Vivi confirmed that Ricky still hadn’t been heard from and that the police remained baffled, both things I already knew from my lunch date with Tim.
Another scuffle broke out about that time over in the section of Rays headed up by Rose and Sugar. Izzy sighed and scurried off, but not without a parting dart or two in my direction and a “we’ll continue this later” mumbled to her twin.
Vivi headed toward the front door, gesturing for me to go first, which I did. She already had her phone out, dialing away, and she pretty much spent the rest of the afternoon either texting or chatting on the phone. She’d evidently also gotten permission from Mrs. Riley to poison their air because, if she wasn’t on the phone, she was vaping on her almond juice, sipping from her bottle of coconut water, and pretending to ignore me, all the while watching me out of the corner of her eye.
Charli came by about an hour later to drop off a casserole and a tossed salad for the Riley’s supper. I’d helped out with a few chores, but, mostly, I’d just putzed around, trying to figure out how long I needed to stay in order to still be thought of as kind and loving. As soon as Charli said she had to scoot to pick up her little one, Jaelyn, from pre-school, I gratefully made my exit too. I was thrilled to have my sister to navigate the crowd with. Despite her small size and meek appearance, Charli knows how to handle herself in a brawl.
However, it turned out that I didn’t need a bodyguard since Rose and Sugar were nowhere around. Out by the street, apart from the crowd, Izzy and May Lynda were having what appeared to be a serious discussion with lots of arm-waving from Izzy and tears from May Lynda. They weren’t loud, but whatever they were talking about had both of them in foul moods.
As we strolled to Mom and Dad’s, where Charli had also parked, I told her about my encounters with the rabid fans and about the coolness I’d experienced from the Conrad sisters.
“Wonder why? I mean, I know both Vivi Anne and Izzy had a thing for Ricky back in the day. Maybe that’s it. Still, it’s not like you and Ricky are together. Izzy’s supposedly got a boyfriend back in Nashville and you know Vivi can get any guy she wants. If I was young and single and I had her job, I’d be going for some hot guy like Stephan Johansson. Only not gay.”
“Wait. What? You mean that guy we were talking about last night?” I said. “He’s gay? I thought he was all in love with that actress Ricky supposedly slept with.”
“There’s a lot of speculation on the gossip sites that his relationship with Beauline is fake so they’ll be able to sell more tickets to the movies. Also, that it’s a cover for him since he’s still really deep in the closet.”
“They do that? Fake relationships?”
“Oh yeah, all the time. They sign contracts and everything. It’s apparently a big thing in Hollywood. Can you imagine?” Charli asked.
I shrugged. “I guess. After all, when it comes to celebrities, most everything else is fake. Why not relationships? Easier to control. Unless one of the people actually fell for the other one in real life. Or fell for someone else and got caught stepping out on the other person. How do you know so much about this anyway?”
Charli ignored my question and changed the subject. “Can you open the shop for me tomorrow? I hate to ask, but they’re having a program at the elementary school. It’s supposed to be over at eleven, but I promised Kevin I’d have lunch with him afterward.”
When I’d been rehired by the radio station to do the morning show, I was supposed to work there full-time, but Herb had cut back on my hours almost immediately. Thankfully, it was right about the same time that Charli bought a local gift shop. She’d hired me to work there part-time.
She usually goes there around 9:30 or so, opening at ten and then I take over, working from about one until six or so Tuesday through Friday and ten until six on Saturdays. We do a strong on-line business, so occasionally I’ll go in early, or she’ll stay to pack orders and such. I work most Saturdays, but she covers about one Friday and Saturday per month so I can have a longer weekend off, which she had done just this past weekend.
“Sure, but I won’t be able to get there until about 10:30 or so. Want me to run by and put a sign on the door saying that in case someone wonders where we are?”
“Don’t worry about it since it’s only going to be about a half-hour.” Charli pulled her phone out of her purse and checked the screen. “Oh! I forgot to tell you! John and Dad decided to go ahead with the renovation of the apartments upstairs. Since they’re finally empty, they thought it would be a good time to do it. Why don’t you think about moving into one of them? That two bedroom one is huge and with new appliances and a bathroom update, it would be so much nicer than where you’re at now. Not to mention, cheaper.”
I had actually been considering doing just that since Dad and John had purchased the building.
“Absolutely!” I said. “You know, I can’t help but think that Tim is going to pop the question soon. He’s hinted a couple of times that he’s got a special surprise cooked up for Christmas. He’s so bad with secrets! That apartment would be awesome for our first home together. I love the old heart pine floors and the exposed brick.”
Charli stopped beside my car and put her hand on mine, concern in her eyes. “I thought you guys were taking it slow. Maybe you shouldn’t be counting your chickens before they’re fully hatched.”
A cold chill ran down my spine. I yanked my hand away. “Why do you say that? Do you think we’re a bad couple? I thought you loved Tim. I thought you were all in favor of our being together.”
“Oh, no, sweetie! I am. I just, well, you guys need time together. Y’all are still so young and you’ve only been together a couple of months. I mean sure, you’ve known each other and been best friends practically your whole lives, but we’d, I mean, I’d hate to see you rush into marriage before you’re ready.” She fumbled around with her keys, avoiding meeting my eyes.
“We’d? So you’re not the only one who feels this way? What’s the deal Charli? Are you and John and Mom and Dad going to try and break up me and Tim like you did me and Ricky?”
Charli fumbled with her keys some more, still avoiding my eyes. “No, never. We all just think that Tim and you are rushing things. I mean, ever since you and Ricky broke up you’ve flitted from one guy to the next, thinking each one of them was “the one”.” She finally stopped messing with the keys and looked at me straight on, her gaze unwavering. “None of us want to see y’all get hurt.”
The chill turned into hot rage. I tried not to shout at her, but it wasn’t easy. “You mean you don’t want to see Tim get hurt. Wow, Charli. I guess it’s a good thing I found out how you guys feel now instead of later.” I brushed away the hot tears filling my eyes. “I gotta go.”
“Marty, don’t be mad! That’s not what I meant at all!” Charli called after me as I put my car in gear and headed off down the street.
The tears were still threatening, but I managed to keep them at bay until I got to my apartment. I had about an hour before I was supposed to meet up with Otey, so I spent it being ticked off about what Charli had said. Twice I even picked up the phone to tell her to run her stupid gift shop herself, but I really needed the money and, well, I actually liked working there.
Later that night, when I met up with Tim for his dinner break, I told him that Charli and the rest of my family thought we were rushing things. (Leaving out the part about how I thought he was going to propose soon.)
He kissed me on the forehead. “They don’t know us as well as they think they do. And I don’t think we’re rushing things at all. We aren’t getting married or having a kid or even living together. Heck, I just signed another year’s lease on my apartment.”
He had? I felt that cold chill work its way back into my spine. Maybe I’d been wrong about him proposing. Maybe he was worried I’d break his heart, too.
6
Back at my apartment, I tossed and turned, fretting and playing my conversations with Tim and Charli over and over in my head. Eve
ntually, I gave up on sleep, trudged out to the living room, and turned on the television. It was still on channel forty-two and the ten o’clock news had just started. I nearly kicked Delbert, who was splayed out on the other end of the sofa, when I saw Giselle, dressed in another too low-cut, too tacky outfit, at the anchor table next to a morose May Lynda.
“What the heck?” I asked Delbert. He didn’t understand either.
As it turned out, Giselle had somehow finagled her way back on air and was a special guest co-anchor, there to provide “input and analysis” of the on-going “Missing: Search for Our Hometown Hero”, as they’d dubbed the Ricky Ray story. I watched long enough to figure out that Giselle didn’t really have anything to input or analyze except her own role in the saga, and that May Lynda, filling in for the usual anchor, had been crying before going on air. Either that or she was having a serious allergy attack that only affected her eyes.
“Guess that means I’ll be doing the party by myself again tomorrow,” I said to Delbert. He agreed by jumping off the sofa and heading back to the bedroom. I flicked through all 240 channels and then back through to that channel with all the shows about aliens and how they used to regularly visit Earth. I finally dozed off, but slept fitfully and had a nightmare that Tim was an alien, but, unlike in those movies with the young lovers, he was chasing me and trying to kill me so he could sell my brains to Giselle.
At five-thirty, when my third alarm went off, I stumbled to the shower, scalded myself, threw on some random clothes, made a giant to-go cup of coffee, and headed down to the station, groggy-eyed and fighting off a massive headache.
Usually, when I get there, about ten minutes before air time, I pretty much have the place to myself once the overnight guy hightails it out of there. Giselle never, not once in the few months since we’d been partners, arrived on time. That Tuesday, though, Herb’s tacky gold Caddy was tucked into his parking spot right up front by the entrance.
He paced back and forth in front of the glass entrance door, yakking on a cell phone. I tried to figure out a way to get inside the studio without him seeing me, but I didn’t have keys to the other doors in the building and, much as I’d tried, I hadn’t managed to learn how to teleport from one place to another just yet. Reluctantly, I climbed out of my car and trudged inside, trying to prepare myself mentally for the onslaught of sexism, halitosis, and spit I was about to endure.
“ ’Bout effing time you got here!” Herb slipped his bedazzled cell phone into one of the slash pockets of the audacious suit he wore. It was a new one: tangerine orange with sequin frogs and giant sequin lily pads on each side of the front of his jacket. Another larger and more elaborate frog decorated the back. The pants sported lime green and yellow vines and flowers down the outside of each leg and Herb’s lime green boots and string tie completed the ensemble nicely. Normally, I would have pulled out my cell phone and snapped a quick picture, preserving it for the book I plan to one day write about my life, but I was so exhausted from tossing and turning all night that I didn’t have the energy.
“I’m actually five minutes early,” I said, while trying to maintain as much distance as possible so as to not get another shower when the spit started flying.
“Well, got some more effing bad news for you. That dad gum Giselle done called in sick again. I saw her on that effing news program last night, so I figured it was coming.” He took three steps toward me, but I did a little bob-and-weave and managed to duck under his arm and get on the other side of him, just out of reach.
“I saw her too. You think this is permanent?”
Herb used a ball point pen to dig around in his ear, then examined his findings. “Eff if I know. I sure hope not. Show sucked yesterday. Better not eff it up again today, by the way. Georgina’s planning on giving it a listen.”
Georgina is Herb’s wife and the station owner. She’d sold it and a couple of television stations to a big conglomerate back in the summer, but when the new owners decided to dump the radio station back in late September, she’d bought it back for a song.
He wiped the pen off on his pants leg and went to work on the other ear. “But the good news is you ain’t gotta do the whole time by yourself. I have a big ol’ surprise for you! That there hot little honey Vivi Anne Conrad is fixing to join you! She’s gonna come talk about Ricky Ray and she said you could even ask her all about her big Hollywood clients! Wooo doggie, what I wouldn’t give to have that little minx wrap herself around me, if ‘uns you know what I mean.” He gave me a sort of double-eyed wink and did a little pelvis bump and grind that I tried to pretend I hadn’t seen.
“What time is she coming over?” I asked, glancing up over his head to the big wall clock that told me I had about thirty seconds before I needed to be on the air.
“Nine o’clock,” he hollered after me as I sprinted down the hall and into the booth. “Make me proud, Marty. You effing owe me.”
The first part of the show stunk worse than a skunk trapped in a dog house, to put it mildly. I sincerely hoped that Georgina hadn’t tuned in yet. It felt like tympani had taken up residency inside my head and my mouth and brain were seriously out of sync. When I ducked out of the booth at 8:30, I ran by the office area to snag some ibuprofen, another gallon of coffee, and a couple of donuts.
A large wicker basket filled with bags of gourmet popcorn, a fancy brand of candy, packs of expensive cookies and chips, two bottles of root beer, two of diet green tea, and two of that gross coconut water sat front and center on the desk we jocks shared, so I checked it out on the off chance it was for me.
Surprisingly, there was a card with my name and Giselle’s typed on it taped to a little balloon that read “Great Job!”. I stuck the card in my bag, picked up the basket, and toted it back into the booth with me, wondering who had sent it, and finally deciding on Georgina. She’s thoughtful like that and our show, while still dwelling deep in the ratings basement, had finally leveled off and even improved slightly in the last few weeks.
When Vivi showed up about nine-fifteen, I was actually glad to see her. I had plans to ask about the incident with the actress and Ricky Ray. Well, not right off the bat, but maybe after we covered all of the initial stuff about Ricky’s disappearance and the search efforts.
She wore the same grey wool pant suit as the previous times I’d seen her and a pair of those fancy, expensive shoes with the red soles. Her Coletta purse, the one Giselle had swooned over, looked so soft and buttery, it almost made me envious. Almost, since I knew that it cost about thirty grand, way more than I made in a year. Not that I would ever spend that kind of dough on a purse, even if I had it. Actually, come to think of it, I wouldn’t spend that much on anything that wasn’t equipped with wheels and a reliable engine.
Vivi clearly knew her way around a radio station because she stood quietly and waited until I finished talking before saying anything. Herb accompanied her into the booth, his hand on her back, as if he was guiding her, but it drooped perilously close to her rear end and he practically drooled all over her.
She perched on the bar stool across the desk from me and reached into her bag, pulling out her tablet computer, a sheet of paper, and her fancy vape pen. “You mind?” she asked Herb.
I fully expected him to say no because, when it comes to the equipment, Herb is a fierce watchdog, but to my surprise he told her to go right on ahead.
His phone tweedled and he glanced at the screen. “I’ll be back in a jif,” he said. “Georgina needs me.” He skedaddled out of the booth, toward his wife’s office.
I started telling Vivi my ideas for the direction I wanted the segment to go, but she cut me off, handing me the paper.
“What I’d like to do, Marty,” she said, all businesslike and, I might add, not in the friendliest of tones, “is talk a bit about the incident at Ricky’s home in Nashville. The police there have authorized me to release a couple of details. I’ll then give the number and website for the tip-line we’ve set up. After that, we’ll talk a litt
le about Ricky’s career, mention briefly your connection with him – try not to sound bitter — and I’ll plug the tour, but without it being too obvious. I want to keep the focus clearly on the search for him. That’s a list of my talking points and some suggested questions. I’d prefer that you not deviate from the list since I’m going to use this with other stations and they’ll have their guys read the questions, then play my answers.”
“Uh, okay,” I said. Her telling me not to sound bitter hadn’t set well with me and I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea of her controlling the segment, but I also knew that if I wanted to get my questions answered, I needed to butter her up a little. One thing about radio is we’re used to dealing with artists and the demands of their publicists. Little stations like ours couldn’t afford to get a bad reputation with how we dealt with them. Plus, the last thing I wanted was for people to think I actually was bitter about Ricky Ray dumping me three fricking days before our wedding.
“Mind if I have one of these coconut waters?” Vivi asked.
“Knock yourself out,” I said, barely looking up from the list of questions she’d handed me. “You’re welcome to both of them. I hate the stuff. I’m going to start by introducing you one minute into the segment, then I’ll ask you the first question on the list. Give about a thirty second answer and then go into your tip line thing. There’s a commercial coming up at...”
While I was talking, Vivi opened the bottle of coconut water, took a big gulp, then took a hit off her vape pen. All of the sudden she began coughing and sputtering, gasping for breath, and flailing around.
By the time I realized what was happening, she slid off the stool and onto the floor, her body convulsing in what looked like a grand mal seizure.
I yanked my headphones off and darted around to her. By then she was perfectly still and seemed to no longer be breathing.
I jerked open the booth door and screamed out for someone to help me. Three other people were in the back office, and two of the sales staff, plus the receptionist were out front. All of them came running.
The Doom Diva Mysteries Books 1 Page 67
