Hung Out to Die

by Sharon Short

  Or . . . and this is when I know I’m really troubled deep down . . . Mrs. Oglevee appears from out of nowhere.

  Mrs. Oglevee was my junior high history teacher. Theoretically, she retired on the day I graduated junior high school. But to earn extra money, she became a substitute, and showed up with alarming frequency in my high school classes—everything from gym to English lit to home ec. And French.

  She was saving money to go on a Mediterranean cruise and had just purchased tickets when she keeled over dead of a heart attack. This did not make Mrs. Oglevee a very happy ghost—or whatever she was—when she showed up in my dreams.

  Tonight, she was in an exact copy of my Mamaw Toadfern’s Thanksgiving outfit—the black pants and the turkey-Pilgrim-motif sweatshirt and the high-heeled mules. She had a drum strapped around her neck and was hitting it, but not with drum drumsticks. With turkey-leg drumsticks.

  I moaned.

  This did not cause Mrs. Oglevee to stop, or even pause, in her drumming with the turkey-leg drumsticks. In fact, she drummed so hard, grease flew everywhere.

  I groaned.

  This only caused her to start tapping her right foot in rhythm with her drumming.

  I finally found my voice. “Could you please just go away, Mrs. Oglevee? I’ve had a rough night.”

  To my amazement, Mrs. Oglevee stopped drumming and tapping. Usually, she never listened to my requests. But her drum disappeared, a rocking chair appeared behind her, and she plopped down into it, still holding the turkey drumsticks. She bit into the one she held in her left hand.

  “Sorry,” she said around a mouthful of turkey. “Long day. First chance I’ve had to enjoy Thanksgiving.”

  I stared at her as she took another bite, this time from the drumstick in her right hand.

  “What?” she said, around another mouthful, glaring back at me. See? I annoyed her, even in my dreams. “Thanksgiving is always a time of great stress and drama for lots of people. Family get-togethers, you know. I don’t understand why people who usually don’t get together—or get along—congregate once a year and then are surprised when things don’t go well. So, this is really my busiest season.”

  She stopped suddenly, looking like she wished she hadn’t made that last comment, and lit back into the drumstick with gusto.

  I gaped at her. “What? You mean to tell me you show up in other people’s dreams, too?”

  She didn’t say anything, finished off her drumsticks and tossed the bones over her shoulder, where they disappeared into the fog. I decided this was a good opportunity to ask her as directly as I dared about whether or not she was really a ghost.

  “Or . . . or . . . for some people do you actually show up when they’re awake?”

  Mrs. Oglevee licked off her fingers. Then she said, “I really can’t say. Confidentiality issues. Part of my agreement.”

  I rolled my eyes. No one had ever felt comfortable confiding in Mrs. Oglevee when she was alive. I couldn’t imagine what the Almighty would have been thinking, assigning her to some afterlife counseling role. Assuming she was with the Almighty. I’d never been quite sure where Mrs. Oglevee was residing in the afterlife.

  But then, Mrs. Oglevee adjusted her glasses, started rocking, and gave me a piercing look. “Start talking,” she said. “I’m on a schedule.”

  And so . . . I started telling her about the reunion with my parents and Toadfern kin. The surreal visit at the Burkettes. The conversation with Rachel Burkette about our childhoods, and our meetings at the shed, years ago.

  I told her about Uncle Fenwick, stabbed, but also made to look as though he’d tried to commit suicide, with the clothesline and the ladder nearby. I told her my theory, that someone had threatened or forced Uncle Fenwick into hanging himself, and then Uncle Fenwick had fought back at the last minute, and the killer stabbed him, left him to die from a combination of bleeding to death and hanging, then panicked and ran off.

  I told her how Rachel had started screaming hysterically, how I’d fumbled with my cell phone and finally managed to call 911, how the snow had really picked up. How finally officers from both the Paradise Police Department and the Mason County Sheriff’s Department showed up.

  I told Mrs. Oglevee about answering the questions of John Worthy, Paradise’s chief of police, and about going with him to Mamaw Toadfern’s house to break the news to her and Aunt Nora, and how both women had been shocked and hysterical and how, somehow, it didn’t surprise me that for all their goofiness, the members of the Toadfern clan rallied around and calmed and comforted Mamaw and Aunt Nora. Even my mama and daddy.

  And I told her about them, too.

  And then I told her how, finally, I’d driven home, and discovered my apartment smelled of burned turkey—the roast had been in there far too long—and how I’d thrown the wasted turkey out, run the kitchen fan, and put away the other side-dish fixings I’d left out on the counter.

  Then I took a quick, hot shower, stumbled into bed and a blessed dreamless slumber . . . until Mrs. Oglevee showed up.

  “And it’s a good thing I did, too,” she said, annoyed again. Which disappointed me. I thought I’d woven a moving tale, well told. I thought Mrs. Oglevee had been wiping a tear from her eye—but maybe it was just turkey drumstick grease.

  “I can see,” she went on, twisting her mouth into a prim little line, as she always did when she thought I wasn’t paying attention in class, “that you are just going to walk away from this murder of your poor Uncle Fenwick.”

  “Well, yeah,” I sputtered. “It’s . . . it’s not any of my business.”

  “That’s not like you. Whatever happened to Nosey Josie?”

  I shuddered at her use of my hated, old nickname and used my favorite line for defending my proclivity for interest in news: “I prefer to think of myself as curiosity-gifted.”

  “Your gift seems to be coming unwrapped,” she snapped.

  “What? You’ve always told me to mind my own business, to stop poking my nose in where it shouldn’t be. Now you think I should investigate Uncle Fenwick’s murder?”

  Mrs. Oglevee glared at me. I gave her a sly look, thinking of something that might get her to leave me alone. “Besides, Chief John Worthy is working with the sheriff’s department on the investigation.”

  As I’d expected, her look softened. It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. Chief John Worthy—my ex-high-school sweetheart and current nemesis—had always been Mrs. Oglevee’s teacher’s pet.

  “Dear Johnny,” she said, wistfully. “He was always so sweet and respectful—”

  “A suck-up,” I muttered.

  “What was that?” Mrs. Oglevee snapped.

  “Nothing, ma’am.”

  “Hmmph. Don’t back talk. Besides, I have a point of view you can’t share, and I’m telling you, this is one time your natural nosiness is needed.”

  “You don’t think old Johnny’s up to the job this time?”

  “I think blood is thicker than water!”

  This time I did roll my eyes. “Oh, please. This is the first time I’ve seen the Toadferns in years. Most of them except Sally—”

  Mrs. Oglevee interrupted me with a grunt of disgust. If anyone could annoy her faster and more deeply than me, it was Sally. Of course, with Sally, it was intentional, because she found Mrs. Oglevee’s reactions amusing.

  “Most of them except Sally,” I repeated, emphasizing Sally, “have been downright rude and ignored me all these years. So why should I investigate Uncle Fenwick’s murder when no one—least of all the officials—wants me to?”

  “Because, my dear, you might just learn some things about your family—and yourself—that can help you personally.”

  There was a shrill sound, and Mrs. Oglevee jumped. “Oh! I had more to tell you, but time’s up.” A gigantic alarm clock—the old-fashioned antique kind with two bells on top—fell into her lap and shrilled again. She peered at it. “Yes, time for the next appointment.”

  Mrs. Oglevee stood up, and the ro
cking chair and alarm clock disappeared. Mrs. Oglevee started fading into the mist that suddenly rolled in around her.

  I frowned. “Wait—Mrs. Oglevee—wait, I don’t understand why I should investigate Uncle Fenwick—wait—it’s a bad idea—wait—”

  But only Mrs. Oglevee’s Chesire cat–like smile remained in the fog, and then there was that shrilling sound again, and I snapped to, and realized my phone was ringing.

  Guy, I thought, suddenly wide awake. I sat up in bed, turned on my nightstand light, and stared at my digital clock: 1:16.

  I grabbed up the phone. “Toadfern’s Laundromat, I mean Toadfern residence, I mean Josie . . .”

  “I woke you. I’ll call tomorrow . . .”

  Owen! I sat up straighter, but still wasn’t fully awake. “No, now’s fine,” I said, rubbing my eyes. “It’s just that Mrs. Oglevee doesn’t make sense . . .” I shook my head, trying to come fully awake. I looked at the time again, then felt a little chest squeeze of panic.

  Owen’s plan was to start driving home Friday morning after Thanksgiving, so we could spend some time together over the weekend. Had he decided to leave early—real early—for some reason? Was he stranded somewhere?

  “Owen, are you okay?” I was wide awake by then, and straining to hear sounds of highway traffic in the background.

  There was silence for a moment on his end. Not the sound of even a single eighteen-wheeler rushing by.

  “I’m fine,” he said finally. “I actually had a great day—a really great day. How was yours?”

  He asked the question hastily, as if he’d suddenly remembered that I would have had a day, also. There was so much I could tell him . . . but I suddenly went cold. Something didn’t feel right. “It was fine,” I said.

  “Oh, good,” Owen said, sounding relieved—not at the fact my day was fine, I realized, but that I wasn’t going into great detail. He, of course, had no idea how I’d spent my Thanksgiving. When he’d left the previous weekend, I’d been as vague with him about my plans as I’d been with Sally before she manipulated me into going to Mamaw Toadfern’s. He hadn’t seemed overly concerned about how I’d spend the holiday.

  “Listen, Josie, I really am sorry to call you so late—”

  “Well, as long as it’s to mutter sexy sweet nothings in my ear in the middle of the night,” I joked—and immediately regretted my interruption.

  Owen cleared his throat. “I’m not going to get back until early next week. Something came up and I have a busy day tomorrow or I’d have waited to call you at a decent hour—aw, hell, Josie, I might as well just get to it.”

  I didn’t say anything. So get to it, I thought, going cold again.

  “I ran into Roger Muller, an old college friend—I think I’ve mentioned him to you? Anyway, he told me that one of his colleagues in the local community college’s philosophy department has to take an extended leave of absence for the rest of the school year due to illness. The college is looking for someone to take over his classes starting in January—and, well, Josie, I applied. I put in my application just a few hours after hearing about the opening—”

  “When was this?” I snapped. “A few hours ago?”

  Now there was a moment of silence on Owen’s end. Then: “What? No, of course not—”

  “Of course not. So why are you calling me now, past one in the morning?”

  “I—I couldn’t sleep and I thought you’d want to know and I didn’t think you’d mind and—”

  “Owen, when did you put in your application?”

  Silence, again. Finally: “Tuesday. Look, Josie, I know how that sounds but . . . I don’t know if I’ll get the job, and my interview is Monday morning, and I couldn’t sleep, so I thought I’d call you, and . . . Aw, hell. Look, Josie, it’s a chance to be around my son all the time. It could grow into a permanent job, if Victor, the guy who’s on extended leave, doesn’t get better—”

  “Ooh, let me make a voodoo doll of poor Victor and start poking pins in him.”

  “Josie, I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just, I want to be around my son more, and—”

  “I respect that, Owen. But you’ve only been back in touch with him for a few months.” The minute I said it, I frowned. Was I just being selfish? Still, I plunged on. “And I know you want to get closer to him, but what about your job at the community college here? Your volunteer teaching at the prison here? Your . . . your commitments . . . here.” Meaning, I thought, our relationship.

  Owen sighed. “You’re angry that I didn’t call earlier this week and talk to you about it, aren’t you?”

  “No kidding.”

  Now Owen turned cold. “You know, I don’t know that this conversation would have been any better—or that you’d have liked my decision any better—if I’d called two days ago.”

  “That’s just it, Owen,” I said, sighing. This was a man with doctorates in philosophy, religious studies, and literature—and yet, I had to spell out the obvious for him. “You didn’t want to discuss this with me—as a friend, or as anything else. You just made the decision and called to inform me at your convenience—which happens to be in the middle of the night. Well, I’m sorry you can’t sleep, but I’m tired. Good luck on your interview.”

  I hesitated, giving him another chance to say something—anything—to convince me that he really hadn’t meant to shut me out of at least talking with him about a decision that big. He didn’t take the chance. “Good night,” I finished primly, without a waver in my voice.

  Then I hung up and burst out crying like a big baby.

  Ten minutes later, I was in my kitchen hiccupping, and licking peanut butter from a spoon. Cherry had once told me that she’d read in a chick magazine that that was a great cure for headaches. I, thank the good Lord, never get headaches, but she swore it worked, so I figured the cure might work for my hiccups. And snuffles. And a confused, breaking heart.

  It didn’t.

  In fact, my apartment still smelled of burned turkey, and I realized that other than Aunt Nora’s cranberry relish and Effie Burkette’s wassail, I hadn’t had a real Thanksgiving dinner at all.

  Which might seem like a petty concern, given Uncle Fenwick’s murder and the fact that my relationship with Owen seemed to be falling apart, but it made me tear up, anyway.

  So I plunged the spoon—a big serving spoon, mind you, not some wimpy little teaspoon—into the wide-mouthed jar and ladled out another spoonful of peanut butter.

  I was on my first lick of the new spoonful when my doorbell rang.

  Now, my apartment is just one of two units on the second story over my laundromat. I’ve lived in my one-bedroom unit for nine years since I sold my aunt and uncle’s house and put the proceeds into trust for Guy, and I’ve rented the other unit off and on. More off, than on, truth be told. The most recent renters, a nice couple, had just moved the previous week into a small house because they were expecting their first child the following spring. I’d been thinking about just expanding the entire second story into one nice, luxury apartment for me.

  Anyway, the only person living above my laundromat was me, and it’s not like strangers—the few times there are any in Paradise—would wander up the exterior staircase on the side of my laundromat, into the exterior door, which I always forget to lock, and down a dark hall to knock on my door for help.

  So, I quickly calculated who it could be that I knew.

  Cherry, I thought. Ha. I knew things wouldn’t go well with her deputy sheriff beau. She was, again, moving too fast for her own heart’s good.

  Like I had with Owen, a needling voice whispered.

  I swallowed my peanut butter, took another lick, and headed to the door. I had a fresh jar of peanut butter at the back of the cabinet. Cherry and I could lick peanut butter spoons until we were sick, and cry our hearts out about our awful boyfriends. Perfect for what was sure to be a sleepless, heartbroken night . . .

  Except when I opened the door—it wasn’t Cherry standing there.

&
nbsp; It was my mama.

  And she’d already cried all of her makeup off. Her face was mascara streaked. “Oh Josie,” she wailed, “it’s your daddy.”

  I jammed my spoon back into my peanut butter jar, and put my hand on my hip.

  “Let me guess. He’s taken off to interview for a job at some school of antiquing knowledge. Maybe a university of antiquities. Maybe—”

  “What?” She looked confused for a second, then burst out sobbing. “No, honey—your daddy’s been arrested! For Fenwick’s murder!”

  8

  It took a lot more than peanut butter to calm my mama down.

  She plunged right past me, flopped down on my couch, and demanded vodka and cranberry juice.

  I told her I didn’t have either, and there wasn’t any-place open in Paradise that sold either at that hour.

  She suggested I call my friends to see if they had vodka and cranberry juice. I pointed out I wanted my friends to stay my friends, so, no, I wasn’t about to call them at 1:00 A.M. with such a request.

  Then she started wailing something about Paradise being a godforsaken place, and I told her that according to Pastor Micah at the Paradise Methodist Church, there was no such place. Then I told her that if she wasn’t going to calm down, she could just get off my couch and go back to wherever she was staying. I waggled my peanut butter-slicked spoon at her as I said it.

  Then she started wailing that she couldn’t get back to the Red Horse Motel because she thought she’d stripped the gears in Daddy’s and her cherry red sports car, which still ran despite its fender-bender with Uncle Fenwick’s RV, and which she’d left in front of the Antique Depot—or some such junk shop, she said.

  Antique shop, I corrected her, bristling. Then I told her to hush up, or she’d have to walk back to the Red Horse.

  That seemed to stun her and I half expected her to snap, don’t sass your mama! in that impatient, flustered tone I suddenly remembered as her usual tone when I was little. But she got quiet and shrank back into the couch.