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I HESITATED WITH MY hand on the door handle, indicating my willingness to step out into the rain if Honey had somewhere to be. Local etiquette dictated that when someone dropped you off while it was raining, it was acceptable to stay in their car until the rain let up. I wasn’t keen to get drenched again so soon after my canoe-paddling adventure. On the other hand, I didn’t want to keep Honey from speeding off to do whatever lawyers did to get their clients off the hook.
“So you still got the T-Bird, ah, Professor? What kinda mileage you getting on that thing?”
I settled back into the passenger seat, relieved. Honey had tacitly invited me to wait out the rain by continuing the conversation. The downpour was so heavy by this time I could barely see the old music portables next to the parking lot.
“The mileage isn’t great. But I live downtown, only a couple of miles from campus. So I don’t use much gas.”
I couldn’t bring myself to tell the environmentally-aware Honey I was driving a car that got eleven miles to the gallon. Or that my exhaust had been pouring blue smoke lately, portending an expensive ring-and-valve job in my future. I had been putting off taking it into Miyashiro Motors. Earl Miyashiro, my well-intentioned but literal-minded mechanic, kept nagging me to ditch my Squarebird and trade it in for something more practical. Unfortunately, Earl was the only mechanic on the island would go anywhere near my car. Otherwise, I’d take my business to someone less judgmental.
“Professor. Remember how you always told us in class, back up your claims with evidence?”
“Of course. I think you guys got sick of hearing me say it.”
“Well, it’s what we gotta do now. Doesn’t matter if you’re innocent or what. What matters is if you got the evidence to back up what you say. The best thing would be to find another explanation for what killed Melanie. Something more believable than you did it. Anything you could tell me about her could help.”
“I’ll tell you anything you want to know. Oh. Suppose someone had copied over Melanie’s files before Pat brought her computer down to the police station. Hypothetically speaking, would I be allowed to share those files with my lawyer?”
“Yeah. Get ‘em to me as soon as you can. They gotta give ‘em to me anyways, but I wanna get my hands on the original. Just in case there’s any ‘accidental’ omissions.”
She pulled a business card out of her jacquard fabric briefcase and handed it to me. Honey’s briefcase was from the same designer as Melanie’s luggage, but instead of a hot pink logo pattern, Honey had chosen a more sober black-on-black.
“You should read ‘em yourself first.”
“Read her private files?”
“You knew Melanie better than anyone else involved with this case. If there’s anything in there that could help you, you’d be the one to recognize it.”
“Can I email you the files?”
“Sure, but drop ‘em off in person too. Print ‘em out if you can.”
The rain had diminished to a fine drizzle. The former music building, which even in its heyday had been nothing more than a flimsy portable adjoining the lower parking lot, looked dismal. Its brown siding was ragged along the bottom, corroded by black mold.
I stepped out of Honey’s car, let myself into the Thunderbird, and rested my head on the back of the seat. When I opened my eyes, Honey’s car was gone.
I didn’t have the energy to drive home. Not yet. I gripped the oversized steering wheel and inhaled the Thunderbird’s old-car smell. None of this seemed real.
Donnie didn’t pick up when I called, so I left a message thanking him for sending Honey Akiona to my rescue. I told him I was a free woman for now and could meet for our dinner date that night as planned. As soon as I disconnected, my phone rang. It wasn’t Donnie calling me back, though. It was Emma.
“Emma. I’m glad you called. Where are you guys? Are you in Pat’s office?”
The rain had picked up again and was drumming so hard on my car roof I had to press the phone tight to my ear to hear. I could feel an occasional drop of cold water hitting my skin. Great. A leak. I couldn’t wait to hear what Earl Miyashiro of Miyashiro Motors had to say about that.
“Yeah, we’re in Pat’s office,” Emma said. “How did you know?”
“The close reverb. You sound like you’re in a small, cluttered space.”
“You liar. It’s ’cause you can hear his punk rock music playing.”
“That too. Why are you in Pat’s office? I’m surprised you didn’t let yourself into mine and help yourself to my espresso machine.”
“We’d never go in your office without permission,” Emma said.
“Uh-huh. What’s the real reason?”
“They’re waxing the floors in your building today.”
Among the three of us, I had the office most congenial to hanging out, thanks to the aforementioned espresso machine. Pat had furnished his office by buying the hairdryer chairs from Tatsuya’s Moderne Beauty when they went out of business. The chairs were comfortable enough, but you had to be careful not to bump your head on the chrome hairdryer bonnets.
No one visited Emma’s office if they could help it. Emma refused to pay for her own office furniture. Visitors had to stand and try not to look at the brain in a jar she kept on her file cabinet.
“Where have you been?” Emma asked.
“You won’t believe what just happened. So after paddling, I came back to my office—”
“Molly, you won’t believe what we found. Okay, Pat found it. He was reading Melanie’s files. Man, she really didn’t like you, did she?”
“How does Pat have Melanie’s files?”
“He made a copy for himself, before he turned in the laptop. Pat, give me that. Nah, I’m gonna read it to her. Just give it! OK Molly, are you listening?”
Pat eventually came on the line.
“We think she was writing notes for some kind of a roman à clef,” Pat said. “It’s pretty bad.”
“I can imagine.”
“Didn’t you guys earn your Ph.D.’s from some fancy literature program?”
“Yes, but we never dealt with trivialities like grammar or mechanics or plot. Those things were supposedly beneath us. If anyone bothered about that stuff, their writing would be dismissed as workmanlike. So are you going to read it to me? I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”
“Alright,” Pat said. “We’ll start at the beginning. Don’t want to miss a single word.”
“Just get it over with.”
“Sorry. I can’t. Emma, you do it.”
Emma came on the line.
“Wimp. Are you listening, Molly? In contrast to her carefree appearance, Melody Parnell had traveled through the jaw of hell, oppressive and discouraging as the used-up bottle of shampoo with only the fragrant dregs clinging to the sides of the bottle that reclined mockingly on her bathroom counter.”
“The ‘jaw’ of hell? Emma, you really don’t have to keep—”
“But Melody was a strong powerful woman, her optimistic hope blossoming like a glistening fountain spewing it's watery jewels heavenward.” That’s i-t-apostrophe-s by the way.”
“I don’t know if I can keep listening to this. I’m getting grad-school flashbacks.”
Melody—I mean Melanie—had never been good at taking criticism. It got to where no one in seminar wanted to be her critique partner.
“You gotta hear this part, though,” Emma said. “Dolly Hardup was jealous of Melody. Jealous and bitter.”
“Jealous and bitter? What is she, thirteen?”
“Dolly was jealous of Melody’s freedom,” Emma continued, “with her repetitive job like a prison, and her boring vanilla romance, she had never known the freedom that Melody had. The freedom of being a wild, uninhabited spirit.”
“Emma, I’ve heard enough. Really.”
“You sure? There’s a lot more.”
“Oh, by the way, speaking of prison, guess what—”
“Oh, Gotta go, Molly. Sherry’s calling.”
“Sherry? You really called Donnie’s ex-wife?”
“Yeah, she wants a change of scenery. I guess things didn’t work out with Mad Dog. Sorry Molly, I gotta get this.”
“I got arrested—”
But Emma had already hung up.