Knickers in a Twist

by Kim Hunt Harris

  “I'll put it to Viv today. And I'll see what I can do to encourage this thing with Nigel the Brit. Maybe by this time next year we'll all be playing canasta over a plate of sliced tomatoes and cucumbers that Viv and I grew ourselves.”

  Each member belongs to all the others.

  As I groomed dogs at my job at Flo's Bow-Wow Barbers, that verse kept running through my head. I had to admit, I didn't care for it. I didn't like to think of myself as being obligated to anyone else—and certainly not to everyone else. To be honest, the Apostle Paul and I don't always get along.

  That didn't mean that I necessarily thought he was wrong. He did, after all, write half the New Testament. That had to give him some credibility right there. I just didn't like it. The truth was, though, that everything we did affected those around us. I had learned that lesson a million hard ways when I was drinking. No one lived in a vacuum.

  It was a slow day at Flo's, and one of the great things about working there was that we didn't have to stay until closing time. If we got done with our dogs, we could leave. So when I realized I was going to be through with work by two o'clock, I decided to use whatever gifts I had to help Viv.

  “Windy, call Viv.”

  Viv didn't even say hello. She must have seen it was me, because she answered with, “What time are you getting off?”

  “I'll be done in about fifteen minutes,” I said.

  “Ooooh, that's perfect! Come straight over. I have a job for you.”

  “Does this involve Nigel?”

  “It does! I had a fantastic idea but I need someone to help me play it out.” She hung up.

  I frowned at the phone. She needed someone to help play it out? What mortifying scene was she getting me into? I swept up and cleaned my tools, thinking that this could help pay back some of the shampoo and breakfast sandwiches Tony had bought.

  That was a thought I immediately checked, though. Tony would never owe me. I would forever be in Tony's debt. I decided that while I was helping Viv capture Nigel the Brit, I would also bring up the volunteer thing at the arboretum. It was the least I could do.

  When Stump and I got to Viv's apartment at Belle Court, she was in a tizzy. She had written out a scene for us to act out as Nigel walked by.

  Although my part was crucial, I wasn't exactly playing Lady Macbeth. Viv rushed us to one of Belle Court's numerous hallways and positioned me and Stump, then stood back and surveyed the effect.

  “Bend your knee a little.”

  I bent my knee.

  “No, the other one. More. No, not that much.”

  “What look are you going for here? Tell me that, and I can bring my own interpretation.”

  “We're just two friends engaged in casual conversation. Do you remember your line?” She checked her lipstick in the mirror that hung above a huge flower arrangement on the hall table. We were in one of the many byzantine hallways in Belle Court’s main building, where an alcove held two floral print wingback chairs for a chance to sit and watch the world go by.

  “But Winston Churchill was Prime Minister during World War II,” I stated. Again. I mentally tried to force my body into the stance of someone engaged in casual conversation about World War II.

  “You're not selling it,” Viv said. She leaned forward and ran a thumbnail along her lip to edge away a stray lipstick smear. “Say it like you're honestly confused.”

  I was honestly confused. I wanted to help Viv, but I couldn't believe she was working so hard to get this guy's attention. She had, after all, already had as many husbands as Elizabeth Taylor. Wasn't that enough? I hefted Stump to my other side, trying to be supportive but also trying to figure out what the urgency was. “What do you hope is going to happen? What is it about this guy that has you working so hard to impress him?”

  “I'm not working that hard,” Viv said. She turned and stood on tiptoe, checking her butt out in the mirror. “I'm just...he's...” She stopped and frowned. “He's British.”

  “And?”

  “And it's so cool. You need to hear him talk—Oh! Here he comes!”

  I turned to look down the hall.

  “Don't look! For crying out loud!” She whirled around and visibly tried to catch her breath.

  I could hear Nigel's group—consisting of himself and what sounded like four or five “old widder women” as G-Ma called them—coming down the hall toward us. Viv took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, then held a hand up to me in a wait-for-my-signal gesture.

  The women were all talking at once, though. I could see why Viv had named them The Gaggle. It was bizarrely like a group of tweens walking through the mall. One of the ladies was Anne, one of my favorite people at Belle Court. Privately I thought of her as Apple Annie because of her round red cheeks. She was every sweet little old lady you've ever seen—Mrs. Santa Claus, the lady who owned Tweety Bird, etc.

  Behind Anne was Imogene, a gruff old bear of a woman who was like the opposite of Apple Annie. My nickname for her was Intimidating Imogene. I never knew if I had somehow, at some point, managed to disappoint Imogene without knowing it, or if she just went through life looking like that, but every time I saw her I felt like slinking away with my tail between my legs.

  “Shut up, Anne,” Viv hissed through her lips. “For once in your life, just shut up!”

  They were on us, then, and the moment was about to be lost. With a frown, Viv signaled to me and whispered, “Loud!”

  “But Winston Churchill was the Prime Minister during World War II,” I shouted.

  “Oh, Salem! Hahahahaha!” Viv threw her head back and laughed hugely. She slapped her leg. She checked the mirror to see if the group passing behind her had noticed. “That's all anyone remembers. The good ol' British Bulldog! But he became Prime Minister halfway through the war. Neville Chamberlain was Prime Minister when war broke out—” She started as if she'd just realize we weren't alone in the hallway. “Well, hello there, Nigel.” She smiled brilliantly. Then her mouth went flat. “Ladies.”

  The snub was lost on Anne. She stood at Nigel's side, smiling her cherubic smile. “You should join us at the pool, Viv. We're about to do water aerobics.” She reached out and rubbed Stump's ears with her soft little-old-lady fingers. “Right, Nigel? Viv would enjoy water aerobics, don't you think?”

  “That's right,” Nigel said. “The more the merrier.”

  I had to admit, for an old guy he was kind of hot. His silver hair swept back from his high forehead. He had the requisite old man bushy eyebrows, but they were still somewhat dark. He sported a mustache and a very narrow goatee, both darker like his eyebrows instead of full silver like the hair on his head. The effect reminded me of a rakish riverboat gambler, except with a British accent.

  “I fear we're not able,” Viv said.

  I looked at her. I fear we're not able?

  “We're working a new case. Got to catch the baddies, you know. Gotta...crack on.”

  “That's right!” Anne said. She beamed up at Nigel. “Viv and Salem are private detectives.”

  “He knows, Anne. You've told him at least five times that I know of,” Imogene said.

  “Yes, well, we'd best be on our way or we'll miss the class.” Nigel turned to Viv and me with a bow. “Perhaps another time.” He took Anne by the elbow and steered her back toward the pool area.

  Viv and I watched him go in silence. She frowned. “Did you see the way he was holding Anne's elbow?”

  “Probably just trying to make sure she didn't fall.”

  She latched on to that. “He is very considerate.”

  “Viv, what is it about this guy that has you so bowled over?”

  She looked at me like I was crazy. “Did you see him? Did you hear him speak? The more the merrier,” she parroted in a sad imitation of his accent. “I mean, he really meant that, I could tell. That was sincere.”

  “Do you think he's impressed by your knowledge of British history?”

  “Of course! He's a war hero—did I tell you that? He flew Spitf
ires in World War II.”

  “That is impressive.”

  “And you should hear him read poetry.” She turned back toward her apartment, lost in the memory of Nigel's voice. “It's like...you know that feeling you get after a nice brandy? Warm in the center of your body, relaxed, content? Nigel reading poetry is like that.” She swanned around the hallway like someone in a half-swoon.

  I remembered the way Nigel had taken Anne's elbow. I didn't want to say anything to Viv, but that hadn't looked merely considerate to me. He'd been almost proprietary. I could imagine that sweet Apple Annie would bring out the masculine nature of a retired war hero.

  Poor Viv. She wasn't the kind of person who dealt graciously with not getting what she wanted. She told me one time that she'd keyed the car of a romantic rival. Not exactly blood sport, but still, I was starting to become a trifle concerned for Anne.

  My phone bleeped as I followed Viv back to her place. It was the sound I'd set for G-Ma.

  “How's it going, G-Ma?” I said in answer.

  “Serena had a vision about that reporter fella and wants you to tell the police.”

  Five questions immediately began to clamor for top billing. I chose the most obvious one first. “Who's Serena?”

  “She's the new card reader in room 6, with all the crystals and stuff. She had a vision.”

  G-Ma had recently converted her rundown strip motel to a cute little shopping center full of individually owned and unique shops. All the former motel rooms were now small businesses—a coffee shop, a nail salon, a used book store-and, of course, the yoga place Viv and I had been to on Tuesday night. This was G-Ma's innovation after her regular clientele of prostitutes—which she still swears she knew nothing about—were forced to either find other operating quarters or change lines of work. G-Ma made the offer to help any of the girls who were willing, get training and small business loans, and started advertising the place big time. A few of the girls took her up on the offer, and although the place was still undergoing some renovations, the shops that were open were getting by.

  I had seen Serena's shop when Viv and I had been there for yoga, but I hadn't met her. I liked her shop, though—she’d had a big blue and silver swirl painted on the front window that spiraled out into what looked like a starry sky.

  So anyway—that was question number one out of the way. On to question two. “What kind of vision?”

  “She said it was more of a feeling, actually. Not like a clear vision. She doesn't get them like tuning into a TV show or something.” She said this with a tone that told me these were the exact words Serena had said to G-Ma. “They're more like just feelings. Like when you're watching a movie and a bad guy comes on the screen, and you know he's a bad guy because the music changes. It's like all that, without the visual, though. You just hear the music and get the sense that there's a bad guy. It's subtle like that.”

  “What kind of feeling did she get?”

  “She said that fellow had been wrestling with demons.”

  I waited, but nothing else was forthcoming.

  “Demons?”

  “Right.”

  “Like...what kind of demons?” Since we were in Viv's hallway by now, I let Stump down to trot alongside us. The other residents on her floor were used to Stump and didn't freak out that she would pee on the carpet or anything.

  “Just demons. But she thinks it's important that the police know this.”

  “Okay, well...” Does Serena not have a phone? I wanted to ask.

  “I told her you had that boyfriend who was the cop and that you would tell him.”

  “G-Ma! Bobby is not my boyfriend. You do remember that I'm married, right?” Somewhat.

  “Colleague, then.”

  I let that one slide, but I couldn't help but grin at what Bobby would think about me and him being colleagues. “Why doesn't she want to tell the police herself? I think police work with psychics sometimes. They would probably want to hear about her having a vision about Peter Browning's death.”

  At this, Viv whipped her head around. “Psychic vision? Peter Browning's death?”

  I took Viv's key from her—because she'd suddenly lost interest in unlocking the door and was focused on my phone call—and opened the door. “I can give her Bobby's number.”

  Viv took the phone from me. “We'll be happy to pass on the information. Now give me all the details.”

  I knew how G-Ma was going to react to that. G-Ma did not like Viv. She thought Viv was a snobby old biddie who'd had nothing but good luck and thought she was better than everyone—‘everyone’ meaning G-Ma specifically, who'd had to work her own fingers to the bone and never had a break from anyone. To her credit, G-Ma was right about parts of that assessment, but dead wrong about other parts. It was true that G-Ma worked like nobody's business and always had. She'd had to make her own breaks, and it made me happy to see how well the motel was doing now, after years of mere subsistence on the side of a highway that people rarely used anymore. And it was true that Viv had seen some good fortune in the last couple of husbands, in that they'd had fortunes to see, and left it all to Viv. But Viv had also had her share of bad breaks in life before that, and she wasn't a snob. She most definitely didn't think she was better than anyone. She just really enjoyed annoying my G-Ma. Nothing made her happier than winning a point in the Battle of Viv vs. G-Ma.

  “No, I think you should give me the information so I can convey it to the proper authorities,” Viv was saying. “Yes, give it to me. What is her phone number, then? I'll call her myself. Just tell me!” Viv frowned and dropped her Jimmy Choo handbag on the floor. “Lady, do you want to be cited for obstruction of justice?”

  I could hear G-Ma laughing from the other end of the line.

  Viv scowled and jabbed the End Call button, then thrust the phone back at me. “She won't tell me.”

  “It's okay, we can go see Serena ourselves.”

  Viv picked her handbag back up. “I'll drive.”

  “Right now?” I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to be steering Viv away from murder investigations and onto less dangerous territory.

  “Of course, right now. Come on. We're taking your car and I'm driving.” Apparently, the point loss to G-Ma needed to be made up somehow.

  Fine by me. I was still not comfortable driving that bus. But I wasn't sure about the whole psychic thing. Would Tony consider this dangerous? Was it okay for a Christian to talk to a psychic? Plus, I hadn't even mentioned the cleanup at the arboretum yet.

  But Viv was already headed out the door.

  “Hang on,” I said. Stump grunted as I picked her up and chased Viv down the hall to the elevator.

  On the elevator I said, “Listen, I need to talk to you about this whole private investigator stuff.” Might as well just be honest. “Tony isn't comfortable with this.”

  “That's fine. Tony isn't doing it.” Viv pushed the first-floor button.

  “He's not comfortable with me doing it, as I'm sure you understand. What with all the guns being pointed at me and stuff. He doesn't care for that.”

  “Has that man forbidden you from conducting investigations?” She put her hand on her hip and glared.

  Viv liked Tony—I mean, everyone liked Tony. He was a great guy. In fact, Viv had worked hard to help me prove him innocent of murder, in fact, when his aunt had tried to frame him. But that didn't mean she would hesitate to go full feminist on his butt if she thought he was exercising overbearing male authority over me.

  “Of course not. But I think I owe it to him to try and stay out of trouble.”

  “No problem. We're going to see a psychic. What's the worst that could happen?”

  I shrugged. “I'm sure nothing will happen. I just...the thing is...” I grimaced. “I kind of told him I would encourage you on to other endeavors that aren't so...rife with bad guys.”

  “Such as?”

  “Such as...gardening.”

  Viv drew her head back. “Gardening?” She wrinkled her n
ose.

  “The arboretum put out a call for volunteers to help clean up the place. You know, rake up dead leaves and clear out underbrush and stuff. I promised him I'd talk to you about it.”

  “Okay, well, check that one off your list. We talked.” The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Viv perched designer sunglasses on her nose and waltzed out the door, a woman who would not be denied her mission.

  I handed her the keys and loaded Stump into the passenger seat. I didn't bother locking the doors anymore. No one wanted a 1974 Monte Carlo, except to marvel that it was still running.

  I studied Viv as she swung the Monster Carlo out of the Belle Court parking lot, her chin set. It was clear I needed to take another tactic with this.

  “You know, it was his idea that I help things along with Nigel,” I said casually. “That's why I called today.”

  “Whose idea? Tony's?”

  “Yes. He really liked the idea of you being in a relationship with such a distinguished man.” Or any man. Any person. Anything that would burn off some of her energy without involving gunfire.

  “Nigel is very distinguished.”

  “Exactly. I think Tony is hoping you and Nigel could become our couple friends. You know, hang out on weekends and stuff.”

  “We could go skiing together!” Viv said. “Weekend trips to Santa Fe!”

  “Exactly!” Never mind that I didn't ski, and it was somewhat debatable whether Viv and Nigel should ski. Tony was back on Viv's nice list, so I could now strike while the iron was hot. “Like I said, he didn't forbid me from doing investigations. He's just uncomfortable with it, so I think I need to lie low, kind of, until he gets used to the idea.” Or until you find a new hobby. I sent up a silent prayer that Viv would discover a heretofore untapped love of gardening. It would take a miracle of Biblical proportions.

  She chewed on her lower lip and seemed to consider it. “Well, okay. I could do some volunteer hours at the arboretum. It would look good on my resume for Nigel, anyway. Last night I saw a documentary about land girls—the women who worked the fields during World War II while the men were gone.”

  “That's fantastic! That would give you a great talking point for him.”