by Liz Turner
Dana nodded absently although she was really staring at the corner booth. Smith was there, looking dejected but relieved.
Taylor was nowhere in sight.
Dana met Smith’s eyes. He shrugged and held up his phone, opened to his text messages. Then he mouthed, “She didn’t show.”
Dana felt a surprising amount of alarm at the news and wasn’t quite sure why. A shiver of adrenaline shot down her abdomen.
“—Ms. Potter? Dana?” Sara Beth was saying politely.
Dana cleared her throat and turned a modest smile on Sara Beth. “Do you mind repeating your question, honey? Sometimes I think I just still go off into la-la land like a little girl.”
Sara Beth giggled and put her arm around Dana, leading her gently toward a booth. “Don’t you worry about it. Happens to Lloyd’s mother all the time, sweet old thing.”
Dana resisted the urge to roll her eyes as she scooted into the leather booth on the side which gave her a view of Smith, should Taylor eventually arrive. Unfortunately though, Dana was sure that if the girl really was pulling some sort of con, she’d take one look at her mother sitting in plain view of the door and decide not to come in.
Their plan was ruined.
She met Smith’s eyes over Sara Beth’s shoulder and shook her head ever-so-slightly. The young man seemed to understand. He sighed and got up, check in hand. Shortly, Dana heard the tinkle of the bell over the café door when he left.
“Your usual, Dana?” Lydia said. Her large form was standing close to their table, and Dana avoided her gaze which she knew was staring intently at her, searching for her eyes. Lydia would want to know why she was there with Sara Beth Reinhart; Sara Beth was perfectly sweet and polite, but she was the sort of woman Dana had left Pippin to avoid becoming back when she was younger. The sort who lived by Pippin’s unofficial social rule-book.
Now that Dana was up in her years, she disliked Sara Beth’s sort of woman for a different reason. Though Dana had gone out and made a very different life for herself—a better life, in her opinion—than what had been expected of women back then in a town like Pippin, her old age now led uncurious people like Sara Beth to draw the most ridiculous assumptions.
Like that an old woman in Pippin could never have been anything more than just another old southern woman who’d spent her youth making some man happy.
“Yes. The usual. Thank you, Lydia,” Dana said.
Inwardly, she thought of Sara Beth. No, you’re not a curious person, are you? Don’t want anything to ruin your perfect idea of what people should be. You’d never expect that I’d had an interesting life outside of this town, just like you can’t fathom your daughter not being the innocent young girl she appears to be.
“Oh, I’ll have an iced sweet tea. Thank you very much, Lydia. And how’s your—” Sara Beth paused and then shook her head. Lydia had walked off in the middle of her sentence as soon as Sara Beth had given her order. “Oh well. She’s got a whole café to run! Can’t be hung up on small talk I suppose.”
“Oh yes, I’m sure that’s it,” Dana replied, and then she settled in for a long afternoon. She’d planned to have their little meeting interrupted by an outburst from Taylor, but now that that clearly wasn’t going to happen. Instead, she was going to have to think up ideas about the Bible study she’d never really planned to start in the first place. “I was thinking we’d go through the verses of James Chapter One, one-by-one, slowly. Yes, that was my big idea. A micro-study of the Bible, one small chunk of a time….”
Chapter 7
Unexpectd News
Four hours later, Dana finally found herself walking home, loaded down with a satchel full of materials Sara Beth had given her. The woman had apparently found Dana’s idea exceptionally exciting and had even asked to join herself. Dana had reluctantly set the date of the first meeting at two weeks from Friday evening.
She grunted as she hoisted the heavy satchel onto her other shoulder. Sara Beth had offered to carry it for her, but Dana had insisted it was no problem at all—anything to avoid the possibility of their meeting spilling into the evening. She knew there would have been a chance Sara Beth would have expected to be invited inside. And then there would have been no telling how long it would have taken for Dana to get rid of her.
As she came up along the side of her house, Dana caught a glimpse of a shadow moving in her porch light. She stopped in her tracks and drew a breath. The idea that it might be Taylor Reinhart—that the girl had somehow figured out her scheme to catch her that afternoon—came to mind.
“Hello? Anyone there?” she called out, figuring that if it was Taylor, there was no reason to be afraid. She was just a girl.
A tanned face popped over the porch railing. It was Smith Fox. “Hi, Ms. Potter. Sorry to just drop in on you like this. I just wanted to talk.”
Dana ignored the feeling of relief that flooded through her. She smiled and continued her slow journey around to the front steps, her satchel weighing her down.
“Hold on,” Smith said, dashing off the porch. “Let me get that.” He lifted the pack from her and hauled it up the porch as though it was as light as a feather pillow.
“Thank you,” Dana said gratefully as she climbed the stairs. “Well, come in then.” She turned the key in the lock of the front door and waved him inside.
Smith hurriedly entered, set the satchel gingerly on the kitchen table, and then hurried back out.
Dana put a hand on her hip and looked at him. “What? You aren’t going to stay for some ice cream?”
“I—I just came here to talk about…I don’t know. I’m a little freaked out by what happened today. I don’t want to put you out. I can just tell you out here.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m not going to stand on my porch to talk to you. Come in, and we’ll have some ice cream and chat. I’m curious myself to find out what you know about why Tay—Laney…would cancel on you at the last minute like that.”
Smith nodded and followed her inside.
Ten minutes later, Dana was sitting in her favorite armchair, sipping an ice-cold glass of tea. The weather could never get too chilly for sweet tea, in her opinion, not that it ever got that cold in Pippin. Smith was sitting uncomfortably on her piano bench, holding a glass himself, though not drinking it. He’d shaken his head when Dana offered him a seat on the couch, but after she insisted, he awkwardly plopped himself onto the piano bench.
“Smith, did Laney tell you why she couldn’t make it?”
He shook his head, nodded, and then shook his head again. “Sorry. She did, but I don’t know if it was the truth, I guess. She said she forgot she had an exam tomorrow and needed to study.”
“I see. And when was this? When did she text you?”
“About twenty minutes before we were supposed to meet up at the Blue Swallow.”
Dana raised an eyebrow. “But you still went to the café?”
“Well, I wanted to tell you what happened...”
“Why do you think Laney was lying? Could it be that she really did have an exam?”
Smith shrugged, his face darkening. “It’s just now that I know she’s been lying so much, I can’t believe a word she says.” His fist curled tighter around his glass. “I just—I just want to know the truth! And I feel like she’s deliberately playing games with me. Maybe has been this whole time…”
Dana nodded. “I wish I had answers, Smith. That’s what I hoped to get today.”
“Oh, what do you know?” he said petulantly.
Dana blinked at him, amused. “Nothing, I guess.”
“For all I know, you’re the one lying. What kind of old woman sets little traps like that for teenage girls? You’re the one who told me she wasn’t Laney in the first place! I mean, who do I believe?” His face reddened, and he’d begun breathing heavily during his rant.
Abruptly, he shot up from his seat and headed out the door, setting the glass on the dining table as he left.
Dana sat in silence, having been un
able to move quickly enough to respond. She figured it was probably for best though; he would find out the truth eventually, or at least she hoped so. Either way, it wouldn’t help to get into a fight about it now.
he finished her iced tea and gently set the two glasses into the sink before starting her habitual tidying up before bed—straightening the couch cushions, pushing the piano bench back into its rightful position, and swiftly wiping down the countertops. She then locked all her doors and headed up the stairs to her bedroom.
As she moseyed along, she resolved to call Sara Beth first thing in morning and demand to be taken seriously about Taylor. Perhaps she’d just show up at their house and confront them both together.
Dana sighed, knowing a confrontation like that wouldn’t end well. If there was one thing the people of Pippin weren’t good at, it was a direct confrontation; they preferred skirting around issues with deferent politeness and euphemisms.
At a loss, Dana didn’t know what to do.
Set another ‘little trap’ for Taylor?
Smith’s words stung a little. What was she doing spending her time trying to catch a teenager in a lie? Something about the situation had stunk of danger from the very beginning, and Dana liked to think she was good at sniffing out real threats. However, in her tired haze, she had to wonder if she’d just been wrong this time. Maybe Taylor was just acting out in an ordinary teenage way.
She yawned and changed into her nightgown. Not before long, she fell into a deep sleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.
***
The next morning, Dana woke uncharacteristically late. The sun streamed in at a horizontal angle through her bedroom window. She stretched, wondering if she was finally feeling her old age.
They do say older folks need more sleep, she thought.
She drank down the glass of water she’d laid on her bedside table and slipped on her reading glasses. It might have been because she was of a certain generation—one that had a whole life before cellphones became the ubiquitous tools they were—that she left her phone face-down on her dresser when she went downstairs to begin her morning routine. She washed her face and put on her terry-cloth robe and slippers. Then she turned her coffee machine on and cut up a peach while she listened to the machine’s gurgling.
She stepped lightly out to her porch, a mug of steaming coffee in one hand and a small dish of juicy peaches in the other. Sauntering down the driveway, she grunted as she bent to pick up the local newspaper left by her mailbox.
She idly checked her watch. It was 9:30 a.m.
After a leisurely half-hour on her porch in the cool air, she gathered her dishes and went back inside, humming to herself as she thought about what she should do that day. This moment of decision was possibly what she loved most about retirement; she had no obligations to other people, only a whole day to fill with whatever she pleased.
She thought about her resolve the previous night to call the Reinharts and chuckled at herself. That would be silly, she thought. I probably should just call Smith to see how he is. He was so upset last night.
But when she reached for her phone and switched it on, she blinked in surprise. Her home screen was filled to the brim with messages and notifications. She hardly ever had any messages other than the occasional voicemail from an old friend or a missed call from Jennifer.
She began reading through them. They were, for the most part, from Constable Hollows, the man in charge of the Pippin Police Department. She occasionally ate lunch with the Constable as a friend, but he never called her seven times in one morning!
She quickly dressed and then returned his call.
The older man answered in his usual manner, gruff and distinctly lacking warmness. “Dana, thanks for calling back. Sorry to call so early.”
Dana winced—of all the days, she had chosen this one to sleep in!
“No, no, it’s not early at all. I’ve just been neglecting my cell phone, I’m afraid.”
“Well,” Constable Hollows said, grunting, “there’s been a bit of trouble up on Milledgeville Road. A young man has been stabbed pretty badly.”
“Goodness. Is he all right?”
“He’s out of the woods for now. Awake and stable, the doctor says. But listen—he’s been asking for you. I don’t know how he knows you. He’s not even from Pippin, he’s from—”
“Jericho.” Dana realized immediately that the young man was Smith Cox. Milledgeville Road was the direct road to Jericho, forty miles through nothing but empty fields.
“So, you do know him. Smith Cox?”
“I do,” Dana said gravely. “What happened to him?”
“We don’t really know. He’s got knife wounds all down his arms, and one deep one in his torso. It’s a miracle the knife didn’t manage to reach something vital.”
“But you have no idea who would do such a thing?”
“The boy says he doesn’t remember what happened. Says he was driving back home to Jericho late last night and pulled over for some reason. That’s the last thing he remembers.”
“Hmmm.”
“Dana, we’d all be much obliged if you would come to Savannah General Hospital. The boy’s been asking for you and, well…I’m at a loss. He wasn’t robbed. He says he doesn’t remember, but…”
“You think he’s protecting someone.”
“That seems to be the only likely scenario. His parents are arriving shortly. Could be one of them snapped.”
“Is this a Pippin PD case? It’s just, if I’m not mistaken—well, where’s the Jericho PD in all of this?”
“He was stabbed along a stretch of road that’s technically part of our jurisdiction. I did phone over to Jericho, but they didn’t want anything to do with it. Bad press and all, I suppose. But the papers will get a hold of it in no time anyhow.”
“I’ll be there in a few hours.”
Dana hung up the phone and sat on her bed for a moment. She had a sinking suspicion she knew exactly who’d done this, but she hoped she was wrong.
***
Two and a half hours later, Dana had navigated through the tight streets of Savannah and was in the elevator coming up the hospital from the parking garage. Her mood was grim, but she was at least clear on something—she wouldn’t wonder again whether she was just being silly with this Taylor or Laney business. Whatever was going on, it now involved attempted murder with a deadly weapon, the police were involved, and poor Smith was lying in a hospital bed.
Constable Hollows met her in the lobby. “Dana, good to see you.” He nodded politely.
“How is he?” she asked.
Hollows grunted in reply as he led her to the elevator. They went to the third floor where they entered a private room.
Dana was unprepared for the sadness that filled her heart when she saw Smith. The young man had bandages covering his arms, a nasty looking scrape on his forehead, and a large swath of bandages wrapped tightly around his abdomen. But it was his demeanor that upset Dana most. The usually energetic boy lied listlessly, expressionlessly looking straight ahead.
A looking-frazzled couple sat on either side of him. The woman, heavy-set and clearly having come straight from bed to the hospital, rose and greeted Dana feebly. She introduced herself in a shaky voice as Smith’s mother.
“Pleased to meet you,” Dana said gently, squeezing the woman’s hand.
After clearing her throat, Mrs. Cox, gestured to Smith. “Do you know anything about… Oh…” She blinked feverishly as tears filled her eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m just a little emotional about the whole thing. I just…Who would do such a thing? Do you know?”
Dana hesitated, but then shook her head.
Mrs. Cox shrugged helplessly. “Well, he’s been asking for you. Barely says anything but your name. I don’t even know who you are. I’ve never heard of you before!” Her voice rose to a hysterical pitch. “It’s like I don’t know my son at all! And now he’s been…oh!” She collapsed into her husband’s arms.
�
��Shhh,” Mr. Cox said gently. “Let’s get you out for a moment. Let the police do their work, Ann Marie.” Without even looking at Dana, he walked his wife out the room.
Dana took the opportunity to sit down in Mrs. Cox’s chair. “Smith?” she said quietly, “it’s Mrs. Potter. The police said you were asking for me. I know this must be very difficult for you, but if you do remember anything about what happened, you’ve got to tell us.”
“Mrs. Potter,” Smith said. He turned his head, wincing slightly, and fixed his frightened eyes on her. “You were right. That’s what I wanted to tell you.” His voice was quieter than Dana had ever heard it, but he spoke clearly and lucidly.
“I was right about what?”
“It’s Laney. You were right. She is—”
But just then, a nurse bustled through the door, smiling cheerfully. “Well, Mr. Cox, it’s time to change your bandages. And don’t worry,” she winked, “we’ll get you fixed up with some more pain medication straight away. Won’t feel it as much that way.” She clucked at the sight of one of the bandages. “I’m sorry, Constable, but do you and your…friend…mind giving us some privacy?”
“Of course,” Hollows said.
Dana could hardly rip her gaze away from Smith’s frightened eyes.
Chapter 8
A Nice Young Lady
“No, thank you,” Dana said to Constable Hollows’ offer of the candy he’d just gotten from the vending machine.
They were sitting patiently in the waiting room for Smith’s wound-care to be finished.
Dana drummed her fingers on the metal armrest of her chair while sirens blared nearby.
“So,” Hollows said, eyeing her, “you know who did this, don’t you?”
