“Don’t kill it,” Herta said. “I changed my mind.”
Cole sighed. “Sentimentalist.” He gave her back the shovel. “This is why you tolerate coarse commercial tripe like Love Actually.”
“What are we doing with those bricks?” Tariq asked.
“The paving stones go over the body to deter animals from excavating,” said Cole. “I’m going to check our work inside.”
“It’s good,” Tariq said. “I’ve cleaned maybe a dozen crime sites, and except for one, my record’s perfect.”
“That sentence makes no sense,” Herta said, digging. “You can’t say perfect except for. It’s either perfect or it’s not.”
“What did you miss at the imperfect site?” asked Cole.
Tariq shook his head. “I prefer not to talk about it.”
Simultaneously Cole and Herta crossed their arms.
“Yeah, fuck, all right,” Tariq said. “I got up all the blood and skull chips and brain goo, but I left one item I shouldn’t have, that’s all.”
“Which was... ?” Herta asked.
Tariq shrugged. “The body.”
“I think that’s called a significant oversight,” she said.
“It was wrapped in black plastic, and I got used to seeing it, you know? Like it became part of the landscape. I cleaned the holy fuck out of that place.”
“But forgot the body,” Herta said and laughed. Cole, who rarely laughed, smiled broadly. Herta turned to him. “You ever think how oversight has opposite meanings?”
Cole pointed behind them. The opossum was gone.
E-mail from Madelyn to her father:
Dear Dad,
I decided to follow your lead and roadtrip!!!
I got so tired of my Houston bunch, just like you said I would!!!
I’ve gone to Mexico!!!
I thought about inviting friends but decided to wing it!!!
I’m so brave!!!
I’ll write again when I’ve got a hotel with wifi.
I hope you’re feeling better about Mom being dead!!!
Love!
“I think you’ve slipped into parody,” Cole said.
“I’m the one who studied her e-mails,” Herta replied. They strolled through the Plaza de Mercado in downtown Matamoros, across the border from Brownsville. “Some stuff you can’t parody.” She wore Madelyn’s big floppy hat, scarf, and sunglasses, as well as one of her blouses — a distinctive polka-dot number. She stood in the shade of a palm tree to take a selfie.
Cole examined the photo and shook his head. “Make the face,” he suggested. “Move deeper into the shadows.”
In her passport photo, Madelyn offered a moue — not to seem pouty, in Cole’s analysis, but to give her face more shape. Whenever Herta showed the passport, she was careful to make the same expression.
“That’s her sexy face,” Herta argued, “not for her dad.”
“He’s seen it a lot, though,” Cole said. “He’ll assume she’s sending the pic to her friends too.”
“I guess.” Herta moved farther into the shadows for the next photo.
In texts to her friends, Madelyn would say that Cole broke her heart and she needed travel. They were spending from Madelyn’s bank account, using her credit cards. They had transferred her money to accounts Herta set up, which was how they’d given Tariq his share. “And what if Pork Chop, who’s nursing his own broken ticker, texts to say he wants to join Madelyn down here?”
Cole thought for three seconds. “Tell him to bring a lot of cash.”
Text from Madelyn to Pork Chop:
Laptop stolen!!!!! Everyone here is out to take what they can!!!! Going to dash down to Can in for better ocean. Let’s get together when I get back. Just me and you!!! I’m ready to try. Love you!!!!!
“Going to Can in?” Cole asked.
“That’s what autocorrect gives you for Cancún,” Herta said.
“Nice touch,” Cole conceded. “You’re kinda dicking with ole Pork Chop.”
“I know.” She laughed. “It makes me so happy. I’ve got an even better one coming up for Dad.”
“Don’t make me read it,” said Cole. “I trust you.”
Madelyn’s text to a girlfriend included a photo that showed Herta-as-Madelyn nuzzling Osvaldo Cuevas, who cleaned the pool at the Hotel Alameda de Matamoros, where Herta was staying. He’s so ethnic!!!!!
Cole stayed across town at the Best Western. He didn’t want the inevitable investigator to hear that Madelyn had come to town with another gringo. “The problem with Mexico,” he said, “is I don’t know how to steal from people here.”
“We don’t need to steal from anyone here,” Herta pointed out. “We have all we need stealing from Madelyn’s rotting corpse.”
“Exactly,” said Cole. “It’s boring.”
The plan called for Madelyn to rent a car and drive all the way to Cancún. There, she would e-mail everyone about a jungle trip she was planning with a guide whom they’d make absurdly sketchy. Then the e-mails and texts would stop.
“Juan is not a sketchy name,” Herta said. “Adolph is a sketchy name.”
“You can’t name a Mexican guide Adolph,” said Cole.
“It’ll be the one odd detail that’ll convince them,” Herta insisted.
“Whatever. You’re the one who likes to think.”
“Are you depressed or something?”
“I’m never depressed,” said Cole. “Just bored.”
“Here’s something that might interest you. What if Adolph holds Madelyn for ransom?”
“Hmm.”
They were walking on the beach and the setting sun caught in the waves’ curls, shining white within them like oceanic smiles.
“How much do you think we could get?” asked Cole. He took her hand.
Facebook post on Tariq’s page:
Any of you guys read Orlando? Gotta wild tranny angle. I’m on a mad Woolf kick. What should I read next?
Part II
Peaceful Hamlets, Great for Families
A Dark Universe
by Larry Watts
Clear Lake
Curtis Simon maneuvered his year-old Nissan 370Z into a parking space in the strip center on Egret Bay Boulevard. On the window in front of him, he saw a bumper sticker proclaiming, Proud supporter of the Clear Lake High Falcons.
Curtis thought of his days at Clear Lake High, which was three miles from where he sat at that moment. Back in school, he’d rubbed shoulders with the children of astronauts. That was back when it was first announced that Houston would annex Clear Lake. Curtis’s parents dragged him to their Saturday marches to voice their objection to the annexation. He was always embarrassed by their activism or anything else that exposed him to public display. The astronauts and their children didn’t participate in that sort of things. They seemed to consider it an activity for the lower strata of society. And he’d lived anonymously in that strata, until he met Jennifer.
Jennifer was born in Galveston — born on the island, or BOI, as the locals said — which put her as close to royalty as the local hierarchy offered. She was self-assured and popular. Willing to be and beautiful enough to be the center of attention in any situation. That would create problems for Curtis, though he didn’t know it at the time.