by R M Wild
“What are you doing?”
Captain Herrick was down at my feet, trying to untie my Bean boots. “If I learned anything from my first marriage, it was never make love with your boots on.”
“Love is a myth. Like the American Dream.”
He pulled the boots off my feet and tossed them in the corner. I widened my eyes to focus, but could barely make sense of his hovering shape at the foot of the bed.
He yanked the comforter out from underneath me and then reached for the button on my jeans. “Let’s get these off.”
I kicked my feet at him. “Hey, stop it!”
“Your pants are soaked,” he said. He thumbed the button apart and then ripped the zipper open.
11
Before I could muster the coordination to put my heel in his face, the door burst open.
“Get your rum-soaked hands off her!”
My head rolled to the side. A giant figure was standing in the door frame.
Captain Herrick put his hands up and unstraddled me. “I wasn’t doin nothin. I was puttin her to bed.”
Matt Mettle took two giant strides across the floor and grabbed him by the flannel collar.
“I’m serious man, I didn’t touch her! I swear to God. She’s wasted and she spilled herself. I was only tryin to help.”
But Mettle didn’t buy it. He cocked his fist back, drove it forward, and delivered a powerful blow across Captain Herrick’s chin. Herrick flopped back over my legs, fell over the side of the bed, and landed with a crash in a heap on the floor.
Mettle rounded the foot of the bed, ready to deliver more, but Herrick crabbed backward and pressed his back to the wall beneath the porthole. He was holding his chin, a trickle of blood escaping the corner of his lip.
So this is what Matt Mettle looked like when he got really angry. It was kind of sexy.
“Don’t hit me again, man,” Herrick pleaded. “I didn’t do nothin.”
Mettle bared his teeth and raised his punchers. “No worries. I’ve always been a Paci-FIST.”
Herrick clawed at the curtains to get to his feet. “This is assault, man. Police brutality. You better have a darn good lawyer.”
Then he scurried out the door.
“And don’t come back!” Mettle said. He shook out his fists and sat down on the edge of the bed beside me. The whole mattress shifted as if we were on a water bed and for a second, I thought I was about to pass out on the deck of The Moaning Lisa.
He shook my shoulder. “Rosie, can you hear me?”
My eyelids were half-closed. I was delirious. “I’m drunk, not deaf.”
“Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
I tried to form the words, but they came out as a mumble. The next thing I knew, I was seeing flames and a certain Phyllis Martin, all crispy and holding a pitchfork, was welcoming me to her new home, adorned with fiery stalactites.
I stirred when the sunlight turned my eyelids red. I sat up quickly, my headache flopping forward like a bad wig and then settling back into the middle of my skull.
My glasses were on the nightstand next to a glass of water. I rubbed my eyes and grabbed them and fumbled to put them on.
“What time is it? Where are my guests? I need to make breakfast.”
“Relax,” Mettle said. He was sitting in a rocking chair across from the window, a faint shadow from the muntin tattooing a cross on his chest. “Your guest went home last night. There’s no one here except you and me.”
I massaged my temples. My mouth was dry. My head was pounding. I glanced at myself in the antique vanity across the room and then wished I hadn’t. I had a horrible case of bedhead, like someone had dumped Elmer’s glue in my hair and pasted every strand to the pillow. I lifted up the comforter and checked underneath. I was still in my clothes, including my pants. My crotch was wet. I think I remembered spilling my rum, but wasn’t sure. I checked my lady parts, all five of them (boobs and butt cheeks get counted separately).
Nothing was sore.
“We didn’t—?”
“Didn’t what?”
“You know.”
“I don’t.”
I made an “okay” symbol and stuck my pointer finger through it.
“Classy, but no,” Mettle said. “What do you take me for? I only sleep with conscious women.”
“A pretty high bar,” I said. “Did you sit there all night?”
“Yes,” he said.
I tried to remember what had happened, but it was all a blur. All I could picture were flashes of the guests and the fire and Captain Herrick grabbing my arm.
“What happened?”
“I came in the room to find Herrick on top of you. I slugged him pretty good and he scampered away like a scared little rat. I told you not to trust that guy.”
“How’d you know we were up here?”
“Eldritch called me. He said that you were drunk and Herrick took you upstairs and I better get here quick. I dropped what I was doing and came right over.”
“God,” I said. “How embarrassing.”
“We all have our moments,” Mettle said.
“I can’t believe you had to see me like this. I feel terrible.”
“Imagine how I feel,” Mettle said.
“Thanks.”
“I’m never drinking again.”
“I could have sworn you told me you don’t drink at all.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“You might have been drunk,” Mettle said. “It was the night after I finished doing your tiles.”
“I’m so embarrassed.”
“Don’t worry. I’ve seen worse,” Mettle said. “Trust me.”
“Crime scenes don’t count.”
Mettle crossed the room and handed me the glass of water. “Hydrate yourself and take a shower. When you’re decent, I’ll meet you downstairs.”
I followed his advice and took a long, hot shower. I let the water run down my shoulders and down my spine, not wanting to step out from behind the curtain, not ever. I couldn’t believe I had put myself in a position to let Captain Herrick take advantage of me, nor that I had let Mettle see me in such an ugly place—both outside and in.
Not only was I going to have to find a new captain, but I was going to have find a way to rescue my reputation, both as a business owner and as a woman.
Now, a strategic partnership with Peter Hardgrave (Daddy?) was my only chance to stay afloat.
If I could find him.
I turned to face the shower head and leaned against the wall in the classic movie-desperation pose, my forearms against the tiles, the water running down my face. Then I gagged and spat. It was really hard to breathe when you faced the shower head like that.
I turned around again and let the hot water follow the path of my spine. I stood there for a long time and savored the steam as if it were the last of the hot water.
If I couldn’t turn things around soon, it was going to be.
While dressing, there was a knock on the downstairs door. Hoping it was a guest, one who was willing to look past the negative comments online, I pulled a clean sweater over my head and quickly shuffled downstairs.
Matt Mettle had already opened the front door. “What’s up guys?”
Two uniformed state troopers were standing on my porch. They were both bald, thinner than Mettle, but about the same height. Other than the fact that one was black, the other white, they could have been twins.
“Matthew Orlando Mettle?” they said in unison.
I blinked, thinking my hangover had trapped me in some bizarro rendition of The Shining.
“That’s me,” Mettle said. “You guys are Ellsworth troop, right?”
“We need you to come down to the barracks with us. We’ve got a few questions.”
Mettle glanced back at me. “About what?”
“Assault.”
I put a hand over my mouth.
“Who pressed the charges? James Herrick?”
“Yes.”
&nbs
p; Mettle shook his head. “Be real, guys. James Herrick is a mess of a human being. He’s got major priors. Sexual assault. Domestic abuse. And he’s a raging alcoholic.”
The left cop didn’t show a shred of emotion. “Herrick took a selfie immediately after the incident. The whole side of his face is swollen.”
“What was I supposed to do? He was on top of Rosie,” Mettle said. “He was trying to take advantage of her.”
The right cop pointed at me. “Are you Rosie?”
“Yes.”
“Did James Herrick hurt you, ma’am?”
I looked at Mettle.
“Go on. Tell them the truth,” Mettle said.
“No,” I said. “But I was pretty drunk. He might’ve intended to—I don’t know what was going to happen.”
The left cop took a pair of handcuffs off his belt. “Turn around, Matt.”
“You don’t need to cuff me,” Mettle said. “I’m going.”
The right cop took him by the arm and led him out the door. Without resistance, Mettle stepped outside, not bothering to look back at me.
“I’ll get you a good lawyer!” I said.
When they were gone, I hustled the rest of the way down the stairs and watched helplessly as they led Mettle to their cruiser and put a hand on his head to guide him into the backseat.
“I’m sorry,” I mouthed as the cruiser backed out of the driveway, the wheels spinning and pelting Mettle’s own cruiser with gravel.
12
I didn’t waste any time trying to look pretty, nor going to the bathroom, nor locking the doors, nor breathing. The moment that second cruiser disappeared around the bend, I hopped into my Honda and sped after it.
For the length of Beacon Street, the cruiser was right in front of me. Usually when I’m driving anywhere within visual distance of a cop, I keep one eye glued to the speedometer, making sure the needle twitches at the posted speed limit.
But this time, I didn’t monitor my speed. I stayed right behind the cruiser. If the cops were speeding, then I was speeding. If they stopped speeding to pull me over, like a silly game of Duck Duck Goose, my tongue was ready with a retort:
What fine examples you’re setting, Officers.
Mostly, I didn’t want to let Matt Mettle down. He had come to my aid and he had given Captain Herrick the punch that I had been wanting to deliver for a long time.
And yet Mettle was the one who was paying the price.
I had to help him. I couldn’t bear the thought of him sitting in a jail cell with the same lowlifes he had arrested over the years.
As I tailed the cruiser, I watched Mettle’s head bouncing in the backseat. As if his spine had turned into a wet noodle, his Chia Pet of ragged hair swayed back and forth with each curve in the road. He wasn’t bracing himself, but bouncing through the potholes.
Sitting in that same backseat where all the drunks had marked their territory was akin to me going back to school and sitting in one of the students’ desks while a teacher straight out of college tried to teach me how to read Dick and Jane.
Was there a worse form of relegation?
Not once, did Mettle glance behind. At the stop sign at the end of Beacon Street, the cruiser made a left and headed over to the highway. This was where we parted ways. I watched Mettle’s head shrink to the size of a Furby and then I made a right to go downtown.
I parked outside my foster-father’s law firm and ran up the front door. Inside, in the first office on the left, Kyle Kendall was sitting at Thomas Seyton’s old mahogany desk. His elbows were on a stack of papers as he sent someone a text message. His hair was slick and shiny and catching a blue highlight from his phone.
“You got a sec?” I said, out of breath.
He put his phone down. “Back so soon?”
“I was hoping you could help me out of a pickle,” I said.
“A jar or a barrel?”
“A vat.”
He stroked his chin. “You know, I’ve been doing some thinking about your little defamation case and I think—”
“Right now, that’s the least of my worries,” I said. “My foster father said you handed criminal cases, right?”
“They are my bread and butter, yes. Although to be fair to my clients, I rarely mention the butter. In prison, most of them are only allowed little packets of margarine. I try not to make them jealous.”
He smiled.
Was that supposed to be a joke? In better spirits—or under the influence of better spirits (like rum and coke)—I might have feigned an amiable chuckle and a convincing flip of the hair.
Instead, I spat everything out in one breath: “Matt Mettle got himself in trouble. Actually, I was the one who got him in trouble. No matter what he tells you, it’s all my fault. I was an idiot and he came to help me, but then the cops arrested him and took him to the barracks.”
“Slow down,” he said. “What are the charges against him?”
“Assault.”
Kendall stroked his perfectly smooth chin. “To be honest, I never thought you’d be concerned about that guy.”
“He’s evolved.”
“How? From a knuckle dragger to an orangutan?”
“He’s not nearly as loathsome as he was in high school.”
“Just slightly loathsome?”
“You need to get to know him better.”
Kendall adjusted his tie. “You know what that bully used to do to me in high school?”
“Should I?”
“Swim team season overlapped with the football team’s spring training. So when the football players were done lifting, they would usurp the locker room and make us swimmers change in the showers. Matt Mettle used to steal my Speedo from my locker and put it on top of his sweats and stick a toothpick in the crotch and dance around on the benches while singing ‘I’m little swimmer, look at my dorsal fin.’ He was too dumb to know that dorsal fins are on your backside. That is what little I know about Matt Mettle, but it’s enough to make me stay away.”
I pictured Mettle doing a little stripper dance—and for some inexplicable reason, in my fantasy, the rest of the football team was dancing behind him, all of them wearing Speedos.
I tried not to giggle. “That does sounds pretty Mettley to me.”
“I’m glad you think my pain is amusing.”
“It was a long time ago, Kyle. People do change.”
“Look, I want to help you out, Rosie, but Matt Mettle? C’mon now. You’re asking me to pet a pit bull after it has bitten me.”
“I didn’t like Mettle in high school either, but he’s helped me out of a dark place a couple of times now. If it’s about the money, I will pay you. Whatever you want.”
Kendall raised an eyebrow. “Close the door.”
I obeyed.
He clicked a ball-point ben and grabbed a legal pad from the fresh stack on the credenza. “What exactly happened?”
“It’s embarrassing,” I said. “You’ll think of me differently.”
“Do you want me as a lawyer? Or a friend?”
“Both.”
“Then you’ll have to trust me.”
I exhaled hard enough to make my lips reverberate. “I had too much to drink last night and James Herrick, the lobster-boat captain I had foolishly partnered with, tried to take advantage of me.”
“In what way? Did he cook the books? Did he steal from you? Did he show up late to work?”
I cleared my throat. “Sexually.”
Kendall adjusted his tie. “Oh. Did he hurt you?”
“No. Thank God. But he was about to. At least I think he was. I was pretty drunk. But Matt got there just in time and slugged Herrick in the chin. Herrick took a photo of the injury and pressed charges. The cops came and took Mettle away.”
“How much do you know about this Herrick fellow?”
“According to Mettle, he’s a real bag of mud. He drinks too much and he’s got a bunch of priors. Working with him has been nothing but a migraine.”
Ke
ndall’s phone was sitting on top of a stack of papers. He tapped the screen. “I’ll tell you what. I will go down to the station and talk to the cops. The chief owes me a favor. I’ll see what I can do. But I’m not promising anything, so don’t get your hopes up.”
I nodded, hopeful already. “Please, don’t bill Mettle for this. The whole thing is all my fault.”
“It’s not your fault,” Kendall said. “You’re allowed to get drunk. Your indiscretion doesn’t make it okay for someone else to take advantage of you.”
I reached into my handbag. “Do you take credit cards?”
“Put that away,” Kendall said. “I’ll try to get it resolved quickly.”
Still, I handed him my credit card. My hand was shaking. “If it’s possible, I’d like to split up the payments.”
“I told you to put it away, Rosie. This one’s on the house. Your father would never let you pay.”
“Foster father.”
“Whatever.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“Absolutely,” he said.
“Thank you. So much.”
He smiled and gazed at me. It felt like he could see the flowers inside my head all turn toward the sunshine.
Uncomfortable with the intensity of his gaze, I broke eye contact and turned to the door. “Well, I best be on my way.”
“Yes. Of course. I have to get back to work too.”
I forced a chuckle and made a cheesy swing at an imaginary jaw. “Gotta pay all those crazy bills, right?”
“Exactly.”
I turned for the door and opened it. “You want this open or closed?”
“Closed,” he said.
“Thank you again,” I said.
“My pleasure.”
I stepped into the hallway, gathered myself for a moment, and then turned around and went to close the door.
“Oh Rosie? On second thought, there is one way you could pay me back.”
“What’s that?”
He grinned.
13
Back in the house, I grabbed the leftover ear from one of the dismembered chocolate bunnies. Whatever weight I had lost in the hustle of treading water to keep the business afloat was going to pop right back onto my thighs like a little pop-up word balloon that said, Moooo!
