For the Birds: Rose Gardner Investigations #2 (Rose Gardner Investigatons)

by Denise Grover Swank

  “I don’t know, but I think we should leave.”

  “We can’t just leave!”

  Neely Kate pointed to the door. “That woman thinks she won somethin’, Rose. And now we have to tell her she didn’t!”

  “How do you think she’s gonna feel if we just take off?”

  “How long’s she gonna be?” Neely Kate asked. “Maybe that was her way of givin’ us the brush-off.”

  “Let’s wait about ten more seconds before leavin’.” But ten seconds came and went, and she still hadn’t returned.

  “Rose, I’m tellin’ you, this is going to be bad. We need to go before she finally opens that door.”

  I was about to agree with her when the front door flung open and a woman appeared in the opening. At first I didn’t recognize Anita because her hair, which had been up in a bun, was now long and full and obviously a wig. She’d changed into a cute skirt and top and three-inch heels, which explained why she was suddenly taller than us. There was, inexplicably, an umbrella in her hand.

  She gave us an expectant look, then screamed and started dancing and stomping around.

  “Oh, my stars and garters,” Neely Kate said as she took a step backward. “What is happening?”

  I wasn’t sure, but I was starting to regret not making a run for it sooner.

  “Uh . . . Anita . . .”

  Neely Kate grabbed my arm and tugged. “I’m beggin’ you, Rose. Let’s just run.”

  “We can’t.” I took a deep breath and pushed it out. “Anita. We’re not here because you won a contest,” I said, all in one long rush of words.

  She stopped hooting and hollering and gave me a blank look. Then she grinned. “That’s a trick. It’s part of it. I’ve seen ’em do it before. You’re here to give me my plane ticket to Memphis.”

  I glanced back at Neely Kate, but she just grimaced and shrugged.

  “No, Anita. We’re not. I’m afraid there’s been a misunderstandin’.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “No,” she said, shaking her head. “I sent my audition tape, and you’re here to give me a plane ticket to Memphis!”

  “Why in the world would we be givin’ you a plane ticket to Memphis?” Neely Kate asked. “There aren’t any direct flights from Little Rock or Shreveport. By the time you land in Memphis, you could have driven there and back.”

  I had no idea how Neely Kate had that particular information stored in her head, but I was sure she was right.

  “That’s not the point!” Anita said, stomping her foot. “The point is that my lifelong dream is about to be fulfilled! I got on the show!” She looked around again. “Where’s the camera?”

  “Anita,” I said. “There is no camera.”

  “Oh, I get it! There’s a hidden camera.” She walked out on her concrete porch with an umbrella in her hand. “Hit it, Floyd!”

  I glanced up and saw a long-haired man leaning out the upstairs window, giving us a thumbs-up and a huge smile.

  “Am I gonna be on TV too?” he asked.

  “Just shut up and hit it!” Anita shouted up to him.

  The music started mid-song and she immediately belted out the lyrics. “You have my heart, and we’ll never be worlds apart.” She took exaggerated steps down the stairs, stomping the concrete to the beat of her song.

  Neely Kate and I took several steps back.

  “Oh, my word,” Neely Kate said. “This is her music video.”

  “What?”

  Anita continued singing, gyrating her hips and arms to the beat—only slightly off—as she made her way across her front lawn.

  “She’s singing Rihanna’s ‘Umbrella.’” Neely Kate’s eyes widened. “It’s because she thinks she’s on that show!” she said, getting excited. “Memphis Superstar!”

  I gave her a blank look.

  “People send in audition tapes of their own live-action versions of popular music videos. Then they have to reenact everything when one of the producers shows up at their door. This must be hers.”

  Anita was singing and dancing her heart out, although very off-key. “Now that it’s raining more than ever.” She turned on the garden hose and started spraying water into the air, only she’d forgotten to open her umbrella, which she hastily did now. She sang something about being under an umbrella while mascara ran down her cheeks.

  “We have to stop her, Neely Kate,” I whispered.

  “Are you kiddin’ me? This is amazin’!”

  I let her move on to the next verse as she sidled up to a tree and spun her umbrella around in front of her, moving it up and down and side to side as though she was playing a complicated game of peekaboo.

  “I have to stop this,” I said to Neely Kate, then turned to face the spinning umbrella. “Anita.”

  Neely Kate lightly slapped my arm. “What are you doin’? She’s almost done. You’re gonna hurt her feelin’s more if you stop her than if you let her go on.”

  “She’s gonna be embarrassed when she finds out we aren’t who she thinks we are.”

  “No, she won’t.” The song ended and Neely Kate gave me a serious look. “Let me handle this.”

  Better her than me. Anita was on the ground on her knees with the umbrella in both hands, her arms straight over her head.

  Neely Kate gave Anita a slow clap. “That was amazing! Wasn’t that amazing, Beth Ann?”

  It was the alias she’d created for me while we were looking for the necklace weeks ago, so I decided to use hers. “I’ll say, Nancy.” What was she up to?

  Neely Kate motioned for Anita to get up. “I’m not gonna lie to you, Anita. Competition’s stiff, but you’re definitely in the running.”

  Disappointment covered Anita’s face. “You’re not here to give me a plane ticket to Memphis?”

  “Not yet. But we would like to do a personal interview while we’re here . . . if that’s okay.”

  She lifted a shoulder into a shrug. “Sure.”

  Neely Kate pulled out her phone and opened up the video app. “We’re gonna record it with my phone for a more indie look.”

  “Okay,” she said, her eyes glimmering with excitement.

  “Where did you find the inspiration for your cover of ‘Umbrella’?” Neely Kate asked.

  Anita launched into a long story about her boyfriend Floyd and a crazy drunken night involving an umbrella and edible massage oil.

  I was going to have to take a shower when I got home.

  “Do you get inspiration from nature?” Neely Kate asked. “Parts of your performance seemed somewhat birdlike.”

  Anita blinked, looking confused. “Uh . . . yeah . . .”

  “It’s just that I heard Rihanna gets inspiration from her surroundings.” Neely Kate waved her hands in a big circle. “Her immediate surroundings.”

  Anita nodded. “Yes. Of course.”

  “Are there any birds around here that might have served as inspiration?”

  Anita looked at her like she was crazy. I could relate. I decided to take things into my own hands. I pointed at the giant cage in Mr. Whipple’s backyard. “Oh! Is that an aviary?”

  She spun around. “That’s where Mr. Whipple keeps his crazy bird.”

  “Crazy bird?” I asked.

  “That bird cusses like nobody’s business. It’s flat-out weird. I can’t even go out in my backyard when that bird’s outside because it catcalls and insults me.”

  “Insults you?”

  “It calls me a liberal hippie.” She shuddered. “I could get disowned for that.”

  “Wow,” Neely Kate said. “You must really hate that parrot.”

  Anita put her hands on her hips, the umbrella jutting out to the side. “I don’t think I ever said it was a parrot.”

  Uh-oh. “What else could be livin’ in a big cage like that?” I hedged. “And most birds don’t talk.”

  “Yeah. I guess.” She shrugged it off. “That old man loves that bird, and he’s a mess since it went missing.”

  Neely Kate gasped. “What happened t
o it?”

  “Someone broke into his house and stole it.”

  “Oh, my goodness!” Neely Kate gushed. “Do you have any idea who would take it?”

  Anita shook her head. “A lot of people in the neighborhood couldn’t stand that bird, but I don’t know anyone who would steal him.” She frowned. “I hope he’s okay. Mr. Whipple treats it like it’s his baby. I’m not sure how he’ll handle it if his parrot doesn’t come home.”

  “Do people like Mr. Whipple?” I pressed.

  She looked surprised. “He has his cranky moments, but he’s usually a nice old man. I was raised in this house, so I remember him and his wife before she died. It’s just so sad he’s alone.”

  “So he gets along with everyone?” I asked.

  “Well . . . there is that one guy.”

  “Who?” Neely Kate asked.

  “He lives down on the corner, but he doesn’t get along with anyone.”

  “Which corner?” I asked. “And what’s his name?”

  She pointed to the house across the street. “Harvey Milner. But why are you asking so many questions about Harvey and Mr. Whipple?”

  Neely Kate put her phone into her pocket. “We’re just tryin’ to get a broader picture of you!” she said enthusiastically. She formed a square with her fingers and framed Anita’s face, then widened her fingers as though widening the picture.

  And Anita was buying every word of it.

  We were in a handbasket getting carted off straight to hell.

  Neely Kate turned to face me, pivoting on her feet with a dramatic flair. “Well, Beth Ann, I’m impressed. I think our work is done here.”

  I didn’t say anything, feeling lower than worm dirt for tricking Anita.

  “Really?” she squealed. “I’m on?”

  My head started to tingle and my vision faded, and I only had a fraction of a second to wonder who would be the subject of my approaching vision.

  I was at my farmhouse, sitting on the sofa in the living room. The lights were dim, but I was familiar enough with the room that I instantly recognized it. Someone was next to me, holding my hand, and based on the way his hand dwarfed mine, it was a man.

  Feelings rose up inside me, longing—both sexual and the need for something emotionally deeper—and happiness tinged with sorrow.

  “I don’t want to hide it anymore,” I said in Neely Kate’s voice. “Rose knows. At least I can stop hiding it from her.”

  “Things are too dangerous right now,” I heard Jed say. “We need to go to Little Rock again. We can take the whole day.”

  I turned to look up at him. The adoration in his eyes made my heart catch, but pain rippled behind it. “So you’re doin’ his biddin’.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “I don’t have to see her anymore. She doesn’t know anything.”

  “But you could string her along. She doesn’t know we went to Ardmore.”

  The vision faded and I said, “You’re gonna string her along.”

  Well, crap.

  Anita’s eyes flew wide open.

  “Beth Ann,” Neely Kate said, her exasperation thinly veiled. “You know this is the best we can do.” She turned to Anita. “Look, Anita. It’s between you and a guy in Biloxi. Our executive producer wants the guy, but Beth Ann and I decided to fight for you, so now we’ll take our video back to him and let him decide. Unfortunately, if you don’t hear back from us, you won’t have made the cut, but don’t let that get you down. You can tell all your friends and family that you were officially a semi-finalist on Memphis Superstar.”

  Anita gave me a wary glance. “Yeah. I guess . . .”

  Neely Kate put a hand on Anita’s arm. “Thank you for your time.” She must have finally agreed it was time to escape, because she turned and headed for the truck. “Let’s go, Beth Ann.”

  I had started to follow her when Anita called out, “Why are y’all in a landscaping truck?”

  “We’re incognito,” Neely Kate hollered back. “We couldn’t very well sneak up on you with Memphis Superstar plastered on the side of our vehicle!”

  We didn’t waste any time hopping into the truck.

  “I can’t believe that just happened. I feel so guilty,” I said as soon as I pulled away from the curb.

  “I’m sorry, but you and I both know she’ll never even get close to bein’ on Memphis Superstar. You heard her sing. And then her dancin’ . . .”

  She had a point. “Still . . .”

  “Look, I would have preferred not to lie to her, but now she’ll tell everyone that she got close to bein’ on the show. This is a win-win situation. We got the information we needed, and we didn’t have to embarrass her.”

  “I guess.” It still felt wrong.

  “You had a vision,” she said. “Who was it for?”

  I gave her a sheepish look. “You.”

  She was silent for a moment. Although it had been Neely Kate’s idea for me to try more forced visions to reduce my spontaneous ones, we’d had an unspoken agreement over the past few weeks: I wouldn’t force any visions of her until she stopped getting letters from her sister Kate.

  “What did you see?”

  I was silent for a moment. “You were at the farmhouse with Jed. You told him I knew about you two, and he said it was still too dangerous to let other people know. Then he said you needed to go to Little Rock with him and you could have the entire day together.”

  “What was the stringin’ her along line about?” she asked in a wary tone.

  “Jed said Kate doesn’t know what you found out in Ardmore. He suggested you could turn the tables and string her along.”

  She was silent for a moment. “So he was definitely goin’?”

  “It sounded like it. He wanted you to come so he could spend time with you.”

  “Hmm . . .” She didn’t look happy, which confused me. She’d seemed plenty happy with him in her vision.

  “Never mind all that.” She did a little shimmy in her seat, then turned to face me. “We need to focus on finding Squawker.”

  “We have to figure out what to do next. We can’t very well question Anita’s other neighbors while she’s home. She’ll catch on.”

  “Yeah, the logo on the side of the truck’s gonna be an issue. How about we just drive around and scope things out?”

  “Okay.”

  I turned right and then turned again to drive down the street behind Mr. Whipple’s house. It was quiet, although that wasn’t too surprising on a hot summer’s late afternoon. All the houses looked the same—old bungalows of various styles and upkeep—and nothing looked out of the ordinary. There was definitely no sign of a green parrot.

  Since we were in my old neighborhood, I realized I could kill two birds with one stone, pun not intended. “Say, do you mind if we stop by my old house? Mike said something to me about selling it, and I thought it might be a good idea to stop by and take a peek. I haven’t been around to check on it in a few weeks.”

  “Violet’s selling the house? Doesn’t she want to see if things work out with her and Mike first?”

  “I don’t know, but Mike asked me to help sell it.”

  “I thought Violet owned it.”

  “She does.”

  “That’s weird . . .”

  “I know.”

  “Hey,” she said. “You only moved out of your momma’s house last November, and Mr. Whipple’s lived in his house for decades. How is it you didn’t know him? Or Anita, for that matter?”

  I frowned. “I told you I didn’t socialize very much before last year.”

  “Even with your neighbors?”

  “Especially with the neighbors,” I said as I pulled into the driveway. “Momma didn’t want to risk any of them finding out about my visions.”

  As I got out of the car, I appraised the house with a buyer’s eye . The yard was freshly mowed, thanks to Bruce Wayne and his new yard care crew, and the bushes had been trimmed. The annuals I’d always planted were absent, but the f
ew perennials like the black-eyed Susans and the rose bushes were blooming. The house was in need of repainting, but the roof had been replaced about five years ago after a bad hail storm.

  I unlocked the side door that led into the kitchen, and as soon as I stepped inside, old memories washed over me—good and bad—just as the wash of heat flushed my face. I glanced over my shoulder at the house Joe had lived in. It was hard to believe it had all only happened a year ago.

  “Mercy, it’s hot in here,” Neely Kate said, fanning herself.

  “Since no one was living here, I turned the air up to eighty-five.”

  “You’ve been paying the utility bills, haven’t you?” Neely Kate asked.

  “Violet couldn’t do it.” I stood in the doorway from the kitchen to the living room. I gasped at the orderly room I found. Every last personal belonging, whether from Violet or the kids, was gone. “Mike moved everything out. Why didn’t Violet mention this sooner?”

  “You two have been getting along lately,” Neely Kate said. “Maybe she was worried about upsetting you.”

  “Maybe.” I turned to my best friend. “Something strange is goin’ on. Mike was borderline rude when he asked me about the house. I’ve never seen him act like that before.”

  “Do you think Violet said something bad about you? You know she spread some lies about you last fall.”

  I considered it for a moment. “No. She seems happy. I could always tell when she was up to something devious.”

  “Maybe Mike was just tired and cranky from all the people.”

  “Yeah,” I said, but something told me there was more to it.

  I still felt uneasy about the whole enterprise—what was the rush?—but we went through the house, making note of what would need to be updated before it was put on the market.

  “It looks great, Rose,” Neely Kate said when we’d reached the back bedroom. “It could use new windows, and the bathroom and kitchen could do with an update, but you should ask a realtor how much difference it will make.”

  “Thanks, Neely Kate.” I checked the time. Five thirty. “I have to meet Levi soon, so there’s no time to do anything else tonight. We need to go back to Mr. Whipple’s street tomorrow, but we can’t take my truck in case Anita’s around.” I headed down the hall toward the kitchen.