Heads You Lose - Lisa Lutz [12]
The job fell to Paul, as usual, because Lacey was at her cover job, which in his book was a waste of time. If they needed a cover, Paul thought, there was nothing wrong with claiming to be caretakers—it was the stated occupation of plenty of Mercer-area residents, many of whom did, in fact, merely take care of a property. But that would have sounded too redneck for Lacey. As Terry Jakes, not exactly upper-crust himself, used to say, “Caretakers are just carnies who got off the ride.”
Paul suspected that Lacey’s barista (maker of coffee beverages)6 gig was more about her self-image than actual cover. She couldn’t even admit to herself that she was a pot grower, Paul thought. Facing facts had never been her strong suit. Even as a little girl, she seemed to have fun only when she was playing dress-up. But he was her big brother, and he’d help her out as long as she needed him. Maybe she’d go back to school after she saved a little money.
With Irving at his side, Paul started where they’d found the body, then proceeded in an outward spiral until he reached the property’s perimeter. Irving trotted alongside him, more doglike than most dogs. Covering the property took almost four hours and yielded only an old badminton (a lawn sport resembling tennis)7 set and some faded orange Hot Wheels tracks covered in pine muck.
He was back inside watching Volcano Chasers by the time Lacey stormed in.
“No head,” Paul said.
“That’s nice. I have a slightly larger piece of news,” said Lacey. “I just saw Darryl Cleveland at Olmstead’s Hardware. Head firmly attached.”
“Are you sure?”
“Let me think about it. Yes.”
“Did you ask him anything?”
“Like what? ‘How do explain your incredible comeback?’” Lacey said, imitating a sportscaster interviewing an athlete.
“No. I mean like, ‘Did you lose your watch?’”
“Of course not.”
“Good. So we’re done,” Paul said.
“Jesus,” Lacey said after a pause. “Could you be a little bit happy it’s not Darryl?”
“I am a little bit happy about that. I’m a lot happy that the head isn’t on our property. Now we can just sit back and watch what happens.”
“How perfect for you,” said Lacey. “‘This week on CSI: Mercer, two pot-growing orphans stumble onto a body, changing their lives forever.’”
“Yeah, yeah,” Paul said. “I gotta run. Senior Circuit today. You’ll be okay around here, right?” It was a rhetorical question, and Lacey had stopped answering those.
“Oh yeah,” Paul added. “Feed Irving. It’s been like a week since he’s killed anything. Maybe he’s depressed or something.”
First stop on the Senior Circuit was Mapleshade, a nursing home/retirement tower that housed most of Mercer’s hidden elderly population, the size of which helped to explain the success of Jenkee’s Diner and two separate pharmacies. Sook Felton’s room was on the top floor, overlooking the forest.
“Brought you some peaches from Lacey,” Paul said in Sook’s room, producing a little bag. Sook’s biggest complaint about Mapleshade was the food.
“Great. They got a pint of vanilla stashed for me in the kitchen freezer.”
“So how was the movie?” Paul asked. Paul always came on a Friday, and movie night was Thursday—most of the sentient residents would gather around the big widescreen in the community room.
“Lousy,” said Sook. “Where is it written that old people in movies have to be cranky, adorable, or adorably cranky?”
Paul wasn’t touching that one, though he had to admit Sook didn’t fit into any of those categories. It was probably more weird than adorable that the thing Sook seemed to enjoy most in life, other than a bowl of high-quality pot, was chick lit. One of the nurses had hooked Sook on the genre soon after he’d arrived at Mapleshade a few years ago, bored out of his mind. Now it was an obsession. Hearing about Sook’s literary preferences,