Murder at the High School Reunion (4 page)

On the third day, I realized that I needed to navigate
the Wii, see what all there was for me to do, then get serious about doing it.
This wasn’t quite as dumb as stepping into that rowboat, but it was in the same
neighborhood. At least I could step off the board anytime I wanted, without
drowning or getting muddy in the process. And I didn’t have to worry about how
I was going to get home. I was already home, and as far as I knew, no one was
peering through my window, laughing at my feeble attempt to improve my stature.

I learned that the Wii Fit Plus had four types of
exercises; yoga, strength, aerobic, and balance. From what I could tell, the
yoga exercises help my flexibility, the strength exercises strengthen my
muscles, the aerobic exercises help me get the fat off, and the balance
exercises help me to improve my balance. Supposedly, all the exercises are
important, but I planned to spend the bulk of my exercise time doing aerobic
exercises, since Doc didn’t tell me that I needed to be more flexible or
balanced, or that I wasn’t strong enough. I’m sure he would have, if he had
some way of measuring those areas, so that he could tell me I wasn’t up to the
department’s standards.

I soon learned that I could kill myself quite easily
attempting some of the yoga exercises, or die much quicker trying some of the
strength exercises or doing aerobics for longer than my body deemed possible at
that moment. Still, I had to push myself. I didn’t want to look out my front window
some day and see Heather driving by with Lou smiling beside her.

+++

Each morning, after I arose and went to the bathroom
to rid myself of every ounce of weight that I could, I trotted to the Wii Fit
board filled with trepidation, afraid that I had lost no weight and that a
picture of Doc would appear, telling me that I was failing to do what he had
mandated. Instead, each morning, shortly after I weighed, Lou called to see
about my progress. I had disciplined myself enough that most mornings I was able
to share some good news with Lou.

+++

Somehow I managed to make it through the first two
weeks. Cooking, and eating what I’d cooked, was hard, but not nearly as hard as
those Wii exercises. Some of them I wouldn’t recommend to anyone over the age
of thirty, particularly those Strength Training exercises. Some of the Yoga
exercises were much tougher than anything I could do. At the end of each
exercise the Wii gave me a point total based on how good of a job I’d done on
that exercise, and most of the time the Wii was tougher than the Ukrainian
judge at the Olympics. I’d yet to score many points on any of them, but at
least I did score some points on most of them. I was best at some of the
Aerobic exercises, and had improved considerably on some of the Balance
exercises. And at some point each day, when I’d had enough of Wii Fit but
wanted to exercise some more, I’d slip out that disc and put one of the sports
discs in. While I had never been much of a sportsman, I actually enjoyed some
of the sports games. Of course most of them didn’t burn off as many calories as
the aerobic exercises. One that did was boxing, but one day I did a little more
boxing than I should have and my arms were sore the next day.

For most of our adult lives, Lou and I have had the
same hobbies. I love watching old TV comedies. My favorite two shows were and
are
I Love Lucy
and
Hogan’s Heroes.
Lou surprised me one year
with a DVD player and the entire first year of
I Love Lucy
on DVD. Over time, I acquired all the episodes available from both shows, as well as some episodes
of other of my favorite classic comedies.

Lou, on the other hand, has been a puzzle guy. Lou’s
always been puzzling, but his hobbies include both types of puzzles, crossword
and jigsaw, plus some other types of puzzles found in books, like logic
problems. Most of the time Lou has spent at home, he could be found working
some type of puzzle or reading a classic novel. Until Wii Fit entered our
lives, neither of us attempted any exercise greater than the effort it took us
to get out of bed each day, which on some days was quite an effort.

When Lou and I entered semi-retirement, we added
another hobby, only this time both of us added the same hobby. Both of us have
always been fascinated with solving things, so when we learned that there was a
bookstore in Hilldale devoted strictly to mysteries, Lou and I headed over to Scene
of the Crime
to check it out, and we returned home with thinner wallets.

Because both of us left the store with an armload of
books, we became as big of a hit there as we were at the Blue Moon Diner.
Myrtle Evans, the elderly owner of Scene of the Crime
,
smiled when she
learned that her newest customers were big spenders. As we returned to
replenish our stock by picking up new titles to try, she learned a little about
us and what our tastes were like, but we never let on that we were police
detectives. Anyone who knows anything about mysteries knows that there are many
types of mysteries, and many mystery fans prefer one type of mystery to
another. While whodunits were our favorites, we ventured out from time to time
and tried other types of mystery authors. This was easy to do at Scene of the
Crime, because each section and room identified the type of mysteries it held.

It had been several weeks since Lou and I had finished
our most recent murder investigation. That amount of time off had given us
ample time to pare down our stack of unread books. When I mentioned this to
Lou, he was as eager as I was to go shopping.

We opened the door of the Scene of the Crime, causing
the bell to ring and Myrtle Evans to look up from where she sat on her stool
behind the counter. I could almost see the drool dripping from her mouth and
the dollar signs registering in her head.

“I’ve been expecting you boys.”

“We’re getting that predictable?”

“Well, let’s just say that the other day, during one
of our slow times, I thought of the two of you and figured you’d be back in
soon. I took the liberty to choose some titles for you.”

She got up off the stool, and searched the shelf
behind her, where she had put two, large, shopping bags full of books. One at a
time she lifted the bags up onto the counter. They weighed more than something
a woman her age should have lifted, but she had both bags on the counter before
either of us could assist her.

“Now, if you boys don’t want any of these books, I
understand, and if there are any more you want, feel free to look as you
usually do.”

“You’ve always steered us in the right direction
before, Mrs. E. I’m fine with these if Lou is.”

Lou and I always bought the same books, and we read
them in the same order. Since we read at roughly the same pace, it gave us an
opportunity to talk about each book as we read it, much like we do with each
murder investigation as it goes forward.

Lou nodded to me that he was fine with her selections
if I was, so I turned to Mrs. Evans.

“No, Mrs. E., you’ve always steered us right before.
These will be fine. Just tell us how much we owe you.”

“I included a book from some of your favorite authors,
plus I added books by a couple of authors you haven’t tried yet, ones I think
you’ll like. Let’s see, that comes to $287.54 each.” To some people that might
sound like a lot of money, but all of the books were hardbacks, and a couple of
them were early editions of books written a long time ago.

Lou and I paid, but lingered a while talking books
with Mrs. Evans, and a couple of customers who came in that we’d met before. It
was fifteen minutes before we grabbed our books and headed for home. Well, I
took Lou home, then went home and plopped down at the dining room table. I
usually opt for some place more comfy, but I wanted a flat surface to lay the
books on.

Neither Lou nor I bothered to look at any of the books
while we were still in the store. I was excited to see what new treasures I
owned. I reached into the bag and plucked the first book,
A Little Class on
Murder
by Carolyn Hart. I’d read some of the others from Hart’s
Death on
Demand
series, and thoroughly enjoyed them, so I was glad to have another
one.

Each time I bought another bagful of books, my routine
was the same. When I got home, I took out one book at a time, glanced at it for
a moment, and then put it aside. After I’d removed all the books from the bag,
I’d sit down in the chair and read the dust jacket to see what the book was
about. Then, I’d call Lou and one of us would suggest which offering to read
first.

I reached back into the bag, and pulled out another
title. This too was a Carolyn Hart mystery, but one from her
Henrie O
series, which I liked even better than
Death on Demand.
Death on Demand
was the name of a bookstore devoted solely to mysteries, much like Scene of the
Crime, but in the
Death on Demand
series, the bookstore owner, a young
woman, finds herself trying to solve a murder that takes place on the resort
island where she lives, an island much like Hilton Head. Henrie O., on the
other hand, is an elderly woman who gets mixed up in murder and may have to
travel to do so. My new Henri O. title was
Death on Lovers’ Lane.

I continued to reach into the bag and pull out another
selection until the bag was empty. When I finished, I found out that Mrs. Evans
had included books by my two favorite authors of contemporary British
mysteries, Martha Grimes and P.D. James, as well as a British author new to me,
Jill McGown. I looked forward to reading
The Anodyne Necklace
by Grimes,
Unnatural Causes
by James, and
A Perfect Match
by McGown.

Other contemporary selections included
Murder With
Peacocks
by Donna Andrews, an author new to me,
The Camel Club
by
David Baldacci, an author I’d heard of but had yet to read,
Loves Music,
Loves To Dance
by Mary Higgins Clark,
Tell No One
by Harlan Coben,
The
Firm
by John Grisham, and
A Diet To Die For
by Joan Hess. I laughed
when I read that title. My newfound commitment to losing weight made it a
fitting time to read that book.

Mrs. Evans didn’t forget to include some of the great
classic authors, as she added
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
by Agatha
Christie,
The Case of the Curious Bride
by Erle Stanley Gardner,
Patient
in Room 18
by Mignon Eberhart, and
The Bishop Murder Case
by S.S.
Van Dine.

I counted the books, fourteen in all. I planned to get
busy reading, and read as many books as I could before those bodies were
discovered, provided there were any bodies to discover.

I sat down and read the dust jacket or back cover of
each book. All of them sounded great. If only I could lose weight reading.
Since Lou got a head start on me, I was sure he was anxiously awaiting my call.

“Did you make it through all of yours yet, Lou?”

“No, Cy, I was waiting to start reading until after
you called.”

“Smart aleck. I know you haven’t started reading yet,
but do you have any idea where we should start?”

“Well, just so you remember what your top priority is,
why don’t we start with that Joan Hess book? I remember how much we liked that
other book of hers we read.

“It sure was funny, and from what I can tell, this
Donna Andrews book is supposed to be funny, too.”

“Looks like we’ve got a good variety.”

Both of us were eager to get to our books, and since
we’d decided which book to begin with, we said our goodbyes.

+++

Our books were the only things that kept the next few
days from being difficult for us. Lou and I were used to being together
everyday. Before we retired, I picked him up each day and the two of us went
about the city’s business, one murder at a time. When there were no murders to
investigate, we still rode around together, did whatever we needed to do to
earn our keep, and ate all three meals together. When Doc ordered me to lose
weight or desist, Lou suggested that each of us eat at home. He knew that I had
a far better chance of losing weight if I stayed at home, and he knew that I
wanted to remain a cop as long as he did.

It was two days later when I called Lou. I’d finished
reading
A Diet To Die For
that morning. When I got ahold of Lou I found
out that he’d finished the book the night before. We spent ten or fifteen
minutes talking about the book, catching up on our Wii exercises, and deciding
which book to read next. We opted for
A Perfect Match.
Both of us had
almost finished our second book of the week by the time I picked up Lou for
church on Sunday morning.

We didn’t see each other the next week, but we talked
once a day on the phone, discussing the book we were reading and how much
weight both of us had lost. It was much the same the following week. I didn’t
see Lou until I picked him up for church. If we kept our noses to the
grindstone, both of us could finish our fourth book of the last two weeks
before that Sunday was over. As it turned out, it was a good thing we did.