I looked across the street at Jake’s store. The door was closed and most of the lights were out, but someone was still moving around behind the front windows, and a couple of lights were on over the racks.
I’d better go see what he had.
Not that I objected to seeing what Jake had. In fact, most of the time I was quite happy to check him out: broad shoulders, a great smile, and—how do I put this?—nice-fitting jeans.
But a delivery for me? I wasn’t expecting anything, and I wasn’t much in the mood for surprises. Still, I didn’t like imposing on the neighbors. Especially a neighbor I would like to get to know a little better.
I looked up and down Main Street before I crossed. At this time of night there wasn’t a car in sight, but despite feeling a little foolish, I still checked for traffic.
I was a couple of steps from Jake’s front door when he swung it open for me.
“I was just straightening up the shelves,” he waved toward the racks of paperbacks, “when I saw you drive up.”
I glanced around. There were boxes of books lined up at the foot of the shelves with packing lists on top.
“A never-ending battle,” I commented. It was a very familiar chore, one I struggle to keep up with myself.
“Yeah. Seems like there’s never time to do it while the store’s open. I gave up trying within the first month. Now I just wait until I close.”
He went behind the counter and came out with a giant box. He carried it easily, setting it on the counter next to the cash register with a thump. It must have been heavier than he made it look.
There was a label on the top of the box with my name and address, but no shipping stamp or postage.
“A kid came by this afternoon in a pickup, looking for you. When he saw you were closed, he tried a couple places, but I guess most everyone was at that memorial service.”
I nodded. “Most of us know the Stanleys, and we’ve known Kevin since he was a little kid. The whole town was there.”
Jake bobbed his head in acknowledgment. “I figured. I knew who he was, but I’m too new to town to really know him or his family, so I didn’t go.”
“Oh, sorry!” I said. “I didn’t mean—”
“I didn’t think you did,” Jake said at once. “No offense taken, believe me. I’m just the new kid in town, that’s all.”
“Well, it wasn’t very friendly of me to point it out.” I appreciated the low lighting; Jake wouldn’t be able to see the blush I felt creeping up my face.
I didn’t blush often, but Jake was a special case. There weren’t many men in Keyhole Bay who fit his description: single, attractive, and smart (well, he loved books, didn’t he?).
So, yeah, I blushed.
“I knew what I was getting into when I moved to a small town,” Jake said. “I’ve only been here three months, whereas most of the people have been here at least three generations. I am the new kid.”
Without a good answer to that, I kept my mouth shut, so I didn’t put my foot back in again, and moved to inspect the box on the counter.
The printed address was on a plain white shipping label, the kind you buy in the office-supply store by the hundreds. There was no return address or any indication where it had come from.
“What in the heck?” I twisted the box around, looking for some explanation of its origin, but I couldn’t find any answers.
I decided the best thing to do was take it home and open it. Besides, I’d imposed on Jake long enough.
But when I started to lift the box, it turned out to be even heavier than I expected. Jake had lifted it easily, but, then again, he was used to hauling around boxes of books.
“Here,” he said, coming to my rescue. “Let me carry that for you.”
I surrendered the box without argument. I suppose I could have tried to carry it across the street, but I think I might have injured myself in the process. Anyway, those shoulders I’d admired were obviously for more than looks.
I thanked him and held the door open as he hefted the box onto one shoulder. I tried to ignore how close he got as he walked past me onto the sidewalk.
I closed the door behind us and trotted to catch up with him. I moved ahead of Jake on the crosswalk so I could reach the door to Southern Treasures and open it for him.
At the sound of the door opening, Bluebeard ruffled his feathers and squawked at us for disturbing his nap. He gave Jake a beady-eyed stare, then moved his gaze to me.
“Tryin’ to %^*$ sleep here,” he said.
Jake nearly dropped the box. “Did he just say… ?”
I nodded. I used to be amazed at the breadth of Bluebeard’s vocabulary, both standard and off-color. Now I was pretty sure it wasn’t always the bird putting together full sentences.
“Sorry,” I said, grabbing the box, which threatened to slip from his arms, and guiding him to the counter. “Just set it here.” I hefted the corner onto the counter, while Jake slid the box to rest next to my sales terminal.
“I apologize for Bluebeard. He doesn’t seem to have his company manners in place today.”
Jake laughed. “It wasn’t his swearing. I heard a lot worse in the service. But I’ve never heard a parrot quite that articulate. How long have you had him?”
As I fed Bluebeard and checked his water, I found myself telling Jake Robinson an abbreviated version of how I came to live with a foul-mouthed parrot in a crowded souvenir shop. He was easy to talk to, and he asked questions with a show of real interest.
After a few minutes I stopped, amazed at how much I had revealed to this relative stranger.
“I shouldn’t be running on like this, keeping you from your work,” I apologized. “I appreciate you carrying that box over.”
I realized I hadn’t even opened the box because I’d been so distracted by Bluebeard. And, if I was honest, by my conversation with Jake.
I stepped behind the counter and got a small box cutter, but I really didn’t need it. The box was held shut with just a couple strips of carelessly applied packing tape. I was able to pick up one end of the tape and pull it across the box.
My heart sank when I pulled back the flaps. A packing slip on Fowler’s Auto Sales letterhead was the first thing I saw, and I didn’t need to see anything else to know what I had.
A box of Kevin Stanley memorial T-shirts, courtesy of Matt Fowler and my meddling cousin Peter.
Jake read the dismay on my face. “Not something good, huh?” he asked, stepping closer to peer into the box. I guess he felt some responsibility for it, since he was the one who took the delivery.
“They’re T-shirts,” I said unnecessarily.
Jake glanced at the shelves, racks, and spinners in the store and back to me. One eyebrow rose in question. “And?”
“And they’re part of a fund-raiser for the high school athletic program.” I sighed. “It’s a long story, but I got volunteered to be a distribution point.”
I debated trying to explain about my cousin Peter, but decided it would sound way too much like whining. Probably because it would be. I was tired, emotionally drained by the events of the day, and already unhappy about my responsibility for the shirts.
Fowler sending them even before the end of the memorial service pushed me close to the breaking point.
“That’s very generous of you, Ms. Martine,” Jake said. The tentative note in his voice told me he realized I wasn’t entirely happy about it.
“Call me Glory,” I said. “All my friends do. And anyone who carts T-shirts around for me has earned that much, at least.”
“Glory, then.” Jake walked to the door. “I can see you’re tired. I’m going to get out of your way and get back to work myself. Someday when you want to tell me the long story of your getting volunteered, I’d love to hear it. Maybe over coffee?”
Before I could say anything, he was out the door and trotting across the street. I watched, open-mouthed, as he let himself into Beach Books and went back to restocking his shelves.
Had he just asked me out? Or was I reading a lot more into the offer of a cup of coffee?
“Pretty boy,” Bluebeard called. I didn’t ask whether he meant himself or Jake.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to know his answer.
I TURNED BACK TO THE BOX OF T-SHIRTS AND PULLED out the packing list. According to Buccaneer Booster Club, via Fowler Auto Sales, I had six dozen memorial T-shirts in assorted sizes.
As much as I hated unpacking at that hour, I wanted even less to face the pile of shirts first thing in the morning. I figured I’d better at least verify the packing list and figure out where I was going to display them.
I reached in the box and plopped a stack of shirts on the counter. On the front of the shirt was a photo of Kevin in his football uniform, kneeling at midfield. I recognized it as the pose yearbook editors had used for as long as I could remember.
Below the picture was his name, his date of birth, and the date of his death, along with a line of flowing script reading, “We will miss you.”
The irony wasn’t lost on me. Everyone would miss Kevin, certainly. But many of the people involved in the memorial T-shirts had their own selfish agendas and would miss Kevin for more than his great smile or his ready wit.
Some of them would miss the opportunity to turn a buck or build an empire on the back of a teenage football star.
The question was, who wouldn’t miss him?
From across the room, Bluebeard started swearing loudly. He rushed across the shop, landing next to the shirts and screeching angrily.
I managed to shove the shirts back in the box before he grabbed them, but he clearly intended to tear them to shreds.
Adrenaline raced through my veins as I backed away from the furious bird. I had never seen him react that way to anything I brought into the shop.
“Bluebeard! Stop!”
He backed up a step but continued to glare at the box.
“What is wrong with you?” I scolded as I closed the flaps. If the blasted bird destroyed the shirts, I was sure Fowler would expect me to pay for them. “Those shirts are to make money for the football team. What do you think you’re doing?”
Bluebeard blinked at me and slowly backed away. I could see calm returning as he settled down on the counter.
Gingerly, I took my hand away from the box and reached for his head. He let me stroke him, and I felt the tension recede. From both of us.
When Bluebeard had quieted down, I carried him back to his cage and gave him a biscuit. “What’s wrong?” I cooed. I couldn’t help it. The poor thing had been badly spooked by the shirts and I had to try to understand why.
“Bad man.”
“Kevin?” I asked. “Kevin isn’t a bad man. Kevin’s just a kid who made a bad mistake and paid dearly for it.”
“Not boy. Man.”
Okay. It wasn’t Kevin. There were two people involved with the T-shirts, Fowler and Peter. Peter was in Montgomery, a hundred miles away, and besides, he didn’t know anything.
That left Fowler.
“Did the bad man hurt Kevin?” I asked.
Bluebeard bobbed his head, and I took that as a yes.
“The bad man hurt Kevin, and somehow you know about it?”
More head bobbing.
I hesitated, glancing around the shop as though I needed to reassure myself I was alone. “Uncle Louis?”
Bluebeard sat completely still.
“Uncle Louis, do you need my help? Is there something I can do to help you?”
I waited, skepticism battling with conviction. One part of my brain told me I was acting like a fool, talking to a parrot and expecting a dead man to answer. But another part of me, a part that relied on faith in my own heart, told me I was on the right path.
“Do you need my help to, uh, move on?”
“Noooo! No move on,” Bluebeard shrieked at top volume. He spread his wings and beat them against the air.
The sudden outburst startled me. He had calmed down, but the question clearly agitated him.
“No move on,” he repeated. His voice had dropped from the initial scream to soft and pleading, almost pathetic. It reminded me of the robot in a movie I saw as a kid, a self-aware robot whose cry of “No disassemble” had brought tears to my nine-year-old eyes.
If Uncle Louis was in the shop—and now I was more confident of that than ever—he didn’t want to leave. The ghost didn’t want to move on to wherever ghosts go when they leave the world of the living. It seemed as though he wanted to stay in Southern Treasures with me.
“You don’t have to go anywhere,” I said, in what I hoped was a reassuring tone. I didn’t really know what would reassure a ghost, but I did my best.
“Even if we figure out what happened to Kevin, you can stay here as long as you want to.”
To my surprise, I meant it. For weeks—months, actually, if I was honest with myself—I had been fighting the idea of having a ghost living in my shop. But in the last few days, as I had slowly shared my secret with my closest friends, I’d come to accept his presence. Uncle Louis was as close to a blood relative as I had in Keyhole Bay, and I found I liked the idea of having him around.
I think.
After all, I didn’t know what the rules were for ghosts. Did he get to talk to me whenever he wanted? Would he answer questions? Did he sleep? That part was kind of worrisome; was I going to have him wandering around the shop at all hours, doing whatever it was ghosts did while people were sleeping?
And would he want to talk to other people? Like Karen, or Felipe and Ernie, or Linda? Karen had already heard him, so I knew others could hear what he said.
Having a ghost around was a very complicated situation.
“It wasn’t an accident.”
Great! On top of all the questions swirling around in my head, Bluebeard had added one more. What really happened to Kevin Stanley?
“You said that before,” I told him. “Do you mean Kevin’s car crash wasn’t an accident? Is that when the bad man hurt him?”
“Bad man!”
There were some serious limitations in questioning a ghost who spoke through a parrot. I was going to need a lot of patience to figure out the answers he gave me.
Bluebeard ruffled his feathers again, then retreated into his cage and settled onto his perch. He tucked his head into his chest. It was a signal he was tired. Like a small child, an emotional outburst often left him worn out and needing a nap.
I closed the door on his cage but didn’t latch it, and draped the old blanket over it to provide him the restful darkness he needed.
Whatever else he had to say could wait until morning.
Unfortunately, the T-shirts had to be dealt with now.
I went back to unpacking, now that Bluebeard was sleeping, and sorting the shirts into stacks by size as I checked them against the packing list.
The six dozen shirts ranged from a handful of kid sizes to “XXX Large,” with most of them in “Large” and “X-Large.” I had to admit, Fowler knew what he was doing with his ordering. When most people bought “special” T-shirts, they wanted them a size or two larger than what they usually wore.
At the bottom of the list was a handwritten note. Shiloh Weaver, Fowler’s office manager, had listed the sales prices for the shirts and my commission as sales agent. She said she’d check with me in a couple of days to see if I needed more shirts, and to call her if I had any questions.
Just one: How do I get out of this mess?
I remembered Jake Robinson telling me what a generous thing I was doing. If I went back on my agreement—well, Peter’s agreement—to sell the shirts, I would have to face the disappointment of a town Fowler had probably already told about the shirts. A town now expecting me to provide them with a way to mourn their lost son and support their beloved football team—all in one simple gesture.
I sighed and cleared a space front and center. If I was going to be civic-minded, I might as well do it right.
THE T-SHIRTS BROUGHT ME A STEADY STREAM
OF LOCALS all day Tuesday and Wednesday, though no actual business. No surprise there.
By Wednesday afternoon, I was sold out of everything but a few size smalls, and I had already agreed to take another four dozen. Shiloh promised me they would be delivered later that afternoon.
Although it didn’t bring me any business, I did get to talk to a lot of people. Everyone expressed their shock and upset over Kevin’s death. I heard again and again what a nice kid he was and how it was a terrible loss for everyone.
A group of four young women came in together early Wednesday morning. One pushed a stroller, and one of the others was visibly pregnant. It took a minute for me to place them: cheerleaders from the squad of a few years back, when Jimmy Parmenter was the football star and Julie was captain of the cheerleading squad.
As they picked through the shirts looking for one that might stretch over a pregnant belly, I tried to be discreet as I listened in on their conversation.
“Julie should be here, too,” the young mother said, maneuvering her stroller between the shelves. “She was team captain. You’d think she would want to come with us.”
A tall brunette, still trim and athletic looking, waved her left hand, on which a large diamond sparkled as it caught the lights. “She said she just couldn’t face it, bless her heart,” she paused. “I can imagine, after what happened to Jimmy.”
There it was, that whiff of disapproval masquerading as concern.
The other two nodded. The pregnant one sniffed slightly and held up the last size double-X. “Think this will fit?” She stretched the fabric across her belly. “I don’t know what is wrong with Julie,” she continued, twisting awkwardly to assess the fit of the shirt. “She cried her eyes out at the service, but she won’t come with us to get shirts? What’s up with that?”
The brunette cast a critical eye on her friend. “Like I said, I really think it’s Jimmy. He lost his scholarship when he got hurt, and now another football star gets killed in a stupid accident.” She shrugged. “That’s got to mess you up.”
I listened while they selected their shirts, and one by one, brought them to the counter to ring up. I didn’t learn much of anything I didn’t already know. Julie Parmenter was upset about Kevin’s death, but I’d seen that for myself at the memorial.
Murder Buys a T-Shirt Page 9
