Death by Sarcasm

Eight

In Studio City, among the office buildings put up in the seventies, parking garages, the occasional furniture stores and overpriced delis, sat the condominium complex for the elderly called Palm Terrace. Like its residents, the Palm Terrace had seen better days.

Mary parked the Accord in a visitor’s spot. She’d gotten the car out of storage now that the Buick was history. She went into the office where she found a woman in her fifties playing euchre on the Internet.

“Excuse me,” Mary said, after politely waiting the requisite few seconds. The office had cheap paneling and particle board furniture. It looked like a hospital waiting room. In Mexico.

The woman held up a finger. She had a heavy sweater, polyester pants and gray hair done up in a perm.

“Just one minute,” she said. She anxiously watched the monitor. Mary saw a flutter of movement on the screen and then the woman shot up from her chair.

“You f*cking idiot! Goddamn moron!” She thumped her fist down on the desk and the keyboard jumped. Mary caught a glimpse of the screen and saw the card game was over.

“Let me guess – you won,” Mary commented.

“Won? How can I win when my own partner, my own husband, makes the most boneheaded, infantile moves…”

The woman hit speed dial on her phone and punched the speakerphone button. A man’s voice answered.

“Don’t start, Rosie...” he said.

“I’m wondering if you have a moment to help me,” Mary said, trying to get to the woman before she started in on the phone. But she was too slow.

“How do your internal organs look?” Rosie shouted at the phone. “Huh? That’s what you must be looking at since YOUR HEAD IS UP YOUR ASS!” An impressively large gob of spittle shot from the woman’s mouth and hit the computer monitor. She picked up the phone and slammed it down. Mary heard a dial tone and then nothing.

The woman turned to Mary. “Sorry about that, but we were playing the Jenkinses,” the woman said. She lowered her voice. “I can’t stand Rhonda Jenkins. The woman is a total bitch. And I absolutely despise losing to her.”

“A competitive drive,” Mary said. “That’s good. So listen, my uncle was murdered,” she said. “Brent Cooper?”

The woman’s mouth snapped shut. “Oh God, I’m sorry,” the woman said.

“Don’t worry about it. I just want to see his apartment,” Mary said. “Condo. Whatever you call it.”

“I’m sorry about that yelling,” the woman’s face had turned red.

“Hey, don’t apologize,” Mary said. “You’re entitled to enjoy your Golden Years any way you want to,” Mary said.

“Tell that to the jackass upstairs,” the woman mumbled.

“My uncle’s apartment…” Mary said.

The woman shook her head. “The police said I can’t let anyone in. They’ve been in and out of there a couple times. It’s sealed shut.”

“I’m sure they didn’t mean everyone,” Mary said. “Family is certainly allowed in.”

“Um…I don’t know…”

Mary whipped out her p.i. license which she’d put into a slick little leather number that let her flash it like detectives flash their badge. There was something about flashing a badge that made people more…malleable.

“Not only am I a grieving family member,” Mary said. “I’m also working as an adjunct with the police. So you actually have to open his condo for me.” She wasn’t really sure what an adjunct was, but she knew the term was vague enough to avoid any charges of falsely impersonating a cop. But hell, Sergeant Davies did that every day and never got busted.

“Okay, okay. Nothing’s more important than family,” the woman said. An interesting comment coming from a woman who had just finished verbally abusing her husband, Mary thought.

The woman reached into her desk drawer and pulled out a set of keys. “By the way, my name is…”

“Rosie,” Mary said. “Your husband mentioned it when you two were chatting.”

“And you are…”

“Mary. Mary Cooper.” They shook hands and then Rosie led the way to the elevators. On the wall across from the office a bulletin board held flyers for classes and programs offered to the residents of Palm Terrace. Rosie noticed her looking at the board.

“People think us old folks just sit around and watch the Wheel of Fortune,” she said. “That’s bull. We write, we paint, we take classes…”

“Any anger management courses up there?” Mary said.

Rosie shot her a look but then the elevator doors opened.

“You remind me of Brent,” Rosie said.

“No need to get nasty,” Mary said.

The door was posted with an LAPD notice, but it wasn’t sealed. Mary thought it was probably because it wasn’t technically a crime scene. In any event, Rosie used her key and opened the door, then followed Mary in.

“Do you mind if I stay?” Rosie said.

Mary did actually mind, but she wasn’t about to antagonize Rosie and have her put in a call to the LAPD about a nosy niece. Besides, Mary wanted to keep an eye on Rosie until she was gone.

“Make yourself at home,” Mary said. “Throw a fondue party. I don’t mind.” Mary said, and took a look around.

There wasn’t much to see. A small, outdated kitchen. A decent sized living room with a leather couch and beige carpet. There were some posters on the walls, old handbills of comedy shows Uncle Brent had probably been involved in. She couldn’t help but a feel a little bit of pride for the old man. He may have been abrasive, but he could be pretty damn funny. It pissed her off to see the apartment, see the small amount of success her uncle had experienced. To see how he’d put it on display, and to know that someone had cut his life short. And for what?

Mary followed a short hallway that led to a bathroom and two bedrooms. And that was it. She didn’t honestly know what she expected to find. Some letters threatening his life? A diary filled with notes about a person wishing Brent harm? A damning piece of evidence that would let her wrap up this case and get back on with her life?

Yeah, that would happen right around the same time she and the Shark would become best friends and have lunches together at the Ivy.

Mary walked into the main bedroom and took a quick look around. No correspondence. No notes. A few pictures on Brent’s dresser. They were mostly black-and-white. Brent as a young man in Hollywood back in the fifties. He’d been really good looking back then, Mary had to admit. His friends all looked like young comics with tans, hip clothes and money to burn. The few women pictured were lookers, too. Mary recognized a couple of the men in the photographs. One was now a celebrity of sorts, a talk show host. The other was a semi-well-known comic who’d been the brains behind a comedy series.

“Finding anything back there?” Rosie called from the kitchen area.

“Just a bunch of sex toys,” Mary called back. “Some of them are pretty heavy duty.”

She took a peek in the bathroom. Nothing there but a newspaper in a little shelving unit that held soap and hand towels. It was open to the obituaries, of course. Old people loved to read obituaries. Sort of a sneak preview.

“How much longer do you think you’ll be?” Rosie called.

“Sorry, I’m putting some of these sex gadgets into my purse,” Mary said. “I’ll need to do some very thorough research with them. Lots and lots of testing.”

Mary walked back into the living room. “I’m just kidding. I’ve got all those things at home.”

Nothing, Mary thought. I’ve learned nothing.

“Anything else?” Rosie said, clearly anxious to be done with this.

“I guess not,” Mary said.

They left the apartment and Rosie locked the door.

“I suppose you’re going to want to talk to the ladies, too? Like the police did?”

Mary stopped. “What ladies?” She looked closely at Rosie and the woman now realized that she’d offered some information that hadn’t been requested – always a bad idea.

“Oh, nothing, never mind…”

Mary gently grabbed her arm. “Rosie,” she said. “What ladies?”

Mary read the expression on the woman’s face as realization that it was too late for a retraction. Rosie let out a long, exasperated sigh.

“Apartment 410,” she said. “Please don’t mention my name. I don’t want to get on their bad side.”

“Shut up Fran, I’ll do the talking.”

The ‘ladies’ as Rosie had called them, turned out to be three friends probably all in their fifties or sixties who shared a huge condo. The apartment was tastefully decorated, everything top-of-the-line. Much bigger, much nicer than Brent’s place.

Mary thought the women in general looked pretty good for their ages. Their personalities, however, were iffy. The self-appointed spokesperson was Helen, a tall, thin blonde with an attractive but stern face. She had a thin martini glass in her hand, filled with a red concoction. A Cosmo, Mary thought.

Fran was the nervous one. Mary could tell by the way the older woman fidgeted on the big white couch. And the way she occasionally bit her lower lip. She had dark brown hair with frosted tips that probably cost a pretty penny.

The third was the quiet one. Her name was Rachel and she took herself out of the picture quite literally, standing off to the side so Mary had to turn her head to see her. She had a worn face but a body that Mary would kill for.

“So, what, you’re his niece, you said?” the leader, Helen, said.

“That’s right,” Mary said.

“So what do you want? We told the police everything we knew.”

“And what was that? What did you know?”

“Can’t you ask the cops for all that?” Helen’s voice was deep and stern. This woman could have been an Admiral in the Navy, Mary thought.

“Oh, yeah, why didn’t I think of that?” Mary said. “They love to share everything they know about murder cases with civilians. Maybe I could bring in some bagels and they’d let me monkey around on their computers for a few hours.”

The other two women glanced at Helen, as if curious to see how she would react to someone actually standing up to her.

“You don’t have to get snippy,” Helen said.

“I’m not asking the cops,” Mary said, her voice softer but not to the point of pleading. “I’m asking you to help me. Someone murdered my uncle, and I’d like to help find out who. Is there anything you ladies can tell me?”

“Nothing,” Helen said. “At least, nothing useful. The cops pretty much told us that.”

“Well-” Fran started to say, leaning her head to side as if she were walking a tightrope, looking for her balance.

“Shut it,” Helen snapped. She glared at Fran then turned her gaze back on Mary. She took a zip of her Cosmo and watched Mary over the rim of the glass.

Rachel, who so far hadn’t said a word, walked over to the dining room table where a glass pitcher sat, nearly empty. She poured some into a glass, then came over and refilled Helen’s. Had that pitcher been full? Mary wondered.

“She’s probably with the police,” Fran whispered to Helen. She widened her eyes for emphasis. “Maybe she works in the drug department.”

“Oh, Christ!” Helen shot back. “Why don’t you just go play with your vibrator?” Helen then spoke to Mary. “Just ignore her. Look, this is a small community, everyone knows everyone at Palm Terrace. Hell, we could all probably show the cops a thing or two when it comes to surveillance. But we really don’t know anything about Brent that has to do with his murder.”

Fran got up and paced behind the couch. Mary watched her and thought, Come on, crack, Fran. Crack.

“So why did the police talk to just you three?” Mary said. She had no idea if that was true, that they hadn’t questioned anyone else at the building, but if she was wrong the ladies would correct her.

They didn’t.

Mary put the thousand-yard stare on Fran, the weak link.

Helen drained the last of her Cosmo in one long swallow. She started to speak but then Mary saw a shudder run through Fran’s body. Fran wheeled on Mary.

“It’s our fault!” she said.

Helen slammed down her glass and jumped to her feet. “Goddamn you, you stupid bitch!”

“I can’t survive in prison!” Fran shouted back. “Do you know what those big nasty guards would do? I’ve got a nice ass! They’d be all over me trying to…”

“-trying to get you to shut the f*ck up!” Helen shouted.

“Are you with the drug people? The AFT? The ATM? What are they called?” Fran asked Mary.

“No, I’m not with the police or the government. But I do like drugs. All kinds really,” Mary said. “I sniffed a bunch of glue on my way over here, actually.”

Now the quiet one spoke up. “Hah! She’s a smart-ass, just like Brent!” Rachel said.

“I’m just going to come out and say it,” Fran said.

“Here she goes…” Helen said, shrugging her shoulders and walking toward the bar with the empty pitcher.

“We illegally…” Fran started to say.

“Hit me,” Helen said to Rachel, who had the last remains of a pitcher of more Cosmos and dutifully filled Helen’s glass again.

“-filled Viagra prescriptions,” Fran finished.

Mary closed her eyes. She hadn’t really been expecting these ladies to confess to her uncle’s murder, but still. Viagra?

“Are you going to arrest us?” Fran said.

“They were for my uncle, weren’t they?” Mary said. “That’s why the police talked to you?”

“We were his f*cking harem,” Helen offered from the kitchen where she’d splashed together another pitcher of Cosmos. Apparently, now that Fran had dumped the goods out for all to see, she had thrown in the towel, too.

“Okay?” Helen said. “We all took turns. We shared him. But it started to get to be too much for him. And we were at each other’s throats because say, if Rachel f*cked Brent in the afternoon, he couldn’t get hard for me in the evening…”

“Please..” Mary started to say.

“…he’d be a goddamn limp noodle for me,” Helen said, glaring at Rachel.

“We had his cock on timeshare,” Fran said, her nervous energy rapidly changing into giddy relief.

“And his balls, too,” Rachel said, her words now slightly slurring.

“He had a nice cock,” Helen said, a wistful note in her voice.

“Nice balls, too,” Rachel said. “I loved his balls.”

“Ladies!” Mary said. “I don’t need the details. I really don’t.”

“So we had to come up with a system for Viagra,” Helen continued. “Because his prescription wasn’t enough. So we got another guy here to have his doctor prescribe it, then we reimbursed him, plus we’d give him a little something extra for his effort.”

“But you didn’t have anything to do with his murder,” Mary said.

“Not unless you count trying to f*ck him to death,” Rachel said. Both Helen and Fran giggled.

“Not unless you count sitting on his face and trying to smother him,” Rachel said, on a roll.

“Stop, okay?”

The ladies were barely able to stifle their giggles.

“No, I don’t believe any of that would hold up in court as attempted murder,” Mary said. “Did you have anything else to offer the police?”

“Just the last time we saw him, which was Rachel,” Helen said.

“Well, technically,” Rachel said. “I didn’t see him because he was behind me the whole time.” Rachel thrust her hips forward and made an ass-slapping motion with her hand.

“Why do I feel like I’m in a locker room?” Mary said.

“When we did it doggy, he used to do this trick-”

“With his thumb, right?” Fran said.

“Thank you, ladies!” Mary pulled out her card. “Call me if you think of anything not involving details of my deceased uncle’s genitalia.”

“We’re always here to help,” Helen said with a straight face. “But we’ve got nothing else to tell you.”

Mary opened the door.

“Come back anytime!” Fran called out.