Seven Stories. Story One, Part 2.
Editor’s Note: We are pleased and excited to introduce our newest Hummingbird Guest Contributor, Beth Kalet. “Trouble” is one of 7 short stories included in Beth’s book Seven Stories, published in 2012. Hummingbird will be publishing it in parts, one per week over the next few weeks, so please check out Parts 1 & 2 and stay tuned for the rest of the story as it unfolds here.
Beth is an accomplished writer and editor. Her work, and her own story are what encouraged us to reach out to her. Please give a warm reader’s welcome to Beth, and feel free to comment at the bottom of the page.
Let’s dive into “Trouble.” I assure you, you will not be disappointed. Welcome Beth!
Photo Credit: Diane Pell
Trouble’s Always Just Around the Corner. Part 2.
I’d had to say I was sick to get the extra day off from work. Another thing Harry had me do. Forget that. Another lesson learned. Think for yourself kid. I called up to see if I could get back on the schedule for Saturday and luckily I could. Saturday night’s my favorite shift to work, as it happens, because it is date night.
Well, of course, I had to find a bus back home, but all that did was make me feel even stronger in my independence. Why on earth I’d ever fallen for Harry in the first place, I don’t know…just because he was good looking and made everything fun? I should have known better.
Glad to be home in my own little apartment in Woodbridge. Thank god I have no roommates. Rather be alone for this. A little self-pity, a little righteous indignation. A new bottle of pinot.
Should a girl know better when all of her friends don’t like a guy? When not a one can think of something good to say about him? No one liked his cute wink or his newsboy caps. Not even Marla, who would pick out the slightest thing about an otherwise boring guy to salvage his supposed cuteness. She was now seeing a guy named Gerry, with the creepy habit of pinching his own chest. He left little dirt marks on all his shirts. But in him she saw a guy with a sweet humble smile. In Harry she found nothing good. She didn’t even give me a pass for his cooking skills. There’s something about him I just don’t like, she said, sorry.
But then we – Harry and me -- found all that stuff on the sidewalk in front of the foreclosed upon junk shop -- The Hindenberg. There was the old record player and the record albums. Harry bought a needle and we listened to them all, dancing to the Sinatra crooning wannabees, guys we’d never heard of, shaking our hair and imitating the ‘60s teenagers for the old rock and roll stuff, if that’s what it was … Freddy and the Hoboes, Jack and the Bean Stalks, whoever they were. That was a good time. By the time we took a good look at the paintings, we’d tossed out some true junk, put some in the Goodwill box and kept a lot of weird stuff. Thought we’d go to the Iron Ring Flea Market on a Sunday, with the good stuff. Harry said he knew some people there.
That was how we sold the paintings. We knew when we took a good look at them, they were a cut above the other junk. I dusted them off, carefully. I knew enough not to disturb the paint. Googled the artist and found they were worth something. Can’t say as I loved any of them. Dark scenes with bag ladies trudging along empty streets, dogs fighting over scraps by a sewer, a kid playing jacks on a patch of dirt beside a brick building. Real downers. Depressing.
On Monday I went to my day job, taking calls at the hospital, which was where I had met Harry six months ago. He’d turned down the wrong corridor and ended up in my little office, where I sit with three other women, each of us behind a little beige desk set on beige carpeting, running up against rosy pink walls decorated with soft flowery paintings. Sometimes I want to curl up behind my desk on the carpet and fall asleep. It’s so soothing. It is.
I was having trouble concentrating on the routine tasks of my hospital job ‑- checking calendars for the diabetes club meetings, writing up announcements for the hospital tour dates, posting notices for the breakfast with Dr. Sammi, stuff like that. But I consoled myself that it was normal to grieve over a lost love. Not that I could rightly call Harry a love. We hadn’t really seen all that much of each other. For the six months since we’d met, I’d say we had about four actual dates. They were pretty good, though.
But then, again, when I thought about where this would have gone, me and Harry, I had to admit that the answer was: nowhere. In just six months, it had already become an up and down thing. I should admit it was up and down. He could be fun. He could come over with a bag of groceries and cook up a crazy meal. But he could pace around in my apartment, looking at my pictures on the walls, asking me who was standing beside me in this one or that one; he would sometimes blame me for crazy stuff, like moving his keys or his cap or coughing during a movie.
On Tuesday a pair of plain-clothes police appeared in front of my desk. They had not gotten there by accident. They were actually looking for me, specifically.
“Is there some place we could go to talk privately?” the woman officer asked me, almost in a whisper. I guess she could tell I was confused. “We’d like to talk to you, if you have a minute,” she said, a little conspiratorially.
This resembled nothing like I’d seen during my many hundreds of hours watching “Law and Order.” Neither she nor her partner, a younger shorter blander generic cop type, was smartly dressed. They weren’t mildly sexy. They weren’t well groomed even. They looked like Sears or K-mart models. You know, dressed for business in wrinkle-free polyester, no muss no fuss hair, soft featureless faces. But they had strong hands and great posture. They were cops. Local cops.
“Excuse me a minute,” I said to Emily, who had the desk closest to mine and was also the nosiest person in the office.
“Follow me,” I told the officers. I took them to a section of the chapel, designed for families going through trying times. No one else was there. Even though I was the host, more or less, they motioned for me to sit down.
“Miss Barnes, do you know someone by the name of Harrison Thomas?” the male cop asked me. They had both sat down and pulled their chairs close in to me. I presume so I could not escape.
I found I could not look either of them directly in their eyes but knew that I had to. I had nothing to hide but they made me feel ashamed somehow. I purposely looked from one to the other, nodding.
“Not really. Not by that name,” I said. “But I think you are asking me about Harry, the Harry I know.”
First rule of talking with cops: Don’t give up any information you are not asked for. The first rule and I had blown it in no time flat. And with these two! Jeez. I was a little embarrassed. On the other hand, they had to be asking me about Harry and for what reason on earth, for what earthly reason would I want to shield him?
“What name do you know him by Miss Barnes?” the cop asked me.
“Harry Newsome?” I asked back at him, hoping I’d picked one he would recognize.
“Is that so?” he said.
“Well, yes. I believe that was – is – his name. The Harry I know, I mean.”
It turns out that speaking with cops, or more rightly, being grilled by cops, is nerve-wracking, just as you might expect. No matter what you say, you feel it isn’t entirely truthful and they know that. So far, I could honestly count three questions they’d asked me: Can we talk? Do you know someone? And, is that so? But, I was feeling the heat. I felt soon I would confess to having taken the extra bag of M&Ms that had dropped out of the candy machine in the kitchen here last week.
“And, what is your relationship to Harry Newsome?” the woman cop asked me.
“Nothing. We have no relationship,” I said. But then that seemed inadequate, as both sat there in their comfy chairs, looking at me. The woman cocked her head, like a dog might.
“But you know him,” she said. It wasn’t a question.
“I do. I did. But I don’t want to know him anymore,” I said. And I couldn’t help but let out a sigh. This was getting tiring.
“And why is that Miss Barnes? Julie?” Now it was the male cop. Did I really have to say anything to him? Could I just say, “It’s personal,” and leave it at that? Why is it his business? Shouldn’t he tell me something now?
“Did something happen between you two?” He just couldn’t let it sit.
“You know,” I said. “I’d actually like to know why you’re here talking to me. What’s this all about? You know I know Harry. What about him?”
“Julie,” he said firmly. And they were both looking at me now in a way that said: We have all day, lady.
“We’d like to understand the nature of your relationship,” said the woman cop, like it was the most natural question in the world to ask a stranger. “Why did you book a room at the Water’s Edge Motel in Atlantic Beach on your credit card last Thursday?”
She knew a little too much about me. I had booked that motel on my card but Harry had paid cash, I thought, when he left before me. Now, I was getting panicky. Did he tell them to charge my card? Damn, I wanted to go online and check but I felt I needed to act calm. Not betray myself.
“Was it a pleasure trip?” she asked.
“Well, it was supposed to be,” I said. Now I was feeling impatient and also like I had less and less reason to hide whatever my “relationship” with Harry ever was and by the way certainly was not anymore. And, another thing: Was it some sort of a crime to sell old paintings you found on the street?
“Harry and I went for a long weekend,” I said. “To the beach. You know. A getaway. No, I mean a little time off, a break, a lark…you know? ”
“So you were dating? Boyfriend and girlfriend, then?” asked the woman.
“I guess. Maybe.”
“But….” She said, trying to lead me to say more. Again, the two of them were looking at me with that world weary, been there done that, expressionless mask. They knew where this was going and sooner or later I would help them get there. That was the way they played it, I guess. It probably didn’t matter, then, what I said.
“But,” I repeated, “I…we… didn’t have that good of a time and he left before I did.” Must I really confess that I was dumped by this creep? Clearly, they already knew he was a creep. Why were they torturing me?
“Why was that, Julie?” the woman asked me.
It occurred to me that they had introduced themselves but I had totally blanked on their names. It would help if I could think of them as people…with names.
“You know,” I said, forcing myself to look into the woman’s eyes first and then turning to make eye contact with the man. Not something a criminal might do, I reminded myself. “I’ve forgotten your names officers. Would you mind telling me again?”
“Sure,” they both said, fishing out business cards and handing them to me.
“I’m Detective Grindhart,” said the man. His card read: Patrick S. Grindhart, Detective.
The woman was Officer Tonya Farris.
We shook hands.
“Now I assume you want to get back to work,” Tonya Farris said to me. “So, let’s do this. You tell us a few more details, then let’s meet for coffee when you’re done with work to talk a little bit more. How’s six o’clock for you? At the Wayside Diner, around the corner.”
Was there really any question?
Part 3 to follow.
Story One, Trouble’s Always Just Around the Corner, Unfolds
Story One. Part 1.
Story One. Part 2. (This one,)
© Beth Kalet
To learn more and to purchase Beth Kalet’s book, Seven Stories, please click here. You may also contact Beth through Hummingbird by clicking here.
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