Stranger

by Megan Hart

  I had a hard time imagining mild-mannered Jared angry, but I could guess at his reasons.

  “I’m sorry to hear that, but I need him to go on this call for me, and you need to get him out here.”

  “He’s really mad at me,” she repeated.

  Somewhere inside me I found the patience to be kind. “Just talk to him, Shelly. Like you’ve done a hundred times. Nothing’s different about that.”

  She made a sort of sniffling snort, but I heard the crackle of the intercom system and after a second she stuttered his name. “J-J-Jared?”

  His reply was less clear, filtered by the intercom, distance and my phone, and I rolled my eyes at her for not hanging up with me to talk to him. He showed up a couple minutes later, but not through the door from the lobby. He’d come around out of the back, which could have been for the convenience of leaving from the door closest to where he’d been working, or because he was avoiding Shelly. He slid into the passenger seat and buckled his belt without a word.

  He stared out the window during the entire drive, and I didn’t break the silence with even the radio. At the family’s house we took care of their grandma as quickly as we could, though she’d passed away in an upstairs bedroom with a doorway too narrow for our gurney to fit through. In fact, Grandma was nearly too wide to fit through that door, a problem that caused Jared and I a few minutes of careful manipulation that left us both sweating. Lifting bodies is an activity more suited for sweatpants, but we never went to a death call at a house in anything less formal than a suit. We owed the family that measure of respect, even if it made our jobs that much more difficult.

  Jared took the body to the van while I spoke briefly with the family, who agreed to come to the funeral home later that day to make the arrangements. I offered my condolences and met Jared, already behind the wheel of the van.

  “Jared.”

  His shoulders slumped a bit. He pulled the keys from his pocket and shoved them in the ignition. “Yeah.”

  The situation with him and Shelly wasn’t my concern except in how it affected my business, and so far I couldn’t see that his behavior was. He’d been polite and personable to the family, and helpful to me. Yet there was no mistaking the fact Jared wasn’t acting like himself.

  We didn’t have a terribly long drive back to the funeral home, but I wanted to talk about this before we got there. There’s something about conversations in the car that make some things easier to say. Concentrating on the road meant he didn’t have to look at me.

  I asked him the same thing I’d asked Shelly. “Want to talk about it?”

  “I think you and Shelly talked about it enough.” He signaled for the turn, but traffic going in both directions meant he couldn’t pull onto the main street.

  So I hadn’t been imagining that he was avoiding me, too. “She was upset. I asked her what was wrong. Look, you kids—”

  “I’m not a kid, Grace. Neither is she.”

  I’d only meant to tease. Both of them were only a few years younger than I. “I know that.”

  Jared’s fingers tapped rapidly on the wheel, and he stared straight ahead while I stared at his profile. It wasn’t hard for me to see why Shelly liked him. He had a good face, not classically handsome but appealing.

  More cars passed in front of us, and I watched Jared watch them as he waited for his chance to pull into traffic. He’d set his mouth into a thin, grim line that didn’t suit him.

  “I didn’t come on to her.” He bit out the words. “I know she’s got Duane. I’m not the one who started it.”

  At last there was a break in the traffic and Jared pulled onto the main street, his driving still careful despite his agitation. It didn’t make much of a difference in our position on the road.

  We were on the main street, but it was still a two-lane, backcountry road that twisted and turned and only needed one slow driver to back up traffic for a mile.

  “She told me what happened.”

  “Yeah.” He bit out a laugh along with the word. “The favor. Doing her a favor.”

  Traffic crept along, but the source of the delay was too far ahead and behind the curve to know the cause. “She told me, Jared.”

  He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe it. “She asked me to do her a favor, like I was some sort of gigolo. And I did it! God, Grace! I did it!”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” I offered, but the bricks had already started tumbling.

  “Why? Because I’m a guy?” Jared’s hands tightened on the steering wheel, but he kept his eyes straight ahead as the cars in front of us sped up and he followed. “It’s okay because I’m a guy, and everyone knows we all think with our dicks, right?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “No. She did.” He shook his head again as the van picked up speed around a turn. “Or something like it, anyway. About how we should just forget about what happened because it didn’t mean anything.”

  I gripped the padded door handle as he took the turn too fast. “Jared—”

  “It meant something,” he snapped. “At least it did to me.”

  We whipped around the turn and caught up to the long line of cars once more stopped behind the construction that had closed one side of the road. I gasped and braced myself on instinct, but Jared eased the brakes swiftly and with such skill the van didn’t even rock as he stopped.

  He turned to look at me, one hand still gripping the wheel but the other resting on the edge of his seat. “She told me you’re the one who said it shouldn’t mean anything. Thanks a lot.”

  My mind raced as I tried to recall what, exactly, I’d told Shelly. I was pretty sure that wasn’t it. “Jared, I never told her to sleep with you.”

  “You did. Even if you didn’t say it, she took you as an example.”

  That slapped me, hard, into anger. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  The construction crew flipped the sign from Stop to Slow, and we began inching forward again, the cars ahead of us picking up speed that hadn’t yet made it to the end of the line. Jared half turned to the front, easing off the brakes but not yet using both hands on the wheel again.

  That’s when some moron with a fire in his pants came flying around the turn behind us, didn’t bother to check the fact that though traffic was moving, we and the four cars in front of us were not, and rammed into the back of the van.

  It was a helluva way to get out of an uncomfortable conversation.

  Chapter 13

  My seat belt cut into my shoulder and the air bag deployed, making the world go white in front of my eyes. I heard Jared shout but could make no such noise myself. I could think it though, over and over.

  Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit and double-damn shit on seven kinds of shit-covered bricks.

  Then, silence.

  I was vaguely aware of Jared asking me if I was all right, but I was already fumbling with my seat belt and pushed open my door to stumble out of the van. I fell on some loose gravel, skinning both my knees and ruining my last good pair of panty hose. I got up and went around to the back of the van, sending up a prayer to any deity that would listen that there hadn’t been too much damage.

  The driver of the other car was getting out more slowly. I caught a glimpse of gray hair and polyester and bit back another curse. Someone’s grandma had rear-ended us in her big old boat of a car and pretty much crunched us all to hell.

  “What were you doing?” she shouted with the self-righteous fury of the wronged. “Why were you stopped in the middle of the road?”

  We had an audience. I hadn’t noticed until that moment that our van had leaped forward to hit the back of the car in front of us. We couldn’t have slammed it that hard, but it was enough to crumple the bumper. The driver of that car was out, too, staring at the damage with Jared, and the road crew on our side had put down their signs to run toward us.

  Feeling suddenly woozy, I put a hand on the van. More important than my vehicle was its cargo, and I was almost too afraid
to look. I forced myself forward to push in the button to release the hatch. Though the bumper below it was mangled and crunched, the hatch opened, albeit slowly and with much protesting.

  The gurney had shifted askew, the body upon it uncovered now with one hand knocked free to trail on the carpeted floor, but she looked otherwise unharmed.

  “Oh, God!” This cry came from the formerly indignant driver of the car that had hit us.

  “Oh, I’ve killed her!”

  The screaming wasn’t funny, as none of this was, but I had to hide my face in my hands to stifle my sudden, inappropriate laughter. I couldn’t even explain to the now-hysterical woman in the purple polyester tracksuit that she had not, in fact, actually killed anything but my van. She screamed. The audience grew. And I, my face hidden by my fingers, laughed until my shoulders shook.

  Jared put his arm around my shoulders. “Hey. Grace. You okay?”

  “Do you know how much this is going to cost?”

  That’s what I meant to say, anyway, but since my face was buried against Jared’s chest, I’m not sure he heard me. He understood, though, and put his hand on the back of my head briefly before hugging me.

  “It’s okay,” Jared said. “It’ll be okay.”

  “No, it won’t! This after the washer? And…” I shook my head, taking a deep breath. “This is just…bad. It’s bad.”

  “I’ll help you take care of it,” Jared said. “I’ll help you. Don’t worry. You don’t have to do it all by yourself, okay?”

  No wonder Shelly had fallen in love with him.

  By the time we got everything figured out with the police and the other drivers, it was too late to make it back to the funeral home to meet the family of the woman in the back of the van. I had Shelly call them to tell them there’d been an unexpected delay, but I knew that wasn’t going to satisfy them for long. I mean, who wants to hear that their beloved grandma was in a car accident on her way to the funeral home?

  We’d been able to avoid going to the hospital, at least, though my neck was growing increasingly stiff and Jared had somehow ended up with some bruised ribs to go along with his sprained ankle. The driver of the car that had rear-ended us had started suffering heart palpitations and had been taken away in an ambulance. I could only hope I wouldn’t end up having to go pick her up.

  The van, though battered, was drivable and we made it back to the funeral home where Jared unloaded our charge and I went to talk to Shelly about the afternoon schedule. The family had called four times, the last time only a minute or two before we got back. Frankly, while I understood their concern and didn’t mean to be unsympathetic since they didn’t know we’d been in an accident, I was more than a little irritated with their persistence.

  Still, I called them back from my office phone as I stripped out of my ruined panty hose and sank into my desk chair to scramble in my desk drawer for some ibuprofen. “Mrs. Parker, I’m sorry about the delay in getting back to you—”

  Mrs. Parker, who this morning had seemed a reasonable enough woman, had apparently been taken over by a raging demon. Without allowing me to get a word in edge-wise, she reamed me up one side and down the other, cast aspersions on my professionalism, criticized my clothing and told me I’d better give them a discount on the best casket I had.

  All because I was late?

  “Mrs. Parker, I know you’re upset, and I’m sorry. Something unexpected came up, and that’s why I was unable to meet you at one o’clock. But rest assured, your mother-in-law is being taken care of, and I have cleared my schedule for the rest of the day. I can meet you—”

  “Well, we can’t meet you! ” She shouted through the phone. “We have plans for dinner!”

  Since she’d just spent five full minutes ranting and screaming in my ear about how important it was for all of this to be taken care of as soon as possible, I couldn’t respond to her for another full minute.

  Sixty seconds of silence can feel like an hour.

  “I apologize,” I told her finally. “I’ll be happy to meet you whenever it’s convenient for you.”

  There was a moment or two of muffled conversation before she came back on the line.

  “Seven o’clock tonight. And it had better take no more than an hour. My show’s on tonight.”

  I’ve had to bite my tongue plenty of times, but this time my jaw was too sore to contain my snark. “It will take as long as you feel is necessary to adequately decide how best to take care of your mother-in-law, Mrs. Parker.”

  The silence this time was no less loud, but it was much shorter, because she hung up on me.

  What a bitch.

  I sank my head into my hands, willing the ibuprofen I’d swallowed dry to unstick itself from my throat and start working on the growing aches and pains.

  “Grace?”

  I looked up to see Shelly in the doorway with a mug of coffee and a plate of those damn cookies. “Are you okay?”

  Anger, like lice, can jump amazing distances from one person to another.

  “Do I look okay?”

  She stiffened at my tone and brought my coffee to me. “Should I call the insurance company?”

  I made no move to take the coffee. “That would be a good idea. Can you manage it?”

  Oh, that was mean.

  Shelly stiffened further, drawing herself up and clutching the front of her sweater. “Yes.

  Of course.”

  “Then do it, please.” I added the please, but it didn’t do much to soften my tone.

  Without saying anything, Shelly left my office. I should have felt worse, but I was tired, aching and pissed off at the world. It wasn’t a good excuse, but it was the only one I had. I got up to close the door she’d left open, probably on purpose to spite me, and heard Shelly and Jared in the entryway by her desk.

  “I’m busy,” Shelly snapped at his request to help him find the new box of cleaning fluid that was supposed to have been delivered. “Find it yourself.”

  “Fine,” snapped Jared. “Excuse me for asking you for a favor. ”

  Ouch.

  I’d seen Shelly cry and blush and even be annoyed, but I have to say that until that moment I’d never seen her angry. She whirled on him so fast I wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d displaced enough air with her motion to make a tornado. She didn’t quite bare her teeth.

  Not quite.

  “What did you say to me?”

  A sane man would have backed away, but Jared, who towered over Shelly by almost a foot, leaned in even closer. “I said,” he told her through gritted jaws, “excuse me for asking you for a favor.”

  “You are such a jerk!”

  “And you’re a coldhearted bitch!”

  Shelly hauled off and slapped him across the face hard enough to rock his entire body.

  Fucking World War Three was breaking out in my funeral home, and all I could do was stare.

  For a minute I thought Jared was going to hit her back, but all he did was grip her by the upper arms to keep her from hitting him again. He shook her just a little, then let her go and threw up his hands like he didn’t want to dirty his grip. Shelly let out a small, stunned cry as he stepped away from her.

  Turning, he saw me, and following his gaze, she did, too.

  “Pissflaps,” I said aloud. “What the hell do you two think you’re doing?”

  Shelly started talking and Jared gave me a sullen, silent glare, but I held up my hand to stop her.

  “This is my business,” I hissed. “Not a playground! What if there were clients here! What the hell are you two doing?”

  I was repeating myself, my voice pitching higher and hoarser. I thought my head might explode from the pressure inside it, and I realized I was about to burst into tears again.

  “BEHAVE YOURSELVES!” I screamed louder than I’ve ever yelled in my life. Louder even than I’ve ever hollered at my sister, even during one of our worst fights.

  Both of them stared at me, their jaws dropping, and I stepped back in
to my office and slammed the door so hard I knocked a glass-framed photo off the wall. The picture hit the carpet facedown, and when I picked it up, the glass had cracked. I couldn’t decide whether I should laugh or cry, and so I did both.

  Hysterics were new to me, but I’m not ashamed to admit I gave in to them behind the safety of my closed door. I used up an entire box of tissues in about fifteen minutes, but at the end of it I felt better. I needed a drink, and lukewarm coffee wasn’t going to do. I wiped my face and yanked open my door to come face-to-face with both Shelly and Jared.

  “How long have you been standing there?” I demanded.

  The guilty looks they gave each other were answer enough. I put my hands on my hips and glared. Jared cut his gaze from mine and shuffled his feet as red tinged his ears and cheeks, but Shelly didn’t look away.

  “There’s mail for you. Why don’t you read it while I go get you a cup of coffee.” She handed me a pile of envelopes. “Go on. We’ve got it covered out here.”

  Her concern and spot-on deduction about what I needed was nice, but I wasn’t ready to forget the scene the two of them had made. “Thanks.”

  “I’ll start on Mrs. Parker,” Jared said. “And the laundry, too.”

  “Fine. Good.”

  I took the mail and stepped back into my office as Shelly and Jared gave each other a few more guilty glances and headed off to their respective tasks. None of this had been resolved, but I didn’t have the energy for it now. Taking the mail, I went back to my desk and put my feet up to sort through it while I waited for Shelly to bring my drink.

  Bill. Bill. Solicitation for a charity I didn’t and had never supported. Another bill. My Funeral Directors Association magazine, which I put aside to read later. And finally, a business-size envelope, addressed to me by hand and bearing the postmark from Lebanon, two towns over from us.

  I slit open the envelope and pulled out a trifolded sheet of white paper, blank on one side.

  The other featured a line drawing of a man with a guitar, and typed text showing the date, time and location of a show.