Mixed Messages (A Malone Mystery) (20 page)

“W
ell, if you’re sure you’re
all right
but I do wish you’d get voicemail so I could at least leave you a message
.
”

“
I’ll think about that but, really,
I’m fine,” Ann said, thinking to herself, ‘if only she knew’ but knowing she wouldn’t say a word to her sister about
any of
her problems
and the fact that they
were barely scraping by now and
couldn’t afford any extra calling features on their phone
.
“I got a job
,
”
she said.

“Bitch! Harlot! Whore!” the caller screamed.

Ann held the receiver away from her ear, staring at it for a few seconds. Her hand shook as she slammed it back into the cradle. What’s going on? she wondered.
This morning I got that weird note and now this? She
took
the phone off the hook.
I’ve had enough drama for one day.

She
walked down the hall and
went into the bathroom
to prepare
her bath
.
The old pipes groaned and shuddered when she turned on the water.
Within minutes, the room was filled with the soft glow of the candles she’d lit and the scent of ocean breeze bath oil
.
She
lay
back in the tub and said aloud, “Relax
.
You need to forget about everything.
You need to relax
.”
She closed her eyes, determined to put all thoughts out of her mind and tried to visualize
the scenes
on the postcards her sister
had sent
her
.

They were all from South Carolina. There were pictures of white sailed shrimp boats, the Hunting Island lighthouse and a beautiful early 1800’s rice plantation at Mt. Pleasant with majestic, old live oak trees laden with Spanish moss.

Several of the postcards were scenes from Charleston where Marnie lived and worked as an attorney for a prestigious law firm. There were views of the picturesque harbor, of the horse drawn carriages driving by the many pastel colored homes
that
gave Rainbow Row its name and of the outdoor farmer’s market with a Gullah woman standing beside the sweet grass baskets she’d woven by hand.

Ann’s favorites were the scenes of Fripp Island, because, when she was five or six years old, their parents had taken the girls there. It was the only family vacation that she could remember. She smiled, recalling how she and her sister had walked along the beach, collecting seashells. She pictured the two of them together, so different in appearance and personality that people found it hard to believe they were sisters: shy little Annie with her dark brown hair in pigtails and her big brown eyes and vivacious Marnie with her long auburn hair and emerald eyes.

One day in particular stood out in her mind: the day she found the sand dollar. She’d reached down and picked up a large sand dollar, gently dusting the sand off
of
it. It was perfect; too perfect, she decided, as she flipped it over and gazed at the intricate, symmetrical black design
that
was etched into it.

“Marnie, look at this!” she shouted. “This is so beautiful! Who would draw this and then just leave it here?”

Ann grinned now, recalling how amazed she’d been when Marnie glanced down at the sand dollar, smiled at her little sister and replied, “God.”

Although
she
could only remember bits and pieces of
their family vacation to Fripp Island
,
Marnie,
only
four years older than her, had never forgotten
it
.
Marnie’s
dream had always been to live near the ocean and she’d made that dream a reality
.
After law school in North Carolina, s
he’d taken the bar exam for South Carolina and, a
lthough s
he lived
and worked
in Charleston
now
,
she
spent most of her spare time at the beach
.
She said that the ocean gave her something that nothing else could: a sense of peace and serenity
; that she felt closer to God there than anywhere else
.

Marnie
was constantly
trying to persuade
Ann and the kids to come down
for a
visit
;
s
he said they had an open invitation
.
One of these days, Ann thought, I’m going to take her up
on it
.
I’ll walk barefoot along the water’s edge and sink my toes into the cool, soft sand. I’ll watch the
pelicans fly and listen to the seagulls
. .
.
.

She heard a noise and sat straight up, cocking her head toward the bathroom door
.
I could’ve sworn I heard the floorboards creaking, she thought
.
It sounded like someone was walking
right
outside the bathroom door
.
I know I locked the doors, she reassured herself
.
Is it one of the kids
?
She listened for another
few seconds
and, when she didn’t hear anything else, she told herself to calm down
.
It’s just the normal sounds of an old house
.
The doors are locked, the kids are sound asleep and David won’t be home for at least a couple of hours
.
She leaned back against the tub, letting the hot water soothe her aching muscles
.
You’ve got to relax; you need to be in the right mood for David.

David. She knew that, when he got home, he most
likely
would’ve been drinking. She
pictured him stumbling around, mumbling to himself and she could almost smell the
unmistakable odor of alcohol on his breath
.
I’ve got to get over this, she told herself
.
If things are ever going to be good with us again, I’ve got to get over this
.
She thought of all the times she’d rejected David when he’d been drinking
.
Just because my father
… .

Her father seldom went to bars to drink, she remembered. He stayed at home most
evenings, drinking beer after beer
.
If she closed her eyes, she could still see him, sitting in his favorite chair in front of the television set with a mug of cold beer in his hand
.

He liked to play a little game with
Marnie and Ann
to trick them. Each time his mug was empty, he would say to
the girls
a variation of, “There’s some cookies in the kitchen. Don’t you want some?”
The minute one of them stood
up to
go to
the kitchen
,
their
father would ask, “While you’re there, would you mind getting me a beer?” Marnie, the oldest, had caught on quickly and, although it took little Annie a bit longer, she eventually figured it out too.
Nevertheless
, they continued to play along.
It became a nightly ritual.

As the evening went on,
their father
would begin to slur his words and then, inevitably, he would fall asleep, sitting up in his chair, holding the mug
.
Ann remembered how she and Marnie would watch him, waiting for the beer to spill
at any moment
but it never did
.
The fact that
he held that mug
all the
while he slept, without spilling it, fascinated the girls.

The flashback to her childhood continued to play like a movie in her head
.
She saw
herself as a little girl, sitting at the kitchen table in the house where she, her sister and their parents lived
.
It was early morning and she was eating a bowl of cereal
before getting ready to go to school
.
Empty beer bottles from her father’s drinking the night before were l
ined up
on the table beside her
.

She counted the bottles
.
Counting the bottles had become a daily ritual for Ann
ie
.
Today, there were eleven
.
Eleven bottles emitting the disgusting odor she’d come to recognize so well from the bottles and from her father’s breath as, each evening before she went to bed, he gave her a hug and a kiss goodnight
.
She scooted her bowl and her chair as far away from the bottles as she could
.
Oh, how she’d hated the smell of alcohol.

I still do, Ann thought, but
I have
to get past that
.
She shivered
.
The bath water was getting too cool
.
She turned the hot water tap on and let the scalding water trickle down
.
I will get past it, she resolved as, back in the present, she reminded herself once again to relax
.
She soaked for over an hour and then, as
Dr.
Thatcher had instructed her, she covered her body with a rich, softly scented lotion
.
She wrapped a towel around her and
went
down the hall to
her bedroom.

She
loo
ked around the room and smiled.
Shortly
after they’d moved in,
she
had gotten Olivia’s permission to paint the apartment
.
Since then
,
she’d painted every room. S
he chose
a pale
, soothing
shade
called “Touch of Violet”
for
the walls of the master bedroom
.
She found
exactly
the
material she was looking for
at a local fabric store, a white background with tiny wild violets in
shades of purples and greens
that
coordinated perfectly with the walls.
She
made the comforter
,
pillow shams
,
bed skirt
and valances from the material
.
She hung panels of sheer white curtains at the windows along with the valances and placed a grouping of Monet prints
in white frames
on the wall above their bed.
The
table
lamps on each side of the bed were antique brass
.
S
he’d found them at a yard sale at an incredibly reasonable price
and purchased inexpensive, but pretty, new
white
shades for them
.
She
’d
wanted to create an atmosphere conducive to
rest and
relaxation
.
Tonight, she hoped it would also be conducive to romance.

She
went
over to her dresser and, i
n the back of her lingerie drawer, she found what she was looking for
:
a skimpy,
deep purple
nightie
that she’d bought a long time ago at a lingerie party that one of the women
in David’s office had thrown
.
But she’d never had the nerve to wear it
.
U
ntil now
.
She liked the feel of the soft satin fabric against her skin as she
guided
her arms into
the thin, spaghetti straps
and let it slide down her body
.

She looked at herself in the full
-
length mirror on the back of the closet door
.
“You’re too fat,” she said aloud
.
She sucked in her stomach and, taking a deep breath, pushed her shoulders back, thrusting her chest forward
.
“Now, if you really looked like that, it wouldn’t be so bad
.”
She ran her hands through her hair
.
“Why do I have to look like this?” she asked no one in particular
.
“Why can’t I be tall, glamorous and sexy?”