When Tiffany’s eyes slipped back down, she saw the woman swinging Truman’s body toward the table. Truman’s friend stood and pointed his gun. The crash of a stone bowling ball boomed through the trailer. An irregular-shaped puzzle piece appeared in Truman’s forehead. A ragged handkerchief fell across Truman’s eye, skin with a section of eyebrow attached, torn loose and hanging down. Blood overspread Truman’s sagging mouth and slid down his chin. The flap of skin with his eyebrow on it flopped against his cheek. Tiffany thought of the mop-like sponges at the carwash that swabbed the windshield.
A second shot ripped a hole through Truman’s shoulder, blood misted over Tiffany’s face, and the woman barreled Truman’s corpse into Truman’s friend. The table collapsed under the weight of the three bodies. Tiffany couldn’t hear her own screaming.
Time jumped.
Tiffany found herself in the corner of the closet, a raincoat pulled up to her chin. A series of muffled, rhythmic thuds made the trailer sway back and forth on its foundation. Tiffany was cast back to a memory of the Charlottesville bistro’s kitchen all those years earlier, the chef using a mallet to pound veal. The thuds were like that, except much, much heavier. There was a pop of ripping metal and plastic, then the thuds ceased. The trailer stopped moving.
A knock shook the closet door.
“Are you okay?” It was the woman.
“Go ’way!” Tiffany howled.
“The one in the bathroom got out the window. I don’t think you have to worry about him.”
“What did you do?” Tiffany sobbed. Truman’s blood was on her and she didn’t want to die.
The woman didn’t answer right away. Not that she needed to. Tiffany had seen what she had done, or seen enough. And heard enough.
“You should rest now,” said the woman. “Just rest.”
A few seconds later Tiffany thought she heard, through the sound baffles left by the gunfire, the click of the exterior door shutting.
She huddled under the raincoat and moaned Truman’s name.
He had taught her how to smoke dope—take small sips, he said. “You’ll feel better.” What a liar. What a bastard he had been, what a monster. So why was she crying over him? She couldn’t help it. She wished she could, but she couldn’t.
8
The Avon Lady who was not an Avon Lady walked away from the trailer and back toward the meth lab. The smell of propane grew stronger with each step until the air was rancid with it. Her footprints appeared behind her, white and small and delicate, shapes that came from nowhere and seemed to be made of milkweed fluff. The hem of her borrowed shirt fluttered around her long thighs.
In front of the shed she plucked up a piece of paper caught in a bush. At the top, in big blue letters, it announced EVERYTHING IS ON SALE EVERY DAY! Below this were pictures of refrigerator units both large and small, washing machines, dishwashers, microwave ovens, vacuum cleaners, Dirt Devils, trash compactors, food processors, more. One picture showed a trim young woman in jeans smiling knowingly down upon her daughter, who was blond like Mom. The pretty tyke held a plastic baby in her arms and smiled down upon it. There were also large TVs showing men playing football, men playing baseball, men in racing cars, and grill set-ups beside which stood men with giant forks and giant tongs. Although it did not come right out and say so, the message of this advertising circular was clear: women work and nest while men grill the kill.
Evie rolled the advertising circular into a tube and began to snap the fingers of her left hand beneath the protruding end. A spark jumped at each snap. On the third one, the paper flared alight. Evie could grill, too. She held the tube up, examined the flame, and tossed it into the shed. She walked away at a brisk pace, cutting through the woods toward Route 43, known to the locals as Ball’s Hill Road.
“Busy day,” she said to the moths once more circling her. “Busy, busy day.”
When the shed blew she did not turn around, nor did she flinch when a piece of corrugated steel whickered over her head.
CHAPTER 2
1
The Dooling County sheriff’s station dozed in the morning sun. The three holding cells were empty, barred doors standing open, floors freshly washed and smelling of disinfectant. The single interview room was likewise empty, as was Lila Norcross’s office. Linny Mars, the dispatcher, had the place to herself. Behind her desk hung a poster of a snarling, buffed-out con wearing an orange jumpsuit and curling a couple of hand barbells. THEY NEVER TAKE A DAY OFF, the poster advised, AND NEITHER SHOULD YOU!
Linny made a practice of ignoring this well-meant advice. She had not worked out since a brief fling with Dancercise at the YWCA, but did take pride in her appearance. Now she was absorbed in an article in Marie Claire about the proper way to put on eyeliner. To get a stable line, one began by pressing one’s pinky against one’s cheekbone. This allowed more control and insured against any sudden twitches. The article suggested starting in the middle and working one’s way to the far corner of the eye, then going to the nose side and working one’s way in to complete the look. A thin line for daywear; a thicker, more dramatic one for that important night out with the guy you hoped would—
The phone rang. Not the regular line, but the one with the red stripe on the handset. Linny put Marie Claire down (reminding herself to stop by the Rite Aid and get some L’Oréal Opaque) and picked up the phone. She had been catching in Dispatch for five years now, and at this time of the morning it was apt to be a cat up a tree, a lost dog, a kitchen mishap, or—she hoped not—a choking incident with a toddler involved. The weapons-related shit almost always happened after the sun went down, and usually involved the Squeaky Wheel.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“The Avon Lady killed Tru!” a woman shouted. “She killed Tru and Tru’s friend! I don’t know his name, but she put his fuckin head right through the fuckin wall! If I look at that again, I’ll go blind!”
“Ma’am, all 911 calls are recorded,” Linny said, “and we do not appreciate pranks.”
“I ain’t prankin! Who’s prankin? Some random bitch just came in here, killed Tru! Tru and the other guy! There’s blood ever’where!”
Linny had been ninety percent sure that this was a prank or a crank when the slurry voice mentioned the Avon Lady; now she was eighty percent sure that it was for real. The woman was blubbering almost too hard to be understood, and her piney woods accent was as thick as a brick. If Linny hadn’t come from Mink Crossing in Kanawha County, she might have thought her caller was speaking a foreign language.
“What is your name, ma’am?”
“Tiffany Jones, but ne’mine me! They’s dead and I don’t know why she let me live, but what if she comes back?”
Linny hunched forward, studying today’s duty sheet—who was in, who was on patrol. The sheriff’s department had only nine cars, and one or two were almost always in the shop. Dooling County was the smallest county in the state, although not quite the poorest; that dubious honor went to neighboring McDowell County, splat in the middle of nowhere.
“I don’t see your number on my screen.”