Unsightly Bulges Read online

  “Why do you call him a creep?” Viv asked. “Besides that he stole your fiancé?”

  “He just is. He’s really snide, you know.” She shook her head. “Look, I don’t know how to say it without sounding completely intolerant and homophobic, and I don’t think I am, I really don’t. But Marky was just...obnoxious. Especially around me, I think. Walking in a prissy way, you know? Exaggerating all his gestures, making all these double entendre remarks. Just very in your face about it all.” She put her hands to her face and gave me a pleading look. “I don’t even know how to say it. I’m not impartial – I know I’m not. I’m destroyed by all this, and I’m angry at CJ and...I detest Marky because I feel like this is all his fault. Like it all started when he came to town.” Then she frowned and blinked away tears. “But of course, that’s not true either. It didn’t start with Marky. It just...it all ended with him.”

  “How did CJ feel about the stories last week, that he’d been...less than forthcoming, I guess you’d say? About the donations to Friends of Joshua?”

  She shook her head and sat back in her chair again, as if she was suddenly exhausted. “We didn’t talk about it much. We weren’t talking about anything much, at that point. I did see him when the hospital had their carnival Wednesday night. The firm sponsors some of the hospital’s fund raising events, and we had to be together. He seemed...just sad, I guess. Worried. But like I said, we didn’t talk about it much except to acknowledge that it was an issue. He worried that it would hurt the donations. The attendance at the carnival was lighter than it had been the year before, and he was concerned about that.”

  Viv and I looked at each other, and I figured we were about out of questions. She leaned forward. “Ms. Shaw, do you have any idea who might have wanted to hurt CJ? Who might be responsible for his death?”

  She closed her eyes and looked toward her windows, but I didn’t think she was seeing the outside. I thought she was seeing the same thing I was – all the hate-filled comments on the Lubbock Journal website. “I know a lot of people were supportive of him, but a lot were angry, too. I quit listening to the radio, after hearing all the people who thought CJ should be fired, lose his medical license, or be strung up on the nearest flagpole. Who knows? Right now I feel like I need to double-check to make sure the ground is still down and the sky up. You know?” She shook her head lightly and looked back at us, giving a flat, humorless smile. “I’m sorry, I’m not much help. The truth is, I have no idea who could have done this. I have no idea of anything.”

  I looked at Viv, and she gave me a slight nod.

  She flipped her notebook shut and tucked it back into her handbag. “Well, we appreciate your time. Like I said, I know this must have been very difficult.”

  She narrowed her eyes a little, as if something had just dawned on her. “Who did you say hired you?”

  I tried really hard not to look at Viv, but we did exchange a brief look.

  “I’m sorry, but we’re unable to divulge that information.” Viv gave an apologetic smile.

  “Did the Hardins hire you?”

  “No, not them. Listen, thanks again for your time. Please call us if you think of anything else that might be pertinent – anything at all.” Viv backed up until she was standing practically on top of me.

  Desiree Shaw glanced again at the card on her desk and then back at us. “Who hired you?” she asked again.

  I stepped around Viv and met her gaze. “I’m sorry that we seem secretive,” I said. I couldn’t very well tell her the truth – we’re basically just meddling in other people’s business because it distracts us from our own boring lives. But what I could say, I meant. “We’re here on behalf of someone who cares about CJ and who cares very much that the truth be told. We’re here on behalf of someone who wants nothing more than justice to be served.”

  Her brow remained furrowed, but she relaxed her shoulders some and seemed to accept that.

  Viv gave me an I’m-impressed eyebrow and we left.

  Viv and I were silent for a while as we drove back for me to pick my car up at Flo’s. I held Stump in my lap and stroked her head, thinking.

  “That was intense,” I said, finally. I pictured with horror just how more awkward it could have been if Dale had joined us and said, without thinking, “Thank goodness we dropped Dale off first.” Then, afraid that sounded as petty and jealous as I actually was, I said, “I mean, I think he would have been fine. It would have been too overwhelming for her to see all three of us at once, that’s all. I’m sure he’s getting good information from the preacher guy. It’s good that we’re able to work like this, you know. Divide and conquer.” I shut up, knowing I was talking too much.

  Viv adjusted the air conditioner vents. “Do you like her for this?”

  I started to say, “She seemed nice,” before I realized Viv wasn’t asking if I liked her. She was doing that thing where she used TV detective speak, asking me if I thought Desiree Shaw could be the killer. “No,” I said. “I did not get a single killer vibe from her.”

  “She has more reason to be mad at him than anyone else. He led her on for years. She gave up the best years of her life for him.”

  “Umm, Viv? She’s, what, 26? I think she still has time to recover a few years of that life.” I thought of that slim figure, shiny thick hair and law degree on the wall. I kind of figured Desiree Shaw was going to be okay, eventually.

  “It makes me really sad,” I said after a few more minutes of silence. “That someone would have to go to such lengths to cover up who they are. Work so hard to be someone different. It sounds exhausting.”

  My upbringing could scarcely have been more different than CJ Hardin’s. He was the golden child, his family well-known for generations. I wasn’t even completely sure who my father was. My mother had never hidden the fact that having a kid had not been her great plan and she hadn’t particularly cared for being my mother. Expectations for me were not high. In fact, I doubted there were expectations for me at all. Mom led her life and if I got in the way – as I did, when one boyfriend and husband after another came through our lives wreaking varying degrees of havoc –she shipped me to my G-Ma’s motel. Her mother, my G-Ma, owned a seedy single-level motel on what had once been a bustling highway through Lubbock, before the Interstate was built. I figured I spent at least half my childhood at the motel.

  I had always envied people like Desiree Shaw and CJ Hardin. Kids with stable families, and parents who believed their kid was a gift from God to be treasured. I’d never considered that that could also come with its own burden. I was free to make whatever decisions and mistakes I felt like, considering only what I wanted to do, but people like CJ and Desiree had to weigh what their parents and friends would think. I didn’t waste a bit of energy worrying about what other people thought of me. I was fairly sure no one thought of me at all.

  If given the choice, I would undoubtedly take their situation over mine. It would be nice to know that someone thought I could do anything and didn’t see me as an inconvenience, or an obligation to get out of the way as quickly and cheaply as possible. But still...I’d always known I was a disappointment and an inconvenience, so I had never had to fear what would happen if...

  I looked at Viv. “So, what do you think about this CJ Hardin thing?”

  “What do you mean? I think he was murdered. I think we solve murders.”

  “No, I mean his whole life of secrecy thing. I just keep thinking how sad it would be to have to live like that. Afraid for your secrets to come out.”

  “It would suck, that’s for sure. But you know how people are. They get all freaked out over stuff like that.”

  “What about you? You grew up in...” I trailed off when I realized the gist of what I had been about to say was, You’re old, isn’t everyone in your generation homophobic?

  “I grew up in Chicago,” she said. “And Indianapolis, for a while.”

  “Were you taught that it was wrong, though? Homosexuality, I mean?”
r />   “I wasn’t taught anything,” she said, swinging a turn that was a bit too wide. “We didn’t talk about stuff like that when I was growing up. I knew plenty of gay people, though.”

  “You did?”

  “Yeah, I told you I danced with the Rockettes, didn’t I? New York City –that’s where people go when they need to get out of places like Lubbock. When they don’t want their entire lives to be secret.”

  I thought about that for a moment. It was no secret that Viv was way more hip than I would ever be, but still, her casual attitude about the subject kind of shocked me.

  “Were you okay with it? Did it make you uncomfortable or anything?”

  Viv shrugged. “I guess it did, at first. I found out this other dancer had a thing for me. It was flattering, actually. I mean, someone thinking you’re pretty is someone thinking you’re pretty, right?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “I don’t know. Back then I just wanted to experience the world, and that was part of the world. They were here and they were queer. So I got used to it.”

  Three

  Love is patient and kind; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own was; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.

  Sometimes the devotional camped out on one section for a few days, and this appeared to be one of those times. The next day was a continuation of the love verses from First Corinthians. I thought God was unnecessarily flogging me with this love thing, when clearly I had tried very hard the day before to be patient and kind. Had I not made repeated remarks that I wanted to include Dale in our team? Had I not gotten him a job? Had I not not punched him in the face when I would have been justified in doing so?

  It made me irritable and resentful, but at God this time, and not Dale. Although it was Dale’s fault, too, because he was the one who was getting me in trouble with God.

  See? I’m, like, six years old.

  Anyway, I managed a smile for Dale when he showed up on my front deck once again. Inside I was thinking (resentfully as hell, to be honest,) See, God. I am patient and kind. So there.

  “Ready for day two?” I asked cheerfully. I didn’t even hesitate to put Stump into the back seat. I patted her cheerfully on the head and slammed the door. By the time I got into the driver’s seat, she was grunting and trying to shove her way between the seats, but her substantial width made it difficult.

  Fairly confident that she wouldn’t get so stuck that I couldn’t free her, I left her to it while we drove to Flo’s Bow Wow Barbers.

  “So, how’d it go at the domino hall?” I asked Dale.

  He shook his head. “Not much to tell. Brother Parker is gone to a conference all week. Won’t be back in town until Saturday.”

  I looked at him. “So...you got nothing?”

  “Nada,” he confirmed.

  Ha! I thought. You got nothing and Viv and I talked to the girlfriend!

  Wow, came a divinely sarcastic voice in my head. How patient and kind of you.

  I wasn’t sure if that was God talking to me or my own conscience, but I was really annoyed with both of them.

  I felt a soft thud to my elbow and looked down to see Stump shoving herself, repeatedly and without any noticeable success, through the seats. Like a Q-Tip battering ram.

  “Good grief,” I said, reaching back an arm to scoop her butt toward me. She groaned and flailed with her back feet, then stumbled and slid against the emergency brake, but between the two of us we got her into my lap. “This is not safe,” I told her. “If we have an accident, you’re going to become my airbag. You get that, right?”

  “Umm, I don’t think she really has the critical thinking skills to understand that, no,” Dale said with a laugh and a look at me like I was an idiot. “Plus, she can’t actually understand what you’re saying. People think dogs can learn language, but they actually just learn to associate certain sounds with certain outcomes. Like they know when you say, ‘go’ because you make that sound and then you get in the car. But they don’t learn actual language skills.”

  “Ummm, I know, I was just...” I bit back a sigh and shifted as Stump tried to turn circles in my lap. Those sounded like language skills to me. “So, you got nothing, huh?”

  Viv was waiting for us again when we got off work. Dale and I had both talked to her on the phone, so I sat silently and tried not to look smug when we compared notes and all the information we’d gained so far had come from Viv and me – mostly me. It was hard. Dale had criticized my customer service skills, my scissoring work, and had said one of my favorite customers, a tiny gray poodle who just happened to be somewhat tightly wound, acted like she needed doggie psych meds. I wasn’t feeling particularly loving toward him at the moment, but I was determined to paste a smile on my face and get on with it. I didn’t want to be stuck back in First Corinthian land tomorrow.

  “So, what’s next,” I said from the backseat. “The preacher guy is still out of town. Who else is on our list of hate groups?”

  “I was watching TV last night and realized we missed the obvious. The first thing Columbo does is go see the last person to see the victim alive.”

  “That would be, Marky, right?”

  “Hey, I know that guy,” Dale said. “Did I tell you that?”

  “Yes,” Viv said.

  “No,” I said. I looked at Viv. “You were discussing the case without me?”

  “Oh yeah,” Dale said. “We talked all about it last night after bingo.”

  I glared at them both. Bingo?! I’d gone home alone to do laundry and read up on CJ Hardin, and they’d been out playing bingo? I hated bingo, but still!

  “You can’t be talking about the case without me, Viv. I’m your partner.”

  Viv stuck her chin out, looking quite satisfied with herself. “Um-hmm. Look who’s talking about partnerships now. Weren’t you the one who’s all, ‘But we’re not real detectives, Viv. You’re just a bored old lady and I’m just a fat girl trying to find my dreams.’”

  My mouth hung open. “Umm, I never once said that.” Not out loud, anyway, I thought. “The point is, we’re in this together, whether we’re real detectives or not. And if you’re going to talk about the case, I need to be in on it. All information has to be shared equally.”

  Dale nodded emphatically. “Only fair.”

  I briefly indulged in the vision of opening his car door and watching him get sucked out and tumble down the highway behind us.

  Instead, I said, “How do you know him?”

  “We worked together at this telemarketing place over off Avenue J. He might still work there.”

  “How long ago was that?”

  Dale leaned his head back against the seat and thought. “Let’s see, was that right before the job with the city? No, I worked at that convenience store out by The Strip before the city job. So the telemarketer job was three jobs ago. So...three weeks ago? Yeah, about three weeks ago.”

  “Wow, a job a week,” Viv said. “You sure go through ‘em.”

  Dale nodded, looking tired. “Tell me.”

  It turned out that Dale didn’t know much about the guy, just that he smoked and he had a weird laugh, and he was from somewhere up north. I had spent my life in West Texas, however, so I knew ‘up north’ could mean anything north of Oklahoma City, and/or encompassing the entire east coast down to South Carolina.

  The telemarketing place was in an old office building, and a group of people stood around on the sidewalk in a haze of blue cigarette smoke.

  Dale nodded. “Yep, this is where they all hung out on smoke breaks. If he still works here, he’ll be out here.”

  It didn’t appear that he was, though. It also didn’t appear that anyone in the group was particularly glad to see Dale, despite his enthusiastic wave and cheerful “Hey, losers!” In fact, I thought I heard one girl in a Captain America t-shirt say, “Oh, hell. What’s he doing back?”

  Dale told them we were looking for that guy
Marky that was in the news.

  “I knew you’d be looking for him, man,” said a guy with a biohazard tattoo on his shoulder. He gave Dale a knowing sneer.

  Dale instantly bowed up and glared. “You’re looking for him, you freak.”

  “Um, actually we are looking for him,” Viv said, stepping in front of Dale. “Does he still work here?”

  “Nah,” said the girl in the Captain America shirt. “He didn’t show up one day.”

  “Do any of you know where we can find him?” I asked. “We need to speak to him.”

  “Tiffany in the office might know,” Biohazard said. “She keeps all the HR stuff. She probably has an address for him.”

  We took a few narrow hallways lined with moldy smelling orange carpet to an office where a girl in a pony tail and baggy knit pants was filing. Unlike the crowd outside, she seemed genuinely glad to see Dale. She also had the kind of rolled bangs that I had burned my forehead with the curling iron to get. In sixth grade.

  “Hi there, Tiffarooni,” Dale said with a wave.

  On closer look, it appeared that Tiffany was actually a bit past middle-aged, with graying brown hair and fairly significant bags under her eyes. The look on her face when she saw Dale, however, was pure preteen girl. “Are you back, then? Did Hal say you could come back?” She looked pitifully hopeful.

  “Are you kidding? He said he didn’t even want me up here to pick up my last check, that he’d mail it to me and for me to never darken this door again.”

  Viv and I looked at each other, then looked around uneasily. “You didn’t mention that part,” I said.

  Dale shrugged. “What’s he going to do, call the cops?”

  “Oh yeah!” Tiffany said, as if he’d just reminded her. “That’s what I’m supposed to do if you show up. Call the cops.”