The Sassy Belles (2 page)

“Well, Harry,” Vivi answered with as much sarcasm as she could
muster, “unless you believe in the walkin’ dead, he’s still right there where I
left him, buck naked.”

“Vivi, if Lewis is actually dead, you need an attorney,” I
interjected. “My God, we need to call an ambulance! The police.”

“Well, y’all,” Vivi said, “aren’t I lookin’ at two lawyers
right now?”

Harry and I stood, looking dumb and stupid, first at each
other, then at Vivi. Still, Harry looked the most confused. The most
disoriented. I could tell he was trying to process how this little development
might impact that precious blossoming political career.

He and his brother, Lewis, had never been close and Harry had
spent a lifetime bailing Lewis out of one mess after the next. Lewis was the
baby of the family. He was good-looking, but in a
Field and
Stream
sort of way. He was the polar opposite of Harry. Harry was
prep-school gorgeous. Straight out of
GQ.
Lewis was
two years younger, with a loud, center-of-attention boom of a voice that could
really get irritating. Actually, overall, Lewis
was
quite irritating. Why in the world Vivi would shack up with him was beyond me. I
looked at her and, despite her mascara-stained eyes, her sheet-white skin and
runny nose, well—honestly, my thought was that Vivi could do better than Lewis.
But what I loved in Vivi was her wild streak. She was one of the few people who
really lived in the moment. Hell, Vivi lived
for
the
moment. And I was sure that’s what attracted Lewis.

After a long, awkward silence in the warmth of the late morning
sun, Vivi spoke. “Well,” she said, as if she had been picked last to play
kickball, “since I don’t really have a turkey wishbone handy for y’all, somebody
be my damn lawyer already! Do we need to play eeny meeny miny moe or what?”

Harry answered first. “No matter what, not reporting a death in
a timely manner is a real crime, so if we don’t call the police and an
ambulance, we will all need lawyers.”

I took out my cell.

“Here, honey, let’s get this over with. You need to call the
ambulance first, even if you think he’s dead.”

I handed the phone to her as I rubbed her shoulder and then
looked over at Harry. He had turned around and was leaning against Vivi’s car,
running his fingers through his hair over and over—his nervous tic. He looked
lost in thought—as though floods of terrible memories were coming back, like
waves crashing a shoreline. I wanted to say something, but had no good words at
the moment. My thoughts turned back to Vivi. She was waiting for the 911
operator to answer.

Vivi had been through this before. No, she hadn’t ever killed
anyone, but short, steamy love affairs were basically on par for her. At one
point, she’d been married to a congressman who lived full-time in Washington. He
was twenty years older than Vivi and totally unattractive, but another blue
blood just the same. The marriage didn’t last too long, though no one ever
thought it would. Vivi would never leave the South. That would be like asking
cotton to grow up North. Vivi just couldn’t be planted anywhere else. But the
congressman had to live in D.C. With all that time apart everyone knew it would
just grow stale. And it did after just a few short years. Besides, Vivi loved to
be…well, let’s call it social. Yes,
social
was a
perfect word for Vivi Ann McFadden. I’m not saying that she was a party girl,
but she loved, thrived actually, on social interaction. Okay, Vivi was a party
girl. She was an only child of wealth and privilege and most of the time she
took the privilege part too far.

She never gave anything much thought. She just flew by the seat
of her pants, or anyone else’s pants. Her free spirit was enviable. She swore
like a sailor, even during high school, and had the reputation as a bit of the
wild child of Tuscaloosa. She was popular and, no, not just with the men.
Everyone loved her because she was so damn funny. The only little problem was
that if Vivi thought it, it popped right out of her mouth before it ever stopped
to register at her brain. Vivi never learned that some things should be
thought
but not actually
said.
Sometimes that got her into trouble. But she had such a
hilarious personality she stayed at the center of the most sought-after social
circles.

As I listened to her choke out her story to the 911 operator, I
could tell that this event with Lewis would change her.

* * *

Harry and I left Mother’s with Vivi to go to the police
station. I suggested to Harry that he could go on to the Fountain Mist and meet
the ambulance, but he insisted he would prefer to stay with us. He didn’t seem
to want to see Lewis, dead or alive. I tried my best to persuade him, but he
wouldn’t budge. After all the years that had gone by, six, I think, since he and
Lewis had even spoken, Harry just didn’t want to be the one to ID the body. If
he got there first, it would be just him and poor, dead Lewis. And Harry didn’t
want that, not after the way things had been between them. So he led the way to
the police station downtown. After that we would all go together to the
motel.

My emotions were in overdrive. Vivi was my best friend since
third grade, my sister in every way, and Harry was my husband, my college
sweetheart, though we had had our share of troubles. Between these
relationships, the fact that Lewis was dead and the fact that I’m an attorney,
too, well, I’ve never felt so stuck in such a messy fix as this. I didn’t know
which feeling to feel, never mind knowing the right thing to say or who to say
it to. We were all in shock for different reasons, and the trip to the police
station was a silent one.

We arrived at the station in minutes. That’s the good thing
about Tuscaloosa—everything is only minutes away. We got out of our cars and
walked into the little building. It was on the corner of the street that faced
the Warrior River. We stepped inside and I stood next to Vivi and held her hand
as she talked to the police. Harry stood on her other side, trying with every
fiber in his being to hold it together, to cover his emotions. Luckily for him,
it was something he’d being training himself to do for ages now—even with me. A
politician should be stoic, composed, unruffled—and I can tell you, he was great
at that.

The little balding officer sat in front of us, diligently
taking down Vivi’s half sentences and descriptive details of her last breathless
moments with Lewis. When she finished, the pudgy officer looked up with his
mouth open and eyes bugging through his tiny square glasses and eventually
spoke. “Ahem. Anything else, ma’am?”

Officer Dooley knew Vivi. He used to work detail for her mother
at the gate of the famous McFadden plantation and had known the family for
years. Tuscaloosa is a small college town, where everyone knows everyone and has
probably slept with their best friend’s brother. Believe me, I know that one for
sure.

This scene at the station reminded me of the principal’s office
in the fourth grade. Standing there together with Vivi and Officer Dooley and
all his questions took me back. Vivi and I were in Catholic school together and
were in Sister Pauline’s class—and she was the meanest old nun in the entire
school. One day, Vivi brought a big roll of clear packing tape to school and we
carefully devised the plan. At recess we practiced. Sister Pauline went out of
class at 1:30 every day to meet with Father Mike about the religion lesson.

On the big day, we waited until she’d left for her meeting, and
then Vivi rolled the clear tape all over the back of her chair. When Sister P.
came back she sat down in her chair, snapping her ruler sharply on the desk and
ordered us into silence. I remember the look Vivi and I passed each other. We
were full of the devil, you could say—typical schoolgirls, at least most of the
ones I knew.

“Here it comes,” said Vivi with a huge smile on her freckled
face.

“Oh, my goodness, I gotta think of something in case we’re
busted,” I said. I was always a lawyer. Even in the fourth grade.

As Sister P. got up to go to the board, a loud ripping noise
tore through the silent class. In a split second, the veil full of curly brown
hair fell from her head, flopping there over the back of the chair, sliding down
into a puddle as Sister Pauline moved toward the chalkboard.

The classroom erupted with laughter and it could be heard all
the way to the principal’s office, which is where, of course, we ended
up—standing together at the principal’s desk, holding hands just like we were
right now.

I was snapped abruptly back to the present when Officer Dooley
launched another question at Vivi. “Where’s the body?”

“Shit!” Vivi said.

That was actually Vivi’s favorite word. She used it whether she
was happy or sad, surprised or bored. However, this time it was more like an
Oh, shit
as she began to utter those next few
words.

“I left the body…”

“Stop, Vivi,” Harry jumped in. “As your lawyer, I’m advising
you not to discuss these details further, not without consultation.”

“Wait, are you my lawyer?” Vivi asked with an excited mix of
relief and worry. “Harry, I hate to remind you, but your brother is the…um, dead
guy.”

“Well, Vivi, I know you didn’t do anything but screw his brains
out,” Harry said, rolling his eyes. It was a familiar tactic—covering up emotion
with sarcasm. “Of course, I’ll help you. Besides, there is no case if Lewis died
’cause you wore him out. That’s not murder. For God’s sake, it’s a death pure
and simple. But if you were the last one with him when he died, you will still
need counsel.”

That vision will remain branded on my brain for all
eternity.

Harry helping Vivi. She needed him and, while Harry wasn’t the
most cuddly, affectionate guy anymore, he seemed a little like his old self at
that moment. Ever since the big family breakup with Lewis years ago, and now
even more as he pushed to climb the political ladder, Harry had learned to turn
off the emotion and the feeling and keep the business hat on at all times. Even
with me—especially with me.

But he was softer with Vivi for the moment. I could see a small
glimpse of him, the old Harry, there with Vivi in the musty police station.

Maybe it was because Lewis, for whom he had shown such absolute
disdain, could actually be dead. Harry hadn’t always been this cold, but over
the past couple of years I had certainly become quite lonely for affection and
good conversation. We never talked about anything but work and politics and
career climbing. I was lonely, but as I noticed a shadow of the old Harry there
in the little room, I began to hope that maybe this drama with his brother might
bring the real Harry back. My Harry was at least there in the police station for
the moment. And it was good to see him.

Harry and I had a good beginning. Watching him there in that
moment took me back to the very first time we met. I had been attracted to him
immediately.

We met in law school, but not at a party or the library like
most college sweethearts. Harry and I met in New York City in line at the
half-price tickets booth in the middle of Times Square. We were in line for a
little-known Broadway show called
Baby.
I had gone
to NYC for an internship at Columbia, and Harry was there that summer, working
in the city.

I felt him getting close behind me as I stood in line. I was
listening to him talk to a buddy and I knew I detected an unmistakable Southern
lilt in his deep, sexy voice. I liked feeling him close to me. I could smell his
aftershave and then…my turn at the ticket window.

“Two for
Baby,
please.” I was
picking up tickets for me and my roommate, Alexa, for that evening’s show

“Last two for today ma’am, good timing.”

“Noooo,” Harry groaned from behind me.

In a split second, I thought,
What do I
do?
Little did I know my entire future lay in these next few seconds
and how I chose to handle this deliciously terrible, heart-pounding,
awkward situation. I hesitated only for a breath, then something else took over.
This “something else” spoke for me.

“Oh, I have one extra.” My alter ego sounded just like me.
Evidentially the other me decided in that split second,
Oh,
the hell with Alexa. Alexa who?

“But what about…” Harry was motioning to the spot where his
buddy had been standing seconds ago and saw that he was halfway across the
street walking backward and nodding with two thumbs up. I giggled and he said,
“Are you sure?”

“Sure am.”

He smiled at me.

Harry, ever the curious attorney, furrowed his brow and asked,
“Weren’t you originally asking for two tickets?”

“Yes,” I said, feeling cross-examined.

“Well, who was the other ticket for?”

“Alex, my
female
roommate from New
Jersey.”

“Oh,” he said, smiling. “But won’t she be expecting her ticket
tonight?”

“Oh, my goodness,” I said in an overanimated Southern accent.
“Didn’t you hear? They just sold out.” A smile crept across his preppy boy face
and I knew I was in for something wonderful.

Behind his desk, Officer Dooley cleared his throat, dragging my
thoughts away from the once-romantic Harry and back to the police station.

“Where is the body?” he asked again, trying to get an
answer.

“I left him when he began turnin’ blue,” Vivi said. “I slapped
him a few times. Well, I had slapped him before, but that was durin’ our—well
anyway—he asked me to. But after he stopped movin’, I slapped him really hard
and when he still didn’t budge an inch, I ran for help.”

“Did you call an ambulance?” The chubby officer continued.

“When he stopped breathin’, I panicked and ran for Blake.”