“Hi, Floyd,” Dolores said, looking for the transaction he might have prepared.
“I need to find Melissa,” he said, passing the photo to Dolores. “I’d like to see if she remembers these people and what happened the night before Ken Solstad died in the car accident. Mike Nelson said she married and moved away.”
Dolores Smith set the picture on the marble counter and looked at Floyd with anger. “Is this some sort of joke?” she asked.
“Not at all. Some things happened that night that we need to clear up. I hoped that talking with Melissa might shed some light on things.”
Dolores made sure no one was within earshot. “Listen,” she hissed, “there is nothing that happened that night that Melissa wants to talk about. Let sleeping dogs lie.” She pushed the picture back to Floyd, turned her back, and walked away from the counter.
Hearing the heated words, the manager emerged from his office. “Is everything okay?” he asked Dolores.
“Just fine,” she replied tersely, as she counted checks at a table facing away from the customer counter.
Floyd was shaking his head. “Brad, can you give Dottie a break for a few minutes? We need to talk.”
“We do not need to talk,” Dolores said without turning.
Floyd took her by the elbow. “We’ll borrow Brad’s office for a few minutes.”
Floyd closed the office door and stood blocking it. “What was that all about?”
“Kenny’s dead. There’s no need to hash it all over again, and there’s certainly no need to dredge up those memories with Melissa. She’s married with a new life and a great husband. Let Ken Solstad rot in his grave and let the memories lie with him.”
“What happened that night?”
“Nothing!”
“Bull. You and I have known each other most of our lives, and I can see through your façade. Give it to me straight.”
“I’ll give it to you straight. Where in hell were you that night? Why didn’t you stop those kids from drinking and driving?” Dolores suddenly broke into tears and ran to Floyd’s arms. “Why didn’t you stop Kenny from raping Melissa?”
Floyd took a deep breath and held Dolores tight until she stopped sobbing. The door clicked open and Brad stuck his head in. “Is everything okay?”
Dolores recoiled from Floyd’s embrace and wiped at her cheeks with her palms. Her mascara was running and her make-up was smeared “It’s fine, Brad. Can I have a few more minutes to get myself together?”
The manager looked at the scene with surprise. “Sure, take whatever time you need. There’s a box of tissues in the top left desk drawer. Help yourself.” He closed the door quietly and left.
“Tell me what happened,” Floyd said as he opened the desk drawer and handed the entire box of tissues to Dolores.
“Those idiots went out drinking like usual. Melissa and Kenny had broken up by mail while he was in Korea, but then he started calling her in the middle of the night to apologize about whatever set her off. She hung up on him at first, but then they’d talk for longer and longer times. I can’t imagine what he must’ve paid for all those international calls.
“Anyway, when Kenny got leave back in the States he showed up on our front steps with a big bunch of red roses. Melissa was still mad at him about something, but the roses and the uniform did her in and she let him in the house. He was really respectful toward us, which was a big turnaround from the jerk he’d been before he enlisted. I was kind of hopeful that he’d turned a new leaf, but my husband, Jeff, said that a tiger never changes his stripes. As it turned out, Jeff was right. Within a few days the old Kenny was back. He hooked up with Mike Nelson and they were drinking, driving drunk, swearing, and carousing just like before Kenny went in the Army. The big difference was that Kenny had muscles to go with his big mouth, and we saw him intimidating people.
“Kenny told us he was supposed to get a month of leave, but the end of the second week he called and demanded to talk to Melissa. Something had been brewing between the two of them. She’d gone out with Kenny a couple times the first week, but by the second week she was driven home early by someone else two nights in a row and she started checking the caller ID on her cellphone and if Kenny called she didn’t answer. Then one night he called on our home phone and asked me if he could talk to Melissa. She spoke with him, and afterward told me that he’d been called back to Missouri because of the Iraq thing. She told him that she wouldn’t go out with him alone again, so he promised to pick her up with at least one other couple. He showed up with Aaron Roberts and Kathy Tucker, promising that he’d bring Melissa home early. He said he had to start driving to Fort Leonard Wood early the next day so they couldn’t be out late.
“I was pretty upset at midnight when there was no sign of Melissa, but she was twenty-one, and I decided I had to get some sleep. I heard car doors and looked at the clock — I think it was like two in the morning. I poked Jeff in the ribs and was getting out of bed when the front door slammed. I met Melissa in the hall. It was December and she was falling down drunk and had lost her coat and one shoe somewhere. I remember her bawling like a calf, but I couldn’t get her to stop crying long enough to tell me what had happened. When I got her to the kitchen I saw that her face and arms were bruised, and her blouse was torn. I thought she’d been in a car accident — I always expected that when she hung out with that bunch.
“Jeff brought a warm washcloth and I started wiping her face while he put on some coffee to try and sober her up. At first we tried to get her to tell us about the accident, and we asked her if anyone else had been hurt. Then her blouse fell open and I saw that her bra was gone and that there was a big bruise on her breast. When she realized what I’d seen, she staggered for the bathroom and locked the door. I could hear the shower running and her sobbing the whole time she was in there.
“Did you call the police?” Floyd asked.
“No, we were stupid back then. Melissa said she and Kenny had a fight, and I didn’t want to believe anything else had happened. When I picked up her clothes from the bathroom floor there were no panties, and the inside of her jeans was smeared with… well you can guess.”
Floyd sat in the guest chair and put his hand over his eyes. “Oh, Dottie, I’m so sorry. You should’ve called me.”
“Melissa said it was partially her fault. She said she led Kenny on, and said ‘no’ too late to stop things. I know better than that now, but back then it seemed almost believable.”
“Let me guess,” Floyd said, “Ken left for the Army and everyone said you might as well let it all pass. If Melissa wasn’t pregnant it would just be a bad lesson learned, and if she was…”
“She didn’t get pregnant, and Doctor Bergstrom examined her and said there was no permanent damage. When Kenny died the next day we all figured there wasn’t any point in airing the dirty laundry.”
“What happened to Melissa after that?”
“She signed up for a nursing program and started spring semester. In two years she was a registered nurse and she’d met a nice radiology technician while she was doing her clinical work. She married Bob Schotten a year later and now they’re living in Redwood Falls where they both work at the hospital. We’ve got three grandchildren, and we don’t ever talk about Kenny Solstad.”
“I assume you remember that Aaron Roberts disappeared that night?” Floyd asked.