She talked about hiring a moving van for any furniture he wanted to keep, and that was when he suggested a tag sale. He knew some reliable people who could throw that together quick. He’d bring his own things with him, and rent a U-Haul if need be. He would move in a week from today. Would he be all right till then? Yes.
“How can I know that for sure?” she asked. She was holding his hand.
“Because I’m not going to do anything stupid.”
“What... what stopped you this afternoon?”
“Really why?”
“Really why.”
He shrugged. “Didn’t want to take the chance that you’d be the one who found me. Wouldn’t do that to you, honey. And pills? I might wind up a vegetable, and you don’t need that in your life.”
“There are other ways.”
“I’m squeamish about blood.”
“You? No you aren’t.”
“I’m squeamish about my blood.”
She smiled and squeezed his hand.
“And,” he said, “one time I found a guy who hanged himself. That didn’t look like any fun.”
She dropped her head and laughed a little. He could always make her laugh. A dark Danish sense of humor was something else they shared.
So it had all gone well. And now he was cooking his first meal in this house, and it would be a good one. He beat some milk, slowly, into the bowl of meat mixture, then egg, salt, and pepper. When the mixture got puffy, he shaped the mix into ovals. For now, he put the meatballs into the fridge.
That was when he noticed the bottles of Coors Light in with the Carlsberg.
He frowned at the interlopers. What were they doing in there, bringing down the property values like that? His eyes searched the shelves — was that yogurt? Dannon, which as a child his daughter had more than once described as “sweet snot,” an opinion he knew she still held. What was that vegetable — was that... oh my God, was that kale?
His first thought was that Krista had lost her mind. But he knew she had a boyfriend, that would-be writer what’s-his-name, who even back in his daughter’s high school days Keith considered a nincompoop. But she had a right to a boyfriend, even that one, and Jerry (that was it) was just the kind of person who would like kale and yogurt.
“Maybe even kale-flavored yogurt,” he said out loud. “Washed down with a Coors Light.”
Keith shrugged to himself. So she invited Jerry over, sometimes. No harm, no foul.
Nonetheless, he checked the medicine cabinet.
Hair gel? Head & Shoulders? Krista never suffered a flake of dandruff in her life. Hugo Boss cologne? Axe deodorant for men? Musk fragrance!
He shut the medicine cabinet door and frowned at his own image, which didn’t remind him one little bit of Paul Newman.
He forced his frown into submission, made his mouth nearly smile. She’s twenty-eight, he thought. She has a guy in her life. Who stays over sometimes. She’s an adult. She has a right.
The smile never quite taking, he sat on the lid of the toilet seat, leaning forward, hands folded, as if in prayer. He was trying to settle his mind down when he saw the stack of magazines on the little stand that was otherwise taken up by folded towels. He took the stack in hand and started flipping through: Women’s Health; Vogue; Cosmopolitan; Elle; WomenPolice magazine; Penthouse.
His eyes widened. What was wrong with this picture?
Next he found himself in the garage, where he spread out a black garbage bag on its cement floor, then snapped the rubber kitchen gloves on before dumping the garbage can onto the waiting plastic. He ignored the food items and other garbage and focused on paper items, specifically mail. Most of it required unwadding. He found the name Jerome Ward, at this address, on various billing envelopes.
When Krista came home, just before five, he greeted her with a smile.
“Too soon to eat, honey?” he asked her.
“No! I’m famished. Smells wonderful!”
He already had the red cabbage going, the boiling potatoes, too — not that the latter was all that aromatic.
He said, “I’ll start the frikadeller then.”
“Oh, good! My favorite!”
She went off to change her clothes and he fried the meatballs in hot butter till they were brown all over. He was ready to serve her up when she returned in gray sweats, her comfy at-home clothes of choice this time of year. She ooohed and aaahed as he set before her the plate of meatballs, red cabbage, and small boiled red potatoes. He got himself a plate, then a Carlsberg, before opening and setting a Coors Light in front of her.
She didn’t notice at first, digging into her food. He got started eating, too. The table was a big wooden farmhouse affair that could serve a party of eight; they sat at the end nearest the kitchen area. Finally she reached, rather absently, for the beer, and when she tasted it, her eyes got big and she held the bottle out in front of her, like somebody in a cartoon who accidentally drank from an ink bottle.
She stopped eating. Set the excuse for a beer down. Said, “All right, so Jerry stays over sometimes. Used to stay over. We broke up, if you want to know.”
He must have wanted to know or he wouldn’t have behaved this way. He felt slightly guilty — slightly — as he said, “If I’m going to stay, we aren’t going to lie to each other.”
“Okay.”
“How long was he living here?”
“Living here?”
“We aren’t going to lie, sweetheart.”
She looked at the beer, still in her hand, and shivered. “Yuck. Who says he lived here?”
“The refrigerator. The medicine cabinet. The skin magazine. And the trash, with discarded mail to him at this address.”
His blue eyes in her face goggled at him. “Jesus. Do you ever stop being a detective?”
“No.”
She got up and went to the sink and began pouring the Coors Light down the drain. “He did live here awhile. I’m of age.”
“I noticed.”
“Well, you might have known, if you’d ever set foot in here after... you know.”
“I know.”
She got herself a can of Diet Coke from the fridge. Popped the top. Said, “We did break up. He stopped by the station today, supposedly to interview me, but... it was something else. Kind of really ending it.”
“Must have been embarrassing having that happen at work.”
She sat, shrugged. “Not terribly... Can we just eat now?”
“Sure.”
They ate.
He cleared the table, gathered his pots and pans, put leftovers in containers and into the fridge. She was loading up the dishwasher.
He went to her. “You should call him. I can move in with Matt or maybe Leo till I can find someplace. I won’t have you disrupting your life over me. I won’t have it.”
She looked back at him, still crouched to load dishes in. “Pop, it’s done. He and I... we were heading that way anyway.”
“You’re not lying to me?”
“No. No more lies, you said. Starting with that.”
“You were thinking of breaking it off anyway?”
“Yes.”
“Will you tell me one thing?”
She stood and faced him. “Okay.”
“Was it the kale?”
She started to laugh and fell into his arms. He was patting her back when she said, “That and the yogurt.”
Four
The following Friday — still unseasonably sunny and not overly chilly for February — Krista met her good friend Jessica Webster at Otto’s Place on the east side.
Dating to 1899, the two-story white-trimmed red-frame structure faced the side of the refurbished old train depot (now the local visitor’s center) across Bouthillier Street. In front of the brick depot, and alongside the restaurant, ran the railroad tracks, beyond which the Galena River formed the dividing line of the little town’s east and west sides.