Suede to Rest (3 page)

“Look, I can already tell you're a lightweight and I know you're not driving back to Los Angeles tonight considering your car's out of commission. You got a place to stay?”

I hadn't really thought of that. When I drove up from Los Angeles, I figured it would take a couple of hours tops to check out the store and sign Ken's paperwork. I'd brought my messenger bag, filled with my wallet, dark red lipstick, emergency sewing kit, notebook, and pen. There might have been a couple of stale ginger candies in the bottom. Not exactly enough for a spontaneous getaway. I pushed my hands into the pockets of my black blazer and my fingers closed around the keys Ken handed off earlier. “I think I have a place.”

Charlie pulled a business card out of the breast pocket of her chambray shirt. “Got a pen?”

I handed her the rhinestone-encrusted pen I carried around with me, hand-bejeweled one day at To The Nines when I was testing a cheap batch of glue my boss told us to use on the dresses we produced. She stared at it a few seconds before taking it and rolling it between her palms. Three rhinestones fell off. She brushed them from her lap onto the floor, then scribbled something on the back of the card.

“Call me if you can't work it out on your own. I have a sofa you can crash on.”

I took the card and thanked her but already knew I wouldn't take her up on the offer. I wanted to be alone to process everything.

She tossed a ten-dollar bill on the counter and left. I ordered a burger and fries to go and paid the balance of our tab. The sun had dropped by the time I walked out of the small bar. The historic downtown area, mostly antiques stores, hair salons, and the occasional office space, was eerily lit by streetlamps that cast a faint orange glow over the fake western storefronts. I approached my car and checked to be sure the doors were locked and then looked across the street. The metal gate to Land of a Thousand Fabrics was dark and foreboding in the evening light.

I walked to the crosswalk, to the end of the block, into the alley, and to the back door. The second of the three keys on my key ring unlocked the lock. I carried my burger and fries to the small metal control panel mounted by the back door and flipped a bunch of switches until the interior was bright with artificial light. Odd, I thought, that the electric worked. I knew Uncle Marius had kept up the mortgage and tax payments but couldn't imagine why he'd paid the electric bill all these years, too.

Now I could see the store, really see it, and focus on what I had inherited. I felt a connection to the bins of fabric, to the walls lined with rolls of brightly colored taffetas and silks, the tables loaded down with rolls of synthetic fur, suede, leather, and damask.

It wasn't what I'd learned at the Fabric Institute that had landed me the job at To The Nines, it was what I'd learned while growing up surrounded by material. During my interview with Giovanni, I mentioned that I'd learned to identify fabric from the feel of it when I was ten years old. He gave me an impromptu test, handing me a dozen swatches from a stack behind his desk, and I proved my knowledge. It wasn't until after I started working for him that I learned the swatches of fine fabrics by his desk were for appearance's sake, and that most of our inventory was as polyester as my name.

I crossed the concrete floor to the white laminate cutting station, and placed the keys in the drawer below the dusty cash register. A small teal notebook sat in the drawer, the word
Resources
written across the fabric cover in red marker. I hoisted myself up on the flat surface right by where a metal yardstick had been mounted for measuring cuttings of fabric, unwrapped my burger, and paged through the notebook. Someone, probably my great-aunt, Millie, had logged details of various bolts of fabric in the inventory.
Red velvet, Spain, 12 yards. Burgundy georgette, Lyon, 50 yards (slight imperfection at selvage). Assortment of toile, Paris. Bolt of blue silk taffeta, 17 yards, India.

Additional pages were filled with similar entries. I imagined my relatives visiting exotic countries, purchasing fabrics to sell in the store. What it must have been like for them to run this place together in the late forties, when Christian Dior had shown his New Look to Parisian high society, when ready-to-wear started replacing true couture, when the idea of homemade glamour appealed to women everywhere. My great-aunt and great-uncle had made that dream a reality for women by stocking something better than the kind of cheap poly-satin blends we used to make dresses at To The Nines.

If I had access to fabrics like these when developing a concept for Giovanni, it would have been a whole different job. Sure, I established the direction our design team would go each season and outsourced the materials to make it happen, but with inexpensive, flammable cuts of fabric that would show wear after one use. I could look at a roll of poly-satin and know exactly what kind of dress it should become. But these fabrics were different. Being in the same room with them, even in what I could only imagine to be damaged condition, was like being on a magic carpet that would take me to another time, another place, another reality.

I cut a couple of yards from a bolt of royal-blue suede and draped it over the wrap stand like a tablecloth. I leaned over the fabric and ate my burger and most of the fries, then balled up the wax paper, the brown carry-out bag, and tied the blue suede around it like a hobo sack. Fabrics were known to absorb whatever nearby scent lingered in the air, and I didn't want the place smelling like a fast-food joint. A small plastic bin was nestled under the register, overflowing with fabric scraps and faded pieces of paper. I hopped down from the cutting table, rested the blue bundle on top of the bin, and carried it out back. Outside, it had grown dark. Weird shadows took on distorted forms. I scampered to the Dumpster, lifted the lid, and turned the trash can upside down, shaking out the contents. When I pulled it out and lowered the lid, I saw a strange man watching me from end of the alley.

He started toward
me. I turned around and ran to the back door, tripping over my own feet in the process. I face-planted on the gravel like I had earlier. I scrambled for footing, coughed a few times, and grabbed the doorknob. I glanced behind me to see if the man had gotten closer. He hadn't. He stood at the end of the alley, silhouetted by headlights from a car idling in the lot behind him. I shut and locked the door behind me, flipped the switches on the control panel to off, and backed away slowly, continuing to stare at the doorknob. Something sounded against the door, like nails on a chalkboard. I grabbed the keys from the drawer under the register and ran to the corner of the store, to a circular staircase that led to the apartment above the store. I fumbled with the keys, almost dropping them twice. When I found one that fit, I unlocked the door and locked it behind me. I sank to the floor at the end of the rose-pink floral carpet runner that led down the hall and hugged my knees, scared to be alone.

As I sat with my back against the door, I listened for sounds—any sounds that indicated that I hadn't imagined that someone was outside, waiting to break in. I heard nothing but silence.

This was silly. Just because my car had been vandalized and a person was standing at the end of the alley behind the store didn't mean I had anything to worry about. I was safe in the apartment.

I waited a few minutes, and then crept back downstairs. My cell phone sat on the corner of the wrap stand. I picked it up and carried it to the staircase, sitting on the third rung from the bottom. I pulled up my favorites menu and called Carson in Los Angeles. Though it now seemed like I was safe inside the store, I wanted to talk to someone who could comfort me, who would tell me everything would be okay.

“Poly? Hold on, this is a bad connection. Let me get to the kitchen.”

Carson, I figured correctly, was at our apartment. The cell phone reception was variable at best, and we'd learned which rooms better served our conversations. “Can you hear me now?”

“Yes. Listen, my battery's low and I don't have my charger,” I said in a hushed voice.

“Why are you whispering?”

“I'm trapped inside the fabric store and I think there might be somebody outside trying to get me.”

“What do you mean, you're trapped in the store?”

I thought about Charlie's warning. “I went outside to throw out the trash and saw a man in the alley watching me. And after I locked the door I thought I heard something at the door.”

“Calm down. You always had an active imagination. Did you call the cops?”

“No, I called you.”

“There's not a lot I can do from Los Angeles.”

“I don't want you to
do
anything, I just wanted to hear your voice. Maybe I did imagine the whole thing. Can't we just talk for a couple of minutes?”

“We could have talked over dinner if you'd come home like I expected you to. It's Friday. I got frittatas.”

“I'll eat them when I get back,” I said absentmindedly, listening from the stairs for sounds of forced entry in progress.

“Frittatas don't keep. Are you even listening to me?”

“What?”

“Don't try to be cute.”

I had a very strong urge to say I wasn't trying, but it seemed Carson wasn't in a playful mood. Carson was rarely in a playful mood, at least not lately. But turn him loose at happy hour with the rest of his banker friends and he was the life of the party. He used to be that way with me, and I figured we'd get back there someday when I got serious about the “marriage and our future” discussion.

“What time do you expect to be back tomorrow?” he asked.

“I don't know if I'll be back tomorrow.”

“I thought this was a cut-and-dried case of inheritance and resell?”

“It's a little more complicated than that,” I said. “My car was vandalized. Before you say anything, I took it to a mechanic. It'll be ready in the morning.”

“Did you call the police?”

“It's no big thing, Carson. Some locals decided to play a joke on me. So I get it fixed and I leave in the morning. This just gives me time to check out the store and decide what I want to do.”

“You should sign a couple of papers to take ownership then sign a couple of papers to give the agent your permission to resell it. Although I can't imagine who would want to buy a warehouse filled with rotting fabrics.”

“It's my store now and maybe I want to keep it,” I said, surprising myself.

“Poly, don't be a fool. Somebody would probably pay a pretty price to get that location.”

I don't know what stopped me from telling him that I already had an offer, but I kept the info to myself. I knew Mr. McMichael was demonstrating solid business sense in his offer and I was demonstrating an irrational connection to the past by not accepting it, but I wasn't ready to walk away from what Uncle Marius had protected all these years. Maybe he and Aunt Millie were together again in that great fabric store in the sky, but just in case they needed a little time to find each other, I didn't want to be the one to trash the thing that kept them connected.

“Carson, did you move to a different room?”

“No. Why?” he asked through a crystal clear connection.

“You're breaking up. I better go. I'll call you tomorrow.” I ended the call and turned my phone off to conserve what was left of the battery.

I climbed the stairs and entered the apartment a second time. Large white sheets were draped over the furniture. I remembered staying here, in the spare bedroom across the hall from Uncle Marius and Aunt Millie's room. I walked down the hall to the bathroom and turned the faucets. Pipes below the sink made a clunking sound followed by a sputter. No water came from the spigot. I glanced at the mirror and wiped my palm across the dusty reflective surface. My hair was mussed up, but that was the beauty of keeping it short. I could go an extra day without a shower. Not having a toilet was a different problem.

I turned off the light. Aunt Millie had kept a basket in the closet filled with blankets and stuffed animals made from scraps of fabric from the store. In the dark, I found the closet and pulled out a furry tiger-striped pillow and a zebra-fur quilt. I felt like an intruder into someone else's life, but I was tired: from the beer, from defending my interest in the store, from running away from a strange man in an alley who I may or may not have imagined. I pulled the sheet off the sofa and created a makeshift bed, then promptly fell asleep.

I awoke to the sound of sirens.

It was a couple of seconds before I remembered where I was. A thin border of bright sunlight framed the heavy curtains that covered the front windows of the apartment, winning the battle of daylight versus darkness when I pulled the cord that opened them. A sheriff's car was angled in front of the store. A portly man in a dark uniform stood next to the car. He held a white megaphone in his right hand. Ken's Lexus pulled up behind the cop car and Ken got out.

I wrapped myself in the zebra-fur blanket and left the apartment, scampering down the cold metal stairs in my bare feet. I opened the front door and bright sunlight blinded me, along with pulsating blue and red lights circulating at even intervals.

“Come out of there with your hands up!” called the uniformed man through the megaphone. “Hands up. Step away from the door.”

I looked to my left and my right to see who he was talking to, but saw no one. “You—in the zebra fur. Yes, I'm talking to you.”

Me?

“I can't come out; the gate is rusted shut.” I continued shivering even though I still had the zebra-fur blanket draped over my shoulders. I opened my arms up with fists on the corners of the blanket, feeling a bit like I was impersonating a vampire, then pulled it around me more tightly. A third car, the black Mercedes sedan with the vanity plates, pulled up behind Ken's Lexus. A handsome white-haired man in a camel topcoat got out of the car.

“What's going on here?” he asked.

“The police got a report last night that someone was vandalizing the fabric store,” said a woman in a pink terry-cloth robe with the letter
B
monogrammed in maroon. “I heard they've been keeping a watch on the place since the call came in and caught her this morning.”

“Caught her red-handed! A squatter. Still inside the store!” said another like-attired woman with a plastic cap on her head.

“I'm not vandalizing it. I live here,” I said through the metal gate. I fed my fingers through the openings and gripped the joints. “Tell them,” I said to Ken. His hair stuck up on one side, like he'd been woken unexpectedly and hadn't had time to use a comb. He shook his head and said something under his breath to the officer.

“Is this how you welcome people to this quiet little town? Sirens and accusations?”

Ken stepped forward. “Poly, calm down.”

The uniformed officer set the megaphone on the back of his car and stepped over to me. “Miss, we're just doing our job. We came over to check on the building as soon as we got the call from the Senior Patrol about suspicious activity on this street.”

“Someone reported me to the police?” I asked.

“He reported you to me,” said the businessman, stepping forward.

“Who are you?”

“Poly, this is Mr. McMichael,” said Ken. He looked less official without his crested blazer and tried to stand straighter to compensate. He succeeded only in looking like the head of the math club who was trying to impress Pythagoras. “Mr. Pickers heard somebody breaking into a storefront on this strip. He called Mr. McMichael because he owns this strip.”

“Which storefront? Mine? Because he doesn't own
mine
.” I turned my focus from Ken to the businessman, “You don't own
this
property.
I
own this property.”

“She's right,” Ken said to the officer. “Technically, she's the owner of this building. For now, at least.”

“Strike that ‘for now' from the record. I own this building. I own everything in this building.”

“I'm sorry, Miss . . . Monroe, did you say?” said the officer.

“Yes. Poly Monroe.”

He fed his hand through an opening in the gate. “Ms. Monroe, I'm Deputy Sheriff Clark. From the sheriff's office, mobile unit. I'm sorry for the inconvenience. Mr. Pickers called Mr. McMichael this morning and we're a little unclear about which store he was referring to. Sounds like it was a misunderstanding. Are you planning on staying in San Ladrón for any length of time?”

I shook his hand and dropped my voice, ignoring Ken and Mr. McMichael. “I feel a little funny talking to you through a gate. Can you hold on a minute? I'll come out the back.”

I closed the door and ran back across the concrete, stopping only briefly at the wrap stand to push my feet into a pair of faded red velvet slippers with Chinese beadwork on the front. They were slightly too long for me but warmed my toes. I wrapped the zebra fur around me tightly and pushed the back door open.

I didn't get far.

In the parking lot behind the store, next to the Dumpster, was a body. Even though a length of blue suede had been pulled over his head and tied around the back of his neck, I recognized his distorted features, his outfit, and his cane. It was the body of Mr. Pickers, head of the Senior Patrol.

His legs splayed out in front of him, one bent at an unnatural angle, the other straight, parallel to his cane. The left foot of his dusty brown loafers had a hole in the sole, showing the bottom of a cranberry sock. His tan jacket was open over a beige button-down shirt and navy-blue work pants. A puddle of blood from the back of his head seeped through the blue suede and pooled by one of the wheels on the Dumpster.

My stomach spun like towels in a dryer, hitting me with a wave of nausea. I coughed twice. I reached out for something for balance, but I was too far away from the building, too far from the Dumpster. I moved backward a few steps, stumbled over a concrete block, then pressed my back up against the door. I fumbled with the knob until the door was open, then closed the door behind me and tried to catch my breath.

“Ms. Monroe?” said Officer Clark. I looked at the front gate. The officer stood by the rusted metal, watching me. “Are you okay?”

“Mr. Pickers—outside—by my Dumpster.”

“Mr. Pickers is no threat to you.”

“He's—he's dead.”

We locked eyes for a few seconds. “Ms. Monroe, stay where you are.”

Officer Clark disappeared from my view.

I propped myself on both palms and breathed in, breathed out. Ringing filled my ears, until I realized it was the sound of sirens. I had a brief thought about meeting Officer Clark outside, but felt too dizzy when I stepped away from the counter to act on the impulse. I bowed my head, kept my palms on the white laminate counter, and closed my eyes, trying to block out the noise.

Tires kicked up gravel. Car doors slammed. Voices—lots of voices. Footsteps. I pulled myself together and walked to the back door, opening it to a scene of Officer Clark conferring with a woman in a black pantsuit. Another man snapped photos of the body with a large camera that hung around his neck. The crowd of people who had been gathering in front of the store now gathered in the alley. Another officer faced them, his arms out on both sides, blocking their view.

I looked back at the Dumpster, then turned away, fighting dizziness.

“Why don't we go inside?” said Officer Clark. He held his arm out, palm open, indicating the back door and blocking my view of the body at the same time. I turned to the fabric store and trudged inside, heading straight for the wrap stand.

“What do you think happened here?” he asked.

“I don't know what happened. You woke me up with your sirens.”

“When's the last time you went out back?”