Genevieve gladly took Sandy’s flea-ridden Santa outfit outside, doused it with gasoline, dumped it in an old oil bin that had been rolling around the back of her Rambler and set it on fire in the garden. Aside from killing husbands and firing off rounds, Genevieve is never more content than when she’s given an opportunity to burn trash.
Meanwhile, Mama, Jane and I pulled down all the shades while Sandy steamed up my bathroom, scrubbing off the dirt and garbage she’d picked up from sleeping on the couches in the Trailway’s bus station.
An hour later, donned in my white terry cloth robe, having been sated with pot roast, warmed noodles, peas and a leftover cinnamon-walnut apple crisp with raisins and vanilla ice cream, she sat on the corner of my couch cupping a mug of decaf coffee and confessed her sins between yawns.
“It started a few years ago, when Martin and I decided to have a baby. He was all gung-ho and I, you know, wasn’t.”
I’d always suspected this, but hadn’t said as much. It was the neat freak in her. Anyone who had a nervous breakdown over the unavoidable dust bunny wasn’t ready to procreate.
“Women are miserable when they’re pregnant, and unhappy when they’re not,” Mama said from the sewing machine, where she was adding the final trim on a shepherd’s outfit for her senior citizen Christmas pageant Friday.
“I thought you wanted to get pregnant,” Jane said. She was supposed to be studying calculus, but I noticed she kept putting down her pencil and listening. I considered this another sign of recovery, the fact that she was back to hanging out with us and being part of the family, so I didn’t nudge her to get back to work. Jason had called twice and she’d made a lame excuse each time to call him back.
“Don’t get me wrong. I’m dying to be a mother now.” Sandy’s eyes welled up. “And I’d probably be one, too, if I hadn’t put it off so long.”
I handed her a tissue and she blew her nose loudly. “You’re not that old, Sandy. You’ll get pregnant. Look at Mama. She was something like fifty when she had me.”
Mama tossed a pin cushion at my head.
Sandy wiped her eyes. “No, I won’t become pregnant because Martin will never sleep with me again.”
Mama leaned over and slapped her hands over Jane’s ears. Jane batted her off.
“Yes, he will. He’ll understand,” I said.
“But I took birth control pills secretly for years. For
years
, Bubbles.”
“So what? It’s your body, isn’t it? If you weren’t ready to have children, that was that. Okay, so maybe you should have discussed it with him first, but for some reason you didn’t. Martin will deal.”
“I sprinkled arsenic in my second husband’s morning coffee for three years and he never blamed me,” Genevieve said.
Mama finished off a hem. “He didn’t have a chance since it killed him.”
“I was trying to build up his immunity for when the commies came and poisoned us all, thank you very much.” Genevieve huffed and went back to sticking price tags on the commemorative snow globes featuring miniature senior citizens dressed as Mary and Joseph.
“What I don’t get,” Jane said, “is why you had to run away. Why do the police even care that you took birth control pills? It’s not like it’s any of their business.”
Sandy and I regarded each other. Well, this was the moment of truth, wasn’t it? Did Debbie know that Sandy had been taking birth control pills? Had she threatened to blackmail Sandy by threatening to tell Martin?
“Actually, Jane, it is the police’s business.” Sandy put down her coffee and sighed. “Someone had called in a tip to the police—likely the same SOB who tipped them off that Debbie had been poisoned—and told them that I had murdered Debbie because she’d threatened to tell my husband that I was taking birth control.”
“Murdered over birth control pills?” Jane tossed her pencil into the air. “That is so bogus.”
I held my breath, dying to know what Sandy thought of
that
.
Unfortunately, the phone rang, right when we were getting to the good part.
“I’ll get it,” Jane announced, hopping up from the kitchen table. “Probably Jason again. Oh, I have really got to break up with him. He is such a pest.”
I crossed my fingers.
“I didn’t kill her,” Sandy whispered to me, when Jane got on the phone. “I would never have killed Debbie, even if she had been blackmailing me, which she hadn’t been.”
“I know
that,
” I whispered back. “The question is, who did? And who is calling in these bogus tips?”
“Mom, it’s for you.” Jane covered the receiver and mouthed,
It’s the cops!
Sandy went rigid. “Don’t tell them I’m here. Please. I want to go to your bachelorette party tomorrow. I don’t want to spend the night in jail.”
Bachelorette party. The farthest thing from my mind. I took a minute to compose myself and then got on. “Hello?”
“Seems like you’re having quite a shindig over there.” It was Mickey Sinkler, a poor excuse for a cop if there ever was one.
“What makes you say that?”
“Lots of commotion in the background.”
I motioned for Mama to step on the pedal of her sewing machine. “Getting ready for the big senior citizen Christmas pageant.”
“Right. I forgot about that.”
Excellent defense,
I thought.
Man, you’re good, Bubbles.
“You calling for a particular reason?”
“Yeah. Wanted to know if you’d had a surprise visit lately from anyone we know?”
I glanced over at Sandy, who was scraping the last bit of ice cream off her plate. “If you’re talking about that one-hundred-dollar Waterford goblet on my wedding registry you’re supposed to be sending me, no. It hasn’t arrived.”
“That’s because my money’s on you bailing out of your upcoming nuptials. There’s a pool going on down at the station. The odds happen to be in my favor.”
“I’ll tell Dan.” I paused. “Anything else?”
“You remember that license plate you wanted me to trace on the Lincoln, the one belonging to an alleged Marguerite who allegedly was after Debbie Shatsky’s husband?”
Finally, I get a break
.
“And?”
“Nothing. The license is held by a Mark Knoffler. And because I am a detective with a well-honed budinsky streak in me, I checked him out thoroughly. He’s unmarried, and as far as I can tell, there is no Marguerite at that address. He’s thirty-two and an architect, which might explain why his license plate spells out brick house.”
I weighed my options. “I’ll be needing the address anyway.”
“What for?”
“Let’s pretend there was a for-sale sign on his car. Let’s pretend I’m interested.”
Mickey grumbled. “Goddamn it, Bubbles. You are such a pain. Okay, I’ll give it to you against my better judgment and only because you’ll spare me no relief if I don’t. Though I’ll tell you this much. You’re wasting your time. Plus, you might piss this guy off.”
“Yeah,” I said, “but it’s a really nice car. And you know me, Mickey. I’m always looking to upgrade.”
Chapter Thirty
I
arrived at Dr. Caswell’s office the next morning tired and slightly put out. Jane and I had had a fight. A huge fight over whether she should keep her standing Thursday-morning appointment. She didn’t want to. I wanted her to. She refused to see it my way. These were the joys of raising a teenager.
“This is not optional,” I told her as she massaged blue gel into her hair. “Dr. Caswell insists that missing even one session could set you back.”
“Dr. Caswell is a moneygrubbing fraud who is stoking my fears instead of encouraging me to find my inner courage.”
“Who told you that?”
“I figured it out for myself.”
“How?”
“Because, despite the low opinion with which you and Dad regard me these days, I do happen to have a brain, you know. A pretty good brain. And when an absolute moron like Dr. Caswell says to me in a baby voice that I should try out for cheerleading because it’s quote unquote wholesome and it will build my confidence, I’m smart enough to know it’s time to blow.”
So that was what had happened. The cheerleading. “Guess tryouts didn’t go so hot, say?”
She slammed the brush down and stared at herself in the mirror. “They sucked. Lissy Clarke and her ilk are nasty, stupid sluts and I can’t believe I let myself humiliate myself in front of them. Cheerleading is pure bullshit.”
“I’m sorry.” I tried to be sincere, but it was hard subduing my absolute delight.
“And that athletic argument is a crock, too. You’re in a short skirt. You’re upside down. You do the math. Sure, right, it’s a sport. A sport for pervs who get off seeing teenage girls flash their butts.”
I said nothing. Better to let her rant.
Her cell phone blared “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” Jane snatched it up and read the number. “Ugh, Jason. We are sooo over. I wish he’d stop calling and give me my space!”
Yes, I decided, there would be no need for further sessions with Dr. Caswell.
As for being tired, that was purely Sandy’s fault. You really don’t know someone, even a best friend, until you lie awake at night listening to them grind their teeth, snore, flail as if they’re on fire and moan about inventory.
“More blue rinse. More bleach. Is the shampoo low?”
The words replayed in my brain like a bad Billy Joel song.
Of course, it didn’t help that I had my own love inventory—or lack thereof—to toss and turn over. Whenever I closed my eyes, I saw Sabina tiptoeing behind Stiletto and him spinning her around and kissing her. I saw them together in his bed, warm and breathless from passionate lovemaking. I saw Stiletto presenting her with the sapphire ring on a brilliant white Grecian beach.
My life. I really needed to take out a low-interest loan and buy a new one.
To top it off, there was my bachelorette party tonight. As Sandy rightly observed, Lorena had gone to a lot of trouble making the arrangements, and backing out now would have been just plain rude.
This might explain why I’d chosen to wear all black today: a black wool dress with a gold belt. Black knee-high leather boots and onyxish earrings. I was in a funereal mood.
Dr. Caswell’s door was open when I arrived. There was no sign of Dan in the waiting room, and for a minute there, I was hopeful his bad back had kept him in bed.
But I was wrong. As is my fate, I am wrong about a lot.
They were waiting for me, Dr. Caswell and Dan. Caswell looked exceptionally prudish, even for her, in a high-necked military green sweater and similarly colored corduroy slacks. She had on her dark, mean glasses and her hair was in a sloppy bun.
Dan was in his standard business suit. He was holding a set of white papers. Unfortunately, it appeared that the Tylenol with codeine had worn off. He was slightly bent and scowling. Man, I missed that Tylenol with codeine.
“Where’s Jane?” he asked.
“And good morning to you, too,” I said. “Hello, Dr. Caswell.”
Dr. Caswell didn’t say hello.
Okay, there were plenty of reasons for Dan to be upset with me. But what had I done to Dr. Caswell, aside from acquiesce to her every admonition and agree with her every instruction?
I told them that Jane could not make it and that, for the record, she wouldn’t be attending any further sessions.
Dan flashed Dr. Caswell an unveiled I-told-you-so look.
“Jane can’t be done with me,” Caswell said sharply. “I’m not through with her.”
I shrugged. “Too bad. She’s through with you.”
Dan launched the accusations. “How long did it take you and your whacky mother to work on her? What did you threaten her with? No food? No TV? No phone?”
I pressed my lips together. Clearly, I’d walked into some sort of trap. “I don’t have to put up with this. Jane is doing just fine. So you know what? I guess I’m done with Dr. Caswell, too.”
“Show her,” Dr. Caswell hissed.
Dan thrust out the papers he’d been clutching in his fat, sweaty hands. “You’re not done. This is only the beginning. Consider yourself served.”
The papers had been typed and prepared impeccably by Dan’s secretary, the bimbo he was sleeping with. It made me curious. I wondered if she’d bothered to ask herself why she was sleeping with a man who was demanding TEMPORARY AND EMERGENCY CUSTODY OF A MINOR CHILD from his ex-wife, the same woman he was supposed to remarry in two days.
“Give it up, Dan,” I said, handing the papers back to him.
He backed away. “Those aren’t mine. Those are yours. And there’s another set I’m filing when the court opens in an hour.”
“You’re not serious.”
“The hell I’m not. You have proven repeatedly to be a neglectful mother, Bubbles, and this latest development of Jane dropping out of counseling is just further evidence.”
“You didn’t even bother to read my affidavit,” Dr. Caswell said, “did you?” She snorted in disgust.
Okay, maybe
that
was a rhetorical question. Still working on that.
“When the judge reads Lori’s affidavit and your track record, let me assure you, my dear ex-wife, that Jane will not be spending Christmas in the Yablonsky household. By the way, the only judge on the bench in family court this week is Judge Roy Hopkinton. Everyone else is already on Christmas vacation.”
Hopkinton. No way! Hopkinton was as corrupt as they came. Plus, he was Dan’s best friend, a regular golf partner and investor in some shady real-estate dealings.
“Don’t forget,” Dan added, “that Roy is a silent partner in that Pocono resort I bought last year. The last thing he wants is a coinvestor who’s so distraught over his daughter’s mental health that he pulls out all his equity. Especially a coinvestor who contributed thousands of dollars under the table to his reelection campaign.”
I gave the papers another look. I was screwed and my fresh understanding of this was clear to Dan. I could sense him gloating, smirking. I wanted to cry, but that would only have added to his pleasure.