Schooled In Lies (5 page)

“Well since you, Audrey, and Gerald were all listed on the account, shouldn’t you all have been receiving bank statements showing deposits and withdrawals?” I asked.

“I never got any statements. As far as I know the bank sent Julian all that stuff and that was fine by me. I’ve got five kids and a husband to take care of and I don’t have time to worry about stuff like this, which reminds me,” Audrey said, jumping up abruptly. “I gotta scoot. My sister’s going to kill me if I’m not home in ten minutes. She has a date tonight. I’ll see you guys at the next meeting.” She drained her soda can and hurried up the steps.

“I never got any bank statements, either. That’s why I had to go to the bank to check the account. I didn’t have any statements showing the account balance and I wanted to make sure of what was in there before we started writing checks off that account to pay a caterer or rent a banquet hall,” said Ms. Flack to the rest of us in a weary sigh.

“As head of the committee, I don’t want to make any decisions about the reunion until we can all meet again. Maybe we can have a picnic down at Lake Mead. That’s pretty cheap. Right now I’m too tired to think about this anymore tonight. I need to get home to feed my cat.”

We all stood to go and as we headed up the steps I noticed the remains of a small slick spot near the top step. This must have been what Ms. Flack had slipped on. As the others headed out to the parking lot, I stopped to examine the spot. I noticed it was way too shiny to be water. I bent down to get a closer look and rubbed the spot with my fingers. I was right. It wasn’t water. It was baby oil. Why would baby oil be on the floor at the top of the steps? Could someone have put it there on purpose so someone would fall? That didn’t make any sense. I realized I was tired, too, and headed out to my car. Dennis and Ms. Flack were already pulling out of the parking lot, but Cherisse was still in the process of putting on her seat belt. A thought occurred to me. I tapped on her window, startling her. She rolled it down looking a little impatient.

“Sorry. I just had a question for you.”

“That’s all right. What did you want?”

“Well, I was just wondering since you used to be Julian’s secretary if you had any idea what could have happened to the money? Did he ever mention it at all?”

I thought it was an innocent, straightforward enough question. Apparently, I was wrong. Cherisse’s face tensed up angrily and her head jutted out of the driver’s side window like an angry chicken ready to peck my eyes out. I took half a step back from the car.

“Don’t you think if I knew anything about that damned money I’d have said so in the meeting? Why are you asking me this?” she said with more aggression then I’d have thought her capable of.

“Hey, there’s no need to snap at me. I‘m just trying to figure out what could have happened to the money.”

Her shoulders slumped and she let out a long breath then gave me a contrite look.

“I’m sorry.” She grinned sheepishly. “Anytime anyone asks me anything about Julian, it’s usually to imply that I’m to blame for him falling off his roof.”

“To be honest, I’m really surprised you even volunteered to be on the committee. A lot of people made your life hell in high school. Why would you want see any of these assholes again, especially since you know they think you’re to blame for Julian’s death?”

She seemed to think for a minute before responding.

“I spent the majority of my high school days living in terror of Audrey and her crew. Even after high school when I’d see one of them at the grocery store or the mall, I’d turn and walk in the opposite direction. But I’m almost thirty. I need to get past what happened to me in high school. I thought serving on the reunion committee would help me do that. I thought things would be different since we’re all adults now. The only difference now is they hate me because of what happened to Julian and Julian’s death wasn’t even
my
fault,” she said bitterly.

My ears perked up at that last part.

“Whose fault was it?” I watched her closely. For a minute I thought she was going to say something. I could see the indecision in her eyes. Then, as if a curtain had fallen, her face went blank.

“I gotta go. It’s getting late and I have to be up early tomorrow. Bye,” she said, avoiding my gaze.

I watched as she pressed the button to raise her car window and stepped back as she pulled out of the parking space and drove away. I wondered. Could Julian’s death have been anything other than a freak accident and did it have anything to do with the missing money? And why didn’t Gerald seem at all surprised the money was gone?

It was after nine by the time I left the high school, and I’d yet to eat. I called Carl to see if he wanted to meet me for a late dinner. He answered the phone on the first ring.

That’s when it hit me. He hadn’t even referred to me by name and he was trying to rush me off the phone. He wasn’t being silly. He was being shady.

“Where are you and who are you with?” I demanded, anger making my voice rise a whole two octaves.

“I’ll give you a call tomorrow,” he replied quickly and then hung up.

I was sitting at the light at an intersection staring at my cell phone with my mouth hanging open. No he didn’t just hang up on me. I hit redial twice and got his voice mail both times. I started to leave a scathing message when a loud car horn blasted from behind me and made me jump. The light was green and I sped through it, rounded the next corner, and coming to screeching halt in front of Frisch’s Big Boy. Hot fudge cake here I come.

I was waiting to be seated in the near empty restaurant when I noticed a bald, brown-skinned, handsome older black man sitting at a booth in back. It was Reverend Morris Rollins. My stomach did a flip-flop. Morris Rollins was a local minister just as well-known for his way with women as for his fiery sermons. I’d met him a year ago, under tragic circumstances, and he’d been trying to get into my pants ever since. Not that the thought of letting him wasn’t extremely appealing; but he was old enough to be my father and I wasn’t sure how much I trusted him. I’d already locked lips with him on more than one occasion, which deep down inside made me think I probably deserved whatever Carl was doing behind my back.

Rollins looked up suddenly like he’d sensed my presence, and his smile lifted me out of my murderous mood. He got up and came over to where I was standing.

“She’ll be joining me,” he told the hostess, who went to put another place setting at his table. Then he grabbed my hand and grinned.

“No problem. You don’t have to explain to me. I just moved on to plan B.” He was laughing at me like he always did when he knew I’d been avoiding him.

“Plan B? What are you talking about?”

“I know you come here a lot. Do you know how many nights I’ve eaten here trying to run into you?” he asked, suddenly serious. I was stunned.

“You’re telling a tale and you know it,” I said, laughing nervously.

“No, I’m not and
you
know it.” His eyes held mine and I looked away first.

“Now, I don’t care what you say. I’m buying you dinner. What do you want to eat?” he asked in a low seductive voice.

Talk about a loaded question.

Chapter Four

I WAS EXPECTING A call from Carl the next morning. By 10 o’clock it still hadn’t come. I started to call him. Then the pleasant memory of my evening of food and flirting with Rollins stopped my fingers before they could punch the numbers. Spending my evening with another man, and dread over wondering what was up with my own man, made me suddenly not quite so eager to know what was going on. I was sure I’d be finding out soon enough. Instead, I put on a pot of coffee and settled down at my kitchen table with a cranberry muffin and the newspaper. I was scanning the local news section, glancing over the emergency squad runs from the night before, when a name jumped out at me: Audrey Grant. I quickly read the brief blurb.

Audrey Grant, 29, of 1291 Pensacola Pike, taken by squad to the emergency room of Willow Memorial Hospital due to illness. Admitted for treatment
.

Audrey was in the hospital? I wondered what could be wrong with her. She seemed healthy enough at the meeting last night, maybe a little tired from chasing around five kids, but otherwise healthy. I wondered if she was still in the hospital. There was only one way to find out. I made a call to Willow Memorial and asked to be connected to Audrey Grant’s room.

So, Audrey was still in the hospital and judging by the busy signal she wasn’t ill enough to not be on the phone, which made me even more curious about what was wrong with her. I hung up and headed for my bathroom. It was Saturday. I had nothing else to do that day and decided that visiting Audrey would be better than sitting around waiting for Carl to call.

An hour later, and armed with a cactus plant from the gift shop, I was standing awkwardly in the doorway of Audrey Grant’s hospital room. She was propped up in bed dressed in the requisite blue gown with the same plaid headband she’d had on in the meeting last night, only now it was crooked and pieces of hair had escaped and were falling in her face. She was also as pasty as the white sheet that was bunched up under her large breasts. Dark smudges under her eyes looked like bruises on her pale skin. An IV of clear fluid was hanging from a pole on the right side of the bed with the line inserted into the back of her right hand and held in place by clear tape. Audrey was staring off into space in a daze. I knocked softly on the open door and she snapped out of her trance and looked over at me.

“Kendra?” she said in a surprisingly strong voice for someone who looked so ill.

“I hope you don’t mind,” I said, coming into the room and standing by the side of the bed. “I read in the squad runs this morning that you’d been admitted to the hospital. Are you okay?” I set the cactus down on the table by the bed.

She glanced at it then back at me without speaking. She continued to stare at me without speaking and looking quite confused, I might add, for a full minute and it took everything in me not to squirm.

“Okay. Well, I should probably go so you can get your rest. Sorry to have bother you.” I turned to go.

“Wait,” she called out, stopping me before I could get out the door. “I’m sorry. That was rude. I’m just a little out of it.” She shook her head as if to clear it and gestured for me to sit in the chair by the bed. I sat.

“They told me that I had a bad reaction from mixing my antidepressants with alcohol. My husband found me unconscious on our bedroom floor when he got home from work last night.”

“Then why do you say you don’t you know what happened?”

“Because I don’t drink. I haven’t had a drink in years. This has to be some kind of big mistake. We don’t even keep any alcohol in the house.” She pulled her headband off and tossed it on the bed in frustration.

I felt for her but couldn’t help but remember the hard partying Audrey of old. The same Audrey who I sat behind in science class senior year and who reeked of stale beer and weed on more than one occasion. Sitting behind her all those years ago, and bearing witness to a level of popularity only rivaled by a pop star, I never pictured her becoming the dumpy, plaid wearing, stay-at-home mom I was currently looking at.