Make, Take, Murder (26 page)

Monday, December 21
5th Night of Hanukkah

Overnight my daughter morphed
into Snarkerella, the princess who couldn’t be pleased. She snarled about the bagels, devoured all the cream cheese, complained about the banana (too ripe!), and stamped her foot with impatience when I explained I forgot to buy more orange juice.

“Gran is never out of orange juice! Never! She knows how much I love it,” howled little Miss Drama.

I mumbled to myself, “That’s because Linnea does the shopping. Your Gran wouldn’t know where to buy o.j. if she lived in Florida right next to an orange grove.”

“What?” Her hearing was perfect even if her mood was bad.

“How about if we stop by McDonald’s on the way to CALA? I’ll get you whatever you want.” Okay, so I capitulated. I prefer to think that I know how to choose my battles wisely.

Grumpy Girl stomped her way toward the front door, paused after she yanked open the door and shouted, “It snowed! It snowed! Wooopppeee! Is today a snow day?”

I’d already been out taking care of Monroe and playing doggie doo-doo handmaiden to my herd of hounds. “No, sorry. But there is an early dismissal. Your grandmother will be picking you up.”

“Sick. Totally sick. This is, like, awesome.”

Right. Easy to say when you don’t have to drive in it.

_____

The drop-off line at CALA moved more slowly than ice melts off your windshield. Most of the other moms wore their Blu-Tooth attachments. I wondered who they were speaking with. I knew most of them were SAHM, Stay-At-Home-Moms, so I couldn’t quite understand the urgency that compelled them to chat non-stop in their cars. When one of them cut me off in her humongous white Escalade, I laid on the horn.

“Mom! Geez,” Anya scolded. “That’s so not necessary.”

Maybe Anya’s bad mood infected me. Or maybe I was twitching because of the restless urge within me to get to the store and find proof that would send Ross Gambrowski to jail. Forever.

The moment we pulled up to the curb, my mood shifted to poignant. In another two years, Anya would be driving herself to school. Chauffeur duty would end, and endless vigilance would begin. How silly I was to wish her up, to try to speed up time rather than to enjoy each minute.

After all, she might be my only child. I might never have another chance to savor all this mystery, mayhem, and moodiness.

“Anya,” I grabbed the edge of her backpack. “You know I love you?”

She rolled her eyes. “Yes, Mom. Can I go? My friends are waiting.”

“Of course.” I watched her race off to where Nicci stood with two other girls. Girls I didn’t know. I chided myself for not being better aware of whom my daughter was palling around with.

I added that to my personal worry list and headed toward our store.

_____

The dogs raced around me in the parking lot, tangling their leashes so that I shuffled into the store. Once I got them settled, I headed for our store computer, where Dodie stored the class data. In that file I found the list of all the classes I’d taught and all the students who had signed up and/or attended.

Fortunately, Dodie alphabetized the names. Unfortunately, I teach classes nearly every month. I sipped a cup of Lipton’s tea, ran my finger along the screen, and settled into the search.

Fifteen minutes later, I discovered Cindy Gambrowski as an attendee for my “Hidden Journaling Class.”

This surprised me. I couldn’t recall having her in that class, and usually I remember my students.

I couldn’t recall Cindy ever attending that class.

In fact, I was sure she hadn’t.

I sat back in my seat and stared at the list.

I resumed my search. Cindy’s name appeared on two other class rosters. Again, I couldn’t recall her being my student. She signed up for “Writing about the Sad Times,” and “Journaling Your Journey.” The only class I recalled her attending was the last session we offered, “All about Me,” the class that spawned the page contest of the same name.

My cell phone sat within inches of my hand, but I had trouble dialing Dodie’s number. She owed me an apology for not telling me about Bama. Phoning her would seem like a capitulation. Not phoning her would keep me stuck here at the computer. Twenty minutes until opening time. Twenty minutes I didn’t have to waste.

I couldn’t change what happened to Cindy Gambrowski. I couldn’t miraculously heal all of Bama’s wounds, either. But I might be able to put a wife-beater in jail for the rest of his natural life.

I phoned Dodie. She picked up on the first ring.

“Sunshine, how are you?”

A million responses zipped through my head. Dodie’s joy was so genuine that it angered me. How could she be so flipping happy to hear from me when I was so bummed to be talking to her?

“Fine.”

“I’ve heard you are doing great at the store.”

“Things are selling.”

“Yes, that’s to be expected, but I’ve heard you are having a really profitable last quarter. I hope to stop in tomorrow or the next day and see the displays you’ve put up. Maybe I’ll even be able to help out a little.”

“Oh.” I sat there flummoxed. How did she know about our sales figures? Every time I asked Bama how we were doing, she’d stonewalled.

“I think you’ll be banking a nice bonus,” Dodie continued.

“Oh,” I said again. A bonus sure would go a long way toward making my season merry. “How do you know all this?” I couldn’t help it if my tone was peevish.

“I’ve done a shadow set of books while Bama was learning the accounting system.”

“I thought Bama knew all this stuff.”

Dodie chuckled. “She was learning as she went along.”

“How is she? Do you know?”

“Better than I expected. We visited her yesterday in the hospital. A good plastic surgeon was on call, and he actually fixed her deviated septum when he set her nose. Luckily, she didn’t lose any teeth.”

“No thanks to you.” I couldn’t help myself. I was ticked, and her comment about Bama’s teeth set mine on edge.

Dodie sighed. “I did what I thought was best. The rules of the group demand we keep our travelers’ identities safe. I took a vow. An oath. The other women have been doing this for years, and I adhered to the policy they’ve developed. Most of the time, it’s proven a valuable safeguard. This time … perhaps not so much. In retrospect, I should have asked you to take the WAR oath. I just didn’t want to drag you into this. Especially since you and Bama weren’t exactly getting along. Which, by the way, was more her fault than yours.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that.

“Bama’s ex-husband is a cop. Law enforcement officials have a high propensity to be abusers. When Detweiler visited you at work, his presence frightened Bama. Instead of dealing with her own fears, she chose to blame you. No matter how often I discussed the matter with her, she persisted in being upset. I actually arranged a session for her with a counselor, hoping they could discuss the matter. Bama refused to go. I guess on a deep psychological level, she believed her fears worked to protect her. She was afraid that if she let her guard down, she’d be at risk.”

“They didn’t protect her. Not at all! You do know that a cop saved her?”

“Not by himself. You also took a licking when you helped her. Kiki, I am so sorry. It must have been awful. To have him hold a knife to your skin?” Then she mumbled something in Yiddish.

When I didn’t respond, she translated, “The cholera on him!”

Even though she couldn’t see me through the cell phone, I nodded. That morning I caught a glimpse of my shoulders. On the blades I sported twin bruises, almost like a matching set of purple angel wings. Under the bandage, the cut was scabbed and angry. My nose was red from being wiped. I was a colorful, painful mess. I hoped Jerald McCallister met a bunch of new friends in jail. I knew they could be particularly tough on cops. I hoped they’d show him how much fun it was to be beaten to a quivering pulp.

“There are wounds on Bama’s outside, but far worse are the scars on her mind. Bama’s struggled with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for years. She’s come a long way, but she’s not capable of thinking rationally. You must be familiar with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. He theorized that every human being has basic needs which must be met in order to graduate to higher levels of functioning. The most simple need is that for safety. If a person lives in a war zone, she doesn’t concern herself with hygiene or social niceties. She puts all her energy into survival.

“Bama is like that. She’s stuck at the lowest strata of the hierarchy. She couldn’t respond to your overtures to be friends. She couldn’t shed that war zone mentality and see you as an ally. She was minimally functional in a lot of ways. Jerald had been beating her for fifteen years. That’s a long time to suffer abuse.”

“Why didn’t she leave? She has an MFA!” I nearly shouted into the phone.

Dodie chuckled. “That was part of the back story we created for her. In actuality, she has a GED. Jerald forced her to quit high school. He controlled every aspect of her life, including the purse strings. One of the reasons I wanted her to do the books was so that she could develop a sense of appropriate income and outgo. He terrorized her by making her account for every penny he gave her. To her, money was power.”

That explained why she had been such a witch every time I handed a customer a cola and forgot to write it down.

“Yes, until this disaster, she had changed a lot, and for the better. For example, her vertigo had mostly disappeared. Thanks to the move here, she was no longer getting hit in the head on a regular basis. She had time to heal.”

I blushed, remembering how I first thought Bama’s dizziness came from drug use. I studied my feet, thankful that Dodie wasn’t here in person for our conversation. I felt lucky I didn’t have to look her in the eye.

I was still irked, but not as much.

A glance at the clock told me I needed to wrap up our conversation.

“Dodie, the real reason I called is Cindy Gambrowski. I noticed she signed up for several classes, but I don’t recall seeing her take them. Am I just being forgetful?”

Dodie sighed. “I guess it doesn’t matter since she’s … dead. Poor Cindy would sign up for a class, but Ross would refuse to let her attend. I told her we’d keep trying until he got sick of saying, ‘No,’ which he did. I left her on the roster, and I paid you, because I shared your handouts with her. I would drop by the house, show her the pages you made as samples, give her the materials, and answer any questions. Often Ross would come into the room to check up on us.”

My lower lip trembled. Dodie had actually figured out how to take my class to a needy student, without alerting me. I wasn’t sure what to make of that.

“That was really nice of you,” I said finally. My voice nearly failed me, but I croaked it out. “Really nice.” I nearly blurted out that if she’d told me what was up, I would have happily visited Cindy myself. Or expanded on my handouts. Or anything!

“Fat lot of good it did her,” said Dodie. “She had pearls around her neck and his foot upon her heart.”

I brewed myself a
strong cup of tea, added Stevia to sweeten it, and opened a three-ring class handout binder. Spreading the resources in front of me, I carefully reviewed the course material Cindy would have received from Dodie. Somewhere, out there, was a clue I’d missed. What else could I do but retrace all my steps? And my handouts were steps, even if their impact had been unknown to me.

I read and re-read all my journaling handouts. Then I sat at the desk and stared off into space. What was I missing?

Nothing came to me. Nothing at all.

Whenever I’m creatively blocked (or just plain blocked), I resort to good old-fashioned walkies to get my juices flowing. I snapped leashes on my crew, slipped Izzy into the front of my zip-up sweatshirt and took off at a brisk pace, slipping and sliding my way down the street. Our shop is on one side of a city block. The other three sides are private residences, once upon a time they must have been adorable houses. Most of the owners have since retired, and the houses have seen better days. Still, out of courtesy to our neighbors, I clean up after my pooches. That can be tough in the late fall with leaves on the ground. Brown is brown is brown, and when you have two dogs pooping, keeping track of their droppings can be a challenge. In the snow, it was much easier.

That’s when the epiphany hit me: Cindy sent me books about hidden images.

She had taken my class on “Hidden Journaling.”

I raced the dogs back to the store, gave them treats, and took out Cindy’s page once more. After carefully washing my hands and pulling on latex gloves, I slipped the page from the plastic protector. In all my classes, I harp on the value of hidden journaling. That’s scrapbook speak for creating secret interactive places where a scrapper can hide her writing. See, not every part of our story is for public consumption. Hiding parts of our written history is a cagy way to save our tales without putting all our “dirty laundry” on display.

Here’s an example: Anita Folger worked with me on her wedding album. Anita’s mother-in-law nearly ruined the day by showing up in a cream-colored, floor-length gown, and repeatedly drawing attention to herself throughout the event. She insisted on standing between the bride and groom for the formal photos! Anita rightly wanted to blast the woman in her writing. “She made me miserable. I’m not going to lie about it by writing about what a wonderful day it was,” Anita said with a pout.

“You could do that, but if you do, everyone will focus on her … again. Instead, why not journal the hurts and scrapbook the highs? Remember? The winners write the history books. Write down what happened. We’ll create a hidden pocket behind a photo. You can slip your narrative inside that pocket. You’ll know it’s there. You can share it with your girlfriends. But you won’t have to hide away your wedding album,” I said. “Instead, you can be front and center.”

“I don’t intend to hide my wedding album.” Anita frowned at me. “I’m putting it out on the coffee table.”

“What about your husband? How did he feel about his mother’s behavior?” I probed.

Anita colored. “He was upset. He begged me to overlook it. Ever since his dad died, she’s been a whack-job.”

“So every time he sees this album, he’ll have to deal with her bad behavior all over again, right?”

“Yes.” She sighed. “You’re right, Kiki. I can write it out, get it on paper, and he won’t have to know, will he?”

“Not unless he pulls the page out of the plastic protector, and he searches for it. Most people wouldn’t go that far. Most guys focus on the pretty pictures, and that’s it. At least, that’s the excuse I’ve always heard for buying girly magazines.”

All this came back to me as I studied Cindy’s layout, a pretty scene showing her and Ross arm-in-arm, standing in front of their fireplace. Pulling my magnifying glass from a drawer, I examined the image closely. I could see where his fingers dug into her arm, wrinkling the fabric of her blouse. I put the glass aside and held the page at arm’s length. The pose struck me as unusual. I realized why.

Cindy was leaning slightly away from Ross, trying to free herself from his grasp.

Using the tip of a bone folder, I tried to lift the largest page element—the focal photo of Cindy and Ross—to test the adhesion. I held my breath as I slipped the ivory instrument under the picture’s matted edge. Maybe Cindy told her story. Maybe she’d recorded her abuse. There was only one way to find out.

The bone folder slid under the photo. I slipped it deeper, weighing how much pressure I could apply without causing damage. Turns out, the folder met little resistance at all. With a flick of my wrist, the happy photo flipped over on the page, exposing another photo underneath.

That picture sent me running to the john to upchuck.