Unsightly Bulges Read online

  I shouldn’t have tried to drown my emotions in fat and carbs. If I had to endure one more weigh-in day with Trisha squealing about her two and three pound losses while I got a, “That’s another point two for you, Salem! High five, Sister Fighter!” with the overly enthusiastic smile from our Fat Fighters team leader, I was going to punch more than the air.

  “Some naked guy, huh?” Viv dropped onto the ottoman across from me.

  “Naked dead guy,” I said. “Don’t sound so intrigued.”

  Viv’s age was unclear, mainly because she had turned out to be a pathological liar. She pretty much made things up as she went along. But she was old enough to look eighty-something and to live in Belle Court Retirement Center. She just wasn’t old enough to realize she was an old lady. Still, for her, maybe she was close enough to death herself that “dead” in a guy wasn’t the deal breaker it was for the rest of us.

  “Naked dead guy in a dumpster,” Viv said, looking contemplative. “You don’t see that every day.”

  “Not every day,” Frank agreed.

  “Let’s make a game plan.” She reached into her $700 designer handbag and pulled out a flip notebook. “First, we have to find out who it was.”

  I groaned. Viv and I had accidentally solved a murder case a few months back, and ever since then she believed we were some kind of crime-fighting duo. She had ordered a private detective certificate online and had cards printed up. The cards had red lipstick and handcuffs on the front, so the receiver couldn’t be sure if he was getting an offer for PI services or a very disappointing threesome.

  “I don’t think we need to get involved in this,” I said. I hauled myself out of the chair and dug the broccoli out of the crisper. I found the Fat Fighters magazine and turned to the crack broccoli recipe, doing my best to keep an open mind. “This has nothing to do with us. At least with Lucinda Cruz we had a reason to get involved. We were helping Tony.”

  Tony. Tony Solis, who had been my teenage husband a million years ago, and the man I thought of as my ex-husband for the past decade. But then I happened to find a dead girl, and Tony had been accused of killing her. In the ensuing investigation I’d learned that we never actually got divorced. So I was a married woman. And Tony and I had a “date” in three days.

  I felt suddenly light-headed and pulled up a barstool to the kitchen counter for balance. Thinking about Tony, and thinking about whatever was or was not going to happen on that date, was way more disconcerting than thinking about dead bodies and crime fighting.

  “It was good to help Tony,” Viv said. “I like helping people, don’t you? Someone here needs our help.”

  I took a deep breath and tried to focus on the recipe. I was supposed to peel the “woody stems” from the broccoli. I turned the broccoli back and forth. They did look like little trees, but still. Woody stems?

  I decided maybe a murder investigation was just the thing to take my mind off my complete neurosis about Tony. “You might have a point,” I allowed.

  “I always have a point,” Viv said. “What are you doing with that?”

  “I’m roasting it,” I said. “It’s supposed to make it like crack.”

  “Crack doesn’t taste good.”

  I gave her a look.

  “I assume.” she said. “I mean, why would it taste good? It’s crack.”

  “I think the point is, it doesn’t taste like broccoli.”

  “I am unclear on the purpose of buying broccoli when you don’t like the taste of broccoli.”

  “That’s because you’ve never been a fat woman trying to squeeze into a dress for a date with the husband she hasn’t dated in ten years.”

  Uh-oh. That reminded me that I also had to buy a dress. I was seeing spots now. I put the knife down and bent over. I tried to put my head between my knees because that was what you were supposed to do when you felt faint, but I was too fat to get all the way there. I got my head near my knees. Near-ish. “Thinking about Tony is freaking me out,” I said. “Let’s talk some more about the murder.”

  “Atta girl. First we have to identify the victim.”

  “You know,” I gasped. It was hard to breathe, bent over like that. I couldn’t help but think I was doing it wrong. I lifted up a little and looked at Viv. “We don’t know for sure it’s even a murder.”

  “Yeah, some guy might have just gotten naked, crawled into the dumpster and died on purpose.”

  “He might have been wasted or something. Overdosed. But yeah, it was probably a murder. What did they say on the scanner?”

  “Oh, it was that guy that took Stump to the vet. Hawkins?”

  “Watkins?”

  “Yeah, Watkins. He called it in to Bobby. He said, ‘Your girlfriend is at it again.’”

  I jerked my head up. “He said what? He called me Bobby’s girlfriend?” More spots. More freaking out. I tried to remember if Bobby had been giving off any I-think-of-you-as-my-girlfriend vibes while we were in the alley with the garbage truck. All I had picked up on was an I-think-of-you-as-a-pain-in-my-ass vibe, but those weren’t mutually exclusive, necessarily. “Was it, like, a joke? Was he laughing?”

  “I don’t know; it was the police scanner. It was breaking up.”

  “What did Bobby say?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  I leaped up and grabbed her by her bony old lady arms. “Viv, think! What did he say?”

  She pulled away and gave me a look that clearly said I was a maniac. “Something like, ‘You gotta be frigging kidding. God help me.’ Something along those lines.”

  “But did he say anything about me being his girlfriend? This is important!”

  Viv studied me carefully. “You need to get a grip.”

  I groaned and dropped back to the stool. “I know. I’m not going to think about that anymore, either.” The list of things I didn’t want to deal with was growing.

  I heard a knock at the door at the same instant Frank said, “Some dude is here.”

  “Is it Tony or Bobby?” I asked. Well, screeched. Because if it was either one, I planned to pretend no one was home. Even though the door was open and the “dude” could see us walking around inside.

  “No, some skinny dude.” I had known Frank long enough to know that it wasn’t laziness or rudeness that kept his own skinny butt sitting in my recliner instead of getting up to answer the door. The thought had simply not occurred to him. Frank was one of the best spectators I had ever known.

  I wiped the little broccoli bits off my hands and went to the door.

  “How did you find me?” I asked Dale as I answered the door.

  “That cop? He gave me your address.”

  “Bobby, the detective?” That didn’t sound like him, giving my address to strange guys.

  “No, the uniform cop. He said he knew you would be good with it.”

  Watkins. Now, that did sound like him. He was getting back at me because Bobby made him take Stump to the vet when she’d been hurt during our last foray into crime solving.

  Dale lifted his hands. “I knew it. They fired me.”

  “You’re kidding! Why would they fire you for something that was clearly not your fault?”

  “It’s a bunch of political BS. They’ve been looking for a reason pretty much since the day I came. They said I didn’t follow procedure –” He made air quotes. “I didn’t report the incident –” more air quotes – “correctly, which is an automatic write-up, and unfortunately it was my third write-up, so they had no choice –” Man, this guy liked his air quotes – “But to let me go. Frigging political BS is all it is. Man, whatever you’re cooking smells delicious.” He rubbed his skinny belly.

  I looked around, wondering what he could possibly smell, since the broccoli was still raw and on the counter.

  “You don’t mind if I stay for dinner, do you? Mainly I just need someone to hang out with tonight, because this whole thing has me kind of freaked out.”

  “Sure,” I said, remembering the way the poor guy h
ad keeled over in the alley.

  I went into the kitchen and leaned close to Viv’s ear. “We have to be nice to this guy; he’s had a hard time of it.” Sometimes Viv needed an explicit reminder to be nice.

  I would set a good example, I thought, although I really had no idea what I was going to feed him. I hoped this was one of those times when just being around other people – even people who fed you broccoli – was better than being alone. It sucked, being fired. I knew. It had happened to me more than once. Of course, with me it was usually my fault and not just political BS.

  I rummaged through cupboards and pulled out everything that was generally considered edible: half a box of dried spaghetti, a can of tuna, some chow mein noodles, and some saltines. I laid it all on the counter by the broccoli and opened the fridge, taking out another crown of broccoli, half a cucumber, and a jug of skim milk with about four ounces in the bottom. After some hesitation I left the tub of non-fat “butter” that I’d bought my first week at Fat Fighters, the one with only half a teaspoon gone from it. That stuff was disgusting, and it looked like my little pile of stuff didn’t need any more strikes against it.

  I studied the array and prayed for a miracle.

  “We’re not eating that,” Viv announced, picking up her pink-jewel-encrusted smartphone. “I’ll call Little Ling’s.”

  I said another prayer, this one of gratitude for such a quick (and truly miraculous – Viv hardly ever offered to pay) response, and began putting all that crap back into place.

  Viv ordered lo mein, moo shu, and fried rice. I did not once say, “Thanks, but I’ll eat my broccoli instead because I’m on a special Strat-EAT-Gic Plan.” I did not say, “Can we explore healthier alternatives?” I did not once look into my Fat Fighter materials to see just how many units were in lo mein so I could make an informed decision and plan the rest of my week accordingly. My Fat Fighters team leader would say that I had issues with speaking up for myself and that I needed to learn how to “put myself on the to-do list” and “make myself a priority.” Yeah, that was the issue, the reason I was having trouble losing weight: I was afraid of offending people. It was not that I jumped at the chance to eat something tasty and fattening and good, instead of that frigging broccoli.

  “We need to talk to your boyfriend,” Viv said after the initial pandemonium of divvying up the food had passed. “He can share what he’s learned so far.”

  I chewed on an egg roll and reflected that it must be nice to live in Viv’s delusional universe. “Bobby Sloan is not going to share what he’s learned. Not with us.”

  “That detective guy is your boyfriend?” Dale asked, with entirely too much incredulity.

  “Don’t look so shocked,” I said. “And no. He’s not.”

  Although he had kissed me. I was 98 percent sure that had really happened. The fact was, I had been kind of whacked-out on trauma and pain meds at the time. Plus, Bobby and I had not spoken to each other once in the few months since, so there was room for just a smidge of doubt in my own mind. “He’s not my boyfriend, and he does not share. Bobby does not play well with others. So what’s Plan B?”

  “Your reporter friend. She’ll have the inside scoop.”

  Thinking of Trisha made me feel guilty for taking another bite of that egg roll, but somehow I managed. I didn’t particularly want to see Trisha, but only because I was mad at her for doing better at Fat Fighters than I was. She probably would have some inside information that she could share with us.

  I checked the clock. She would be focused on getting the newscast ready. “I’ll call her after the late broadcast. And don’t call her a reporter. She’s an anchor, so I think that’s kind of an insult.”

  Meanwhile the carbs, fat, and sodium from Little Ling’s were doing their job, soothing over my anxiety and numbing my emotions. I cleared dishes and was wondering if I could snatch the rest of the moo shu from Frank in time to have enough left over for lunch tomorrow, when I realized that Viv and Dale were engrossed in an intense discussion about the body in the dumpster, without me.

  Dale dug a torn envelope from the stack of junk mail on my bar and started to sketch out plans.

  “So first we have to determine the motive,” he said, scribbling on the envelope.

  “Right. Who wanted this guy dead in a dumpster?” Viv narrowed her eyes and looked into the middle distance, as if the answer might possibly be hovering eighteen inches over my living room carpet.

  “Sounds like revenge to me,” I piped up because it was the only thing I could think of. I never have liked being left out of stuff.

  They ignored me.

  “Once we’ve determined motive, next comes opportunity.”

  “Why?” I asked, perhaps more irritably than was necessary. “Why does opportunity have to be next? It’s not like solving a murder is a neat three-step process where you just check off boxes, you know.”

  I dropped onto the ottoman that sat crookedly between the two of them, three ripped soy sauce packets still in my hand.

  Viv leaned over to see around me. “So we find out who was the last guy to see him alive,” she said. “And we work out from there.”

  Dale nodded, jaw slightly open as if this was one of the single most brilliant things he’d ever heard. He scribbled some more on the envelope.

  “What about known enemies?” I asked. “Police always ask about known enemies first. And spouses. Nine times out of ten, it’s the spouse.”

  “Which is why I’ll never get married,” Frank said, still staring at the television.

  “Got spouses already,” Dale said, not looking up from his scribbling.

  Having had enough, I sighed and rose, then threw the packets in the waste basket and licked a rivulet of spilled soy sauce off the back of my hand. I might as well add a little water retention to the growing list of annoyances.

  But what I’d said kept running through my head. Maybe there was a process that detectives followed to solve murders. Viv and I had solved one murder and a couple of petty crimes by watching reruns of Columbo and Matlock, but surely the real detectives had something a bit more structured. If it was to be found, it could be found by Google.

  My crappy Internet service and even crappier computer, a hand-me-down from Les’ son, allowed me to search “murder solving,” “how to solve a murder” and “most likely to commit murder.” This last one sidetracked me to a high school reunion website that turned out to be a big time suck. It had a multiple choice questionnaire that I couldn’t pass up. I was “Most Likely to be Involved in a Sex Scandal with a Faculty Member.”

  “Hey look,” Dale shouted when the teaser for the evening news came on, interrupting my “investigation.” “That’s my truck!”

  We all stood (except Frank, of course) and edged closer to the TV. A picture popped up of the alley, cordoned off with yellow police tape. There were cops everywhere, and spectators in the background. Dale’s garbage truck still sat where he’d stopped it. I guess they were processing it for evidence.

  “A disturbing discovery today in a mid-town garbage dumpster. Good evening, and thank you,” the anchor said, with his trademark solemn nod punctuating the words, “for joining us.”

  “Police are at the scene of a disturbing discovery in the alley of the 3300 block of Avenue B, where a dead body was found this afternoon by a City of Lubbock sanitation employee,” Trisha said in her most professional voice.

  “Ex-employee,” Dale said bitterly.

  “The discovery was made around 4:30 this afternoon. Very little is known at this time, but sources say the person in the dumpster was male, and believed to be deceased when the dumpster was picked up by the truck. Lubbock PD has scheduled a news conference for 8:00 p.m. with more information. We will bring you more as it becomes available.”

  They moved on to what would have been the biggest story of the day, sans a body-in-a-dumpster – a thunderstorm promising to build on the edge of the viewing area. My part of West Texas had been stuck in a drought for almo
st two years, and any hint of rain, no matter how remote, sent everyone into a breathless tizzy.

  “Well crap,” Viv said. “She didn’t tell us any more than we already knew.”

  “I’ll wait till the broadcast is over and then call Trisha. Patrice, I mean.” Trisha Thompson and I had grown up together in the neighboring small town of Idalou, Texas. She changed her name to Patrice Watson when she got married and started her career in broadcast news, but I was having a hard time making the name change. The best I had managed so far was to catch myself halfway through the name, so instead of “Patrice” it came out “Tri-patrice.”

  Her co-anchor moved on to a story about a local guy who’d been missing for a couple of days.

  “I saw this,” Frank said. “That guy took all the money and fleed. Fleeded.” He moved his lips silently a little, then stopped, apparently satisfied that he’d settled on the right word.

  “Took all what money?”

  “From that big fundraiser thing, you know the one for all the homeless people?”

  I had seen something about that, but to tell the truth, I’m sometimes a little too wrapped up in my own drama to pay that much attention to what was going on in town. I knew the big national organization, Hope for Home, had been having their annual blow-out fundraiser. I knew because my boss’s grandson had been selling coupon books to a bunch of local bars, restaurants and golf courses. I didn’t play golf, I was on probation and not allowed to enter bars, and, of course, everything in every restaurant was deep fried, which wasn’t the optimum way to “Fight the Fat!” as we Fat Fighters cheered every week, making muscleman poses. I bought a stupid coupon book anyway. Because of course I did.

  But now that Frank had reminded me, I remembered that the guy who was in charge of the whole shebang had disappeared Saturday afternoon, after the annual 5K “fun” run, which was the event that typically capped a week of various fund raising and awareness activities. It was a big deal because the same guy had been in charge of the event for the past seven or eight years, and this was the first hint of anything amiss. People were speculating that something awful had happened to him.