***
I moaned and opened my eyes. Vanessa dabbed at my head with a wet baby wipe.
"Marty, are you okay? Are you all right? Marty, honey, talk to me." She was trying to be gentle, but damn did it hurt when she touched my head.
I swatted at her hand. "Nessa, stop! That hurts. What the hell happened?"
"You ran into that tree branch there." She pointed up at a low-hanging branch. Her face shimmied back and forth. "Are you sure you're okay? You have one heck of lump popping up. Do you know where you are?"
I stared up at the branch she'd indicated. It shimmied, too. The sunlight filtering through the leaves made intricate patterns, like fairies dancing. The kids were playing Red Rover. "Red rover, red rover, send Adam right over," they chanted. They laughed and shrieked, clanging noises came from the industrial park, but something was wrong. What was it?
I sat up and felt the knot on my head. "Ouch!"
"I'll bet. You were running full tilt when you smacked into the tree. I asked you if you know where we are."
"Morley Park," I said. Then I remembered. "Oh God!"
"What? What is it?"
Panic. "We gotta call the police!"
Vanessa looked puzzled. "The police? What on earth do we need the police for? Here, follow my finger with your eyes. We need to make sure you don't have a concussion."
I couldn't focus, couldn't track her finger, couldn't stop thinking about the body in the trash can. "The police! Gotta get the police!"
"Marty, stop it. You're scaring me. What's going on?"
I sucked in air and grabbed her hand. "Vanessa, there's a dead guy in that trash can. The one I threw the diaper in. We've gotta get the police!" My voice sounded weird, sort of like I'd been inhaling helium.
"Oh, honey, you're just hallucinating. You know...."
I cut her off. "No! I'm serious. Go look for yourself if you don't believe me."
She looked skeptical. "Okay, if it'll make you happy, I'll go look."
When she reached the trash can I didn't watch her open it, fearing that she wouldn't see what I'd seen. Fearing that she would. She put her hand to her chest and I could see her lips moving.
I choked back a sob and looked away. The children were taking turns on the slide. Singing at the top of their lungs. So innocent. So full of life.
Vanessa gently closed the lid of the trash tote and crossed herself. Automatically, I did the same thing, a silent prayer echoing in my mind.
I struggled to my feet and went to her.
"Nessa, we've got to get these kids out of here," I said. "Right now. Then, the police. We have to get the police. I’ll call. You take the kids and go. I'll wait here."
No answer, just a dazed expression.
"Vanessa?" I touched her shoulder. "I said, for you to take the kids and get them out of here. Now.”
"Okay." Her voice was weak. Like a frightened child.
“Just take the kids to your house. I'll come get them as soon as I can," I said.
"They can just stay there until Charli gets back. I'll fix them some lunch and they can play in the backyard." Her voice sounded flat, emotionless.
I picked up a weak signal and dialed 911 while she rounded up the kids. Luckily, they hadn't noticed anything was wrong. I was grateful for that. One of Vanessa's kids complained about having to leave. She told him to stop arguing, just get in the van. He looked like he was going to cry, but thought better of. He grabbed Adam's hand and the four older kids trooped off toward the parking lot. Vanessa scooped up Jaelyn and hustled after them.
It didn’t take her long at all to get Jaelyn’s car seat transferred and within seconds, it seemed, she shot off out of the parking lot, spinning gravel all the way to the train tracks, leaving me all alone in the park with the dead guy.
I managed to get the basic info relayed to the 911 operator before I lost the signal and the call dropped. I waved my phone around, trying to re-gain the signal so I could call back, but it was a lost cause. The sun passed behind a cloud making everything dark for a few seconds. When it emerged, the boundary of light and dark passed quickly over the park until the whole place was once again bathed in sunshine.
Another train passed by, this one heading back toward the coal fields, its cars empty and hungry looking. I watched it until it was out of sight, my head pounding along to its clack, clack, clacking.
While I waited, I went and sat back down on the picnic table. It was hard not to look at the avocado colored tomb, though. Every time I glanced toward it, I pictured those flies buzzing around, some lighting in the blood-caked hair, and that hand, just lying there, so still. So damned still.
The park was quiet and beautiful, the sunlight reflecting off the play equipment. Two little squirrels chased each other around and around and disappeared into the top of one of the oak trees. How could this picture perfect setting contain such a grisly secret? I shuddered.
On the other side of the railroad tracks, past the industrial park, lay the city of Glenvar, Virginia. Imagine Mayberry on steroids. Daddy says Glenvar isn't just a city, it's a state of mind. Sucker that I am, I'd believed him. I'd always felt safe there, protected.
Now, though, everything felt different. More common. Even the familiar Church spires and the Courthouse clock tower, standing their vigil over the city, seemed to belong to another place and time. So did the surrounding mountains.
The gentle, rolling peaks of the Blue Ridge were normally a comforting sight. On that terrible day I didn't find them very appealing. They loomed ominously in the background, making me feel small and alone. I shivered and quickly looked away, hoping the police would hurry.
It took less than ten minutes for them to arrive. My mom, Maggie Sheffield, beat them by a full five minutes.
The Madams of Mischief: Doom Divas Book # 1 Page 3
