the hospital?”
“Panic attack,” Merle said. “He’s a fucking mess. Looks like a zombie.”
“So do they know anything yet?” Dale asked. “Any word on Shannon?”
Merle shook his head. “No, but my buddy told me the detectives suspect Paul may have had something to do with it. I imagine they’ll want to ask him some more questions. And they’re bringing in a forensic team right now to go over the house.”
I was stunned. “What, they think he’s like Scott Peterson or something? That he killed Shannon and threw her body in Lake Codorus?”
“They don’t know what to think at this point,” Merle said. “But yeah, Paul’s a suspect. For now, at least.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I grumbled.
“They called him a suspect?” Dale asked.
Merle paused. “Not exactly. My buddy said he was a person of interest.”
“Sounds like a suspect to me,” Cliff said. “Ain’t that what they call them now?”
“Well,” Dale suggested, “maybe the investigation will turn up something else, instead.”
“Let’s hope so,” I agreed. “Poor Paul.”
Dale nodded. “And poor Shannon.”
We talked it over for a few more minutes, and debated whether or not Paul was capable of killing his wife. Merle and Cliff seemed convinced that he’d done it. Dale and I weren’t so sure. Then Cory and Claudine both got home from work around the same time and joined us in the backyard. Claudine informed us that word of the disappearance had already spread to the library, and that was why she was late. Cory was pissed off that he’d missed all the action, and immediately excited by the police presence in the neighborhood.
A news van from one of the local television stations arrived and parked at the Fire Hall. A reporter and a cameraman piled out and began unloading equipment.
“Shit,” Merle said. “There goes the neighborhood. In another hour they’ll all be camped out here.”
“Like vultures,” Cliff agreed.
“Hey!” Cory grew even more excited. “Maybe we can be on TV. That would rock, dude.”
“Knock yourself out, kiddo,” Merle told him. “I want nothing to do with them.”
Cory reached into his pocket, pulled out his trusty Hacky Sack, and started kicking it around, trying to attract the media’s attention. He missed the ball with about every third kick, and Cliff mentioned that he wouldn’t impress anybody that way.
Dale waved. “See you guys later.”
He and Claudine went inside. Cliff and Merle snickered about his erection and how he’d better put it to use on Claudine while it lasted.
I excused myself and went inside as well. I had no desire to listen to their commentary on Cory’s athletic skills and Dale’s arousal, or stand in the backyard and watch the media circus. Paul’s face would soon end up plastered across every newspaper and television station in the county, possibly in the country, if it was a slow news week and the national media got hold of the story. Pundits would discuss it to death, and by next week Paul’s and Shannon’s names would be on everyone’s lips. No matter what had really happened to Shannon, Paul would be tried and convicted in the court of public opinion before he even got his day in a real court.
There was a surprise waiting for me in the kitchen. Tara had heated up the remaining leftovers and set the table with our best china, silverware, and tablecloth. She’d also lit red candles, and the dining room smelled like rose petal potpourri. The radio played softly, and Whitney Houston promised that she’d always love me. Big Steve crawled under the table and lay down. His nose tested the air; he was hoping for some meat loaf.
I heard Tara bustling around upstairs. While I waited for her to come down I turned on the television. Sure enough, there was a shot of Paul’s house. A reporter was standing in the alley, reporting live on Shannon’s disappearance. Behind him Cliff and Cory mugged for the camera. Cory was flashing gangsta rap signs with his hands, and he looked like a white, idiotic version of Flavor Flav. I couldn’t help but laugh. Then the local reporter told the viewers that Paul was considered a person of interest in his wife’s disappearance.
“And so it begins,” I said.
I turned the television off.
Cloth whispered behind me. I turned around. Tara stood in the doorway looking as beautiful as the day I married her. Fresh from the shower, she’d changed into a long, flowing nightgown, and red lace covered her every curve. Her long, dark hair spilled over her shoulders and breasts. Her feet were adorned with red high heels. “What do you think?”
I opened my mouth to answer her, but nothing came out.
She smiled. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Please do. You look beautiful.”
Tara pulled out my chair and beckoned for me to sit down. Then she opened a bottle of wine and poured each of us a glass. Whitney Houston segued into Luther Van-dross. Still thinking about Paul and Shannon, I halfheartedly smiled at Tara. She smiled back. The candle flames danced in her eyes.
She raised her glass. Her diamond earrings sparkled, reflecting in the wine. “Here’s to you starting your next book.”
“Cheers,” I mumbled, and took a sip. It tasted bitter, more like vinegar than wine.
“You’re quiet,” she observed.
I nodded and poked at the meat loaf with my fork. I didn’t have much of an appetite.
Sighing, Tara sat her wine down and took my hand. “Adam, what’s wrong?”
I filled her in on everything Merle had discovered: Shannon’s disappearance and how the police were already looking at Paul as a prime suspect.
“God, that’s terrible,” she whispered. “I hope Shannon is okay. She’s so nice.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “They both are. I don’t think Paul had anything to do with it. He couldn’t have.”
“I hope you’re right.”
We ate dinner, and I tried to get into a romantic mood and forget about everything else. Tara did the same. We talked about our first date,
Pulp Fiction
and coffee at Denny’s, and of things we’d done since then, like our vacation trip to the Grand Canyon and the first roach-infested apartment we’d shared together, and our wedding day. We avoided mention of the miscarriages and shied away from any events too close in time to those bad memories. Slowly my appetite returned, and the wine kicked in. By the time our plates were clean I felt much better. I was suddenly filled with love for my wife. If you’ve been married for a while, you’ve probably experienced the same thing. There are moments where you feel that same electricity you felt when you first met. It’s an overwhelming emotion, while it lasts.