Dark Corners READY FOR PRC (8 page)

“I haven’t been to the store in a while. I doubt you could find anything to make.”

“I figured. I brought groceries.”

Susan picked up the bags sitting by the door and pushed past me, not waiting for an invitation. I followed her sluggishly as she walked to the kitchen. I saw her looking around the house and I knew she was judging me for not keeping it together. In the kitchen, she immediately started searching for pans and rummaging through her bags. I sat on one of the stools along the counter and watched. My mind drifted back to how it used to be.

Danny and I pulled up in front of the Daniels’ home.

Game night—my favorite part of the week. It was the only night we escaped the house and all that we needed to do. Danny and I stopped working early to head over to Doug and Susan’s every Thursday for an evening of fun and entertainment.

It was a good stress reliever and kept us from killing one another. Constant exhaustion and unending home repairs was making the little things the other one did, like smacking their gum, not changing the toilet paper roll, and the constant humming, unbearable. It was nice to have one night every week that we could relax.

Loud music blared from their house as we walked up to the door. Danny rang the doorbell and Doug opened it immediately as if he’d been waiting by the door. They lived in a new house in a new subdivision. It had a wonderful, open floor plan and a lot of natural light. I greeted Doug, then made my way to find Susan. Doug and Danny trailed behind me as I walked to the kitchen where Susan was dancing as she assembled pizzas. She grinned widely when she saw me.

“Hey, lady! How was your day?” she asked, bubbling with enthusiasm. Susan was the type of person who had endless amounts of energy and never seemed weary. She worked long hours at the hardware store, even more than Doug, and volunteered for countless organizations. The woman knew no limitations and I often wish I had her spirit.

Doug was much more reserved and quiet. I often caught him staring, at Susan, at Danny, occasionally even at me. Sometimes he’d stare off into space and you had to actively try to get his attention. He was always careful about what he said, never really cutting loose. Susan, on the other hand, never thought before she spoke. Everything tumbled out of her mouth as soon as it hit her brain. They were definitely a case of opposites attract, yet they fit together. Together they were a complete person, each making up for the other one’s deficiencies. To a certain degree they reminded me of Danny and me.

“Hey, yourself! What can I do to help?”

“Ummm, you want to chop vegetables for the salad?”

“Sure.” I said and grabbed a chopping knife. Doug got two beers out of the refrigerator behind me, while Danny sat at the counter watching us cook. Doug handed Danny his beer, then leaned against the refrigerator taking a swig of his own.

“Doug, you should show Danny our new entertainment system.” Susan said.  She couldn’t stand to see other people just sitting around; everyone needed to be engaged in some sort of activity. She directed her attention to Danny next. “You should go look. It’s . . . elaborate. Doug did all the wiring himself. We now officially have a theater room.” She spoke the words brightly, but there was an edge to her voice.

Doug rolled his eyes. “It’s only elaborate to those with the technical knowhow of an 80-year-old, but I’m always happy to show off my work. Do you want to see, Ella?”

“Thanks, but no. I’ll stay and help Susan. It’s not fair to leave her with all the work.”

The guys headed to the basement to look at the theater room, leaving us to finish dinner.

“Good, that should keep them busy for a while,” Susan said as she put the pizza in the oven and came over to help me with the salad. “So how are things with you guys?”

“Great. We finished the floors today. I’m exhausted physically and mentally, but everything’s coming along.”

“The house still picking on you?” she asked in a teasing voice. I gave her a tight grin in an attempt to keep from frowning. She sounded just like Danny.

“Something like that,” I mumbled, suddenly very interested in the mushrooms I was chopping.  Neither of us said anything for a while. I felt like Susan had more to say, something she wanted to discuss, but she wasn’t sure how to approach it. Uncertainty hung in the air between us until she finally said, “Home improvements can be stressful.  How are you two holding up?”

“Fine. We argue a little, but that’s life, right? Once things settle down we’ll get back to normal. How are things with Doug? Is he still sleeping the guest room? Did you talk him into couple’s counseling yet?”

Susan’s jaw clenched. “No. I envy you—at least Danny will argue with you. Doug pretends like nothing’s wrong. He spends all his time in his workshop playing with cameras, circuits, and God knows what else. I think he misses working with technology. Maybe he regrets moving here . . . I don’t know he won’t talk about it” Susan flipped on the oven light to check the pizzas. . “When I ask him, he tells me nothing’s wrong, he’s just tired. I told him it’s no wonder since he stays up most of the night. That’s when he started sleeping in the guest room.” Her eye twitched from the stress. She pressed her hand against it, and forced a smile. “We’ll work it out.”

“Of course you will,” I assured her. “Everyone goes through rough patches. The two of you are perfect for one another.”

She nodded, but her eyes glistened as she put the final touches on the salad. Doug and Danny wondered back into the kitchen. I distracted them by assigning them to set the table while Susan pulled the pizzas out of the oven. I set the salad on the table and we all took our seats.

“So what’s new in the Reynolds house?” Doug asked.

“Nothing, just working away.” I said.

“Well, not quite nothing, this morning Ella told me how there was banging in the walls and kitchen all night. She barely got a wink of sleep. Apparently our house is haunted by a drummer.” Danny smiled as he started on his newest favorite thing to do. Telling “my crazy wife” stories. Susan and Doug laughed, smiling at me as if I were a silly child. I bit my lip to keep myself from making a scene.

“Have you checked the pipes?” Doug asked. “Plumbing in those old houses can do that…”

“Yeah, I’ve checked everything. Our drum-playing ghost likes apples too, isn’t that right, Ella? Tell them.”

I gave him an icy glare “What and rob you of being the center of attention? I wouldn’t dream of it. Be my guest.” I tried to keep my voice light and mocking so Susan and Doug wouldn’t know how much he was getting to me. Sometimes Danny was just so— gah!

“Apples?” Susan asked.

“Yes, apparently our apple tree in back had bushels of apples on it last week. Ella had grand plans to make a pie for tonight with them, but when she went out this morning there were no apples on the tree or the ground.”

Doug laughed and Susan wrinkled her nose. “It was probably that creepy neighbor of yours, Mr. Sexton. That man gives me the willies.”

Doug laughed even harder. “That old man is harmless.”

Susan shrugged, but Danny joined in the laughter. He kept on telling stories while Susan and Doug laughed loudly, egging him on.  I sat quietly fuming about being the butt of the jokes. Eventually they tired of the subject and moved on to other things. Furious did not begin to cover what I felt towards Danny for doing that, but it wasn’t worth fighting with him.

The rest of the evening was pleasant. We talked about movies, town gossip, and anything else that came to mind. When dinner was over and the dishes were cleared Susan pulled the game choices from the closet. We decided a cut throat game of Cranium would ensue once we were divided into teams.

“Let’s do couples,” Danny said.

“No, we do that every week.” I shot the idea down thinking it might be easier on Susan and Doug, plus I was still mad.

“I’ll be on Ella’s team,” Doug said brightly. “We can mix it up a little.”

“No,” Susan said, looking uncomfortable which surprised me. “Let’s do girls against boys.” Both of the guys shrugged, but went along with the suggestion.

Susan and I won without even exerting ourselves. We played three times and each time the guys were no where even close to us. We did a victory dance around the living room after each win, as Danny watched laughing and Doug smiled.

“Well, Doug,” Danny said with feigned seriousness, “next time when the girls want to be on a team together, just say no.”

Susan and I eventually stopped gloating and soon Danny and I gathered our jackets, saying goodbye. Before I could leave Susan hugged me.

“It was fun tonight, thank you guys for coming over,” she said.  Her face looked happy, but her eyes looked sad. I hugged her back then jogged to catch up with Danny on his way to the car.

“Did you have a good time?” he asked

I nodded. “Well, except for being the butt of all your jokes I did. Did you?”

“Yes, it was especially nice to see you laughing and smiling again. You're so serious at home. And you weren’t the butt of any jokes. I was simply sharing your experiences with our friends.”

“You were belittling me and you know it.”

He sighed. “I wasn’t belittling you. It’s a sad thing that you can't laugh at yourself, El.”

I didn’t reply. I had nothing to say. No matter how many times I explained myself to him, he could never see my point of view. It was all a big joke to him. We pulled in front of the house; the windows watched us suspiciously.

“Sorry,” he said quietly as we sat in the car.

I got out, slamming the door behind me.

Home, sweet home.

I yanked myself out of the memory and forced myself back to the present. Susan was looking at me like I’d grown an extra head or something. Whatever she had said I completely missed it. I attempted some sort of conversation.  “You don’t have to make dinner. I'm fine, a little messy perhaps, but fine. You can go.”

“I came to see you, Ella. You don’t seem to realize you don’t have to do this all alone.”

“Funny. You weren’t here a lot while the police were investigating.  I could have used you then.”

“You shut everyone out. We were grieving Danny too. I didn’t have the energy to fight you every step of the way.”

“You thought I did it,” I said, incredulous over the way she was recasting events.

“I didn’t think you did it.”

“Really.”  It was hard to keep the recrimination out of my voice.  “It didn’t seem that way to me.”

“Well, you seem to think a lot of things happened that didn’t actually happen,” she snapped.

I narrowed my eyes. I was not about to back down on this. “You still think I'm making this up, that I'm insane.”

“I do now, because you’re acting that way.”

“You never believed me about anything.”

“That isn’t necessarily true. I don't know how I feel about your stories. They are . . .  implausible, extreme. Even Danny didn’t think they were real.” Susan suddenly looked tired and sad.

“Is that why you think I killed him, because he didn’t believe me?”

“Ella, this isn't easy for me either.”

“Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?” I asked coldly