October Fest: A Murder-by-Month Mystery

by Jess Lourey

  “Sorry,” she said, slathering olive-laced cream cheese onto the bagel before wrapping it in wax paper. “Tuesday night is TV night for us. Popcorn and root beer in front of the boob tube.” She bobbed her head toward the crowd in the main room. “You just here for lunch or are you covering Glokkmann for the paper?”

  “Funny you should ask. I might be doing a little article on her.”

  She finished filling a mug with hot water, popped in an unbleached bag of tea leaves, and set it on a tray next to my bagel. “Ron ask for it?”

  Dang she knew me well. “Does he ever know what he wants? I better get to it.” I paid for my purchase, grabbed the bagel in one hand and the tea in the other, and sauntered to the outskirts of the room. I was glad I hadn’t sat in the center because Tanya had chosen that moment to lead the assembled reporters in a “nondenominational prayer that gives thanks to God.” I bowed my head so anyone cheating on the prayer wouldn’t see me chewing.

  After the lengthy prayer, neither Tanya nor Glokkmann ate. Instead, Tanya played the role of “voter” and interviewed Glokkmann about what she called “family values issues.” They set it up like a fireside chat, two friends talking, with a dozen reporters scribbling down notes. Tanya mostly lobbed softballs: “How important are schools to you?” “How crucial do you think a strong family base is for our community?” I tuned it out and scarfed my lunch, wondering if anyone could hear me moan. The combination of chewy bagel and creamy cool cheese accented with salty bits of green and black olives was embarrassingly good.

  Unfortunately, the clock was running out for me. I was hoping to meet with Glokkmann one-on-one to ask some questions, but it was looking like I wouldn’t have time for that before work. I was about to give it up for the day and head out when Tanya’s question fried my ears.

  “What are your views on gay marriage?” She had the prim smile of a nanny changing a smelly diaper.

  Glokkmann, the consummate politician, responded. “I think they are welcome to their personal lifestyle choices, but marriage is sacrosanct and should remain between a man and a woman.”

  They were talking about people who were gay like they were some weird hybrid zoo creature. Tanya nodded approvingly and said, “Shall we say a prayer for lesbians?”

  Grace stepped over and whispered something about gay men in Tanya’s ear. She listened, and then frowned. “Oh no, dear, they can’t be helped. Just the lesbians.”

  My last bite of bagel caught in my throat. I was reaching for a book off the shelf to lob at Tanya’s superior smile when I saw Curtis Poling stand in the back of the room. I’d been so fixated on my bagel and Glokkmann that I hadn’t noticed he was here. Curtis was the Senior Sunset stud, a 90-year-old man with beautiful clear eyes and teeth that were as perfect as the day he’d bought them. Many in town thought he was crazy, probably because he could be found fishing off the roof of the Sunset on any given day. Those of us who knew him personally knew that was just a quirk that kept him from getting bored. He was still as smart as a steel trap, probably too smart for his own good. I wondered how he’d snuck out of the Sunset this day. “Phoo-ey,” he said.

  I spotted a few other locals around him nodding their heads. Tanya ignored him and went on with her prayer.

  “I said phoo-ey,” Curtis said. “Tanya Ingebretson, you’ve been mean-spirited since you were a little girl, and that’s just about enough. That’s not how your parents raised you.”

  Tanya flushed. “The Bible says—”

  “Bible shmible. You’re a bully, always have been. Just because you’re hanging out with a whole bunch of other bullies on that issue doesn’t make you any less wrong.”

  “Shut up, Curtis Poling! I walk in The Light!”

  “Looks like the Dark Ages from where I’m sitting,” someone behind Curtis muttered loudly. I craned my neck and saw it was the owner of the new flower shop. I wanted to hug him. His comment set off a firestorm of others, and suddenly reporter and local alike were distancing themselves from Tanya’s words. Even Glokkmann looked like she wished she could beam herself to a different conversation.

  I became aware that Nancy and Sid were standing behind me. I turned and offered a half-smile. Nancy’s face was a mix of sad and grateful. Sid had smoke coming out of her ears.

  “If only Tanya knew how close she was to the enemy,” I whispered.

  Sid shrugged. “She knows. What she doesn’t know is that I sneezed in her food. She should be fully gay by the next full moon. Her husband will surely be relieved.”

  “Sid!” Nancy gasped and swatted her arm. “You wouldn’t dare sneeze in someone’s food.”

  Sid and I exchanged a grin and returned our attention to the main room. Curtis was on his way out in protest, and most of the townspeople were following him. Glokkmann stood to pretend that she was calling the press conference to an end rather than acknowledge that it imploded. She ignored Tanya, and I couldn’t but hope that Tanya would get to feel the sharp side of the representative’s tongue later.

  I was about to leave on that positive note when Glokkmann called my name.

  “Mira!”

  I turned. How did she know who I was? But of course—Grace was standing behind her. I walked over and held out my hand. Up close, she looked older than I expected, or more tired. Her makeup was cracking at the edges. “Pleased to meet you, Representative Glokkmann. Quite a gathering.”

  “Call me Sarah,” she said. “Grace tells me you’re a reporter here in town, and you want to do a story on my work here?”

  Not what I’d call work, but I wasn’t writing what anyone would call a story, so I didn’t split hairs. “I would. I’ll of course cover today’s talking points, but I’d also like to ask you some questions. I have to go open the library now, but maybe tomorrow?”

  “I’m sure we can figure something out. Grace, how does my schedule look?”

  Grace consulted her handheld. “Your next opening is Thursday.”

  “You plan on staying that long?” I asked.

  Her tense smile tightened. “I feel it’s my responsibility to listen to my constituents when Congress isn’t in session. I’ll be in Battle Lake as long as that takes.”

  Or for the murder investigation to wrap up. “Great! What time Thursday, and where would you like to meet?”

  “How about 10:00 a.m. at the library?”

  “Perfect,” I said. “We don’t open until noon so that would give us uninterrupted time to talk. I appreciate it.”

  “It would be helpful if the library was open earlier,” she said, her brow furrowing.

  “I agree. Our funding was cut.”

  “Oh no, that’s not right. That’s not right at all. I will have to see what I can do about that. In the meanwhile, what do you say about changing the Thursday library hours?”

  “Changing them to what?”

  “Ten to whatever time you’re scheduled to close.”

  “I can do that this Thursday, but like I said, there’s no funding for longer hours.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “There must be a way to cut corners. You like your job?”

  I didn’t like the direction this conversation was taking. Yet. “Yeah, I do.”

  “And does the town love its library?”

  “I think so.”

  “Then you’ll find a way, I know you will, even if it means taking a pay cut. In tough times, we all have to tighten our belts.” She nodded her head brusquely. “I’ll see you Thursday at 10:00 a.m.”

  “Thank you so much,” I said acidly. Out of the corner of my eye, I noted Tanya eavesdropping on our conversation and smiling broadly. I mentally stuck my tongue out at her.

  “My pleasure,” Glokkmann said, but she was already looking over my shoulder. Most of the reporters had left.

  On my way out, I heard Glokkmann thanking Nancy for her wonderful food and hospitality. I wondered if Sid was going to let the representative walk out without giving her a piece of her mind.

  I left all that behind me to run
the library for the next six hours at what were already poverty wages. I certainly could volunteer to work to keep the library open longer hours, but that wouldn’t solve the problem of slashed funding for basic community services—schools, medical care, libraries. I fumed for hours about how that woman had made me feel guilty for doing my job, but at the end of the day, I had bigger fish to fry.

  Or backs to spray. I still wasn’t a hundred percent clear on how Kennie had tricked me into tonight’s gig. Really, it was Mrs. Berns’ fault because I wouldn’t be indebted to Kennie if not for her. I was rolling that negative thought around in my head, getting ready to close up the library, when in walked Conrad, marching like he was on full parade. He pounded toward where I stood behind the front counter and held out his hand. Feeling peevish, I didn’t take it.

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Berns?”

  “It’s what you can do for my mother. Allow me to speak plainly. She’s going to be moved to a nursing home where I can guarantee she’s safe, and I need your help in making a smooth transition for her.”

  I swung from one angry tree to another. “Safe? What kind of life is ‘safe’?”

  He pounded his fist on the countertop, and I jumped. “For God sakes, you’ve seen her in the hospital! She almost died on Sunday. Do you want that on your shoulders?”

  I sucked in an angry breath. “I might not always agree with her decisions. You might not always agree with her decisions. But she’s earned the right to make her own choices and to live with the consequences.”

  He leaned in closely, his nose advancing toward me like a paring knife. “I know she cares about you. If you care about her, you’ll encourage her to move to the new nursing home, and you’ll tell my sister that you think it’s for the best. I don’t know why, but Elizabeth has come to respect your input.”

  I didn’t back down. “Do you even know your mother? Have you even asked any of her friends what she’s like, or do you just come in and tell everyone how it’s going to be? Because if you asked around, you’d find that your mom is pretty well-respected in this community, and she’s happy. And she’s settling down.” I had a hard time following the script but soldiered on. “She’s engaged to an employed man and she’s meeting with a life coach. She’s turning her life around.”

  He ran his hand over his face, and for a moment, I saw the man behind the curtain. “I want her out of harm’s way. That’s all. I just want my mother to be protected, and to live a life that would make my dad proud.”

  “What about a life that would make her proud?”

  He didn’t answer, instead turning a neat 180 on his back heel and marching out the way he’d come.

  He left me agitated by thoughts of Mrs. Berns being forcibly led away despite her best attempts to get her granny on, and this agitation slowed me down. I got out of work later than expected. I had only enough time to run home and check on Tiger Pop and Luna, who were both sunning themselves in the backyard, before I cruised back into town and parked behind Stub’s. I was dismayed to see the lot was already filling up. Kennie was equally disappointed when I walked in, but for different reasons.

  “Sugar pie, I thought we agreed you’d come early to help decorate the tables and storm up some conversation starters?”

  I had no patience for her whining. “It’s been a crappy day. You’re lucky I’m here at all. But since I am, how’s this for conversational springboards for tonight’s festivities: ‘Why are you orange?’ or ‘Can you believe we paid for this?’”

  “Now now, that’s no attitude. This is a fun night! You’re a sparkly hostess! Come with me.” She dragged me over to the spray tan booth she’d set up. It consisted of four cloth room dividers arranged so they formed a portable room in a roughly square shape. A curtain lay draped over the single opening so people could walk in and out without moving the dividers. Inside the makeshift room rested a single chair, which Kennie informed me was for the shirts of the tanners, and a bench which contained the MagiTan® spraying equipment, hair cover-ups, and white paper towels for the clients to tuck into the waist of their pants so no orange smeared on them. My instructions were to only spray faces and upper bodies.

  I listened to half of what she said, wondering if I was supposed to have some sort of license. Any job that entailed changing the color of someone’s skin should require formal training and a standardized certification. “I’m only doing this because I told you I would, you know,” I said pettily. “I already found out that Swydecker doesn’t have an alibi for the night of the murder.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Then you certainly won’t want to hear that he was with a woman that night.”

  “What?” I thought back to my conversation with him. He’d been the picture of resigned honesty. “He said he wasn’t with anyone the night of the murder. Why would he lie if he had someone to corroborate his whereabouts and get him off the hook?”

  She tapped her long red fingernail against her chin and pretended to ponder that idea. “Let’s see. Why would a married man running for political office hide the fact that he’d spent the night with a woman?”

  I pictured his empty wedding ring finger. “The woman wasn’t his wife.”

  “Bingo! But don’t be too disappointed. I have even more interesting information to share. We’ve found enough evidence at the scene of the crime to name a suspect.”

  My ears perked. “Not Swydecker, right?”

  “You’ll have to wait until after your shift to find out. When some of those men take off their shirts and you have to push aside back hair to get to their skin, you might lose your resolve without incentive to stay.”

  Or my lunch. I looked longingly at the rows of glittering glass bottles behind the bar, slapped myself, and walked, head down, into the booth just as the line began to form outside it.

  The only way I could get through the hour of spraying the bodies of strangers was by pretending I was a prison guard delousing them, and that they were all going away for a very long time. The patrons’ reactions ran the gamut from shy to sheepish to excited. Mostly, though, they were nervous and trying to hide it. The only person who acknowledged the strangeness of the evening was a sweet woman in her late twenties with a slight limp. I’d seen her around town and thought she worked at one of the gift shops. She was constantly in the library checking out books on animals, but she was painfully shy and I didn’t know her name.

  When her back was turned, she said, “How long have you been doing this?”

  “About thirty minutes.”

  She laughed politely. “No, not tonight. I meant in your life.”

  “Yup,” I said.

  “Oh.” She held out her arms when I asked. “This is kinda weird, then.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She coughed and reached for the bra she’d set over the back of the chair and then caught herself, squaring her shoulders and holding her arms out again. “I’m not going to meet anyone if I don’t step out of my comfort zone, am I?”

  My sympathy for her squelched my sarcastic urges. “It could be a fun night.”

  “Yes,” she said firmly. “Will the spray cover up my tattoo?”

  I glanced at the lower back art, the head of a German Shepherd above the name “Toby.” According to the dates, he had died last year.

  “I don’t think so, and it’s only temporary in any case. Do you still want the spray?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I’ve seen you working at the library. Is this your new part-time job?”

  “Not if I can help it. Was Toby your dog?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry. I live with a part German shepherd. Her name is Luna. I know how easy it is to love your dogs.” I finished spraying her back and instructed her to face me. She was kind enough to cover her breasts with her hands. The spray lines would be odd, but it made us both much more comfortable.

  “Yes. It is.”

  Her shoulders were quavering a little, so I finished quickly. “Good luck tonight.”

>   She thanked me, got dressed, and left. I returned to the drudgery of coating people who were too embarrassed to talk, which was fine by me. I was doing great until the very last gentleman entered my booth, his coupon in hand. He was in his early thirties and thin, sporting a long Ichabod Crane neck with a bobbing Adam’s apple. I gave him the spiel.

  “We’ll treat this just like a tanning booth. First, take your shirt off.” He complied. “And your glasses.” He slid them off his nose and set them on his neatly folded shirt. “Hold your arms out like you’re a scarecrow.” I sprayed his front. We were doing great until my sprayer clogged.

  “Excuse me,” I said. “I have to go rinse this. I’ll be right back.” A quick rinse under hot water, and I had the sprayer working again in under two minutes. The end was in sight, and so by the time I returned to the tanning room, I was almost in a good mood. Until I pulled back the curtain on the tanning room and saw Ichabod standing there, facing me and completely naked. I squeaked, and then, I swear I couldn’t help it, my eyes shot to his down-below before zipping back up to his face. My cheeks burned. Never underestimate the skinny guys was the hard-earned lesson there.

  I covered embarrassment with indignation. “What the put-your- pants-on is going on here?”

  He might have blushed, but it was impossible to tell because before leaving I had sprayed his face the color of a tropical sunset. “You told me to treat this like a tanning booth. I tan naked at the tanning booth. Tan lines, you know. Everybody tans naked,” he added, as if I hadn’t gotten the memo. He looked ready to cry, but defiant, like he didn’t want to admit that this mortifying situation was all his fault.

  He looked so, well, naked. I felt bad for him. I sucked in a deep breath. “You’re right that I did say to treat this like a tanning booth. I’m sorry I wasn’t clearer. I really should have been.” I indicated his lower torso without looking directly at it. Okay, I might have snuck in one more glance. Goodness. “This is only top-up tanning. Nothing from the waist down. I’ll step out so you can get dressed.”