Malice in a Very Small Town by Greg Jolley

OTHER NOVELS BY

GREG JOLLEY Danser Dot to Dot The Amazing Kazu Where’s Karen?

Murder in a Very Small Town

MALICE in a VERY SMALL TOWN Copyright Š 2018 Greg Jolley All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher.

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Published by Open Window an imprint of BHC Press Library of Congress Control Number: 2017961362 ISBN: 978-1-947727-14-4 Visit the publisher at: www.bhcpress.com Also available in ebook

Though her husband’s body was frozen, the sawing was still distasteful, no matter that no blood flowed, spilled or splattered. Alternating between the scream of the chain saw for the thick sections—the thighs, upper arms and neck and the long cuts across his chest and mid-section—she worked the hand saw whenever she could, preferring the quieter carving. It wasn’t a thankless task. It was life changing work with a well-deserved goal of freedom and a well-funded retirement.

With the large sections wrapped in gasoline soaked butcher block paper, she used the branch clippers from the garden table to snip off ten stiff fingers. Although not a means of identification, she also clacked the blades and removed his turtle head of a penis, experiencing a brief, grim satisfaction and adding it to the small ten digits package.

Flesh to ash. Body to dust. Her ten-pound sledge hammer leaned against the jam to the backyard door, which she would use to mash his bones once the meat was cooked off.

The packs laid in uneven rows on the tarp back of her on the concrete slap. She used kitchen tongs to lift her late husband’s papers and files soaking in a bucket of kerosene and wrapped them, her last task before heading out into the weather to build a fire.

13

Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and cauldron bubble. ~ William Shakespeare ~

1 The towering poplars formed a yellow canopy over the twisting dirt road, their silent vigil disrupted by the rev of a fast running, small green station wagon. The car appeared at the exit of the autumn tunnel, moving fast and sliding, all four wheels chewing up and spewing out mud and stones. Splashing puddles of muck and ice, the car swayed and bounced in and out of tire furrows. Cry Baby tumbled over on her back in the rear area behind the driver’s seat, ending up with her little feet in the air. She whelped with laughter, looking up at her raised yellow rubber boots.

With the car’s next aggressive turn, the four year old collided with her car seat laying on its side in the back area—the back seats were folded down.

The green car straightened itself out, accelerated and exited the tunnel of vibrant dying leaves. Cry Baby righted herself amidst the spill of groceries from the paper sacks as the car approached the grade for the railroad tracks.

The car rose and launched, all four wheels spinning in the air. She went weightless and rolled over backward, her boots scraping the roof, her legs pumping as she let out another yelp of laughter.

The car landed, sending out a spray of mud and ice. Sara gripped the steering wheel and straightened out the car, calling over her shoulder, “Cry Baby, got your helmet?”

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The next turn was downhill and tight. Sara applied the brakes and downshifted. Cry Baby answered by hurling her bike helmet. She let out a cackle as it clouted the dashboard and fell away.

“Oh, good,” Sara said to her daughter while the car rocked and bumped through the turn. She heard Cry Baby tumble over again as the car slid and swayed.

The GPS device spoke up from Sara’s lap in proper British accent, In one half mile, turn right on Barking Road.

“Thanks Jill, you frosty cu—” Sara bit off the last, using her nickname for the device. “Give me a half hour in your knickers, I’ll defrost your proper English ways.”

A rut of rocks and gravel tried to wrestle the wheel from her hands, but she gripped tight and applied the accelerator further, taking back control as the car entered the next bend.

“Orange, baby,” Sara hollered over her shoulder in happy song.

Cry Baby raised her plump face from a sideways grocery bag and looked out the window. The roadside and overhanging trees were brilliant with pumpkin color. She let out a delighted giggle before toppling over again when the car turned in the opposite direction.

The car ran smooth and straight before rounding three more bends and turns. “Jill” had slipped off Sara’s lap and spoke from between her knees on the floor, Turn right on Twisty Lane.

“Thanks, Jill. Some night, you, me and a warm, naughty shower.”

A narrow wood bridge loomed around the next corner. Sara locked the brakes and the muddy tires clawed for traction as they bounded up the rise to the boards.

Cry Baby rolled to the rear door and looked out at the stream of sparkling water under the bridge, while her momma steered to the right along the following dirt road. Sara brought the Subaru to a skidding stop on a paved driveway, knocking into a stack of patio chairs beside a moving van, setting off a clatter and crunch of aluminum.

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Sara and Cry Baby turned to one another. Cry Baby was the first to laugh. They climbed out, Sara pulling the hem of her dress down and handing her daughter the bike helmet. Cry Baby put the helmet on and took her momma’s hand. They walked alongside the realtor’s silver Cadillac and up to the open front door of their new, temporary home.

Cry Baby spotted her other momma and broke into a run. Wiki was standing just inside the door, alongside the realtor. Cry Baby’s red cloth coat was twisted nearly sideways on her wide body and her eyes were as bright as her smile. She plowed into Wiki with both arms open, clenching her little hands and laughing as Wiki turned her bike helmet around in the proper direction. Wiki hugged her little girl, looking out into the bright daylight from the front door. Sara was carrying two grocery bags down the driveway.

She rounded the crunched and toppled patio furniture at the bumper of their green Subaru with a “Sorry about that.”

Hugging Cry Baby close, Wiki nodded to whatever it was the realtor was telling her about idyllic lakefront living.

The realtor looked to Cry Baby and asked in sugary baby talk, “Do you love this home?”

Cry Baby bared her teeth and snarled.

“She growled.” The realtor’s happy face faltered.

“Yes, Cry Baby has decided not to talk yet.”

“Missed you,” Sara breathed to Wiki, easing between the two women with a “Hey” to the realtor.

“Missed you more,” Wiki replied.

“I know.” Sara flashed her wicked smile, leaned and kissed Wiki warmly.

The realtors already weakened smile froze and she looked away—up the driveway and across the narrow lawn that separated the property from the neighbors. The grass rolled downhill to the lake and was fenced and marked with the unevenly placed headstones of the Weaps family cemetery. Beyond the small graveyard, black and oily smoke climbed into the blue sky from the burn pile on the neighbor’s lawn close to the water.

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“Christ, that smells bad,” the realtor muttered to herself. The smoke had shifted directions with the wind and wisps of its fouled meaty scent were crossing to them. She turned back to her clients and saw they were gone. Taking a last glance to the burn pile, she spotted the difficult wife who lived across the way, that crank of a woman she had introduced herself to while searching properties for Wiki and Sara and their unusual, non-verbal child.

Sara called to Cry Baby from the kitchen, asking her to get the last grocery bag as the realtor stepped aside for one of the movers rolling an empty dolly out the door. The bearded big man was dressed more for deer hunting than delivering boxes, and she didn’t bother to look to his eyes or offer a smile.

The house that Sara and Wiki were renting while their place was under repair was a weekender entertainment home, and a large one for Lake Dent. The entire first floor was void of bedrooms; an open-air design for parties, cooking, drinking and enjoying the floor-to-ceiling view of the lake. The west wall was floor-to-ceiling windows and glass doors. They were renting it furnished and there was a loose layout of couches and low tables waiting for cocktails and casual dining. To her right, a hip-high wall ran before the lengthy kitchen of expensive stoves and ovens, two dishwashers and two refrigerators.

The realtor jerked forward at the sound of the child snarling behind her, needing to pass with the last grocery bag.

“Da fuck,” Sara called to the open door. “What are they burning? In-laws?”

Their wild child rounded the low kitchen wall at a run, her yellow boots padding fast toward the realtor. Sara reached out to stop Cry Baby, who ducked the grasp and four fast strides away, lowered her head.

The realtor squatted and opened her arms for the childish collision. Her balance was uncertain and the child didn’t slow, her bicycle helmet becoming a battering ram. The realtor fell back, hands up waving before her face, expecting impact, and landed hard on her rear. Cry Baby skidded to a stop and rolled her head back, pointing at the fallen realtor, bubbling with laughter.

The realtor was sprawled, wide eyed.

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“Cry Baby, cheez…” Sara pleaded.

The child dropped to her knees, still laughing and turned over onto her back, peddling her boots in the air.

The deer hunter parked his loaded dolly beside the realtor and offered his hand. She ignored it and struggled to her feet, straightening her coat and dress and the spill of lacquered hair from her eyes. Applying her most professional smile, she told Sara, “I’m gonna go get the final lease addendum out of the car.”

The burly mover unloaded the dolly, and the child continued to pedal her imaginary bicycle.

She was almost to her Cadillac when she spotted Wiki over at the edge of the rickety fence encircling the private cemetery. Stepping alongside her, they both watched the frumpy neighbor woman shovel another scoop of deadwood and leaves. The fire smothered in response and the smoke coughed a change from black to gray. The neighbor hefted a ham-sized object wrapped in butcher paper and threw it in. As the package crashed down it cleared an opening for oxygen and the fire flared.

“Those are the Weaps,” the realtor explained. “Not the nicest, but civil.

Barely. Met them on Tuesday and asked about the private cemetery. It’s owned by her husband’s family. Goes back to the 1840s.” She turned and pointed across the stream that paralleled the road, to an overgrown driveway winding uphill through wild hedges and ungroomed spruce. “That’s their place.”

“The Weaps?” Wiki repeated.

“Yes.” Two masonry gate posts were overrun with vines, the rod iron gate having fallen back and way in the thrush weed. Through the tree limbs, the tall and long ago grand Queen Anne tower house peeked through here and there; peeling gray paint, grime glazed windows and a single turret on the right side; shingles missing, the once elegant frieze work chipped and weather worn.

Wiki pressed her hand to her nose and mouth, shielding some of the rancid stench in the smoke wisps coming from the other direction. “I’m changing that. They’re now the Creeps.”

19

2 Cry Baby stood in the middle of the road while Wiki returned to the house to retrieve her bag lunch. She threw another rock down into the stream as her momma walked back up the driveway, holding the lunch bag and tugging her black wool greatcoat over the black summer smock dress she had borrowed from Sara. Wiki had also nicked a pair of coal wool socks and black work boots. She watched her daughter merrily throw a third fist-sized rock, followed by laughter that shook the child’s long red coat.

The two took hands and walked up the road, alongside the start of the fenced-in private cemetery. Wiki stopped at the far edge of the graveyard, looking down the hill to the back of the neighbor’s backyard where the Creep wife was squatting before the circular stone fire pit, sifting through the smoldering ashes with a hand shovel. She set the hand tool aside and click clicked into the embers with chicken tongs, retrieving a small object and placing it in the open suitcase at her hip.

Cry Baby tugged on Wiki’s hand and the two continued up the road, Wiki looking over her shoulder until the front of the Creep’s house blocked her view. Her daughter pulled her farther along, walking with her head back, eyes to the puffy and fast white clouds.

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Approaching the bridge, Wiki saw that the stream was backed up by a nasty mass of limbs, branches and leafy muck. They crossed the bridge and started along the winding town road. The one lane twisted alongside of the lake, past cottages and houses on both sides. After a twenty minute walk, they came to a church on the corner and crossed Main Street; there being no sidewalk on the lakeside.

“Step, darling,” Wiki told her daughter, who had traveled all the way with her eyes to the clouds. They passed the pawnshop, the sewing shop and the next two vacant shop doors and windows. Cry Baby continued to watch the sky as they made their way to the school. When they approached the town’s sidewalk mailbox, Wiki gently tugged her out of the path of collision.

The playground in front of the cinnamon brick school was a bustle of four and five year olds hard at play with shouting, happy voices, except those in tears and screaming. When Wiki opened the office door, Cry Baby locked her boots in place for a last leaning look at the sky, ignoring the kids on the play structures and in the tanbark.

The office was way too warm, with primary painted walls decorated with pinned up children’s art. Wiki was given a folder, clipboard and borrowed a pen. She chose a low plastic chair, frowning at the forms. She started through the trudge of detailed and repetitive questions. Cry Baby walked in through the low swinging doors to the office area and waded into the talking staff and teachers.

A loud bell went off inside the office and echoed from the playground.

“That’s the ten-minute bell,” one of the clerks told Wiki, who nodded but didn’t look up from the paperwork.

“Whoa,” the same clerk called out, nearly tripping over a trash can that had been slyly moved behind her legs. Cry Baby was smirking, looking away.

“Nice try. This one needs a leash.”

Wiki looked up from the paperwork and saw her daughter being led through the swing door by the portly clerk with a firm grip on her daughter’s shoulder, tugging her red coat up. Cry Baby was smiling and wide eyed pleased. Wiki giggled and covered her mouth.

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The front door opened and Cry Baby, breaking the hold, dashed through while Wiki turned her attention back to the documents and pen. A young woman sat down in the chair beside her and said, “Like chocolate milk?”

“Yes, I do,” Wiki replied, frowning at another intrusive question.

“Here, have a few.”

Wiki looked over. The young woman had a cardboard box in her lap filled with little milk cartons and two stacks of paper trays with child snacks under cellophane.

“Can I have two?” Wiki asked.

“Yes, you can. They’re extras.”

Wiki selected two cartons of chocolate milk and slid one into her coat pocket. The young woman had a crooked smile and a blackened eye.

“You a mom? Course you are,” she said. Before Wiki could respond, she added, “I’m Ingrid. Are you an artist or just weird?”

Wiki replied by opening the small carton but didn’t drink. Ingrid was analyzing her all-black apparel with a kind, curious expression.

“I’ll go with weird,” Wiki said. “Nice to meet you, I hope.”

“It is. It will be.”

Wiki sipped the cold and sugary rich chocolate milk. Ingrid’s black eye looked tender and painful in its spread to the side of her fine nose and part of her cheek.

“What’s your name?” Ingrid asked.

“Wiki.”

“For real? And you’re not an artist? What a waste.” This last said with a widening of her sideways grin. “Your child’s name is C.B.?” She was looking at the top of the form in Wiki’s lap.

“No. Oh, oops. That’s not going to work. Her name is Cry Baby.”

“Wiki? Neither are going to work.”

“Why not?”

“Play yard cruelty.”

“For real?”

“Yep.” 22

MALICE in a VERY SMALL TOWN

Wiki frowned and placed the pen between her teeth.

“I’d go with the long CB,” Ingrid suggested.

“Huh?” “S-e-a-b-e-e, and put ‘artist’ in your occupation box.”

Wiki studied the top of the form for a moment before taking the pen from her teeth and making the change, using the spelling exactly as Ingrid had suggested.

“That reads nicely, and it’ll help protect your darling little girl.”

The two smiled to each another. Wiki took another drink of chocolate milk.

“Does Seabee have a last name? They’ll want that.”

“Well sure, umm.”

“Let it go. Leave it blank. They’ll chase you down, later. What they really want from you parents is the big check.”

“Uh oh.” Wiki tapped the pen on the next line, which read, Father’s First Name. “This sucks.”

“Oh?” Ingrid asked in playful voice, “Not sure?”

“I want to line out Father and write Donor.” She ignored the idea and wrote in, Sara.

“That’ll get them peeing all over themselves.” Ingrid sparkled with laughter, winking at Wiki with her good eye.

The office door opened hard, striking the back wall. The portly clerk entered, dragging two children by the hand, her grip tight and her pace quick for such beefy legs. One of the children was a boy, roaring in tears. The other child was Seabee, eyes narrowed with a smile filling her plump face.

“This one is yours, right?” The woman glared at Wiki.

The boy continued his painful yelps.

Wiki took a sip of milk and bobbed an eyebrow to her daughter.

“Nice trip?”

“That’s not funny.” The wide woman gruffly released Seabee to her mother and led the dusty, pitiful boy through the swinging doors and up a narrow hall.

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“They’re going to be calling you Seabee here, okay?” Wiki told her daughter.

Instead of answering, her small chubby hand opened for the milk carton and Wiki gave it to her. The four-year old drank it off, acquiring a chocolate mustache. Ingrid took a tissue from her vest pocket and handed it over, gesturing to her own mouth and wiping.

Seabee put the tissue in her coat pocket and studied the office workers behind the counter. She took two steps in that direction, crouched low like a clever stalker.

Wiki giggled and so did Ingrid.

The school bell rang again and an elderly yard duty with cotton candy hair herded nine children inside. Her hand graced Seabee’s head and nudged as she passed. Seabee bristled, but followed without a single look back to her mom.

Wiki and Ingrid watched the wandering line of four- and five-year-old children walk up the hall to their classroom.

“Coffee?” Ingrid asked.

The snaking line of children disappeared through a side doorway, with Seabee in tow.

“Sure. Where?”

“The Dent.”

“What’s that?”

“I’ll show you. Give them their great big check and silly paperwork.”

Both women walked to the counter, Ingrid reaching for the pen in Wiki’s hand. She stashed it into her pocket as Wiki handed over the clipboard. Placing the low box of snacks and milk cartons on the counter, Ingrid whispered, “Extra chocolates,” to the woman at the nearest desk. “Enjoy.”

Wiki and Ingrid left the school and walked the sidewalk along Main Street. The wind was up, swirling leaves and dust and litter. They were shoulder to shoulder as they passed the first two shuttered shop fronts.

“I’m your neighbor,” Ingrid said.

“You’re a Creep, oops, a Weap?”

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Ingrid laughed. “No. I’m on the other side of your place.”

“There’s a house on our other side? All I’ve seen is brush and trees.”

“Not a house, a cabin. Only my husband calls it a house.”

A gust tussled their hair and nearly bumped Wiki from her feet. Ingrid’s hand went to her elbow and steadied her.

“Thanks. My baby’s first school day.” Wiki squinted from the cold.

“I like her. Spunk, delight and mischief eyes.”

“That’s her. She’ll also have a wise mouth, when she decides to start using it.”

They crossed a narrow brick alleyway.

“What’s with the box of milk and snacks?” Wiki asked.

“I’m the school chef,” Ingrid said dead pan before a smirk.

“And a mom?”

“Not no more.”

“Grown up? Off to another school?”

“Deceased.”

Wiki stopped, her shoulders rocking forward like she’d taken a fist to the belly.

“Oh no,” was all she could find. Ingrid stepped back alongside her, sliding her arm inside Wiki’s and pulling gently.

Wiki looked Ingrid over for the first time. Her boots were scraped and dirty as were her faded jeans. Ingrid’s vest and coat were raggedy and her hair was unwashed and cut haphazard. Wiki found her best warm smile and said, “I’m so sorry. And by the way, we’re going to be friends.”

“Of course, we are,” Ingrid replied and the two continued along the sidewalk. To their left, the lake rippled between two tall thin bungalows.

“Can I ask about your black eye?”

“You just did,” Ingrid answered with a sideways grin. “I ask a lot of questions, too. I asked the wrong one at home.”

“And the best whoever could do is answer with a fist? I’m sorry, but…

I’m going to intrude and tell you to scratch that person off your list. Fast. Not a single look back.”

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“I’m working on that.”

“Good. If I can help.”

“You can. And will. Thank you.”

They passed the closed scrapbooking store, a dusty and sad antiques store and a florist shop, barren of window displays. From the alley up just a way, running feet preceded a boy dashing into view, crossing Main without looking left or right. The boy had a metal bucket on his head and entered the gaggle of pre-teens in a restless queue before a school bus. The bus had the big city’s middle school’s name written along its side and was two-thirds empty. Wiki watched the kids file along the windows, the bucket-headed boy in midline, jammed up as the others searched for seats with their friends. She remembered the boy from years before and his nickname, Buckethead.

She had taken him under wing during her first visit to the very small town of Dent, some four years before, during the rampage, the same year Cry Baby was born.

The bucket was still worn proudly, another kid’s hand tapping it’s side reverently. She hoped that the boy still wore it out of odd habit and not lingering fear from the bloody events and nightmare of gunfire and deaths in the snow.

The air brakes released a hot gasp and the bus wobbled and smoked for the north end of Dent, where it would pass the town’s trademark massive Christmas pine on the corner lot before the expressway entrance.

Ingrid tugged Wiki’s arm as the bus disappeared from view, turning her new friend to the wood and glass shop door, lit from inside. The Dent, was etched in flaking gold on the pane above: Market, Hardware, Books, Coffee, Videos & Snacks.

“Been here before?” Ingrid reached for the door.

“No. Sara does all our shopping.”

“You’ll like it. Owner calls it an emporium.”

There was a dusty assortment of groceries and tools in the display window.

“Should I scoff?”

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“Yes, please.”

Before following Ingrid inside, she looked up the street. Her and Sara’s dirty green Subaru was parked behind a white van with no side windows.

Both vehicles sported a brown hem of dirt spray and rust.

A glass counter and cash register were just inside the door to the right, before three short aisles of groceries and hardware. Wiki read a sign deep in the store above a doorway, Books & Movies: buy, rent or borrow. Vamping jazz was wavering with scratches and skips from a stereo speaker flex-tied to a center beam. Beside her, a bearded thin man with a box of nails waited at the cash register. She looked for his eyes, but they were locked on the box he was holding.

“On my way, eat a licorice,” a woman’s voice called out from the doorway between two glass cases: one for Dairy and the other Pop & Water. The rough-looking skeleton twisted off the plastic lid to a tub of grape licorice and selected two. The woman stepped through the sliced plastic doorway and her most compelling feature, surely intentional, were her wonderfully full and high breasts and alert nipples within a sheer, low, black blouse. The woman approached with her gaze over her shoulder, the buoyant breasts nodding. She was a few inches taller than Wiki, with creamy ghost-white skin. She looked to be in her mid-50s and her falling hair was a wavy, coal black. When she saw Wiki, she flashed a grin from her lovely pale face and lavender lips.

Ingrid tugged on Wiki’s arm, breaking her gaze. The woman went behind the counter and the thin man set the box of nails on the glass top.

“Hey, Ingrid. Have a seat,” the woman said, looking over.

Ingrid led Wiki to their left, to three picnic tables in a clearing before the curved glass case with a Deli sign. Wiki stopped short. Sara was seated at the middle table, her boots up on the bench, with a book in her hands and a cup of coffee and a dessert plate with a spoon to her side. Wiki titled her head, surprised, before walking to Sara and kissing the top of her head. Sara looked up, saw Ingrid beside her lover. Smiling, she put her arm around Wiki’s hips and pulled her close. Leaning back, the two shared a brushed kiss.

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Wiki sat down beside Sara’s raised knees and boots; her dress gathered into her crotch as Ingrid took the bench on the other side.

“Thanks, and see ya,” the show-stealing breasts spoke from the front of the store.

“Hi, do I know you?” Sara asked Ingrid.

“No, but you should. I’ve seen you around.”

The two women exchanged friendly smiles and first names as Wiki rested her hand on Sara’s raised knee.

“Mmm,” Sara breathed across Wiki’s hand. “You two have to have dessert and coffee—I’m buying.”

“Both?” Ingrid asked Wiki, standing.

“Coffee, please.”

The woman from the cash register rounded the aisle end display of pet treats and toys, saying to Sara, “So this is your darling?”

Sara nodded, chewing a spoonful of cake.

“Wiki, right? I’ve heard a lot about you. I’m Maureen. Maur, if you would, and please remember to pronounce the U.” “Maur…” Wiki pondered. “The U is silent. It sounds the same.”

“Not to me.” Maur’s smile broadened, sitting down on the top of the picnic table with her left breast beside Wiki’s face.

“She causes me boob envy, too,” Sara said with a giggle.

“Stop.”

“That guy, call him Nails. Comes in every day for a new box. One box a day.” Maur’s voice was both motherly and pleased.

“Not coming here for nails. It’s the view.” Sara smirked.

Ingrid joined them at the table and Maur extended her hand across, just short of touching Ingrid’s blackened eye and cheek. “Oh, cupcake.”

“It’s not so bad.” Ingrid returned a sideways trembling smile.

“Lemme guess. You fell down the stairs?”

Ingrid took a sip of steaming coffee.

“Hard to do,” Maur said, continuing to study the tender black-and-blue injury, “in a one-story cabin.”

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Sara swung her boots off the bench and turned fully to Ingrid. Her hand went out for Wiki’s as Maur added, no more joking, “Child, I sell rifles and ammo.”

“Next topic.” Ingrid turned around to the bakery case.

Taking Ingrid’s cue, Sara turned away to Wiki. “Darling? No dessert?”

“I didn’t see any pie.”

“Nope. Sorry.” Maur frowned. “But there will be the next time you stop by. That’s a promise.”

Ingrid called from behind the deli counter. “I’m gonna slice the fruit and cheese and meat for tomorrow’s snack trays. Then a nap.”

“Ingrid? Don’t go home to that. Nap here, in the apartment. Go upstairs and take a shower and crash, okay?”

“Thank you,” Ingrid answered in thoughtful soft voice. “If it’s okay with you. Bye Sara and my new friend, Wiki.”

“That just plain old sucks.” Wiki’s hand returned to Sara’s knee, shaking her head sadly. The front door of the Dent opened with a jingling bell and Maur stood, saying, “Hear about the Weap boy? Damn shame. I hope he’s found soon.”

“Our creepy neighbor was allowed to give birth? Sorry, what happened to him?” Wiki asked.

“Vanished. Poof. Ran off—not a bad choice. Don’t know. Heard it from one of the moms. It being less than twenty-four hours, all the sheriff ’s doing is worrying about it.”

Maur headed up front. Sara leaned over and stole a kiss, whispering, “That’s frightening.”

“He’ll show up, they almost all do.” Maur stepped along the glass case to the cash register.

Eyes up to the plank ceiling, Sara twisted her lips in worry and concern, but didn’t share.

“What are you reading?” Wiki breathed.

Sara flipped the worn paperback over and Wiki read, “Swimmer by Bill Danser.”

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“Again?”

“Read your blue book, darling. We can hang out here until Cry Baby gets out.”

“Sara? I had to change her name.”

“Oh?” “I’ll spell it. S-e-a-b-e-e.”

“I like it, if she does.”

“Well, she didn’t say.”

Both laughed. Cry Baby, now Seabee, had yet to speak a single word through her first four years.

✳ ✳ ✳ When the noon bell rang, the school door was shoulder opened and children exploded through shouting in a wild parade, electric with happy yelps and eyes searching the moms standing street side with open arms. Seabee was the last to appear, looking dazed but smiling. Her red coat was twisted about her rotund frame and there was a note pinned to her lapel. The cluster of moms and young ones parted like a cloud of baby talk and chatter when Seabee spotted her momma. Her eyes tightened down, her smile widened and she broke into a run across the school yard to Wiki sitting on a curb with open arms. Seabee knocked Wiki back as they collided, letting out a peel of laughter.

Mom and daughter started up Main Street, hand in hand, except when Seabee wiggled away to examine something interesting in the gutters. A dark cloud rolled across the sky, stealing the autumn sunlight and adding wind that had chilled as it swept low across the silver lake. They passed the church on the corner and turned off Main, onto the twisty road for home. Along the way, Wiki unpinned the note on Seabee’s lapel, read it twice, and stowed it in her coat pocket.

Mother and daughter walked the dirt road along the south side of the lake, their boots flattening gold and red leaves into the mud. Wind up in the tall trees shook out a gentle fall of orange and yellow.

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Four turns along the way, a white jeep rolled into view around the next tight bend. It came to a stop on the wrong side, at a mailbox on a post. The driver inserted a roll of mail, and Wiki and Seabee stepped to the shoulder to wait for the mailman to pass. Wiki took the carton of chocolate milk from her coat pocket and handed it to Seabee, who tore off the top and happily drank.

Seabee handed the empty milk carton over. Wiki placed it in her pocket and they joined hands for the rest of the way. Ten minutes later, they made the last bend before the view of their new home.

Wiki looked to her right, up the hill to the grand old, abandoned looking house surrounded by dense spruce and willows and frost burned bush.

The three-story structure appeared to be leaning to the north, like one of its legs had tired and knelt. The gray paint on its clapboard walls was peeling and a long porch listed along its entire length, adding a forlorn, disappointed chin. All the windows were dark, saying long forgotten.

Seabee broke free and ran onto the wood bridge. Wiki turned and watched her daughter going electric with excitement at the bridge rail, bouncing on her yellow boots and laughing while pointing down into the stream. Just beyond the nasty looking blockage of tangled branches, limbs and muck, something had splashed the surface in the flat water beyond, sending out tiny circles. Wiki walked onto the bridge, the timbers strong underfoot, and stood beside Seabee, who continued bouncing and pointing in delight. Wiki smiled to her daughter, no matter that she couldn’t see or understand the cause. Looking to the blockage, it seemed to have expanded since that morning.

The crisp mid-day air was torn open by the harsh cry of a table saw—a metallic scream from the direction of the Creep’s home. The offensive outburst stopped abruptly, followed by a silence that settled like dust.

Seabee continued bouncing and pointing to the stream with wide eyes as Wiki studied the Creep’s overgrown yard and half-ass painted house. The front yard was cluttered with errant furniture, a discarded washing machine and a swing set without seats. Across the front of the yellow house, a strand of unlit Christmas lights hung in a sagging, sad run of broken bulbs. Dark brown curtains were drawn across all the windows and the garage door was 31

GREG JOLLEY

raised, exposing listing towers of boxes and household castaways and head high stacks leaning over a narrow twisting pathway.

Wiki took Seabee’s swinging hand and they crossed the rest of the bridge, the source of her daughter’s merriment having disappeared. The Creep wife rounded from her porch, dressed in chest high, black rubber waders and a tape patched, ratty brown, down coat. Her stride was strong and weary. Wiki traced the woman’s tightened down eyes, locked on the rusted mailbox at the top of the driveway.

“Stay away from that one,” Wiki warned Seabee, gently tugging her hand toward home.

They started past the edge of the Creep’s driveway at the same time Mrs. Creep opened the mailbox, reaching inside without looking—something Wiki would never do. Her hand came out empty and her disappointed gaze swung around to the scratch of Wiki and Seabee’s boots. Wiki paused and released Seabee’s hand, “Go on home, love.”

“Hello,” Wiki offered the woman looking her over.

The woman wouldn’t look to her eyes, her tight gaze to Wiki’s neck, her mouth chewing. Wiki offered a smile, a wasted effort. Locking the smile in place, she swept her gaze to the side of the house and down the hill to the lake. A sinew of black oily smoke was crossing from the woman’s backyard and entering the private cemetery, brushing low along the headstones.

“You’re one of the lesbians.” The Creep wife addressed Wiki’s throat.

“The fuck?” Wiki held the words back to a mumble, looking at the woman’s blackened, threadbare work gloves. “What are you burning?” She struggled for her good manners and a change of topic, “It smells, umm, unique.”

The palm of one blackened glove slapped the mailbox closed. Wiki bent her knees, trying to catch the woman’s eyes. It was a no-go as the woman also bent low to avoid eye contact, “Meat. Our freezer died.” She scowled, speaking to Wiki’s throat again.

“Oh? That’s a shame.”

The Creep wife swung her head to the lake below, her lower jaw working, her unwashed nest of hair swaying across her squinting eyes.

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MALICE in a VERY SMALL TOWN

“Shame? You two and that poor child. That’s the shame,” she muttered in garbled voice, looking across the private graveyard to Wiki and Sara’s house.

Wiki turned that way also, following the hostile and offensive woman’s gaze to her own driveway, where Seabee sat in a puddle formed by a tire furrow.

The woman grumbled something else, her voice low. Wiki turned and asked, “What?” as the woman shook her head and walked away, down the gentle decline to her smoke fogged backyard.

Wiki raised her hand, waving “so long,” restraining her middle finger.

When she reached Seabee, the four year old was lying flat on her back in the mud and leaves. Wiki squatted beside her as Seabee fanned her arms and legs back and forth. Repeating the movement two more times, the child raised her head and looked at the design and started to laugh and roll side to side.

“My mud angel.” Wiki grinned to her daughter’s delight.

Seabee swung her hair, casting a muddy spray of drops onto her momma’s face, hand and clothing.

“I’m going to moyder you,” Wiki told her, joining in the laughter.

33

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Greg Jolley earned a Master of Arts in Writing from the University of San Francisco. He is the author of fourteen novels and a collection of short stories about the fictional Danser family. He lives in the very small town of Whitmore Lake, Michigan.