Caught In The Act. Gayle Roper

It was 8:30. We’d been at the house for about three hours. I was already a half hour late for the photos of the AAC-FOP committee, and I had to take Jolene home yet. I shrugged. Hopefully the committee had lots of last-minute plans to make and would still be there by the time I managed to make it.

      We drove back to Amhearst in silence. I kept thinking that one second you’re alive, and the next you can be dead. One minute your brain is zipping electrical impulses all over your body, the next it’s flat line. One minute your blood is racing through your veins, and the next it’s a pool all over the yellow tile floor.

      A mystery, if ever there was one. What did you think about this phenomenon called death if you didn’t believe that absent from the body was present with the Lord?

      We drove through downtown Amhearst, past the cluster of brightly decorated stores open until nine in a mostly vain attempt to attract the Christmas business back from the malls. Shortly we pulled up before half of a double on Houston Street in the older, less prosperous part of town.

      The light by the front door showed a porch covered with bright green indoor/outdoor carpeting and lined with black wrought-iron railings. In spite of it being December, two white molded plastic chairs sat on either side of a small white plastic table in the center of the porch. On the table was an arrangement of plastic greens and an angel whose head turned from side to side. A wreath of plastic greens with a mashed plaid bow hung between the storm door and the inside door.

      I couldn’t imagine anything more unlike the mansion we’d just left.

      Jolene grabbed my arm. “Come in with me, Merry. I can’t face my parents alone. They loved Arnie. They really did.”

      The last thing I wanted to do was help break the news of the tragedy, but I opened my car door and climbed out. We started up the steps as the door of the other half of the double opened. A man in a camel topcoat came rushing out only to stop short when he saw us.

      “Jolene,” he said and sort of reached for her.

      “Reilly.” Jolene nodded at the man but kept walking up the stairs, making it obvious that she wasn’t stopping for conversation.

      Reilly watched her with a hungry expression, but when Jolene kept moving, he went down the steps to a car at the curb.

      “Who’s he?” I asked as we reached the porch.

      “Reilly Samson. He works with Arnie. His grandmother lives next door.”

      “Her?” I indicated the gap between the curtains next door where an eye stared at us. I smiled and nodded. The curtain promptly fell back in place.

      “Old Mrs. Samson, the world’s nosiest neighbor,” Jolene muttered. Her face twisted. “Wait until she hears about Arnie! She’ll probably celebrate.”

      “What?” I was shocked.

      “She hated him.”

      “Why?”

      “Who knows. She’s just a bitter old lady who hates everyone.”

      “Even Reilly?”

      “Sometimes I think so.”

      “Even you?” I couldn’t resist asking.

      “Especially me,” Jolene said.

      “Really? Why?”

      “Because I got rich.” With that, she opened the front door.

      The house was a typical Amhearst double with two stories plus basement and attic. The rooms ran in a front-to-back pattern of living room, dining room, kitchen, and back porch on the first level with a large staircase in the front hall running to the second floor where a hall opened into three large bedrooms and a bath. The third-floor attic where the roof pulled the walls in would be a single huge room. A postage stamp of a backyard finished the property.

      As soon as we came through the front door, an older man and woman rushed into the hall, swooping down on us and burying us in solicitude and questions about Jolene’s tardiness. I was surprised because I hadn’t realized that Jolene’s grandparents lived here, too.

      “Come in, come in,” the man kept saying to me, beaming as he tried to take my coat. A slight Southern accent colored his voice. “I’m so glad Jolene brought a friend home with her!”

      “Are you all right, Jolene Marie?” The woman scanned Jo’s face and hugged her shoulders. “You don’t look well, dear. Maybe we need to make it warmer for you? We can turn up the thermostat, can’t we, Alvin? Or maybe you just want to come into the kitchen. I saved your dinner. There’s plenty for your friend, too. Are you certain you’re all right?” And she pulled Jolene to her bosom again.

      Jolene pulled away from the smothering arms and said, “Mom, that’s enough! Dad, make her stop.”

      Mom? Dad? Not Grandmom and Grandpop?

      “Easy, Eloise,” Jo’s dad said, patting the woman on the shoulder. “We need to meet Jolene’s friend.”

      Suddenly I was being stared at by two curious elderly gnomes, one with vague blue eyes, one with sharp brown ones.

      “This is Merry Kramer, Merry as in Christmas. We work together.” Jo made it sound as if I were a fellow escapee from a chain gang.

      “Merry.” Jolene’s mother smiled sweetly at me. “What a lovely name, especially this time of year. Were you born in December, dear? I just bet you were.”

      “June,” I said.

      “Oh.” She looked confused. “I thought Jolene Marie said Merry.”

      I must have looked equally confused because Jolene’s father said, “The month of June, Eloise. Not the name.”

      The woman smiled sweetly. “Oh, of course. Silly me.”

      She looked older than my Grandmom Kramer by several years, though I knew she couldn’t be. Grandmom Kramer was seventy-nine, and there’s no way she could have a daughter as young as Jolene. Of course the appearance of age could have been caused by this woman’s determinedly gray hair and the too-tight permanent, the unbecoming glasses and the lined face.

      As I smiled my sweetest at Jolene’s mother and father, I searched my mind for Jolene’s maiden name. Carlsbad. Mammoth. Jewel. It had something to do with caves or caverns. Ah! Luray!

      “Mr. and Mrs. Luray, how nice to meet you.” I shook their hands prettily. My mother would have been proud.

      “Right this way, girls,” Mrs. Luray said. “The food’s waiting.”

      Mr. Luray was wrestling me for my coat while my stomach growled at the wondrous aromas that filled the air. No wonder Jolene came home for dinner every night. “I can’t stay.” AAC-FOP was waiting. “I’m sorry.”

      “I wish you would.” Mr. Luray’s fingers wrapped around my coat collar as he tried to drag it off my shoulders. He was bald, homely, wore thick glasses and had muscles on muscles. It was obvious he and Arnie had bonded over weights. “Jolene doesn’t bring friends home much.”

      “Dad,” Jolene said sharply. “Let Merry alone, for heaven’s sake!”

      Mr. Luray nodded pleasantly. “Okay.” His hands fell from my collar.

      Mrs. Luray peered first at Jolene, then at me. “You do look pale, Jolene Marie. You do. So do you, Merry, but then maybe you’re always pale. I wouldn’t know, would I?” She smiled vaguely at me, patting my hand.

      I smiled vaguely back.

      “But are you sure you girls are all right? Have you had a disagreement or something? I know that when I have a fight with Mrs. Samson, Dad can always tell because I look so pale.” She smiled at me again. “Not that we have that many fights, you know. But that’s how it shows when we do. Or maybe—” and her smile faltered as she turned to Jo “—maybe you had a fight with Arnie, dear? You didn’t have another fight with him,