Sassafras, Part 30

Rick



We just sat for a few minutes. I think both of us needed to catch our breath. I picked up the ice cubes that were still scattered across the cushion and held them up against my bruise again. Eventually we started talking, just making small talk until the moment I had been dreading happened. She started asking me questions about prison. I laughed when she asked me if I had any roommates, like we were talking about time I spent in college instead of in prison.

I didn’t know what to say when she started asking about fighting. I really tried to avoid fighting, but sometimes it seemed like the harder I tried not to fight the more people got on my nerves, or I got on their nerves, and I ended up fighting whether I wanted to or not. Most fights weren’t a big deal, just a couple of swings and a lot of shouting, but a few were pretty bad. I showed her the scar in back of my ear where I had been kicked. I didn’t mention that it had been a guard kicking me, trying to break up a fight I was in. I don’t remember the fight at all. The doctor said the head injury erased my short-term memory. All I remember is being stuck watching Matlock in the day room, then waking up in the infirmary. I also showed her the pin in my wrist I got after I pissed off one of my cellmates. I don’t remember exactly what I did to piss him off, but I must have done it exceptionally well.

Then she asked if I hurt anybody. I would have ended up with a lot more than a bunch of stitches and a pin if I hadn’t hurt other people. I didn’t want her to think I was some kind of thug, so I just admitted I had, but didn’t go into any details. I was glad she let it drop and started asking questions about where I was from.

The pizza came then, and we sat in the kitchen eating and talked some more. We were still eating when the phone rang. Somebody was looking for her nephew. I could see her start to pace as far as the phone cord would let her. When she hung up she said Bill was missing. He was supposed to be across the street, but he left over an hour ago. Joan was so worried about Bill, but there was nothing she could do about him. He was probably fine. She just needed a little patience. I convinced her to stay home and not go running up and down the street like a crazy person. I told her I would stay with her until he came back, no matter how long it was. We sat on the couch watching TV and talked while we waited for him to come back.

She picked her planner up off the floor and looked at the list she wrote last night. “Do you have any idea what ‘Not Bouncy’ means?” she asked. I told her how she ran right into me last night, but she didn’t remember it.

“Where did you come up with all this?” I asked her. “Sandwiches? What does that mean? We didn’t eat anything last night.”

“The waitress told me you come in a lot and eat sandwiches.”

“Did she tell you I have a nice ass?”

She started blushing and closed the book. “I don’t remember,” she said. “Look, Rick, I was drunk when I wrote all that. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Apparently you were thinking I have a nice ass.” She started blushing even more. “On the other hand, you also think I’m a clumsy nerd. I’m not sure I like that very much.”

“Well, you did bump into me last night and make me spill my beer, and you said you were a nerd.”

“Yeah, when I was 15. You don’t think I’m a nerd now, do you?”

“No,” she looked at me. “You’re not a nerd.”

She asked me if I would be at the viewing tomorrow afternoon, but I told her I had to work at the factory this weekend. I wouldn't get off work until 4, and the viewing was supposed to be over by then. I wouldn't be able to go to the funeral, either. I felt guilty about not going, but couldn't take off work. I tried to think of what I was going to be doing this weekend. I had some computer work to do for Sneider Saturday, but I could do it anytime I wanted Saturday night. I needed to find out more about Joan's sister.

"You know, the more I think about that night, the more I think things don't add up," she said. "She wouldn’t have been on that street if she was walking home. Did you see the coroner's report? Those bruises on her arm were classic defensive wounds."

"Okay Nancy Drew," I said, "what was the motive, and who are the suspects?"

"I don't know," she said, starting to look worried. "Why would anybody want to kill Jenny? She didn’t have an enemy in the world. She didn’t have a jealous ex-boyfriend. She wasn't anything like that drug dealer on the news, Sanchez or Santos or whatever. He deserved to get killed, not Jenny."

"Why?" I asked her. "Because he broke the law he deserved to be shot in the back of the head?" I didn't want to think that I might be the next Santos.

“No, I didn’t mean it like that. He didn’t deserve to die just because he broke the law. It’s just, well, Jenny was a good person. He was a drug dealer. They shoot each other all the time.”

"I know. Maybe the same person killed both of them."

"But why? What does Jenny have in common with that drug dealer? She didn't do drugs, or sell drugs, or hang out with drug dealers."

"I don't know. Maybe she saw something in the diner, a drug deal or something," I said.

Joan picked her planner up and flipped to a blank page, then leaned back against me and started writing.

"Well, I know she wouldn't have been walking on the street where they found her body if she was walking home. Either she wasn't walking, or she was going somewhere else," she said, "but I don't know where else she would have been going in the middle of the night."

"I don't like that coroner's report, either," she said, adding another line to her list. "All those marks on her arm look like defensive wounds. And both of her legs should have been broken where the car's bumper hit her legs, but there's only one bruise on her thigh."

"Boy, you really are Nancy Drew," I said.

"Thanks to Court TV and lots and lots of detective novels," she said. "I also don't like the whiskey the coroner said he found in her stomach. She never drank whiskey. The last time she drank whiskey was in high school, when she got so drunk she passed out in our neighbor's back yard. After that she couldn't stand the taste of it any more. And besides, the bartender said she was drinking beer, not whiskey."

"And what about her jacket? It was cold that night. She would have put her jacket on before she left Tanner's. She wouldn't leave her keys."

“Did you ever find Jenny’s camera?” I asked.

“No.”

“Do you even know what kind it was? What did it look like?”

“I don’t know. I never saw it. You would have to ask Billy.”

She sat looking over her list. "This all started at Tanner's," she said. "Maybe I should talk to the bartender again."

I thought about Mark, the bartender who was on duty the night Jenny died. Franklin, one of the cops, is his brother, and he's definitely involved in about half of the crimes I've found out about, who knows how many crimes I haven't. I couldn't let her talk to him. "How do you know he isn't the one who killed her? You shouldn't trust anybody, Joan. Don't trust your friends, don’t trust the witnesses, and don't trust the cops."

"Oh, you don't think the cops are involved in this, do you? You know them. They're not crooks are they?" she asked.

I wish I would have just said yes. Yes, they're dirty. But I didn't tell her. I didn't want to tell her I knew they were dirty and I was helping them. Even if I told her I was working with the DEA, I don't think she would believe me. I mean, it's not like I had a piece of paper saying I'm working undercover. On the other hand, I definitely didn't want her confronting Sneider with any of this. She didn't realize what she was getting involved in. "Don't trust them," I said. "I don't know if they are okay or not. I just work on their computers, I'm not really involved with them all that much. Don't trust anybody. "

"Not even you?" she asked.

"Not even me," I said. I thought of all the damage to the front of Jenny’s car. Could Sneider have staged the accident with her own car, or was Billy involved with the police somehow? Criminals knew how to take advantage of the easier laws governing minors, so most of the people in prison with me had started on their life of crime about his age. "If you read mysteries, you know everybody is a suspect, even your nephew."

"You're crazy," she said. "Billy might not be a choir boy, but he would never kill his own mother. You don’t know him. I can’t believe you would even suggest such a thing!”

"You don’t even know where he was or what he was doing," I said. “Look, I’m not saying he did anything. Maybe there was an accident or something. I looked at Jenny’s car. It’s missing the mirror on the passenger side, the grill is broken, and a headlight is duct taped in place. Do you know how long it’s been like that?”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. Billy would never hurt anybody,” she insisted, but she didn’t look convinced "You really do think somebody killed my sister, don't you?" she asked. “I’m not just being paranoid.”

"I think it might be more than a simple hit and run, but I don't know what happened. If there is a killer on the loose, I don't want you to be next. Don't trust anybody."

"Not even you?" she asked.

"Oh, definitely not even me," I answered, and gave her another long kiss.