Unlike every other house on West Goepp, which had been decorated with at least a plastic candy cane or two since Halloween, mine was devoid of any Christmas decorations. This was the first year that I was so not on the ball and my bare door was fast becoming a neighborhood scandal.
Jane and I lived in one half of a brick-and-aluminum-sided double with green Astroturf on the porch and, in the summer, a red geranium. The other half was tidily occupied by the Hamels, who, following the unwritten Lehigh ordinance mandating Christmas decorations on October 31, had strung icicles from the porch overhang and colored lights on the bushes out front months ago. Mrs. Hamel felt so bad for me that she had tacked a cardboard snowman on my mailbox.
Mama was devastated that I wasn’t keeping up with the neighbors. In her mind, not having Christmas decorations was bad for Jane, bad for the neighborhood, bad for America and, most of all, bad for her campaign to turn Lehigh into the heretofore unknown Discount Christmas City.
Which might explain why, on returning from Phil Shatsky’s, I found my mother industriously sawing at the ropes affixing the Christmas tree to the top of my Camaro.
“It’s about time. How long were you gonna wait to get a tree? December twenty-fourth?”
I’ll be married by then,
I thought sadly. “What are you doing here?”
“You’re going out tonight to that fund-raiser. Can’t leave Jane alone.”
This was true. Ever since “the incident,” Jane hated being alone. After years of learning to cook herself dinner while I went to community college at night or stayed late at the House of Beauty earning extra tips or, more recently, covered meetings for the
News-Times,
she could not bear one minute by herself once the sun set. And, these days, it set pretty early.
“Hey, everyone. I jerry-rigged us a tree stand!” Genevieve appeared on my porch holding, ominously, a hubcap with the center cut out. It looked like it belonged to the Salabskys’ Ford Windstar, which it probably did. “Jeezum. That’s a sorry-looking specimen of an evergreen if I ever did see.”
“Help me, will you, Genny?” Mama dragged the tree off my car.
I caught one end, feeling guilty that a little old lady—okay, she wasn’t that old and not that little and, now that I thought of it, not much of a lady—was hauling my Christmas tree.
Genevieve heaved it onto her shoulder with ease. “Dangy, that’s dry. This thing’s going to catch fire faster than a lit match in a fart.”
Who needed Shakespeare when there was such sweet prose from Genevieve’s lips?
“Say, Genevieve,” I said as we carried the tree up the steps, “what exactly did you do to Flossie Foreman?”
“Took her out, like you said.”
“I was thinking maybe taking her out to a nice restaurant, to the movies. You know, some ice cream. I wasn’t talking about taking out her kneecaps.”
Genevieve let the tree down in my living room with a grunt. “Taking out is taking out. She should be glad I quit at one. I was itching to pop off the right but your mother wouldn’t let me.”
I winced. I would have to send Flossie a huuuuge bouquet in the morning.
“Mom? Is that you?”
Jane appeared on the stairs. She looked the same: grungy low-riding jeans, royal blue hair, a supertight Green Day T-shirt and studs all around. But she was clinging to the doorjamb and staring at us with almost palpable anxiety.
“Buffy the fun slayer,” Genevieve grumbled.
My loopy daughter skipped down the stairs clutching the cell phone Dan had purchased for her. She never went anywhere without that stupid cell phone—in case the phenomenal Jason should call.
“Finally. A Christmas tree. I wondered if you were ever going to get around to buying one.”
I gave her a dirty look.
“Are we going to decorate it?”
“Soon, hon,” Mama said. “First, there’s chicken you made today. And it’s already six o’clock. Late.”
Disappointed, Jane turned her attention to today’s latest delivery of wedding gifts.
“You’ve got to open them, Mom. It’s not polite to let them sit there. People will be expecting thank-you notes.”
Mama was plunking on the table a lemon-roasted chicken with rosemary, a bowl of canned green beans and a tub of mashed potatoes. Genevieve lined a plastic basket with waxed paper and tossed in slices of Wonderbread. It was nutrition galore at the Yablonsky household.
“Maybe tomorrow I’ll open the gifts. I have to go on assignment tonight.”
“Again? You just can’t wait to leave me, can you? Guess I’m not worth being around.”
In the old days, I would have laughed off that kind of snotty teenage line. Not now. Thanks to Dr. Caswell’s report, I was supersensitive to any allegations of maternal inadequacy. Jane’s quip opened up a nice, fresh wound.
Ignore her,
Genevieve mouthed.
“I can’t wait until you and Dad get married. Then maybe you’ll be at home more and I can have a real family for once instead of a television, Grandma and . . .
that
.” She cocked her head at Genevieve, who, having distributed the Wonderbread, was spying out the window with her military-issue infrared binoculars, looking for Commies or whatever it was that got her so excited.
“Gotcha,” I said.
“Dinner’s ready!” Mama barked.
“Where are you going?” Jane asked as I headed toward the stairs.
“I have to get dressed for this fund-raiser I’m covering.” It was hard to get out the words. My mouth had gone dry, realizing that Stiletto probably had some plan to get us alone so we could be together with no one else for the last time ever.
“You seem stressed,” Jane said, pulling out her chair at the table. “Everything go all right at work today?”
“Um, okay.”
“Nothing exciting happen?”
I was forbidden by Dr. Caswell from mentioning anything disturbing that might cause Jane to suffer a flashback. So even though there were a couple dozen housewives outside waiting to comfort a man whose wife had dropped dead right before my eyes, murdered by hair extensions, even though I’d been shot at by the violent wing of the anti-Christmas lobby, all I could say was “Not really, sweetie. Everything is hunky-dory.”
“Good.” Jane joined Mama and Genevieve, who were already engaged in passing, buttering, cutting and scooping.
There was a knock at the door. I stopped with one foot on the bottom step. Immediately, a shadow fell across Jane’s face. “Should I get it?” she asked.
“No, Jane.” I reached the door first. “It’s okay. I’ll get it.”
Jane ran from the table and pushed me aside. “No, Mom. Let me. It’s part of my therapy, learning not to be afraid to open my own front door. That’s what Dr. Caswell wants me to do. Besides, you’re here and Grandma and Genevieve and there’s a peephole. Perfectly safe.”
She pressed her eye against the peephole and sighed with relief. “Oh. I’m such an idiot. It’s nothing.”
“Who is it?”
She unlocked the door. “Nobody. Just Santa Claus.”
Chapter Nine
“N
OOO!” I threw my body against the door and flipped the latch.
Jane stepped back. “What’s wrong? It’s only some guy dressed as Santa Claus. Probably from the Salvation Army.”
“It’s a Santagram.” Mama wiped her lips and pushed back from the table. “Let him in, Bubbles. Don’t be so queer.”
Genevieve waved a slice of Wonder. “My musket’s right there by the door, Sally, if you’re hankering.”
I grabbed the rusted musket, surprised by how heavy it was. I had no idea how to fire this thing or if it was already “tamped and loaded,” whatever that meant.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
My heart was pounding at breakneck speed. What to do? It might be Ern Bender or my stalker in the Mercedes. I simply couldn’t take the risk.
Jane was regarding me quizzically. “Mom? Is something going on that you’re not telling me?”
Knock. Knock.
Dampness spread into my underarms. “Noooo. I’m just being careful, sweetie. That’s how mothers are.”
“Careful about Santa Claus?” Jane scrunched her mouth, as if such a thing weren’t possible. “Maybe I’m not the only one who needs to see Dr. Caswell on Tuesdays and Thursdays, hmm?”
“Miss Yablonsky?” It was a man’s voice. He might have been the stalker, but he was more sober sounding than Ern Bender. “Do you have a minute? It’s me, Phil.”
Phil Shatsky. Debbie’s husband. Whew! Feeling like an idiot, I unlatched the door and let him in.
Phil was, indeed, dressed like Santa Claus and he appeared more frightened than any of us. “You always answer the door with a gun?”
I dropped my gaze to the rusted musket in my hand. “Sorry. Precaution.” Then I pointed to his duds. “You always dress like an elf?”
“I do when there are customers filling my house with tuna noodle casseroles and I need to escape.” He smiled a broad, sad smile.
Okay, so he wasn’t textbook handsome or particularly built. Still, Phil Shatsky had a kind face and a swollen nose, probably from crying.
“I’m sorry about the note,” I said, leading him to the couch. “I should have waited. I mean, this must be so confusing right now.”
“What’s so confusing?” Jane asked. She was standing over us with her arms folded and eyebrows raised.
“Nothing’s confusing, honey,” I said. “This is a personal matter. Maybe you should go to your room.”
“My room! I haven’t been sent to my room since I was nine.”
Mama got the message. “Come on, Jane. Let’s go out for dessert.” She grabbed her coat off the hook by the door. “Your mother has work to do.”
Jane stamped her foot. “No. Something’s going on and no one’s telling me. There are all these women outside and our neighbor shows up in a Santa suit and Mom’s throwing around a musket. What happened?”
“My wife . . .” Phil started, before I could put up a hand to stop him.
“What happened to your wife?” Jane wanted to know.
“Jane!” Mama frowned the frown that still terrorizes me in my nightmares.
Mama’s glower did the trick. It got my pesky daughter to back off, but not willingly. She was suspicious and for good reason. A woman across the street had been murdered, had died in front of her mother. This was not the kind of crisis we were used to in our neighborhood. This was way worse than untrimmed front doors and no Christmas trees.
This was the kind of crisis that even marrying Dan might not be able to set right.
“How can I help?” I asked, after Mama, Jane and Genevieve had hustled out to the Lehigh Diner for their famous peppermint stick ice-cream pie.
Phil took off his Santa cap and fingered the pom-pom between his thick, grease-stained fingers. “Tell me what happened. I want to know everything.”
I couldn’t see how describing Debbie’s death would hurt anyone or hamper an investigation, so I started at the beginning, making sure to play up that Debbie had been singing his praises right until the end.
“Really? She said all that stuff about me?”
“You should have seen her, Phil, how proud she was to have a husband who watched the Lifetime Channel and folded laundry.” I nudged him. “Said you made terrific love afterward, too.”
A big tear rolled down Phil’s flaccid cheek. He brushed it away and sniffed. “My grandmother taught me that real men cry. That’s a lesson that kinda came in handy today.”
“She’s a good woman, your grandma. A good woman.”
“Debbie is”—he paused and closed his eyes—“
was
a lot like my grandma. Too bad they never got to know each other.”
My chest tightened. I would have given him a hug then and there if I wasn’t afraid it would lump me in with the other desperate housewives outside. I could definitely see the attraction to Phil Shatsky. Under different circumstances, I, too, might have been tempted to pour some celery soup over chicken pieces for him.
“Look at it this way, Phil. Maybe they’re getting to know each other right now.” I patted his hand. “Now that your wife and grandma are together in you know where.”
“Boca Raton?”
“Excuse me?”
“That’s where Grandma is. In Boca Raton, Florida. She doesn’t like to fly or drive long distances, so she didn’t make it to our wedding. And Debbie never had a chance to get to Florida, what with all the other traveling she had to do for business.”
Bells went off. A granddaughter-in-law in the travel business who didn’t make time to visit her husband’s elderly grandmother. A woman with enough frequent-flier miles to start her own airline? That wasn’t right.
I added it to my growing list of facts that made Debbie weird, including once being married to a sallow pharmacist who went to jail, harassing by phone a self-absorbed hair stylist with two first names and running an alleged scam she co-opted from her ex-husband.
“You know how we met?” Phil asked, not waiting for my answer. “Debbie had a stopped-up toilet. A toothbrush she’d been using to clean the grout in her bathroom had been in a bucket. She emptied out the bucket into the toilet, the toothbrush got stuck and, the next thing she knew, she was up to her ankles in water.”
Yuck.
“She was so cute. So bubbly and full of life. I never met a woman who could giggle like that.” He smiled to himself. “She was wearing a bikini. Polka dots. Said she always wore a swimsuit when she cleaned the shower.”
Or was trying to seduce the most successful plumber in town.
“What about her former husband?” I prodded.
Phil rested his chin on his hand. “That guy couldn’t find the business end of a wrench. He was useless. Used to fall asleep in front of the TV every night. Guess that’s because he was a drug addict, too. Do you know about that?”
I played innocent. “I heard he went to jail for drugs. Don’t know what exactly.”
“You name it, he did it. Had the whole pharmacy to himself, like an alcoholic owning a bar. Valium. Per-coset. I don’t know what else. Debbie never put him down, though. She always referred to him in the best light, of course.”