The Whistle Blower

by Robin Merrill

  “Who’s Bob?”

  An insane giggle bubbled up out of Sandra’s torso and escaped through her mouth. She was pretty sure she’d never laughed like that. Like an attention-seeking hyena with an especially high-pitched voice. The thought of the hyena made her laugh again, and now Joanna looked on the verge of tears. Sandra sent up a silent prayer, “Lord, help me get a grip.” Then she looked down at her daughter’s upturned face. Choking back another insane giggle, she caressed her cheek. “I’m sorry, punkin. Didn’t mean to scare you. I’ve just got some adult stuff going on. Nothing for you to worry about.”

  Joanna didn’t look convinced, but she did turn her attention back to her tablet, so Sandra took that as a win. She took another deep breath, and her chest shook, threatening another giggle, so she tried to clear her brain of anything that might set her off again. Then she called her husband.

  He didn’t answer, as she expected. This was a busy time of day for him. She left him a message, telling him that she would be going for soccer ref training that night at seven. Her voice only cracked twice during the five-second message, but she managed to avoid the lunatic laughter.

  With her call finished, she closed her eyes and leaned her head back. It’s okay. I can always back out. I have hours to decide whether or not to actually show up, and whether or not to actually be a soccer ref. She needed to talk to Bob. More than talk to him. She needed him to go with her. God, she prayed, if Bob’s not busy with some golf scuffle, could you send him my way? Then she opened her eyes and forced herself to focus on Peter’s soccer practice.

  Not twenty seconds later, Bob appeared beside her window. Her body jerked so hard that the whole van shook. Joanna had gone back to her tablet and didn’t look up. Sandra stabbed at the window button, but nothing happened. She hurriedly turned the key in the ignition, scared to death he was going to vanish before she got to talk to him, and then rolled down the window. “Where have you been?” she said, a little surprised by how demanding she sounded.

  He looked amused. “Do you really want to have this conversation out loud right here?” He glanced pointedly at Joanna, who remained oblivious.

  “Well, you said you can’t read my mind!” How else could they have the conversation if not out loud?

  “What?” Joanna asked, but didn’t look up.

  Sandra sighed. “Nothing, honey.” She rolled the window up, turned the battery off, and got out of the car. At first, she thought Bob had vanished again, but then she realized he was standing behind the van. She followed him into the shade of an orange-leaved oak tree. Between the shade and the van, they were hidden from view of everyone there. She felt as though she were about to engage in a playground drug deal. She looked at Bob expectantly.

  “You beckoned?”

  “Wow, that actually works?”

  He furrowed his brow. “What works?”

  “I prayed and asked for you, and you came. I didn’t think that would work.”

  “Of course it worked. Now, what do you need?” He sounded almost as impatient as Mike had on the phone.

  “Mike White called me.”

  Bob gasped and stepped closer, like a high school cheerleader eager to devour the juiciest tidbit of gossip.

  Sandra laughed. She was growing quite fond of—and comfortable with—this supernatural being.

  “What?” Bob pushed. “Why did he call you?”

  “Well, if you’d check in, ever, you’d know that Nate called him last night to ask—”

  “Your husband knows him?”

  “I guess. Nate knows everyone. Anyway, he asked Mike to get me into reffing. And Mike just called me to tell me that there’s training tonight at seven. At his funeral home.” She waited for the absurdity, and possible danger, of this last detail to sink in.

  “His funeral home?” Bob looked perplexed.

  She shrugged. “I dunno. He called it White Funeral Home. His name is Mike White. I just put two and two—”

  “Well, find out for sure tonight.”

  “Bob, you have to come with me.”

  He scrunched up his nose and looked at the sky. Sandra imagined him doing a quick scan of his angelic version of a calendar app. “Sure. Okay.”

  She breathed out a rush of air. “Awesome. Thank you. But don’t be late. I’m not going in without you.” She looked him up and down. “If anything should, uh ... go wrong ... can you defend me?”

  “What? What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I mean, if he tries to murder me and stuff me in a coffin, can you whip out some miracle power and save me?”

  “Of course.” His expression, which was completely sans confidence, did not match his words.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure! Stop worrying. He’s not going to try to kill you. He has no reason to be suspicious of you.” Bob had a point. As far as Mike White knew, she was just a new soccer ref. “Is that all? Because I really need to get back to football practice. There’s a kid playing with a concussion, and I need to stay close.”

  “Sure. Oh, wait. Do you know if Peter’s coach is still mad at him?” She only felt a little guilty for keeping the angel from the injured football player.

  Bob frowned. “Not really a pressing issue.”

  “Do you know or don’t you?”

  He let out a resigned sigh. “I have no reason to think that Peter’s coach is mad at him. In fact, I overheard him praise Peter’s aggression to his wife.”

  “Oh good.” She wasn’t sure if this was good or not, but she’d take it. “Thanks, Bob.” But he was already gone.

  She climbed back into the van to see a text message from Nate. “Will you still have time to cook supper?”

  Oh good grief. “Yes,” she texted back. “I won’t let you starve.”

  Chapter 22

  With her family fed and Sammy tucked into bed, Sandra bade farewell to Nate and got ready to step out into the night.

  He stopped her at the door and gave her a peck. “Good luck, honey. I still think this is bizarre, but I’m proud of you for it nonetheless.”

  This admission surprised her and filled her whole body with warmth. Suddenly, she didn’t resent pausing the YouTube soccer rules videos to cook him supper. She couldn’t remember the last time he’d told her he was proud of her. Had he ever? “Thanks, Nate. See you in a bit.” And she stepped out into the crisp autumn air.

  Bob was sitting in the passenger seat of her locked minivan. This was simultaneously comforting and creepy. Still, she couldn’t help but flash him a smile as she climbed behind the wheel. Her heart pounded with excitement. “Fancy meeting you here.”

  “What?”

  She ignored his lack of a funny bone and started the car. “Too bad I have to drive across town. Can you just grab me and zap us both over there?”

  “What?” he said, sounding even more confused than the last time he’d said it.

  She turned to look over her shoulder, not entirely trustful of the backup camera. “You know, how you flit around town disappearing and reappearing. Can you make me do that?”

  He didn’t answer her.

  Once she’d backed out onto the street and put the car in drive, she looked at him, but he avoided her gaze. All right then, either he didn’t want to admit he couldn’t do it, or he wasn’t allowed to admit anything. “Is that proprietary information?”

  “Do you have a plan?” he asked after an awkward pause.

  She snorted. “No, I don’t have a plan. Wasn’t this your idea? Shouldn’t you be the one with a plan?”

  He stared out the windshield looking contemplative. “Yes, I suppose I should.” She didn’t know if he was wistfully wishing he had one or actively coming up with one, so she let him think in peace.

  Soon, before she was ready, she was pulling into the parking lot of the funeral home on Kirkland Street. As its name suggested, the massive building bore white siding. It also bore far more doors than she thought necessary, and she peered into the darkness, trying t
o figure out which one to approach. As she stared, she saw a man she didn’t recognize striding toward a door near the back. “Maybe we should follow that guy.”

  “Maybe we should,” Bob said and then vanished and reappeared outside the van.

  She climbed out and whispered, “Can’t you just get out of the vehicle like a normal person?”

  “Do you really want someone to see your door opening all by itself?” he whispered back.

  Oh yeah, that. He had a point. “You ready?” she asked, mostly to stall for herself.

  “Waiting on you.”

  Fine. She willed her legs to move, and found that once she took the first step, the rest followed easily and quickly and soon she was standing inside a well-lit, tastefully appointed hallway. The carpet was so clean that she had the urge to remove her shoes, but before she did so, she realized how weird that would be. Voices drifted down the hall toward her. She couldn’t make out what they were saying, but, now in full-sleuth mode, she crept closer, trying to overhear. Bob kept pace with her, staying behind her, and reinforcing her theory that no, if Mike White tried to shove her into a coffin, her angel would not be able to stop him. She paused a foot from the doorway and strained to hear.

  “We have several policemen working as officials,” a man said.

  She bit back a gasp. Policemen? That was a good sign, right? She wanted to look at Bob to see if he’d heard, but she didn’t dare turn away from the conversation, lest she miss something.

  “Well, it’s not something I’m dying to do.” This new voice was unusually deep. He sounded a little like Robert Barone from Everybody Loves Raymond. “I don’t even like soccer.” He gave a hearty laugh. “But my basketball buddies have guilted me into it.”

  The original voice laughed. “Whatever it takes. We’re desperate for help.”

  There was a long pause, and Sandra considered giving up the eavesdropping effort.

  But then the first voice said, “We’ll get started in just a sec. Just waiting on another new ref. The high school principal’s wife.”

  The second voice laughed. “A woman?”

  Sandra rolled her eyes.

  “Do you have many of those? There’s only a few reffing basketball, and I’ll tell you, they struggle—”

  “Really?” Voice number one, which Sandra had concluded belonged to Mike White, interrupted the Robert Barone wannabee. “Statistics show no such thing. The numbers suggest women make fantastic referees.”

  Sandra waited nearly a full minute, but Robert had decided to be quiet, and Mike was allowing that to happen, so, with a giant intake of air, she stepped into the open doorway. Instantly, she made eye contact with Mike, who stood to greet her. “Sorry I’m late!” She tried to sound confident and headed for the seat closest to the door, which put her right beside the Robert-impersonator. Mike offered his hand. She shook it, trying to have a firm, manly handshake, and mostly failing.

  “You’re not late at all. We were early.”

  She allowed herself to look at Robert. Though he was seated, he was still nearly eye to eye with her. She offered her hand, which he took readily enough. “Hi, I’m Sandra.”

  “Dwight.” Dwight was as tall as Robert, but that’s where the similarities ended. Dwight was so pale that Sandra feared he was a vampire. His face was all jagged edges, like it had been chipped out of a cliff.

  “Pleasure to meet you, Dwight.” She sat down and faced Mike. Faking confidence was making her feel confident. Her heart was still pounding hard enough to hurt, but still, she had this weird inner assurance that she was going to be just fine. She, minivan-driving soccer mom Sandra Provost, could handle this, even if she didn’t know quite what this was yet.

  Chapter 23

  “Thanks for coming,” Mike White said in a grave tone. “We’re grateful you are here. We are really hurting for refs. I’ve even had to do some middle school games.” His tone made it clear that such an activity was miles beneath him. “And we’ve even had to cancel a few games.”

  “Aren’t you a college ref?” Robert, scratch that, Dwight asked, and Sandra wondered if he would always be such a brown-noser, or if it was a practice he saved for first impressions.

  “I am. But when there is a hole and no other official to fill it, either I do it, or we cancel. I don’t like to cancel games on middle schoolers.” He managed to sound as though he really cared about the children. For a second, Sandra forgot she was looking at someone who might be a murderer.

  “Does that mean I’m going to get stuck with all the middle school games?” Dwight asked.

  “I would like to volunteer to do solely middle school games,” Sandra piped up.

  Mike smiled at her. “You’ll both be doing middle school this year. Maybe a few JV games if there is no one else to cover, but let’s get some experience under your belt before we get too excited. Now, first things first.” He slid a rule book across the table to each of them.

  Sandra opened hers and squinted down at the tiny print.

  “I’m going to assume you know the basics, so I’ll just go over recent rule changes with you today.”

  Sandra wasn’t sure this was good news. Just how basic were the basics? If he meant that she needed to know the difference between a corner kick and a goal kick, she might be all right. But if the basics were anything more complicated than that, she might be in trouble.

  Mike jumped right in, and he was a fast talker when he wanted to be. Sandra scrambled through her purse for a writing utensil, and panicked when all she could find were two broken crayons and a dried out eyeliner. Mike White read her mind, though, and slid his pen across the table to her. She began to scribble notes, but it was mostly no use. She had a question for nearly every statement he made, and she didn’t have the courage to ask them. She knew they were stupid questions, and she didn’t want these men to know just how clueless she was.

  About fifteen minutes after he started, Mike stopped his instruction and asked if there were any questions. Still, she couldn’t think of one that didn’t make her sound like a complete moron.

  Dwight had a question, of course. “There’s a written test, correct?”

  Oh man. Of course there would be. She was in trouble. Maybe Bob could help her. That would only be cheating if she really wanted to be a soccer ref, right? She was just doing this to try to solve the Frank Fenton puzzle. Once she’d done that, she would retire back to her normal life. So no, she didn’t think it would count as cheating. It would just be part of the undercover process. She fervently hoped Bob would agree to her shaky detective ethics. She could feel him standing behind her and wished she knew what he was thinking. She hoped he was picking up some clues, because she wasn’t getting anything. Mike White appeared to be an upstanding professional at the moment.

  She realized Mike was talking about the written test and forced herself to focus. “As long as you get it done within a few weeks, you’ll be fine.”

  “And is there a field test?” Dwight asked.

  Mike shook his head. “I’ll set you up to shadow a mentor ref, pronto. You’ll do a game with him or her before you do one on your own.” Sandra thought he’d probably added the “for her” for her benefit, and found the gesture to be a kind one.

  “Listen to the feedback from that mentor official. I’ll put you with ones who know what they’re doing. Then, I’ll give you a game where you’re live, but you’ll still be working with that same mentor official. Don’t worry, you’ll get paid for both games.”

  It hadn’t even occurred to her to wonder about that, but now that he’d mentioned money, the idea cheered her.

  “And if the mentor ref thinks you need another shadow game, we can do that too, but that rarely happens. It’s a simple game. You guys will be fine.”

  Right. She’d be fine. What could possibly go wrong?

  Mike handed each of them a short stack of paperwork. “Everything else you need to know is right here. Please read through it, and if you have any questions, email me or cal
l me anytime.” He looked into her eyes. “I mean it. If you need anything. I want you to be successful, and I’m here for you.”

  A little freaked out, she dropped his gaze and studied her paperwork. Then, before she was ready, he dismissed their meeting. She panicked. She had not learned a single thing about their case. She searched her brain for a question, any question, she could ask. “You own this funeral home?” Her cheeks grew hot. What a stupid question.

  He gave her a broad smile, and there was a twinkle in his eye. Oh great. Not only was it a stupid question, but now he thought she was flirting. “I do, but it’s not as weird a profession as you might think.”

  “I was wondering about that,” Dwight said quickly, as if he was jealous that Mike was talking to her instead of him. “How did you ever get involved in this business?”

  Mike shrugged. “I’m all about job security,” he said and laughed at his own joke. Sandra got the impression it was a joke he’d cracked many times before. She didn’t smile, and Dwight laughed as if it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard.

  Sandra strained to think of another question, but her mind was blank. She finally allowed herself to look at Bob, hoping he could telepathically communicate an intelligent detective-like question, but he, apparently, was in no mood for telepathy.

  “Don’t mention Frank. Play it cool,” he said right out loud.

  She jumped and looked around wildly to see if the men had heard, but they clearly hadn’t.

  Mike put a hand to the small of her back. “Are you okay?”

  Being this close to him, her womanly sixth sense sounded all kinds of alarms. For sure, the guy was a creep. Maybe not a murderer, but definitely a creep. She stepped away from him and nodded. “I’m fine, thanks.”