The Sassy Belles. Beth Albright

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      2

      “Vivi and I will go in my car,” I said.

      “Okay,” Harry agreed. “I’ll take mine in case I have to leave.” We heard the sirens of the police and emergency vehicles racing ahead of us as we walked to the parking lot behind the station.

      The warmth of the late-spring sun hit my face in the street. God, I so loved this time of year. With the magnolias in full blossom, the smell of the coming Southern summer was overwhelming and transporting. A sweet, pungent aroma lingered in the breeze, reminding me that summer and good watermelon were just around the river bend.

      As though a time portal were drawing me in, I was suddenly eight years old and on my grandmother’s screened front porch. I could smell her roses and honeysuckle and the huge magnolia trees in the front yard. I watched the bees on her camellias. I loved Mother’s, every corner of it. I took in a deep whiff and pulled in as much of the fragrance as I could, held my best friend’s hand and put her into the Navigator.

      As I walked around to get into the driver’s seat, I felt so protective of Vivi. People could call her a lot of things, but they certainly could never call her a murderer.

      As I slid onto the warm leather seat and put my key into the ignition, Vivi looked over at me with her wet green eyes full of insecurity. “Am I goin’ to jail, Blake?”

      I answered her without hesitation. “Not on my life, sweetie. Not on my life.”

      “Blake,” she said. “Thank you.”

      “For what, honey?”

      “For always being my Swiss Army knife.”

      I smiled at her. I knew what she meant. I also knew how much she was counting on me to get her out of any mess that lay just on the other side of the river.

      Vivi would be a person of interest simply because she was the last person to see Lewis alive. She wasn’t guilty of a thing. They were just screwing, for God’s sake. But Vivi is a reactionary. She will think the absolute worst and in the most dramatic way possible. It’s just part of being Vivi. Regardless, I was bound and determined to make sure she would never be charged with anything.

      Vivi broke the conversation in my head. “I’m a nervous wreck, Blake.”

      “Why, honey?”

      “It’s just that, well…uh, we had a little friend with us in the motel room.”

      “What? You were in a threesome?”

      “Oh, my good God, no, honey. I meant—you know…a sex toy. I named him Deputy Dick.”

      “Oh, for heaven’s sake…I thought you were fixin’ to really shock me. I know you and Lewis can be a bit on the kinky side, no big deal.”

      “I just don’t want the police to discover him. It. I will just die of embarrassment. But I have no idea where he got to. I was in such a panic when I ran for help.”

      “Don’t worry, I’m sure you aren’t the only woman in the world to play with toys in the bedroom. I’m sure he will turn up.” I tried to get my thoughts together as we drove, and wondered if Vivi had any other interesting details she needed to divulge.

      Though we rode in silence, I never let go of her hand. The emotions were stuck in our mouths. Vivi and I have never really needed words. In moments we had crossed the bridge over the Warrior River to the Fountain Mist motel. We drove in and parked as Harry made his way over to us. He opened Vivi’s door and helped her out.

      The Fountain Mist was one of those old, side-of–the-highway kinds of motels. The kind that could charge by the hour. It had a red neon sign out front and a lighted fountain, like one of those old silver Christmas trees from the sixties that had the colored lights spinning underneath. The fountain changed colors and definitely helped to cheapen the motel’s appearance. Inside the lobby, the green carpet was threadbare and fading. The entire place needed painting. And sanitization.

      Harry had his legal pad in hand and was standing with the police and the paramedics outside room 106. Everyone was in a panic, and Harry looked like he’d gone into shock.

      “Where’s the body?” a paramedic yelled out at us as we approached. “There’s no body here!” Vivi and I walked over to the door at a clip. The dust from the gravel parking lot swirled in the air.

      A frenetic chaos filled the room. The motel manager was standing on the dusty carpet, answering questions while a police officer took notes. I couldn’t see for the glare as the sun bounced from the mirror of the cheap dresser. Two officers and two paramedics had turned the room upside down. The frustrated sounds came again from the first paramedic. “Where the hell’s the body? We got a call from someone saying that her boyfriend had stopped breathing.”

      “I left him right there, dead on the bed, buck naked and blue as blue blazes,” Vivi said with fear and panic in her eyes. I looked at Harry and he looked at Vivi.

      “Vivi!” Harry said. “Where the hell is Lewis?”

      In a split second, a breathless silence fell over the room and Vivi fell over backward right onto me. I caught her just as she slumped sideways, and a paramedic rushed to her while a policeman radioed the station.

      No body, I thought. Is Lewis possibly alive? Or is someone hiding evidence? I held Vivi up till the paramedics got hold of her.

      I looked at my stoic Harry. I knew he was thinking of his public image and trying not to show any emotion. At the same time, I knew he was trying to process and manage this unbelievable situation. But this was typical Harry. Sometimes so closed off he became his own worst enemy. He locked everyone out to make sure his image was so perfect it was almost not even human. It was robotic, with all the right responses, always so prepared with just the right answers. Sometimes he was just exasperating. Feel, I thought. Let me see you. Though he would say that I feel too much. I overfeel, he had said once. Too happy, too sad, too angry.

      What was happening to us was much like the story of Scarlett and Rhett. You don’t show me any emotion, so I won’t show you any. Both of us would be independent, spirited people, strong and stubborn, who just didn’t need anyone but ourselves.

      And so it had gone for about six years now. Lots of work, lots of career building and even lots of sex. СКАЧАТЬ