Candy Apple Red

by Nancy Bush

  I ran on, keeping to the shadows. By the time I got to my car I was shaking all over. I could scarcely get the key in the ignition.

  I drove away and wound around Lake Chinook back to my little corner of West Bay. Tumbling into bed, sore and charged with adrenalin, I thought it might be in my best interests to reconsider this information specialist gig.

  I was going to have to have a serious talk with Dwayne Durbin.

  Chapter Seven

  Champagne…oh, champagne…it isn’t how much I consume that affects me—anything counts. I can be quite drunk or stone-cold sober the whole night but as long as I drink champagne I’m bound to feel it. As I lay in bed on Sunday morning, gradually waking to the heat of a July scorcher, I could feel the aftereffects: the faint misery in my gut, the dull head, the niggling worry that I was going to have to give up alcohol along with dairy products and anything else that was fun.

  I simply was not going to do it.

  I turned over and that’s when the alarm bells went off inside my left arm. A stinging pain reminded me that I’d gotten tangled on the fence. I’d barely escaped the damn dogs. Those Dobermans’ bared teeth and snouts and frenzied barking had scared me so badly I would have gladly given my left arm to get away. I was grateful it was still with me, however, despite the screaming, tortured muscles that made me groan.

  “Good…God…” My mental screen jumped to another scene. Burying my face in my pillow, I attempted to blot out unseemly pictures—like a series of snapshots complete with sound effects—of Heather and Cotton, humping, thrusting, faintly squealing and panting.

  Oh, yeah. This is how I wanted to wake up.

  And had I learned anything? Anything useful? I seriously doubted it and I was all for taking my five hundred bucks and running. What did Tess need me for anyway? I had another mental picture of her in her Audrey Hepburn disguise and I wondered again what the hell she thought she was doing.

  Testing my arm, I was relieved to realize it wasn’t seriously injured. Sore, yes, but working. My clothes were in a jumble on the floor. The dogs had missed me, but the fence…? I examined them, found a few tiny rips, moaned over the loss, then decided it was simply a week meant for losing clothes.

  In my T-shirt and board shorts, I moseyed out to my back patio, squinting through the pounding in my head, to stare out at the green waters of the lake. There was a cheap lounger with white plastic strips sitting in the morning sun. I eased myself onto it. It was Sunday. I could phone Tess and report my progress—whatever that was—as she was probably expecting a call.

  It was going to be hot today. It was too bright to open my eyes. I climbed to my feet again, moving carefully as my bargain-basement lounge chair has a penchant for suddenly collapsing if you act too quickly. The phone started ringing and I squinted at my watch. Way too early for callers. I walked without enthusiasm to pick it up. Only family called this early on Sunday. It was either Mom or Booth. As soon as that thought struck me it sizzled along a nerve. Oh, shit. Booth was coming over with Sharona tonight.

  My head throbbed like it was beaten inside by a hammer. “Hi there,” I said into the receiver. No caller ID. I probably pay for the damn service but the phone in the kitchen’s about a hundred years old and clunky as hell. Dwayne has cursed my slow conversion to everything electronic, but hey, he’s not exactly a poster child for moving with the times himself. What’s with that cowboy gear? Didn’t that go out with the ’80s?

  “Hello?” a female voice greeted me back. The seesawing sound of fuzzy reception indicated she was on a cell phone. “Is this Jane—er—Kelly?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Hi, this is Megan Adair. Um, y’know I have Binky with me? I was supposed to drop her off?”

  “Who’s Binky?”

  “Aunt Eugenie’s dog?” She faded out for a moment.

  Another jolt like electricity. My eyes felt like they did not belong in my skull. “I’m not taking that dog.”

  “What?” Her voice was scratchy and faraway. I could scarcely hear her.

  “I’m not taking the dog!” I yelled.

  “Are you there? I can’t hear you. Listen, if you’re there, I’m just down the street. I’ll be at your place in a few minutes…”

  “I’m not taking the dog!” I practically screamed into the receiver but the phone was dead. I hung up and looked blankly around the kitchen. “Binky?” I repeated, dazed.

  Coffee…and aspirin…or acetominophen…stuff…

  I dug through my cupboards and found some baby aspirin. Little tiny yellow pills with mini milligrams. Still, I’m a chicken when it comes to drugs. I swallowed four, which I suspected wasn’t half of my normal dosage, but it pays to be careful. My shoulder sent little pain signals along my left arm. Just a reminder that last night hadn’t been without its dangers.

  Nothing helped and I was lying on my couch, arms cradled against my chest when my guest arrived. Megan Adair was true to her word. She knocked on my door so hard I thought she might break through the panel.

  With an effort I climbed off the couch and opened the door. She was tall with a spiky cap of blond hair. She wore tan shorts, a red tank top and in her arms was the ugliest dog on record—a walleyed pug with a snorting habit that made me wonder if sticking the nozzle of a bottle of nose spray up its snout might be in order.

  “This is—Binky?” I asked.

  “Mind if I put her on the ground?” She didn’t wait for a response as she set the dog on my hardwood floor and dusted her hands on her shorts. The pug snorted rapidly a few more times, turned a quick circle, then propped its tiny front paws on my leg and looked up at me. Its pink tongue lolled out of its mouth and it panted furiously.

  “She could use a drink,” Megan said.

  Couldn’t we all. “I can’t have a dog named Binky,” I said. But I dutifully walked to the kitchen, took down my grandmother’s blue-flowered bowl and filled it with tap water.

  “Eugenie was pretty specific.” Megan followed after me, glancing around my small bungalow with interest. “How do you know her?”

  “I don’t know Aunt Eugenie.” I paused. “How do you know Aunt Eugenie?”

  “She’s my aunt.”

  We stared at each other for several seconds. “You want a drink?” I asked, automatically pulling open the refrigerator door even though I knew better.

  “What have you got?”

  I leaned on the door. Without the shriveled carrots and milk there was nothing to commend it. “Tap water,” I offered.

  “Terrific.”

  I poured her a glass. Oregon water is not only drinkable, it’s good. Having lived in southern California most of my life and dealing with water that tastes as if it’s been fortified with soap, I sometimes forget that I can drink right out of the faucet. Right now it was all I had on tap, so to speak, so I poured myself a glass as well.

  Binky squeezed between me and the refrigerator, propping her little paws against the lowest shelf. “Hey!” I yelled, to which she smacked her lips several times and panted some more.

  “I’ve got her things in the car,” Megan said, setting down her glass.

  I watched her head outside. Her things? I glanced down at the dog who was sitting in a kind of odd sidesaddle position and gazing up at me as if ready for me to make a decision of some kind. “What things?” I asked. Binky closed her mouth and tilted her head, listening hard. I half expected her to respond, but all she did was resume panting.

  The “things” proved to be a little furry bed, a leash, a half-full bag of dry dog food and a metal food bowl stamped with BINKY in big, raised letters. I was going to be able to save my grandmother’s bowl for better things, apparently. Megan left this stuff in a pile in the middle of the living room and Binky ran over and snuffled everything before jumping in the bed and curling up, happy.

  Megan glanced at her watch. “Gotta run.”

  “I really can’t take this dog. I know my mother said I would, but it’s a responsibility I can’t handle.”


  Megan looked a bit crushed. She pulled out a pack of Players and turned them around in her fingers. “Can you keep her for a while? I don’t have a place right now. I’m kind of in between living arrangements. I love the dog, but…”

  “Sure,” I said quickly, seeing my out. “Hey, for a while, no problem.”

  “Great,” she said, heading for the door. She pulled out a cigarette as soon as she was on my porch. I followed her to her ancient Land Rover and watched her light up. The sharp smoke wafted my way as she waved out the match. Don’t ask me why, but sometimes I like the first scent of a lit cigarette. It’s a guilty pleasure most people don’t understand, myself included. I’ve never been a smoker but sometimes that first whiff of tobacco is aromatherapy at its finest. Maybe I’m a latent pyromaniac. I inhaled a lungful of secondhand smoke as Binky shot through the door and came over to us, weaving between our legs.

  “Does she understand about the road?” I asked. I lived on West Bay Road, a small connecting street between Bryant and South Shore, but it had its share of traffic. Twenty-five miles an hour be damned. People drove like maniacs.

  “I don’t think so. You’ll have to watch her.” Binks settled at Megan’s feet, staring up at her. “I couldn’t hand her over to Deirdre. Her husband’s a complete ass and those kids don’t look fully evolved. They’re from the Pleistocene era, or something. They didn’t want Binky and I didn’t want them to have her.”

  It was interesting she was so averse to Deirdre—the correct name for Aunt Eugenie’s daughter, apparently. Deirdre must be spurious indeed, if Megan were more interested in handing the pooch over to a complete stranger. What did that say about relatives?

  “Deirdre would be Aunt Eugenie’s daughter?” I said, to clarify.

  Megan snorted. Binky, watching and listening, snorted, too. I hoped to hear additional dirt on Deirdre, so to speak, but Megan had the good grace to keep her thoughts to herself, more’s the pity. “You’re lucky you’re not related to her,” was her final pronouncement. She reached into a Velcro pocket on the side of her shorts, withdrew a pen and piece of paper and wrote down a number. “That’s my cell. If you need me, call.”

  “What do you do?” I asked.

  “I’m a bartender.”

  “Really? I used to be a bartender in California. You’re at a bar in Portland?”

  “The Crock, short for Crocodile. You know it?”

  “I’ve heard of it.”

  “Good Mojitos. Lousy tips. Young crowd.” She shrugged. “On the east side. Not too far from Twin Peaks.”

  Twin Peaks was the name dubbed to the two bluish-green glass pyramids that rose above the convention center. The structure, with its glowing red lights crowning the tip of each pyramid, had been built around the time of the popular TV show and though the show was long defunct, its moniker lived on in Portland.

  I found myself warming to her in a way I generally reserved for only a few close, twisted individuals.

  “She’s been spayed. And she’s house-trained,” Megan said, returning to Binky. “Her vet was down the street from my aunt. I don’t have the number but I’ll get it. They’ll fax over her medical info.”

  I was overwhelmed. I didn’t think I was ready to assume responsibility over another living creature. “My friend Dwayne has a fax machine.” I reluctantly gave Megan the number and she promised the vet would send over all the medical information.

  Megan finished her cigarette, ground it underfoot, then conscientiously picked up the butt and carried it to her car’s ashtray. “Oh, and here are her papers. She’s registered with the AKC.”

  I had an immediate vision of Binky wearing a white sheet with cutout eyeholes and carrying an automatic weapon before I realized I’d mixed KKK with AK-47. “What’s the AKC?” I asked cautiously.

  Megan was digging through the stuff thrown on the passenger seat of the Land Rover. She pulled out an envelope and put it in my hands. “American Kennel Club.”

  She fired up the Land Rover, sketched me a wave, then backed expertly out of my drive. Certain I was in over my head, I turned toward the house, Binky dogging my heels. We headed into the living room and I closed the door.

  “Okay,” I said, gazing down at the dog. She was one sorry-looking creature. Her eyes were so far apart I wondered if she really possessed stereoscopic vision. She looked more like a bird or a fish than a predatory mammal who relied on its eyes working together to hunt prey. It was doubtful Binky would hunt anything, for that matter, just based on shape alone. She was built like a wide, torpedo-shaped footstool, broad back and short legs. Her face and tail were black; her body light tan. She was like a Siamese cat on steroids who’d undergone a species-change and then taken up chasing parked cars.

  I opened the papers. Binky’s full name was THE BINKSTER. How cute. Aunt Eugenie had shortened it to Binky. Like something you’d stick in a baby’s mouth. Or maybe some minor indiscretion, like a fart. I could see someone saying, “Oh, my. That was me. I just let loose with a binky.”

  The name had to go.

  “Anyone tell you you look a lot like Ernest Borgnine?” I asked her seriously. “Maybe I’ll call you Borg. How’s that? Hello there, BORG!”

  Binky turned around, faced the front door and started barking furiously. Her barking was close to hilarious. About as far down the scary scale from the Dobermans as one could get. She glanced back at me. My shouting had convinced her someone was here. “Not exactly swift on the uptake, are you?” I suggested.

  She collapsed into her sidesaddle lounge and began panting anew.

  “I don’t understand how dogs can just accept that they’re somewhere else and someone else is taking care of them,” I complained into the phone later to Dwayne.

  “What do you think they should do?”

  “I don’t know. Howl. Whine. Run away.”

  “Some dogs do.”

  “Not this dog,” I said darkly. “It’s made itself at home on my couch. And I’ve got the fan going full blast because all it does is pant and drink water.”

  “Have you fed it?”

  “I’ve only had it an hour,” I responded a tad testily. “I’m going to feed it tonight.”

  “What’s its name again?”

  I clamped my teeth together and counted to five. “Binky,” I said evenly. Dwayne wasn’t listening. He hadn’t been listening throughout my diatribe, though he’d accepted that a fax would be appearing on behalf of the dog. Why I’d felt he could somehow help, or commiserate, escaped me now. “I’ve got to change it. I can’t live with it. Even though this dog’s going away at the first—”

  “Did you go to the benefit?” he cut in.

  Well, how rude. “Yes.” I had half a mind to say nothing else. Name, rank, and serial number. That’s all you get, buddy. But I had another bone to pick. “And I damn near got myself killed in the process!”

  “Yeah?”

  He seemed only mildly interested as I regaled him with the previous night’s escapades, and he had the colossal nerve to respond with merely, “Write it down. All of it. Your impressions.”

  “Thanks for caring. You want me to put down the sight of Cotton’s bare ass pumping up and down? Tess’ll love that.”

  “When did you turn into such a prude?”

  “That’s such a…wrong thing to say. I do not do voyeurism well.”

  “Maybe you need some lessons.”

  I nearly bit out a response before I realized he was teasing me. Good old Dwayne, always trying to get my goat. “What kind of mother names her child Dwayne?” I said, jumping into battle.

  “The kind who’s in love with his father, Dwayne the dad.”

  “Oh. God. Seriously? Dwayne’s your dad’s name? Are you a junior?”

  “Different middle names.”

  “What’s yours?” I asked curiously.

  “Austin.”

  “Dwayne Austin Durbin?” Much as I hated to admit it, I kind of liked the sound of that.

  Dwayne got back to the
subject. “Put your notes together. Put ’em on a file on your computer, or better yet, a disk or flash drive. You can write up a report for Tess and make her feel she’s gotten her money’s worth. Clients like hard copy.”

  “Flash drive?”

  “An external piece you stick into a USB port. Mine’s silver, about the size of my little finger but flat. Comes in all different storage amounts. Mine’s 512 K. The size of the storage affects the price. Don’t be cheap.”

  “I’m not cheap,” I protested, lying through my teeth.

  “They’re also called flash hoppers, grasshoppers, a bunch of stuff. I know you don’t have a zip drive, so we can forget that. You do have a USB port on that dinosaur, right?”

  “Of course.” I was pretty sure I did. He meant that little rectangular opening, didn’t he? I wasn’t about to ask.

  “Get a flash drive. Better yet, get a new computer. It’s past time, Jane.”

  “I love my computer.”

  “No, you don’t. You’re just afraid to upgrade.”

  “Fine, fine.” I just wanted to get off the phone. Dwayne’s relentless dragging of me into the current millennium tried my patience to the extreme. I practically slammed the phone down, then called Tess. My headache had diminished to a tiny throb and my shoulder felt stiff but okay. I wondered if I had time for a run, or if the heat was too unbearable.

  Tess’s answering machine picked up; a relief to me. In a cheery voice I told her I’d spoken to Cotton at the benefit about nothing important. I let her know I was awaiting further instructions. I did not mention the five hundred dollars I was now owed, but it took all my mother’s hard-fought years of discipline to keep me from screaming the reminder to her.