Iced Tea

by Sheila Horgan

  “You know what Cara, my nails might grow a little fast, but that’s a sign of good health, and at least I don’t have fur growing out of my toes.”

  “Here we go. Hairy toe comments. You know what Teagan? Hairy toes are a sign of intelligence.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Quick, name 3 stupid people with hairy toes.”

  “Fred Flintstone, Sasquatch, and you.”

  “Fred Flintstone does not have hairy toes, he has three toes, get your facts straight.”

  “Fine. Sasquatch has hairy toes.”

  “Perhaps, but Sasquatch is not stupid. He has been hunted for decades, leaves virtually no forensic evidence, yet keeps himself in the news just enough to stay interesting, but not so much that the bounty on his head attracts sane people.”

  “I guess that leaves you.”

  “I am many things in this life Teagan, but stupid is not on the list.”

  “I agree, but how do we prove that. Your actions don’t really advertise your intelligence lately.”

  “Don’t be a jerk. I can prove it. Exactly what is your tolerance limit for stupidity?”

  “Oooh, very good. I have no tolerance for stupidity. Yet I have an infinitesimal amount of tolerance for you, so you’re at least dim, if not brilliant.”

  “That’s all I’m saying.”

  “How did we get here?”

  “Hairy toes.”

  “Right. Did you call Liam and Morgan and find out what we can do to help with the wedding?”

  “Why me?”

  “Because I’m going to talk to Mom and find out what she’s doing. I figured I’d run interference. If you call Mom, she’s going to want to know what you’re doing about Joe-the-cop and she’s going to want to know what you’re doing about a job, but hey, if you want to call Mom, I’ll be happy to call Liam.”

  “I like your plan. It’s much better. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you have hairy toes, you’re just that smart.”

  “Cara, if I did have hair toes, you wouldn’t know because unlike you, I actually have pedicures.”

  “That’s because your toe nails are best described as hooves.”

  “Don’t start.”

  “I didn’t. You pulled the hairy toe card.”

  “Call Liam.”

  “Yes, ma’am. You want to come over for food?”

  “Actually, I would. Jessie is out of town, but I can’t stay late.”

  “Call me when you’re leaving your office. I’ll do something easy.”

  “You sure it’s okay? AJ won’t mind?”

  “He’s working late tonight. I think he’ll like the fact that I’m not here alone.”

  “Well, Teagan the Terrible will be there to play body guard.”

  “If my call to Liam and your call to Mom don’t turn up anything earth shattering, we’ll just talk tonight.”

  “Sounds good. Cara, you using your maid lock?”

  “Yes, Teagan, I’m using the maid lock.”

  “Good. I invested almost ten dollars on that puppy, and I’d hate for you to end up all dead and everything.”

  “I love you too.”

  I know that when people put things off, everybody assumes it’s just a case of procrastination, but I swear on my favorite nightgown that isn’t what I was doing. I was percolating. I was letting the facts of the last few weeks percolate in my brain. I know me, and when I allow my wee little brain to wander down its own little path of pursuit, it always comes up with something.

  I decided that I’d just been thinking too hard, trying to force answers when my strength in life is actually asking questions.

  There are a whole lot of things that just don’t add up in all of this, and the problem is that I’m doing one of those stupid online IQ tests things. Instead of taking all the numbers and adding them up, I’m look at the total and trying to see what numbers I want to use to get there. Life doesn’t work that way. At least not for anyone I know.

  I said out loud, “By God, I’m gonna have some kind of answer to something, by dinner.” That is the kind of commitment I can handle. A little nebulous; easy to deal with.

  Chicken fingers. Where did that name come from anyway? One of these days I’ll take the time to look it up. I need to do that so that when I have kids, and they ask where chicken fingers come from, I’ll have a good answer.

  Speaking of answers, I decided to go online and see if my mathematician friend had an answer about the three tag numbers sharing three of the same letters was a better shot than the lottery.

  Sure enough, there was an email waiting for me.

  I read it twice. Something about the number of tags in each county and the number of variables on each tag and something else, but the short answer is that for my purposes, it was basically a crapshoot. A random event.

  So, I was right. I told Joe-the-cop that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and the tags really don’t mean anything.

  I sat down and tried to remember. It seemed like it had been forever since all this started, but it really hadn’t been all that long since I’d met the jerk.

  I was at Louis’s condo. Jerkface, sorry, that’s disrespectful, Officer Jerkface showed up. He wanted the book. I said I’d have to ask. He went away. I searched the condo for the book. Found the journals. Freaked out because they were creepy. Came home. He showed up at my house. I called dispatch and they vouched for him. We read the journals.

  He never tried to take them away from me, which is kind of weird, isn’t it. If Louis was working undercover, and the journals are some big deal, then why are they still sitting on my desk? And if he knew that I had the journals, and that was what he was really looking for, why did he need a search warrant?

  And if he was working with Louis and Louis was undercover, then why in the hell did they call me in to clean up the condo in the first place? Wouldn’t they just call his brother and explain that they were working on something and that there would be a delay in releasing the property?

  They kept Bernie’s property all tied up for days and she wasn’t even a cop or anything, and if he really was undercover, and he really did die in a suspicious car accident, then why the hell was I allowed into his condo?

  The phone rang.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi.”

  “Liam, oh crap.”

  “What did I do now?”

  “Nothing, I was supposed to call you and Morgan and I got sidetracked.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I need a favor.”

  “Did Teagan call you?”

  “No. Listen, when Morgan took off to meet AJ this morning, she left her phone on the charger. The school just called and Jordan fell down. They said to come and get him. I’m on my way, but just in case a run to the emergency room is in my near future, I need Morgan to call me. I don’t have AJ’s number.”

  “Boy, didn’t take long to turn him into your son, he is already getting clumsy. I guess clumsy is catching after all. I’ll track Morgan down. You go to the school and take care of your boy.”

  “Thanks.”

  I couldn’t decide if I was pissed off, annoyed, or just confused. AJ hadn’t mentioned anything about meeting up with Morgan. I decided to decide later just how pissed-off I should be, and dialed the phone.

  AJ answered on the third ring.

  “Hey, I’m a little busy, can we talk later?”

  “Sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt, but I need to know if you know where Morgan is. Liam just called. Jordan has had a minor accident at school, but they told Liam to pick him up, and he needs to talk to Morgan.”

  “I’ll have her call right now.”

  “Thanks.”

  “That’s it?”

  “I thought that was a big enough reason to call. Liam asked me to.”

  “No, not that, I thought maybe you would be mad that I didn’t tell you about Morgan.”

  I might have been a little bit snippy, “If you thought I’d be mad, I have to wonder why you did it anyway,
but you’re a full grown man, you don’t need my permission to get in contact with somebody.”

  “We’ll talk tonight.”

  “I thought you were working late tonight.”

  “I was, but if Morgan has to take off, that’ll change everything. I can reschedule the stuff I had planned for tonight and spend the time with you.”

  “I’m having dinner here with Teagan.”

  “You want me to stay away?”

  “Never.”

  “I don’t want to intrude on your night with your sister.”

  “AJ, I want you to be a part of my life, it isn’t an intrusion, and you need to tell Morgan about Jordan. We can talk tonight.”

  “I’ll be home by six, if nothing else changes.”

  “Okay.”

  I stomped around the house for a few minutes. Well, I didn’t actually stomp, but if I lived upstairs, the downstairs neighbors would have been unhappy with me.

  I took a bunch of deep breaths.

  Then it hit me.

  I’m an idiot.

  Whatever it is that AJ was doing with or for Morgan, was directly or indirectly related to his liking me. If he didn’t like me, then he wouldn’t bother with Morgan. It’s not like they’re out on a date. Morgan is madly in love with Liam. So instead of being annoyed, I should be excited. AJ might not have done whatever it is he is doing the way I would have preferred, but I don’t get to decide on every single thing he does. That’s just stupid.

  I went back to figuring out the mystery of Officer Jerkface, so that I would be free and clear to spend the evening with AJ, after all, Teagan said she had to leave early. What a good sister.

  I jumped up, got a couple more chicken boobs out of the freezer for AJ’s dinner, got out some paper, and started to make notes about the whole Officer Jerkface thing.

  Half an hour later, I had a few questions written down. Questions like: if Louis was really working undercover, and Officer Jerkface was really his old partner, then why didn’t he find the journals? There was plenty of time between when Louis died and when I cleaned out the condo for him to find everything he wanted.

  Was there ever really a search warrant? I never saw it. I just assumed that Officer Jerkface was telling the truth, but since then, it seems to me that he is acting a little more than a lot weird, so maybe not.

  And the whole journal thing is weird anyway, who works undercover on a serial murder case? And if the journals are documenting all that stuff, why the hell haven’t the cops come and taken them away from me? All the stuff you see on TV about chain of evidence, shouldn’t they be in the basement of a police station somewhere? Okay, no basements in Florida, but they shouldn’t be on my desk.

  And if my mathematical calculations are right, and they should be, because I didn’t do them, then the whole tag thing is a fluke, so we were all focused in the wrong direction, and if that’s the case, then how come Officer Jerkface didn’t know that? You would think a cop would have someone do the math, or that his experience would tell him I was on the wrong track, so why didn’t he speak up?

  And if this was really all about an undercover thing, then what could Bernie and Ivy-whatever-the-hell her name is have to do with it?

  And if the three of them weren’t murdered by some crazy tag number murderer in the first place, that brings us full circle back to what the heck this is all about, how did I get in the middle of it, and what am I supposed to do to extricate myself with my body and brain intact, preferably, no arms and legs akimbo?

  I decided a long shower, for thinking, was in order.

  While I was in the shower, it dawned on me that Steven still hadn’t contacted me about any of the stuff I’d asked him about. If I were trying to clear away my brother’s stuff, I’d call the service back. He was either rude, or didn’t care, or maybe he really was working with the cops, and delaying me.

  I wrapped a towel around myself, sat at the computer, and sent off a quickie email. Basically, I asked Steven to answer all previous questions, and send me some money. I figured if this whole thing was going to blow up in my face, at least I wanted to get paid for the time I’d already invested; I’d spent the money he sent me upfront on boxes and locksmiths and whatever. I will say, with a bit of pride, that I’m a really good record keeper, so I was able to copy and paste my little list of all moneys spent to date. I even put mileage in there.

  Feeling like I’d accomplished something, I decided I’d get dressed and run over to a couple of the big box stores and check out some prices for wedding stuff. Stuff like the munchies we would need for the non-shower. Prices for the food if Morgan decided we would do the cooking instead of having Jovana’s people do it. Truth is I was getting my little duckies in a row to make a good argument that we should just let Jovana’s people deal with it. I always get stuck being of service at family stuff, this time, I just want to be a guest and enjoy it. Dance with AJ. Maybe I can even get Daddy out there on the floor. He says he can’t dance, but when I was in high school, there was a father/daughter dinner dance, he brought me, and near the end of one of the dances, his back went out, he dipped me so low that people applauded. It’s still one of my favorite memories.

  By late afternoon I was back home with just a little bit of heartburn. A hotdog and soda at one big box store, soft serve ice cream at the other. I purchased several books, more chicken boobs, the super size box of tea bags and sweetener, and enough shampoo and conditioner to last most of a year, which is okay, because they were smart enough to put those pump thingies on top of each bottle, like hand lotion, so you don’t have to lift the hundred pound container with wet slippery hands like you used to.

  I took a quick shower, more of a rinse really, put hot rollers in my hair, because wandering up and down the aisles at the store, every box of beauty stuff had a woman with long flowing curls, and although I’m not going to have anything that impressive, I thought I’d experiment.

  While my hair cooked in the rollers I went out to the kitchen to start the dinner prep process.

  I got out my huge cookie sheet, and my huge metal cooling rack. I have to wash that sucker off every time I’m going to use it, because it gets rusty, but it’s the best way I’ve found to cook french fries and basically everything else I cook.

  I pulled the chicken out and cut it into appropriate chicken finger sizes. I’m not sure what chicken finger size is, but it’s like class, hard to describe, but you know it when you see it. I put the chicken in a plastic container, shoved it back in the fridge, and grabbed a Ziploc bag. I dumped some Wondra flour in there, seasoned salt, some chicken bullion, and pepper, mixed it all up and closed the bag. Stuck that to the side as well. I sanitized my knife and cutting board; raw chicken innards can be hazardous to your health, a lesson I don’t intend to learn the hard way.

  As I set the table, it dawned on me I should warn Teagan that AJ would be home. She did the good sister thing and asked if I wanted to cancel, but I assured her we were good.

  I went into the bathroom, finger combed my hair, did minimum makeup, which for me is a truth, not a cute little saying, and went into the closet. I decided not to decide what eveningwear I would choose later, ‘eveningwear’ is the nomenclature AJ and I decided on. Eveningwear is my lingerie.

  I pulled out a maxi dress. It’s a weird purple color and makes my eyes look really blue. Most importantly, it’s cool, and it’s comfortable, and it covers all the right stuff so you can wear it at home or out and about, which can’t be said for my eveningwear.

  At a loss as to what to do to keep myself busy until AJ and Teagan arrived, I got online to look for something constructive to help with the wedding. I know how O’Flynn weddings are done, but I’m not sure that’s what Morgan will want, so I should really look around for ideas.

  The Internet is a wonderful thing, but sometimes, it gives you too much information and too many options.

  I found a website that has a list for every kind of wedding imaginable. From destination weddings in third world
countries, to little do it yourself weddings in the backyard, every list was long and detailed.

  My kind of list.

  I like to break my lists down into teeny tiny little pieces, so that I am constantly marking things off as done, so I feel like I’m getting something accomplished. When I was younger, I used to put making a list, as one of the things on my list, so I always started out with a check mark. Probably something I shouldn’t share with just anybody, people might worry about me. I don’t do that any more. I also don’t use checkmarks. Messy looking and they don’t give you much bang for your buck. Now I use a highlighter and mark through each item. Much more motivating.

  According to the calendar I found on the same site, telling you when you should have each step of the process done, we were already fatally behind.

  It said we were supposed to announce the engagement in the newspaper. I’m not sure that Morgan and Liam want to do that.

  We are supposed to determine what kind of wedding, casual or formal, I guess that one will be determined by the dress that Morgan chooses, and according to what she said when we were looking at the ballroom, I’m thinking we are going with semi-casual. A formal dress would be out of her price range. It really is a shame, she is gorgeous, and she seems the fairytale type that would want the outrageous dress, but the truth is, especially when you have a child, you don’t always get the fantasy, my prayer for her is that she gets the dream, maybe not happily ever after, but certainly a beautiful life.

  I continued to make a list from the calendar.

  We have the reception area, yay.

  I’m pretty sure after my sojourn into all things catering that I’ll be able to talk Morgan into allowing Jovana’s staff to handle the food. It’s easier to decide on a menu than to create all the food on one.

  I wonder if she’s going to have the ceremony and the reception both at the ballroom. I’m going with yes, unless she tells me something different. Not that I really get a vote, but for research purposes, I’m going to assume that everything will be in the ballroom.