I’m useless with dead people. When I was sixteen, my father had a sudden heart attack. I fainted just before the funeral and wasn’t permitted to attend. Since then, I’ve made an art form out of avoiding open caskets. My mother insists I have a nervous condition, inherited from my father’s mother, whom she detested. Maybe so, but I doubt it. The truth is I’m afraid of ghosts.
But it was too late this time. She was under all that stuffing, covered in blood. I don’t know how I missed her the first time. I bent down to feel for a pulse. Nothing. I could see her green eyes, but they couldn’t see me.
Sangfroid eluded me. I felt the bile rise to my throat. Clutching my hand to my mouth, I stumbled out to the car and grabbed the phone but could barely hold it, I was trembling so badly. I dialed 911 and told them what I’d found. Then I sat down on the curb and gulped fresh air. I wasn’t sure I could stand up again until I heard the sirens wail around the corner.
The cops were kind. They brought me coffee and someone draped a blanket around my shoulders. I watched the coroner’s truck pull into the driveway and the medical examiner go inside. Through the front window I could see flashbulbs popping. The neighbors came out and were standing around, pretending to turn on their sprinklers and look through their mail. A tall woman with a phone clipped to her belt affixed yellow tape around the perimeter of Mrs. Flynn’s front lawn. It was a crime scene now.
After a while, two men came over and sat down on the curb next to me. They introduced themselves as Detectives Moriarty and Lewis. They inquired as to how long I had known the victim, and the nature of our relationship. I said five days, and that we had no relationship. We were acquaintances, that was it.
We talked for another half hour or so. They asked all the right questions but didn’t seem very interested in my answers.
“That about wraps it up,” Detective Lewis said, stretching out his long legs. He rose and a shower of crumbs hit the ground. Doughnuts. The blanket lady had brought them. “I have to ask you, Ms. Caruso, to let us know if you’re planning to leave the area. This case will probably go to trial fairly quickly, and you’ll be needed to testify.”
“Excuse me, Detective, are you saying you know who’s responsible?” Forensics had come a long way, but things were moving pretty fast for me.
“We’ve got a good idea. We’ve visited Mrs. Flynn before. She had a complicated life. Do you know her sons?”
“I didn’t even know she had children.”
“Well, you wouldn’t want to boast about these two. Twins, but they don’t look anything alike. One uglier than the other. They’ve been on our radar for years. Damon runs a crystal meth lab. Gil just beats people up. A couple of months ago, Gil showed up on his mom’s doorstep with a forty-five, demanding money. Roughed her up pretty bad. Mrs. Flynn called us but decided not to press charges. We told her that was a bad idea, but mothers get kind of sentimental.”
“So that’s it?” I asked. “The investigation is over?”
“Well, she took a couple of bullets to the gut,” Lewis said. “You figure it out.”
Detective Moriarty finally spoke up. He was older, and had a Southern drawl. “No offense, ma’am, but we’ve been in the business for a while. Used to be we’d take our time, mull things over. We don’t operate that way anymore. After all these years, Lewis and I, we can read a crime scene at a glance. The thing is, you don’t want to throw too wide a loop. You don’t want to look for something that isn’t there.”
I remembered a riddle I’d once heard:
Q: What’s the difference between the cops and everyone else standing around at a murder scene?
A: The cops are the only ones who don’t know who did it.
I decided to keep it to myself.
Moriarty and Lewis walked me to my car. I gave them back their blanket. That meant it was time to drive home. So I did.
I didn’t sleep well that night. It was hot. I was sweaty. My hair stuck to my neck like flies to flypaper. I got up to pour myself a glass of water at four A.M. and sat at the kitchen table until I heard the thwack of the newspaper a few hours later.
I waited until seven to call Lael. She sounded sleepy and pissed off. Baby August had been up all night with a fever, which had broken at six, and she had finally gotten him to sleep when I called. I apologized for my timing, explaining that I had just found a dead body and needed to talk.
She arrived an hour later, after arranging various play dates and baby-sitters. It was Sunday, so we headed over to the Hollywood Farmer’s Market. Lael patted my back as I wept into my blue corn tamale.
“I just don’t understand,” I said, sniffling. “All I want to do is finish my book. That’s not too much to ask, is it? Just some peace and quiet so I can work. But all of a sudden everything’s gone to hell in a handbasket. Poor Mrs. Flynn. To be murdered by your own children. And I’m a witness, a witness in a hideous murder case! And I get to meet this fabulous, legendary clotheshorse, and she turns out to be a lunatic, and I wind up with a crush on the lunatic’s son, who’s too young for me. And Joseph Albacco, somehow I have to find out who really killed his wife since the prison chaplain thinks I’m a good Catholic, and—”
“Stop right there, missy,” Lael said. “Let’s go over this. First of all, the police are going to find that woman’s sons and they’re going to go to jail. You stumbled upon an ugly domestic drama, that’s all. But Joseph Albacco, he needs a lawyer, Cece, or an investigator—a real one. You’re not the person to handle something like this. C’mon.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Oh, don’t get touchy, please. You know exactly what I mean. You’re a writer, for Christ’s sake. You write about this stuff—you don’t get involved with it. You’re not a cop. It’s too late to impress your father.”
“That was unkind.”
“I’m sorry, but you can’t let these people insinuate themselves into your life. You’ve got enough on your plate right now with Annie and Vincent.”
“I know, I know. You’re right. But Annie doesn’t even want to talk to me. I suppose I’ve been obsessing about this whole Joseph Albacco thing because I was flattered to be needed.”
“Well, maybe that’s so, but don’t let your weaknesses get you in more trouble than you’re already in.”
“Excuse me, aren’t you supposed to be comforting me?”
“I’m supposed to be shopping.”
Lael bought two dozen ears of corn, a dozen avocados, and a bagful of artichokes. Plus some gorgeous boysenberries. I bought candy-striped beets and tiger-striped tomatoes, some arugula, a pound of mountain-grown cherries, and cat grass for Mimi.
We stopped to listen to a Caribbean steel drum band. The front man was wearing an American flag top hat. I began to cheer up. We wandered past the incense and aromatherapy candles, past the yeast-free muffins and the flavored honeys. While we sampled white nectarines, a bald guy holding a bunch of kohlrabi sidled up to Lael.
“I don’t know why I bought this stuff except I know it’s supposed to be good for you. Do you have any idea how to cook it?”
Lael looked like a cross between Barbie and Strawberry Shortcake. Men adored her and she adored them. “Steaming is always nice,” she said. “Or you could sauté it with a little garlic and white wine.”
Soy and ginger would be better, I thought. But I kept quiet.
The tamale stand was on our way back to the car, and we decided on two more for the road.
“Have you tried the turkey, cranberry, and chipotle one? It’s awesome. Would you like a bite?” It was an agent type, in horn-rims and a baseball cap, trying his luck like the rest of them.
“I don’t eat meat, actually, but thanks,” Lael said, with a smile that could’ve melted steel.
How did she do it? I suppose niceness is genetic. Lael’s kids were nice, too, especially Tommy. Annie was nicer than I was, so maybe it skipped a generation in our family. Well, my mother wasn’t actually that nice—maybe it skipped two generations.
While Lael paid for our tamales (I got another blue corn and she tried the lox, cream cheese, and onion), I inventoried hat styles. Everyone in L.A. lives in fear of carcinoma. Lots of hats in L.A. A tall, dark-haired woman in a floppy number caught my eye. She was wearing a cropped black T-shirt and had the flattest stomach I had ever seen. Lots of flat stomachs, too. Then I noticed the man she was with. It was Vincent. And in between them, holding their hands and laughing, was a little boy. I caught my breath. Vincent’s little boy. He had his father’s curly hair and his mother’s dark skin and was holding a red balloon as big as he was. I stopped and watched, and wondered as I watched how I would tell Annie what a beautiful family they made.