Chili Con Corpses (2 page)

The twins said, “Hi, y’all,” and smiled. James could feel his heart flutter.

“Aren’t Parker and Kinsley names of towns in Kansas?” Bennett asked once he found his tongue.

“Wow! You’re the only person who’s ever known that without us saying something!” The twin named Parker exclaimed. “You must be a master of geography.”

“Well …” Embarrassed, Bennett looked to Willy for help, but the proprietor seemed to have forgotten all about the notion of providing customer service.

“Can we interrupt you for some hot tea, Willy?” Murphy prompted kindly.

Willy leapt out of his chair while issuing apologies. “Forgive a man for staring, ladies, but are you two famous or something?”

Kinsley laughed. “Nope. Just tall, blonde American girls with big white teeth. And these teeth would like to sink into a double scoop of Chocolate Cookie Dough Chunk, if you please.”

Her sister examined the ice cream flavors carefully. “They all look delicious, but I’ll just have a Diet Coke.”

“And for you, Ms. Alistair?” Willy handed the twins their orders. “The usual Peanut Butter Cup Perfection?”

“You got it, Willy.” Murphy linked her arm with the blonde sipping Diet Coke through a straw. “Parker and I were roommates at Virginia Tech,” she explained to the three men. “Can you imagine what it was like to share a room with someone who looked like a supermodel and had the brains of a neurosurgeon?” Murphy smiled fondly at her friend. “But Parker was so nice that I liked her despite the fact that boys only hung around me to get inside info on Parker. What was her favorite flower? Was she dating anyone, yada yada. Now she’s a vet with her own practice in Luray and between our two crazy jobs, we don’t get together nearly enough.”

“But we’re working on it,” Parker chimed in. “I’ve got a wonderful partner at my office, so I can leave the animals in good hands and we can hang out some more.”

“Don’t leave me out! I’m hoping you give Mr. Perfect Partner Dwight lots of furry clients so that you can show me all the sights,” Kinsley said to her sister.

Turning back to the men, Kinsley offered them a winsome smile. “See, I’m brand new to town—a transplant from the North.” She then paused in order to devour her frozen custard with gusto. James was amazed at how fast she could eat. After she licked a stream of custard from the back of her hand, Kinsley added, “but don’t hold being a former fast-paced New Yorker against me.”

“I don’t think I could hold much against you, sugar,” Willy said in appreciation while watching the beautiful young woman polish off her frozen treat.

After downing a cup of water, Kinsley wiggled the fingers on her left hand in farewell and headed back outside with Murphy and Parker.

“Did you get a load of those blonde bimbos?” Lindy squawked as she entered Custard Cottage a few seconds later.

“They’re kind of hard to miss,” James said with admiration. “And I don’t think they’re bimbos.”

Lindy chose to ignore James. “I saw your mail truck outside, Bennett, and thought I’d join you. I need some sugar to perk me up after finding out that Barbie Number One is going to be joining the staff at Blue Ridge High.”

Bennett gave Lindy an odd look. “What’s the problem with that?”

Lindy thumped her fist on the counter. “What’s the problem? I finally decided that I’m going to ask Principal Chavez out … well, by the first of the year anyway. And now how am I supposed to do that? I’d be competing with a Heidi Klum lookalike. Every man in this town is going to be licking his chops over that girl.”

“Ask him out anyway, Lindy,” James advised.

“It’s about damn time you did,” Bennett commented. “You’ve been dreaming about that man for over a year, so why wait until January?”

Lindy ordered a hot chocolate with extra whipped cream and caramel drizzles. “Because I want to lose just a few more pounds. Especially now, with that young Christie Brinkley on staff. I need a boost of confidence.”

“You don’t need to lose any more weight,” James offered. “You look terrific.” It was the truth. Lindy had had her long black hair cut just above her shoulders. Layers snipped at sharp angles softened Lindy’s round face, and she wore subdued makeup that enhanced her latte-hued skin and enormous dark eyes. Though Lindy was still quite curvaceous, especially around the bosom and hips, she had lost enough weight that her new and improved hourglass figure was strikingly voluptuous. Lindy had gone from being pudgy all over to being soft in all the right places.

“I wouldn’t kick you out of bed for eatin’ pork rinds,” Willy teased as Lindy blushed.

“That’s two resolutions for the new year then.” Bennett raised his coffee cup in the air. “Here’s to you bagging your man, Lindy. Me? I’m trying out for
Jeopardy!
”

Willy looked at James. “And what about you, Professor? You five always do stuff together, so you must be planning something big, too.”

James shook his head and stared fixedly at the light brown drips swimming around in the bottom of his mug. “Not me. I’m fine with the status quo.”

But he was lying. There was something he would very much like to change, and for once it had nothing to do with his appearance. Suddenly, James felt the beginnings of a major headache coming on. He never used to get headaches, but lately they had been plaguing him more and more frequently. Rubbing his temples, he said goodbye to his friends and climbed into his old white Bronco.

For a moment, he gazed at his own reflection in the rearview mirror and then answered Willy’s question truthfully. “I’d certainly like to change something. Yes, indeed. I’d like to know what a guy’s gotta do to score with his girlfriend.”

“I have an
announcement to make,” Lucy Hanover declared after she tapped a pair of wooden chopsticks against her glass of Chardonnay.

“It must be big news, too,” Lindy interrupted, “since you’re springing for the tab for this extravagant feast.”

The members of the supper club group, who had adopted the self-effacing moniker “the Flab Five,” had been pleasantly surprised to accept Lucy’s invitation to change the location of their meeting from her house to the Dim Sum Kitchen.

The Dim Sum Kitchen was famous throughout the Valley for its authentic and delicious Chinese cuisine, but because it was so small, reservations were required for any party larger than two. Located in a tiny brick house, which had formerly been home to an interesting group of businesses including a dentist’s office, a psychic, a barbershop, and, in the 1800s, a ladies’ hat shop, the building’s Colonial architecture seemed unsuited for an ethnic restaurant.

Luckily for the area inhabitants, Mr. and Mrs. Woo disagreed. They gutted the space, installed bright red carpet, painted the walls gold, and hung paper lanterns and several magnificent dragon kites from the ceiling. After hanging a simple plaque outside the front door in jade-green lettering, the Dim Sum Kitchen opened in the middle of a three-day blizzard. Folks slowly became aware of the restaurant’s debut and, bored by the storm, piled into their four-wheel drives and filled the place to capacity from eleven in the morning until ten at night. The Dim Sum Kitchen became an instant success.

“This sure beats cooking,” Lucy said, her face breaking into a grin as she stared up at one of the dragon kites. “Besides, I’m not going to have as much time to cook as I used to.” James thought he had never seen her so happy. She was glowing like a new bride or an expectant mother. “You see,” Lucy continued, “I passed both the written and psychological exams and am now only one step away from becoming a deputy for the Shenandoah County Sheriff’s Department!”

Bennett, Gillian, and Lindy clapped heartily, while James followed suit in a mechanical manner. He was torn between sharing Lucy’s joy and feeling hurt that she hadn’t told him about her triumph first. Ever since Lucy had been employed as an administrative assistant for the sheriff’s department, she had longed to exchange her computer keyboard and telephone headset for a pair of handcuffs and a firearm. All summer and into the early fall, Lucy had studied and exercised, preparing herself for a challenge she hadn’t felt ready to face until now. James was proud of her, but he was upset, too. Wasn’t he her boyfriend? Wasn’t he supposed to be privy to all of Lucy’s life-changing events before everyone else?

Lucy accepted the praise of her friends and pointedly avoided meeting James’s eyes. Biting into a crispy won ton, James thought back to their last date. As usual, they had gone out to dinner at a restaurant where they could select a healthy meal that wouldn’t require them to spend the entire next day on the treadmill. Afterwards, they had seen the latest movie that had generated the biggest buzz in Lucy’s beloved
People
. The film was a dud, in James’s opinion, as it had a weak plot and stilted dialogue unsuccessfully disguised by expensive special effects and a group of staggeringly beautiful actors. Of course, Lucy had completely loved it and called James a snob in what he hoped was a teasing manner.

Back at Lucy’s house, after she had barricaded her three enormous German shepherds called Bono, Benatar, and Bon Jovi in the kitchen, she and James settled down on her fluffy sofa. Pretending that they were going to watch
Seinfeld
reruns on Lucy’s ancient TV, they barely made it through Jerry’s opening monologue before they were fervently kissing. Trouble arose as it would always invariably arise at this juncture, for this was the point during each date when James would attempt to unhook Lucy’s bra. As predicted, Lucy twisted her back away from his determined fingers and whispered, “Not yet.”

As he had done several times before, James repositioned himself on the couch and Lucy got up to collect two glasses of water from the kitchen. They both downed their glasses of water as their overexcited hormones calmed down and then watched an episode of
Dukes of Hazzard
, which Lucy loved and James fell asleep to. After this date, James climbed into his old white Bronco and wondered, for the umpteenth time, what he had done wrong. He hadn’t gotten up the courage to ask her why she refused to allow him to touch her in a way that would take their physical relationship beyond a PG rating, but he knew he had to soon. His physical and mental health depended on her giving in, as their current state of limbo was slowly driving him mad.

Watching Lucy now as she speared a snow pea with her chopsticks and chattered with their friends, he took note of her wide blue eyes, her caramel-colored hair, and her creamy skin. His eyes traveled down her neck to her alluring cleavage and then to her shrinking waistline. From there, his examination was blocked by the wooden table, but he had no difficulty picturing the round curve of her hips and the soft cushion of her thighs. Like Lindy, Lucy’s body had diminished by a dress size or two, but she was not skinny. To James, she had a perfect feminine physique, and he longed to claim her like some kind of primitive caveman, but he lacked the guts.

“So tell us what some of the psychological test questions were like, Lucy,” Gillian said as she shoveled spoonfuls of vegetable fried rice onto a porcelain plate decorated with cherry blossoms. James noted that the orange hue of Gillian’s hair almost matched the koi swimming around the outside of the rice bowl.

“Yeah, did they ask you if you wanted to kill your mama and sleep with your daddy?” Bennett teased.

“No.” Lucy scowled. “They weren’t easy questions, though. You had to answer true or false to almost five hundred questions and some of them … well, let’s just say there wasn’t a simple true or false answer each time.”

Her friends were intrigued. “Give us an example,” Gillian pleaded.

Lucy hesitated. “I don’t know if I should.”

“It’s not like any of us will be taking the test any time soon,” James argued, trying to sound playful even though he felt genuinely combative.

Lucy finally fixed her gaze on him, and James felt as though she were really looking at him for the first time since he had picked her up from her house. Her blue eyes sent out mixed messages of tenderness and irritation in an infinitesimal amount of time before she sighed and said, “Okay. One of the easy ones was
Do you often have nightmares?
I don’t, so the answer was
false
.”

Gillian helped herself to an egg roll and, after taking a bite of the crispy dough, swallowed and said, “I’m
sure
there must have been some questions that probed into the
deepest
corners of your psyche. Those difficult ethical and moral dilemmas we must
all
face. After all, to uphold the law, to be placed in a position of judgment upon your fellow human creatures, you must be
resolved
of your own internal struggles.”

Bennett raised an eyebrow at Gillian. “I never know what you’re talking about, woman, but there must have been some juicier questions on that test than whether you’ve got nightmares or not. Come on now, tell us a tough one.”

Lucy took a gulp of wine. “Oh, fine. I admit that I had a really hard time answering two questions. The first was
Did you ever steal anything when you were younger?
And the second was
Do you always tell the truth?
”

“
Did
you steal something when you were a kid?” Lindy raised her black eyebrows inquisitively.

Lucy colored. “Yeah. When I was in the eighth grade, a bunch of the cool girls were swiping little things from the drug store. That was back when those glitter pens, the ones that had sparkly ink, first came out. We all wanted to write with those.”

“Your poor teachers,” Lindy clucked her tongue. “The ink is so pale you can barely see it.”

“Exactly! That was part of the fun.” Lucy drank another sip of wine. “Anyway, this new girl had joined our class. Her name was Claudia and she was from England. It took all of five minutes for her to become the ‘alpha’ girl. I wanted to hang out in her set so bad that when she dared
me
to steal something just for her, I did it.”

Gillian’s eyes rounded. “What was it?”

Lucy mumbled, “A unicorn air freshener.”

“Your first taste of crime was pocketing an air freshener?” Bennett cackled gleefully.

“Yep.” Lucy grinned sheepishly. “It had a rainbow on it and Claudia loved rainbows. I got caught, too. The store manager saw me tuck it in my pants. I got
such
a licking when I got home. Lord, I don’t think I sat down for two days.”

“So, did you put down
true
as your answer to that question?” James wondered.

Lucy shifted in her chair. “Yeah, sure.” She added, “But that was hard. It’s not like I could say I was a kid or that it was an item worth less than a dollar. All they’d see is that I stole something.”

“That second question is totally unfair,” Lindy said, twirling lo mein noodles around with her fork. “There isn’t a person on this earth who tells the truth all the time.”

“You got that right,” Bennett agreed. “Sometimes you gotta tell a little white lie to keep things peaceful. Just the other day, my boss showed me a picture of his new grandson and asked if I didn’t think that that child was the most beautiful baby ever born. Well, all I saw was a red face with wrinkly skin and a bunch of black hair wrapped in the middle of about a thousand blankets. Shoot, looked more like one of those little Mexican dogs than a kid, but of course I said he was the cutest thing I’d ever seen.”

James laughed. “You’re right. There are some questions you could never answer truthfully, especially if you’re a man. Like,
Do I look fat in this?
or
Don’t you wish my mother lived closer?
”

Lindy poked James with her chopsticks. “Or when men ask us women questions about our ex-boyfriends. We have to lie and tell you that they were all unattractive, acne-covered wimps or you’ll obsess about them.”

Gillian took a sip of green tea. “That test question almost feels like a trick. Who can be truthful all of the time, unless you’re Buddha? Lucy, you poor thing, what did you put down in the end?”

“I stared at that question until time started running out,” Lucy answered quietly. “Unfortunately, they asked that same question using different wording about ten times throughout the test. In the end, I just kind of circled an answer without really looking and handed in the test.” She shrugged nonchalantly, but James saw the tension in her shoulders by the way she slumped slightly forward in her chair. “Guess whatever the answer was, it didn’t keep me from passing.”

The table fell silent. No one fully bought Lucy’s tale of blindly answering her test questions, but none of them felt as though they could have answered a similar question with more ease.

“I think the worst lies are those of omission,” James spoke into the silence. “The ones you don’t even admit to yourself. I didn’t see those kinds of lies until I met all of you and starting thinking about all of the things I was burying inside my layers of fat.”

Everyone nodded in empathetic agreement.

He continued. “And I discovered one truth about myself when I was at the Y with Bennett. I want to take a break from being obsessed with dieting. I’m having so much fun tonight eating what I want and focusing more on the company than on counting calories.”