A sliver of the garden, black as my mom’s coffee, shouted at me from our bay window. The garden was my dad’s project, but I was the one on the end of the dumb shovel. I’d been trying to read my new Philip K. Dick paperback, and it pissed me off that the patch of dirt on the front yard was in my sight. When my father came home, he’d expect the weeds to be yanked, everything watered, and deadheads to be deaded—or whatever the hell it was called.
There was another big pile of dirt in the back yard. So much dirt. I went outside to start the chore. As I tied my Gazelles, a woman in a yellow dress came up our front sidewalk, sunlight sparkling on her and something she carried. As she came into focus, I stood, one lace still undone. I was dizzy but not from standing up.
“Do you mind if I look?” she asked.
I’d never seen her on my street before. I would have remembered.
“At what?” I took a half step, tripped and almost fell.
Her laugh was the warmest thing I’d heard that spring.
“Be careful.” She kneeled by the garden. “Might be too wet, but the soil is rich.”
“Uh, yeah. I just do what my–” I stopped. “What I’m told.”
She plunged her hand into the dirt and brought up a thick clump, squeezing it through her fingers.
“Leave it for today,” she brushed her hands, then unsure where to put them, she held them up to me. “Could I come in and use your sink?”
I leapt up the stairs and held the door open. She smelled like Christmas oranges. She gave a nod, and maybe a wink. Did I imagine that? She had to be ten years older than me. A glittery purse on a thin leather strap hung across the tight yellow dress. I followed her in, hoping she didn’t hear the pounding coming from my chest.
“Straight through to the kitchen, yep, on the right.”
She ran her hands underneath the faucet, the water burbling over the dirt as she rubbed them. My dad would have said she had curves in all the right places. I always thought that was a creepy thing to say.
I handed her a clean tea towel, pushing away my mother’s chiding about using them only for dishes. After she dried her hands, she readjusted the purse.
“You all by yourself here? No one else around?”
“Uh, yeah,” I said.
“You must be back from university, on a break.” She studied a photo of my parents stuck to the fridge by a cat magnet that read hang in there baby.
I rubbed the stubble on my chin that I’d been trying for a week to make into something. I wasn’t about to tell her the break was from Grade 12.
“Yeah,” I said.
She floated out of the kitchen into the living room. Outside, an engine gunned and a flash of red zoomed past our bay window. She turned from the window, walking past the chesterfield, Dad’s recliner, our chipped coffee table, and the upright piano.
“Oh, do you play?” she ran a finger across the keys. “I love musicians, simply love them.”
“A bit.” My voice skipped and it sounded like I said a beet. I coughed. “I’m in a band.”
“Will you play something? You won’t wake anyone up?”
It was 1:00 in the afternoon. Why would she think that? The engine noise was distant, but still revving, tires squealed around a corner. I sat down and played the solo from an Art Tatum tune my high school jazz band had been working on.
“Oh, you really can play. That’s jazz, right?”
“Uh-huh.” I faded off my playing.
“No, keep going. It’s like I’m in one of those clubs you see in old movies.”
She leaned forward, hovering above me, her scent filling the room. A car honked right when I played the last chord. Her hand touched my shoulder, and she played an imaginary trill with her fingertips, trailing down to my bare arm. Her fingers left my skin, and she turned back toward the bay window.
“Music makes me feel like I’m somewhere else. Does it do that to you?”
I caught a slur in her voice, and reconsidered the scent I thought was her perfume. Dad had a brandy that smelled like oranges.
“Sometimes I see myself playing at one of those clubs. But there’s nothing like that around here.”
“I went to a place like that once. It was dark with blue lights that lit up the smoke. There was a lot of smoke. Women with big mouths laughed. Do you have anything we could drink?” she asked.
It took me a second.
“Uh, there’s some Seven-Up in the fridge.”
“What about something to go with the Seven-Up?”
Heat went into my cheeks.
“Sure. I’ve got something.”
I grabbed the pop from the fridge, and reached below the sink where Dad kept his forty of rye, making a mental note to top it with water after she left. There was another honk outside. What the hell? We never have much traffic on our street. I poured the whiskey into two tumblers, grabbed some ice and spun off the pop lid. She put her hand on mine, stopping me.
“Just like that is good. I like to feel it burn, no bubbles.”
“Yeah, me too.” I handed her the glass.
She took a long drink, leaving a line of red against the tumbler.
“Should we drink these in the kitchen or go somewhere more civilized?” She looked down the hall. “Where do you sleep?”
“In the basement.”
My answer came out too fast—I wanted to take her down there, lead her into my bedroom, and then I didn’t know what. Except downstairs were my basketball trophies, and my action figures that me and Jerry still traded back and forth—right next to the box of comics for shit’s sake. I swear if that yellow dress got any tighter she’d pop right out of it. Did I still have that condom Jerry gave me? Is that what she’d want? Jesus, what if I don’t know how to put it on?
She gave a laugh that turned into a cough.
“Let’s go back to the garden. It’s too nice a day to be inside,” she said.
“Take our drinks?”
“Sure. But I need a top up if you don’t mind.” She rattled the cubes.
The horn blower leaned on it, drowning out my response. She gave a slow neck turn back toward the sound, and then to me.
“Do you know who that is?” I asked.
“Probably Archie. He’s looking for me.”
“Oh, should we, um…” I had no idea what we should do.
“It’s fine. Let’s go out the back.”
She took my hand and led me through the kitchen. Her skin was like the softest leaves. I felt the bump of something hard, not a ring, maybe a callus, though that seemed unlikely.
The back door gave a long squeak, and she looked quickly over her shoulder.
“You ok?” I asked.
Her eyes flashed—then her face softened to match her hands. She smiled.
“Of course.” She pointed to the fence. “The little gate, where does it go?”
“The alley.”
“And where does that go?”
Footsteps fell hard and fast on the driveway. I spun around to see a guy in a suit churning towards us.
“Agnes.”
Way too many things happened at once. She hurled the glass, cubes and all, at the man’s head. He ducked, and it bounced off the BBQ, shattering on the concrete pad. She dipped into her glitter purse and brought out something black. The air exploded in three pops. The suited guy shouted, his shoulder jerked and his tie flipped up. He grabbed his chest. He took one more step before face planting into the row of petunias my mom put in last week.
“Holy shit.”
“That’s that,” she said.
Part of my whirling brain wanted to find a movie camera and hear someone yell, “cut.” The other part saw the police squeal into my yard with their guns raised, shouting what cops shout.
“Hands in the air,” I said barely above a whisper.
A gust of wind blew through the big poplar at the back of the yard.
“Shit. All right. You gotta help me,” she said.
She grabbed my hand, and I really felt the calluses, there were more than one. She stuffed the gun back in her purse.
“What? I… I don’t know–”
“Snap out of it, kid. He had it coming.”
“Agnes. That’s what he called you.”
“His name for me when he was mad. Which was a lot of the time.”
“Is that your real name?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
She pulled me across the lawn to the dead body next to my mom’s flowers.
“Who are you? Why are you here?” My tongue was thick in my mouth.
“Too many questions. Ah, grab that. You got another one?”
She pointed to a spade leaning against the back of the house.
“We can’t bury him here,” I said. A burning rose in my throat and I knew I was going to toss my cookies.
She squeezed my hand too hard. I bent over, gave a heave, and upchucked on the lawn.
“Jesus.” She dropped my hand.
“Sorry.” I wiped flop sweat from my forehead.
“Get it together, kid. Someone might have heard those shots.” She pointed again, this time to my dad’s pile of topsoil that I was supposed to spread over the lawn. “We can put him in there.”
“You can’t put someone in a pile of dirt. And it would take hours to dig a grave,” I said.
“Hours?”
“It’s not like in the movies. I read that it takes eight hours for a regular person to dig a grave.”
“In a book? You some sort of brainiac?”
Her voice had changed, no longer all sing-songy. The orange smell had changed into what it really was—mixed with the glass and a half of rye she smelled like grandpa after he’d had too many.
“You have to go,” I said.
She barked a laugh.
“Go where?”
“Anywhere. You can’t be here.”
She stared at me. It was like a shade had come down. She was way older than I’d first thought.
“I’m going to call the police.”
She flipped open her purse and pulled out the gun. She didn’t point it at me, just let it hang down her side.
“You’re not going to call anyone.”
The wind went out of me. I thought of my parents coming home, finding me in the back yard, my mom crying.
“I–”
“Shut up and grab his feet.”
She shoved the gun back in her purse and swung it behind her back. She flipped the body, grunting, but she did it easily. Her biceps flexed.
“C’mon kid, move it.”
His eyes were shut, and his mouth drooped open, a bloom of blood on his chest. I was going to hurl again.
“Kid!”
She hoisted him under his pits. I took his feet and together we lifted. I didn’t notice it before, but he wasn’t a big guy, barely five and a half feet. He looked bigger when he ran toward us.
We carried him around the corner of the house. I thought he’d be cold. How long did that take? A wine-colored Buick was parked like it had slid into the driveway.
“Pretty quiet street,” she said.
“Uh-huh.”
Most people around here left for work early and didn’t show up again until supper. Other streets had stay-at-home moms, with babies and dogs to walk.
“Set him down. I’m gonna pop the trunk.”
My back twinged as we laid him on the cement. Again, I noticed her flexed muscles. My head spun and my chest was on fire—not from carrying the guy, but from the whole situation.
Our driveway angled in, so me and her and the dead guy were in the shade of the house. She peered out, taking a fast look, before coming back and fishing through his pockets. If he left blood on the driveway how the hell was I going to explain that? How the hell was I going to explain anything?
“Kid.” She was snapping her fingers.
She’d already opened the trunk. We lifted the body, carried it over, and dropped it into the large empty space. She adjusted the feet and he easily fit in the Buick’s trunk with room to spare. He looked like he was napping.
“When he starts stiffening up it will be a helluva time to get him out of there. But that’s not my problem.”
She closed the trunk softly, and pushed down until there was a click. I wanted to ask whose problem it was going to be.
“You seem like a good kid. Probably a bit horny like boys your age. I was thinking of making it with you, did you know that?”
“No.”
My face didn’t know what expression to make.
“It goes without saying that I was never here, and neither was Archie. I don’t have time to explain to you the ifs and buts and whys. I wasn’t going anywhere with him. Not while he was breathing anyway. Got it?”
“How did he know you were here?”
She fingered her glittery purse again, considering something.
“I knew your dad once. Hell, how long ago was that?”
She looked me up and down like I knew the answer.
“You look a lot like him. Not now, but from back then. He was handsome, too. Is he still?”
“Still what?”
She swatted the air like a fly was buzzing.
“Archie must have thought I’d come here. He knew your dad, too. Did you know that? Of course you wouldn’t, you’re just his kid.”
I didn’t say anything.
“Damn. I came looking for your dad, you know? I wish Archie wouldn’t have shown up,” she said.
“Me too.”
She laughed.
“Forget you saw me.” She pointed at me, and ended the gesture with a snap.
Agnes, if that was her name, got in the car. I expected her to peel out, but she just backed out of the drive slowly. I looked at the spot where dead Archie lay. There was no blood. How did that work? I thought when someone was shot they’d be bleeding all over the place.
Back by Mom’s petunias there was some redness in the dirt. The flowers were ruined already, so I grabbed the shovel and turned them over, mixing them into the ground until I couldn’t see anything but soil. That’s what Mom always called it.
“It’s not dirt, Richard, it’s soil.”I sat on the picnic table and stared out at the mound of Dad’s dirt. I felt cold. I hoped my parents would come home early for work. I had no idea what I would tell them, if anything.
#
Craig Terlson’s fiction has appeared in Mystery Tribune, Carve, Hobart, and many other literary journals. In 2021, he received his second Manitoba Book award nomination for, Manistique, the second novel in his crime fiction series featuring Luke Fischer. He has written essays on the writing craft for Write magazine, Substack, and Lit Hub. His new novel Samurai Bluegrass was released this summer, and the third book in the Luke Fischer series launches this fall.
Punk Noir Press 
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