Moving Can Be Murder (6 page)

“Once a nurse, always a nurse,” said Nancy.
She reached over and patted my hand. “I forgive you. I was just so
shocked I got a little carried away. You’re not really going to
move, are you?”

“Not if I have anything to say about it,” I
said. “I plan to be carried out of my house feet first. In a body
bag.”

Mary Alice recoiled at that. “God, what an
image, Carol.”

“When we got home from the Geezer Tour, I
sat down and made a list of the pros and cons of moving to an
active adult community.”

I put my glasses on, then continued. “I made
a list of what needs to happen to keep our house running, and
assigned each task to either Jim or me. Feel free to jump in if
I’ve left anything out. Here’s Jim’s list: lawn and landscaping,
house painting and outdoor upkeep, snow removal, garbage and
recycling. If we moved to an active adult community, Jim wouldn’t
have to do any of this. They’d all be included in the monthly
common charge, which isn’t cheap.”

I took a quick bite of the special muffin of
the day -- chocolate chip. Yum.

“Here’s my list: cooking, food service and
cleanup, house cleaning, laundry – although Jim’s taken over some
of that, much to my dismay – changing beds, pet care. These are the
ones I thought of very quickly. Notice anything about my list?”

“That’s all the things a woman does around
the house every day,” Nancy said. “But I see where you’re going
with this. If you moved into an active adult community, you’d still
have to do all your jobs, right?”

“That’s right,” I said. “I even asked if
there was a maid service at Eden’s Grove, and the sales agent
looked at me like I was crazy. And I’m not giving up my dogs. I
told Jim that I am not moving to Eden’s Grove – no way, José.”

“Good for you, Carol,” said Mary Alice. “But
Jenny’s going to be moving out this month, right?”

“I can’t be selfish about that,” I said.
“Jim and I have loved having her home since last summer. She was
wonderful last year when Jim was in that awful mess about his
retirement coach. I don’t know what I would have done without her.
But it’s time for her to be out on her own again. And I have to
admit, I’m thrilled that she and Mark Anderson are getting so
close. Although I’ve tried not to push the relationship. I doubt
Jenny even knows how much I’d love to see them become a permanent
couple.”

“Yeah, Carol,” said Nancy with the wisdom of
someone who’s known me since grammar school, “we all know how
subtle you can be when you want something.

“Not!”

“Hey,” I protested. “I can be subtle.”

“Humph,” retorted Nancy. “Manipulative, yes.
Subtle, no.”

“Anyway,” I went on, determined not to let
Nancy’s needling get to me, “we haven’t seen much of Mark the last
few days. He’s up to his ears in that hit and run accident case.
The one that happened at Fairport Community College last Friday
night.”

“That was so awful,” Mary Alice said. “I’d
gotten called to work at the emergency room that night, and by the
time the paramedics got that poor girl to the hospital, she was
gone. I can’t imagine what her parents must be going through,
losing a child so tragically.”

Nancy and I didn’t respond right away. We
were both remembering the premature death of Mary Alice’s husband,
Brian, killed in an auto accident some twenty years ago. It must
have been extra tough for our friend to deal with the young
accident casualty and her grieving family.

“What I can’t imagine is how anyone could be
so cowardly as to hit someone in the dark and then just drive away
and leave her to die,” Nancy said in disgust. “I hope the police
find who did it and put him away for life.”

At that moment, my cell phone rang. It was
Jenny. She didn’t waste time with pleasantries.

“Dad’s had a heart attack. You’ve got to get
to the hospital right away.”

Chapter 7

There’s so little difference between
husbands that you

might as well keep your first one. Just look
at all the time

you’ve spent breaking him in. Do you really
want to

go through that again?

Thank God I was with Mary Alice and Nancy
when I got Jenny’s call. I was so upset I know I would’ve had an
accident driving to the hospital myself.

By the time we got there, breaking
who-knows-how-many traffic laws, I was relieved to see Jim was
already sitting in the out-patient area, ready to be released.
Typical man, he assumed an ornery persona when he saw that Nancy
and Mary Alice were with me. I think he was embarrassed at causing
all this excitement.

“God, Carol, you didn’t have to bring
reinforcements with you. I’m not dying.”

I started to blubber and Jim stood up – a
little unsteadily, I thought – and gave me a hug. “I’m really all
right. It was just a scare. A mild angina attack, the doctor said.
He’s referred me to a cardiologist, as a precaution. And then he
released me.” Jim fished in his jacket pocket and held up a card.
“See? I’ll call and make an appointment right away when we get
home. Promise.”

“But, Jim, why did this happen? What were
you doing?”

I knew My Beloved was hardly a couch potato,
but he wasn’t an exercise nut either, like some men I know.

“All I was doing was clearing more of the
ice off the front sidewalk,” he said defensively. “You know how
worried you always are that someone’s going to fall and sue
us.”

Humph. Seemed to me that he was the one who
worried about getting sued. Not a good time to argue about that
point, however.

“Sorry I gave you such a scare,” he said.
“Fortunately, Jenny was home and she called nine-one-one and here I
am.” At my questioning look, Jim continued, “she stayed with me
until the doctor saw me, but then she had to leave to go teach a
class.”

“As long as you’re all right, Jim, Mary
Alice and I’ll get out of here,” said Nancy, who had remained
uncharacteristically quiet.

“Wait a minute, Nancy,” said Mary Alice. “We
have to give them a lift home. I’m sure they don’t want to travel
in an ambulance. You can pick up your own car later, Carol. It’s
safe in the Paperback Café parking lot.”

“I’m just glad to be going home,” Jim said.
“I was afraid the doctors were going to keep me overnight for
observation.”

“Are you sure it’s safe for you to leave the
hospital, Jim?” I couldn’t help it. I was scared, and if I sounded
overprotective, I didn’t care.

“I’m fine, Carol,” Jim snapped back. “For
God’s sake, don’t make this into a crisis.”

I couldn’t help myself. This was first sign
that one of us was showing signs of our mortality. I know we all
have an expiration date. I just didn’t want Jim’s to come too
soon.

For the next few days, I hovered over My
Beloved like a hawk stalking its prey. I drove him so crazy that he
even started going to the newspaper office even when he didn’t need
to, just to get away from me.

I also spent a lot of time wrestling with my
conscience. What right did I have to insist on staying in our house
if Jim’s health was at stake?

I forced myself to take another look at my
home-maintenance jobs list, and realized that Jim’s were all
labor-intensive, requiring physical energy that could seriously
damage his heart. Of course, in my own melodramatic way, I could
easily imagine My Beloved keeling over, clutching his chest, just
from taking out a bag of garbage, and saying with his last breath,
“Honey, I’m sorry. I was only doing it for you.”

You can’t take that chance, Carol.

I made the only decision I could, under the
circumstances. I called Nancy and told her I wanted to list our
house for sale.

“You’re absolutely sure you want to do
this?” asked Nancy. “You don’t want to talk it over with Jim first
before you sign the listing agreement?”

It was a few days before Valentine’s Day,
and Nancy was helping me set the tables for our monthly Bunco game,
which is a game of dice requiring no brain power whatsoever. My
Beloved claims that Bunco is just an excuse for a group of women to
get together for eating, drinking, and gossiping. And laughing –
there’s always a lot of that.

Bunco night is the one night of the month
when Jim can’t get out of the house fast enough. He’s even has been
known to walk on the wild side and pay full price for a movie
instead of a twilight bargain show, something he’d never consider
doing under any other circumstances.

Nancy had arrived long before the other
players. Come to think of it, she was spending much more time in my
house these days than in her own. Her husband, Bob – or The
Bobster, as we called him when we were kids – was a financial guru
and always seemed to be on the road solving one crisis after
another for clients. I knew Nancy would never admit it, but I think
she was lonely. Which is probably why she was such a successful
real estate agent – she put all her energy into her job rather than
her own home.

Not that I’m one to criticize anyone else’s
priorities.

Nancy pulled the listing agreement out of
her Gucci briefcase and carefully put it down in front of me. She
then took the next ten minutes to try and talk me out of what I was
determined to do.

“I want you to be absolutely sure about
this, Carol,” she said. “I’ve known you too long, and I know you
too well. You love this house. Once you and Jim sign the agreement,
you’re in a contract relationship. Not that you have to take any
offer that’s made. But I don’t want this to spoil our friendship,
and it could, if you haven’t really thought this through and try to
back out.”

“I don’t want to sell my house,” I said.
“But if I have to choose between keeping our house and Jim’s
health….” My eyes spilled over as the enormity of what I was
signing hit me. And the equal enormity of what could happen if I
didn’t. Talk about being between a rock and a hard place.

So I switched gears, an avoidance technique
that’s worked well for me over the years. “Are you cold, Nancy? Now
that Jim’s gone out, I can push up the thermostat.”

“Don’t worry about it, Carol,” Nancy said.
“Once everybody gets here, all the gabbing and laughing will keep
us warm. And no trying to change the subject. Are you positive you
want me to list the house?”

I immediately became defensive. “I’m
entitled to change the subject in my own home.” I gestured around
my dining room with its beautiful fireplace, built-in corner china
cabinet, and gorgeous wainscoting. “And this is still my home.
Until you sell it. Besides, Jim has to sign the listing agreement,
too. You know the house is in both of our names. It won’t be final
until he does. I want to give him the listing agreement as his
Valentine’s Day present. The way you’re trying to talk me out of
this, it sounds like you don’t want the listing.”