Under My Skin

by Jaye Maiman

  Carly was practically sweeping the paint off the deck, all the time muttering something to herself in Italian. I figured she was getting too pissed for English, and I could guess the reason why. Last year there was a series of break-ins in the community. When Police Chief Robert Crowell realized that three of the homes were owned by gay male couples, he stopped the investigation cold in its tracks. The community hired my agency and we gathered evidence that clearly pinned the break-ins on Bobby Gardener and one of his friends. Crowell refused to pick up the case. Despite what they say, justice is far from blind and the scale hardly ever balanced.

  “Did you speak to Crowell yourself?” I asked.

  “Barely.” Carly had exchanged the broom for a bucket of birdseed. I followed her down the stairs and around the side of the house. “He took one look at Noreen’s outfit, then glanced at me, Amy, and Helen. It didn’t help that Helen was still obviously drunk. You could almost hear his Tinker Toy brain clicking away.”

  “He didn’t question you?”

  “Sure he did. He sneered at us and said ‘You ladies been drinking?’ What could we say? The kitchen smelled like a damn distillery. We told him about last night’s party and he snorted like he was trying to blow his nose through his mouth. Then he nodded to himself.”

  I had a sinking feeling. “Did he cordon off the area? Trace the position of the body?” Carly’s puzzled expression cut off my questions. Frustrated, I blurted, “What did he do?”

  “He had two of his deputies cart her body out to some kind of van, then he told Amy to make us all some coffee —”

  “He what?”

  “Well, you know, Amy has that waspy, femme look. The blonde hair, the ponytail, the paisley skirt —”

  “Shit, Carly, I’m not asking for a fashion report. You all sat down in the room where she was found?”

  She scooped the seed into the feeder and pursed her lips in annoyance. “We weren’t being disrespectful —”

  I groaned. “Ah, Carly, that’s not the point. I’m thinking about evidence. The placement of objects around the room, footprints on the floor, fingerprints...”

  “Oh.” I watched her snap the lid back onto the bucket. When she finished, she looked up at me with concern. “I didn’t even think about all that. I was so worried about Helen...”

  Taking a deep breath, I asked, “Did he bother searching the house?”

  Carly tapped the feeder with her index finger. “No. All he seemed interested in were the names of everyone at last night’s party and our level of alcohol consumption. You should have seen his smirk when we told him that Robert and Allan flew down to Key West this morning. Amy said she heard him utter something about sending the rest of the queers south.”

  Great. “Did he run sobriety tests on all of you?”

  She shook her head.

  I asked her a few more questions about Crowell’s half-assed interrogation, then we walked back to the deck in silence. I rapidly added up everything I knew so far and I wasn’t real pleased with the direction in which my instincts were driving me.

  When we got back to the front of the house, Helen was stretched out in a mesh hammock, Amy standing alongside her massaging Helen’s temples with some kind of liniment. I felt Carly stiffen beside me. I knew the scene was innocent, but I nevertheless understood Carly’s reaction. The two of them looked a little too cozy.

  I walked over and said, “It doesn’t sound like you have much to worry about, Helen. From what everyone’s told me, I doubt Crowell has any interest in investigating Noreen’s death.” Disapproval slipped into my tone. I knew my words represented good news for Helen, but they galled me. “I’d still like to check out the scene myself.” As Helen’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, I added quickly, “Just for extra assurance, in case this ever goes to court.” The truth was my curiosity was greedier than Ivan Boesky.

  Amy handed me a cracked leather key case. “I used Noreen’s keys to lock up when we left.”

  I pocketed the case and headed for my car. I could feel Helen’s gaze burning through my corduroy jacket.

  The smell of whiskey hit me as soon as I opened the front door. Man, I thought, she must have bathed in the goddamn stuff. The entryway led into a great room with a cathedral ceiling dotted with skylights. Dust motes floated in the shafts of natural light transecting the room. I glanced around and knew instantly whose hand had orchestrated the room’s design.

  The carpeting was maroon, the furniture constructed of fine cherry wood outfitted with gleaming brass handles. The sofa and matching armchairs were upholstered in tufted black leather. A cast-iron grating covered the brick fireplace on the far side of the room, and ornately framed paintings of horses bucking, prancing, and vaulting adorned the walls. Overall, the decor was distinctively masculine and upper-class, reminding me of a musty, private men’s club my ex-publisher once dragged me to.

  I wondered how Helen had lasted here for as long as two months.

  In the kitchen, the atmosphere was drastically different. Ice-cold contemporary. Steel counters, black-and-white tiles on the walls, gray industrial carpeting covering the floor. The only other colors in room were shades of red. Headache-red faucets, cranberry dish towels, scarlet Venetian blinds, and a crimson stain spread out in front of the sink like a mutant amoeba.

  I slipped on a pair of dishwashing gloves, then knelt down and inspected the carpet on my hands and knees. The charcoal fibers reeked. I removed a handkerchief from my back pocket, sprayed a little peppermint Binaca on the center, and tied it around my nose. Then I swept my hand around the stain, hoping to dislodge any item not immediately visible to the eye. Still fingering the carpet, I traced the faint discoloration that delineated the edges of where Noreen’s body had apparently lain. I paused, puzzled.

  The carpet felt damp in the area surrounding the outline, but was bone dry where she had fallen. I untied the handkerchief and sniffed the floor covering like a hound dog. The stench of whiskey was concentrated along the curving line of discoloration that marked the body’s position.

  I stood up and surveyed the room again. There were no other bloodstains visible. The sink bore a trace of vomit, but the counter, neighboring stove top, and wall tiles were clean. No spatter marks from a powerful blow to the head, no drops from a bloody weapon. I ran a finger along the surface of the counter and walls to see if they had been recently washed. The kitchen grease on the tip of my index finger was an unambiguous answer.

  My pulse was racing by then. I grabbed the wastebasket from under the sink and rummaged through the contents. I found browned apple cores, crusted coffee grinds, the remnants of an omelette, junk mail inserts, but no bottle of booze. My suspicion grew as I searched the cabinets, broom closet, buffet drawers, and even the refrigerator. I walked into the adjoining bathroom next and checked the medicine cabinet. There were expired prescriptions for everything from Seldane to Antivert, plus several herbal treatments prepared by Amy. The first shelf contained a vial of Amy’s remedy for sciatica. I knew the stuff well. Just five months ago, a mean case of sciatica had ripped through my right thigh and into my back. It lasted five painful days. Amy tried to convince me to try her herbal concoction, but I had stubbornly refused. Now I remembered how Noreen finally sat me down with a sheaf of articles and convinced me to keep an open mind.

  With a shiver of guilt, I acknowledged the fact that Noreen had a compassionate side few people ever saw. I wondered if anyone would truly mourn her loss. Including me.

  I opened all the containers and sniffed them tentatively. Within seconds, I had a violent sinus headache. Slamming the cabinet door shut, I headed upstairs. I tried the master bedroom first. Under a cherry-wood sleigh bed I found a metal file box. From its weight, I was pretty sure it didn’t contain booze. But I had to be sure. I pulled out the silver case of picks given to me by my brother on my last birthday and snapped the lock open. Nothing but basic financial and legal documents. I scanned the files, jotted down a few key numbers and replaced the papers.
r />   An hour later, I finished combing through the rest of the house.

  There was no alcohol on the premises.

  Chapter Three

  I assumed a Southern accent and said, “Police Chief Crowell, please.”

  “One moment, please.” The receptionist’s voice reminded me of Julia Child’s. Suddenly I found myself craving a slice of crusty French bread with a thick slab of butter. She murmured something out of range of the telephone receiver, then returned. “Can I say who’s calling?”

  I thumbed through the compact disks Noreen had stacked on the shelf next to the phone. “Meg Christian from the Pocono Record.” The name sounded nice and proper. I figured Crowell’s favorite song probably wasn’t “Ode to a Gym Teacher.”

  “Can you call back tomorrow, ma’am? It’s just after six, and he’s kind of anxious to get going. Promised his wife that he’d pick up a turkey on the way home.” She chuckled congenially. I love these small-town folks.

  “Well, I understand that. Truly. I’m cooking up a storm myself, come Thursday. But I have this deadline, see.” I poured it on thick, complaining about my tyrant editor and the horrific prospect of being plunged into yet another job search. A minute later, Crowell picked up the line.

  “Thank you for taking the time, sir.” I wanted to sound like Pat Robertson’s dream female. “I’m new here on the paper and I’m just following orders myself. My boss said ‘Get on the phone to the police chief’ and I just hopped to it. Hope your wife won’t mind. I imagine she knows you’re an important man ’round here.”

  He had Dan Quayle’s high-pitched laugh. I shuddered.

  “Honey,” he said. “You sure don’t know my wife. Now, how can I help you?”

  “John heard that someone died under rather questionable circumstances up in a community outside Canadensis. I wrote the name down somewhere. Hold on, here it is. Telham Village. What can you tell me about that, sir?”

  He almost giggled this time. “Questionable, honey? Is that what the man said? Shoot. Nothing questionable about this one. Some bulldyke up in Telham drank herself to death. Simple cardiac arrest. Now, you go tell your boss to stop listening to them gossipmongers and naysayers. Thanksgiving’s coming. I want to read some uplifting stories. Kids from the high school are planning a real nice parade. That’s the kind of story folks want to read.”

  I bit my lip, then said, “Couldn’t agree more. My mama sure didn’t raise me to be writing about drunks, but I have to make a living. Now, are you sure about this woman? Maybe someone just tried to make it look like she was drunk, you know, poured alcohol on the body after she fell. Something like that.”

  “Whoa, sweetheart. You should be writing for TV, you should. No such possibility.”

  “Have you determined the time of death?”

  “Huh? Can’t see that that matters much, but yeah, we did. Coroner guesses it was sometime between midnight and four in the morning.”

  “There’s a kid in the community I’ve heard about. A real troublemaker—”

  “Bobby? Nah. The boy’s just high-strung. Besides, I hear that he’s biking cross-country. Look, hon, I talked to her friends. They were all drunk as skunks. I even checked with some neighbors. Matter of fact, the coroner knows her personally. No, sweetie. She just over-imbibed. Pure and simple. Now, if you don’t mind, I better be getting to that meat market before all the turkeys are dead and gone.”

  I hung up angrily, thinking, fat chance. The turkeys will inherit the earth.

  When I returned to the cabin, K.T. was sprawled in the overstuffed plaid couch reading Bon Appetit. I tossed my jacket onto the coat rack, then turned to her. The glow from the fireplace highlighted the reds in her hair. She looked up and smiled at me contentedly, and my hands started to shake. Wordlessly, I headed into the kitchen. Every burner on the stove was occupied with pots or saucepans and the air was deliciously aromatic. I peeked under the lid of the stockpot.

  “Chicken kurma.” K.T.’s voice drifted toward me from the doorway. I didn’t turn around. She continued speaking as she approached me. I could feel myself stiffen in anticipation. “I brought the spices with me. I’m also making some curried rice.” She wrapped her arms around my waist. “Maybe we need to talk.”

  Inexplicably, I started to quake.

  She spun me toward her and stared. “What is it?” She looked frightened.

  What could I say? I was terrified. More terrified of what was happening here in this house than I could ever explain to anyone —including myself.

  I shook my head and extricated myself from her arms. “I don’t think Noreen’s death was accidental,” I said.

  She narrowed her eyes and shot me a look that penetrated far too deeply. I meandered around her. “This isn’t about Noreen. Christ, I’m not stupid, Robin. You’re freaking out about last night, aren’t you?”

  Her Southern accent was more apparent when she was irritated. I wanted desperately to kiss her. Instead I snapped, “I have a surprise for you. My world doesn’t revolve around K.T. Bellflower, chef extraordinaire. I spent the afternoon investigating a possible murder. Not quite as lovely a pastime as dabbling in the kitchen.”

  I watched the blood rush to her cheeks and waited for the explosion. She sighed deeply, wiped the back of her hand across her forehead, and smiled. “You’re good at this, aren’t you?” she asked, sending a shiver up my spine.

  I felt naked and trapped. “What are you talking about?” I asked, looking frantically for some safe place to hide. I walked into the living room and picked up the television remote. Click. The weather channel.

  A hand fell softly on my shoulder. “You’ve been running from me for six months. Every time we talked on the phone, you’d start off sounding thrilled to hear my voice, then you’d gradually tighten up. By the end, I felt as if I were concluding a business call. ‘Thanks so much for calling.’” She imitated my sign-off perfectly.

  I flopped onto the couch. Click. Highlights from Monica Seles’ victory at the Virginia Slims. My eyes were riveted to the screen.

  “Robin.” Her voice was like honey. I almost turned around. “Robin,” she repeated, her tone insistent yet unbearably gentle. “I know how hard it is to trust someone. Believe me.”

  She squeezed in next to me. My breath grew shorter. Images from my past were pressing in. I closed my eyes, but they were still there.

  Soft fingers stroked the side of my face, circled my ear. “My father died when I was just eight years old. He was a truck driver. Big strapping man who looked like John Wayne. Boy, did he love country music. His favorite was ‘Six Days on the Road,’ by Dave Dudley.” The affection in her voice was acute. Something in me begged to be let loose. I drowned it by turning the volume up on the television. “He was the gentlest man I’ve ever known. When my parakeet died, he buried it under the dogwood outside my bedroom window. The day before the accident, we —”

  She fell silent, and the noise in my head intensified. I saw my father’s face at the funeral where my sister’s body lay prior to the service. His eyes steel-gray, his skin blotchy and scarred, his lips so tight they turned the color of raw chicken. He pushed my mother to one side then hauled me into the room by my wrist, my feet dragging on the floor, my cries bouncing off the walls like rubber bullets. He slammed open the coffin lid. “Look at her,” he growled. “Look at your sister. What you have done.” He hoisted me up by my collar, the top button of my starched white Peter Pan shirt pressing hard against my Adam’s apple, choking me, stifling my sobs. Finally, the button popped and landed on Carol’s horrifying wax-like figure. He tossed me then, like a bag of garbage.

  “You, you...” he stuttered in rage. With more emotion than I had ever seen him express before, he tore off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. I cowered below the coffin, waiting for him to strike. When the blow came, I barely winced. I remember thinking, I deserve this.

  “You are no better than the Nazis that killed my family. Do you hear this?” Each word punctuated by the back o
f his hand crashing across my cheek. “No better than a Nazi.” He spat something at me in Yiddish, the first and only time he ever used the language in front of me. And the last words he ever spoke to me.

  Du bist der malekhamoves. The harsh, guttural sounds haunted me for years, till I finally asked a friend to translate what I remembered. She had stared at me uneasily.

  “You are the Angel of Death.”

  Now, my hands trembling, the memory strangling me, I turned to K.T.

  She was lost in her own history. I watched conflicting emotions flicker across her face. Finally she said, “We fought that day. A stupid fight. I wanted him to work in the mines like the other fathers in the area, so he’d be home more often. He told me he didn’t want to end up like my mother’s father, a bitter, hacking old man at the age of forty-four. Then he drove off.” Her eyes filled and I envied the easiness of her tears. “He was killed in a three-vehicle crash in Tennessee the very next day.”

  I had shifted toward her and now she cradled me in her arms. I shut off the television and tucked myself closer.

  “No one told me he died. My mother said, ‘Daddy’s gone there.’” K.T. pointed upwards. “I thought I had been so bad he had run away from us. Then one day, I was playing with a wooden plane he had built for me…” She paused and looked at me closely. “I still have it. It was in the dining room the night I lured you to that dinner party.”

  I nodded, recalling the evening too vividly. It was also the night I found out someone else in my life had died.

  “Well, I was outside playing with it and I saw a red plane roar overhead. That’s when it hit me. My daddy was up there, flying around, waiting for me to apologize. For years, anytime I heard a plane, I’d run out and scream, ‘I’m sorry, Daddy. You can come home now.’” Her look darkened. “My life became hell once he died, in more ways than I’d like to recollect.”