Helens-of-Troy (53 page)

“And I told you what I could,” Helena
told him firmly.

“But not everything,” Roy insisted. “So
much for the trust in our relationship.”

“I’ll take care of it, Roy,” she told
him. “Just like the Fourth of July.” She could sense that the bond
they between them was now broken, and it saddened her.

Helen could sense it as well. She put
her arm across her mother’s shoulder. “Let’s get out of here,” she
said, giving Roy a look that may or may not have been
deserved.

The seven of them left the building in
silence.

Helena glanced around. “Are we all
out?” she asked, as they started to head away from the schoolhouse
and back towards the bridge.

“Yes,” Ellie gasped.

“We’re not done yet, Helen,” Helena
reminded her. “On three…”

“I’m already there, Mother,” she
informed her, turning around, pulling the pin from the grenade and
hurling it through the still opened doorway.

Helena did the same with the device in
her pocket, lobbing it through the glass window of the basement
washroom. “Hit the deck,” she told the others.

Two explosions immediately
followed.

“Is everyone okay?” Helena asked once
the ensuing smoke and debris had cleared. One by one the six others
nodded.

“I suggest you say it was a gas leak,”
she told Roy tersely.

He walked away from them, shaking his
head as he did so. The man in him knew that it was a good thing the
three—whatevers—were dead, but the officer in him was having a hard
time with the rights and wrongs of the situation.

“Now what? Helen asked. The strength
she had summoned from within had been totally exhausted, and she
began to tremble.

“Betty’s got that bottle of whiskey
with our name on it,” Helena replied. She gave a sigh of relief and
smiled a little, watching the four teenagers head back to Ryan’s
car, their arms around each other in a formation of love, peace and
hope. “I’m thinking that’s a start,” she laughed, putting her arms
around her daughter.

EPILOGUE

The groundskeeper at Forest Lawn
cemetery had placed a canvas canopy over the open grave that would
be Mr. Wagner’s final resting place. A three inch layer of snow had
formed atop it since the morning. It was now mid-afternoon, and
thankfully the precipitation had finally stopped. All the mourners
were left to contend with weather-wise was a biting wind coming
from the north-west.

Ryan stood at the foot of Old Man
Wagner’s open grave and tossed a full beer can into it. The crowd
of mourners smiled.

“Thanks Old Man—I mean Peter—for giving
a guy a break every once and a while. I thought you might get a
little thirsty on your journey, so here you go. I know this isn’t
your favorite brand, but my Ma said under the circumstances I could
take one of hers.”

From the side of her neighbor’s final
resting place, Betty Lachey laughed and wiped away a tear from her
eye. Peter Wagner had been a cantankerous old coot in her opinion,
but the street wasn’t going to be the same without him.

She glanced over at the LaRose women,
and noted that none of them were dressed in black for the occasion.
“Times have changed,” she sighed to herself.

Helen seemed to have read her mind.
“Nice outfit, Betty,” she said sincerely. “Black becomes
you.”

“Thank you,” Betty replied, somewhat
rattled by the compliment. People were being inordinately nice to
her since she got out of the hospital. Now that Ryan had been
cleared of any wrongdoing, she was able to hold her head high once
again in the close-knit community. Still, things weren’t quite
right. She wasn’t sure why her living room carpet had come to be
cleaned while she was away. Or why she was missing a hell of a lot
of whiskey. Or the big one — why she had obtained a soft spot for
the women in the house next door. But she had.

She took Helen’s hand and patted it.
“Stop by for coffee sometime, you lovely woman. And bring that cute
daughter of yours along. I think Ryan likes her.” She shrugged her
shoulders and laughed. “Who knows, we could be related
someday.”

“Thank you,” Helen replied with a
smile. “I’ll do that sometime.” She took a couple of steps away
from Betty and joined her mother. “What the hell, Mom? I know you
drugged her while Mike Webster was fixing the chimney, but by any
chance did you throw a little sugar into the potion to sweeten her
up while you were at it?”

“I had her out cold, Helen. A woman has
to do what a woman has to do,” Helena affirmed
mischievously.

Helen sighed.

“Honestly, that man worked so slowly I
thought I was going to have to leave her unconscious ‘till
Christmas. Remind me to take a good look at his invoice when it
comes in.”

“Shh!” Helen reminded her.

“Mr. Wagner was a cool dude,” Ryan
continued, ignoring the idle chatter around him. “One summer, Tom
and I snuck into his yard and raided his crab apple tree, thinking
nobody was home. But he was home alright, and he caught us. He made
us pick every fucking apple on the tree.” He saw Helen wince, but
continued his story. “It took us hours. He wound up making apple
sauce with them later that night, and the next day he brought some
over to my Ma. She said it was the best she ever had.”

“I never heard that part of the story
until now,” Betty admitted aloud. “Or I would have whooped your
ass, Ryan. But the sauce was really good.”

Ryan smiled and took a deep breath.
Delivering the eulogy was tougher than he thought it was going to
be, but deep in his heart he knew he was the man for the job. He
collected his thoughts and was about to continue speaking when a
short loud wail of a police siren made everyone’s head turn towards
the parking lot.

“We probably shouldn’t have left Stan
alone in the front of the car,” Purdy confessed to Roy. “Our track
record’s not that great with him.”

“Well, maybe we shouldn’t have kept the
keys in the ignition,” Roy grimaced. “I caught Ryan driving Betty’s
car before he was legal. I really don’t want to have to explain to
the town council how Stan took a joyride in the
cruiser.”

“I didn’t want him getting cold,” Purdy
tried to explain. “He promised me he wouldn’t touch anything. He’s
getting more and more like Ryan every day.”

“Maybe that’s not such a bad thing
after all,” Roy acknowledged. Stan had been through a lot and he
was worried about the boy. “Have you had a chance to talk to him?”
he asked Purdy.

Purdy nodded. “I did when we went to
get Betty from the hospital. He seems to have selective recall
about the whole ordeal. I can’t explain it.”

“I bet I can,” Roy said, looking
disapprovingly at Helena.

Ryan cleared his throat loudly. “Are
you done?” Ryan asked the officers. The tone of his voice indicated
he harbored some ill-feelings towards the two lawmen despite being
off the hook for the murders. “Because I’d like to get through this
before supper, unless you’ve got some toaster pops for
me.”

The officers turned their eyes to the
ground and nodded, feeling a little sheepish.

Ryan started to continue, only to be
silenced this time by the sound of a cell phone playing a remixed
theme from The Adams Family, thumb clicks and all. Ellie pulled it
from her pocket and glanced at the call display before shutting it
off.

“Sorry,” she offered honestly in
response to Ryan’s pained look.

“Who was it?” Tom asked, leaning over
her shoulder to try and get a peek at the call display.

“Dina,” Ellie replied. “A friend from
my former life. She can wait,” she said, turning her phone off and
stuffing it back into her pocket. “Where’s Jacey?”

“Jacey doesn’t do funerals. I’m
confused right now, about what Jacey does and doesn’t do, but
apparently she doesn’t do funerals.” He took Ellie’s hand and held
it.

“
People. I know Old-Man
Wagner’s not goin’ anywhere, but I’m getting cold. So shut up,
okay?” He waited for silence. “Okay. My mom said he was a fucking
sly dude when he was younger,” Ryan continued, retelling his
favorite story as only Ryan could. “The cops were always hauling
his ass off for something. They ripped out his whole garden one
summer in the sixties, or so my granny said.” He looked at Helen
and laughed. “Look, Ms. L., I’m tryin’, okay?”

“I know. But just for today, could you
say frack?” Helen asked politely. “I mean, it is the man’s
funeral.”

“I can’t, Ms. L,” he explained.
“Especially today, because Old Man—I mean Peter—we used to watch
Battlestar Galactica together at his house sometimes, and he’d
scream at the screen when they kept saying that. ‘Say what you
mean’, he’d yell. ‘What’s the point? We all know what you’re really
saying, so just say it.’”

“It’s true,” Helena agreed. “Mr. Wagner
told me that too. It used to drive him crazy when they said frack.
Other than that, he was a big fan of the show.”

“Ma, can you pass me my guitar?” Ryan
asked. “I know I gotta wrap this up, but I wrote a little song
about Mr. Wagner, that I’d like to sing for you now.” He took the
guitar from his mother and strummed a few strings. “Gimme a
second,” he pleaded, “this cold weather makes it hard for the
strings to stay in tune.” He adjusted the tension and strummed
again. “Okay, like I was saying, this is a song I wrote…well,
actually, Helen LaRose and I wrote. She helped me with the lyrics.
I know, I know, it’s crazy that this foxy mama wanted to spend some
alone time with me, but she did,” he laughed. He looked over in the
direction of Ralph Wildman and Tara, who were standing in the
background. “Don’t even go there, Wildman. Are we good, Ms.
L?”

“We’re good,” Helen smiled. “But don’t
push it.”

“You did what?” a shocked Helena leaned
over and asked her daughter. “When did this happen and should I be
worried?”

“Well, I was always liked to write
poetry. I just thought I’d help him out a bit. Clean it up a
little, if you get my drift. I still know how to sneak out of the
house, you know. It’s like riding a bike, you never
forget.”

“You are full of surprises, Helen,” her
mother laughed. She gave her daughter a hug.

“The apple doesn’t fall far from the
tree,” Helen noted. “Remind me to install an alarm on Ellie’s
window, will you?”

“If you want to. But it’s a waste of
time and money. She’ll find a way out. It’s genetic,” Helena
protested.

“I know,” Helen admitted. “Maybe I want
to keep things from coming in. Home sweet home and all
that.”

“I take it Willie never said
good-bye?”

Helen shook her head.

“He’ll be back,” Helena said, rubbing
the back of her daughter’s coat. “Whether we want him to or not.”
Both women pondered the ramifications of that statement for a
moment, and then turned to Ryan.

“Okay, here we go,” Ryan began, tapping
his foot as he sang in a loud baritone voice:

“You were the last man
standing,

When thy sent you off to
war,

You were the last man
standing,

When your mission was no
more.

You were the last man
standing,

When the poker call was
made,

You were the last man
standing,

When the final cards were
played.

Now I’m the last man
standing,

Missing you like hell,

I’ll be the last man
standing,

Wishing you farewell.”

The crowd clapped quietly as Ryan
nodded to the clergyman. “Take it, Padre.”

“Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” the
preacher began, as Ryan strummed his guitar softly in
accompaniment. He waited until the clergyman had given the rites,
and then chose the moment to show off some fancy fret
work.

“Encore!” Ellie yelled to
Ryan.

“You know what Goth?” Ryan responded.
“There is a song I can’t get out of my head that might just work.”
He strummed a d-chord, g-chord, d-chord opener and began to
sing:

“
Swing low, sweet
chariot,

Comin' for to carry me home;

Swing low, sweet chariot,

Comin' for to carry me home.

I looked over Jordan,

And WHAT did I see,

Comin' for to carry me home,

A band of angels comin' after
me,

Comin' for to carry me home.

“
Swing low, sweet
chariot,

Comin' for to carry me home;

Swing low, sweet chariot,

Comin' for to carry me home.

If you get there before I
do,

Comin' for to carry me home,

Tell all my friends I'm comin'
too,

Comin' for to carry me home.

This time the mourners didn’t clap.
They coughed, and they cried and they reached for their family
members and gave them a hug.